Dear Colleagues,
We write to remind you that the on-line administration of Student Evaluations of Teaching (SET) for those classes ending May 2 will be available April 18 and will remain open for two weeks. Please forward this announcement and reminder to your faculty. An email announcement will also be sent to all students on Monday, reminding them that the period for on-line evaluation is open and asking them to complete the evaluations.
The on-line SET allows our students to assess our teaching effectiveness, which is one factor in tenure decisions. Moreover, the SET is one measure that enables us to celebrate success in the classroom, while also give support to those faculty who need it.
Below are a summary of best-practice strategies that have helped to increase participation in using on-line SETs from other universities as well as our own faculty who had very high response rates. Student engagement in evaluating teaching effectiveness is valuable to classroom assessment, and larger engagement and assessment is a good thing.
- Department Heads should remind faculty about how important these SETs are to understanding students' perceptions about teaching and encourage them to use some of the strategies discussed below.
- Faculty can send email reminders to their students during the SET evaluation window to let students know how important this process is to them and how they use the information to improve their teaching practices.
- Best practices indicate that faculty with high response rates provided time in class to complete the on-line SET and informed their students about which day the in-class evaluation was planned, reminding them to bring a phone, tablet, or laptop to complete these DURING class. If faculty are going to provide time in class, students can also be asked NOT to complete evaluations before the time that has been set aside in class (even though the evaluation link is available in HuskyCT).
- If class time is not going to be used to complete the on-line SET, class can be dismissed a few minutes early with a reminder that this time should be used for the completion of the SET.
- Students should be assured that their evaluations are confidential and are very helpful to faculty in planning future changes in the course.
- Faculty can emphasize the green/sustainability nature of our use of the on-line SET (saving hundreds of thousands of pieces of paper).
- Department Heads can post a message on their departmental websites reminding students to complete the SET.
Other best case strategies that work well include the following, and we indicate what we will be doing to comply:
- We will be sending multiple automatic email reminders during the SET evaluation to student Husky email accounts.
- We will be using table advertising in dining halls to remind students to complete the SET.
- We have asked USG leaders to circulate reminders about completing the SET.
At the conclusion of this semester, we will carefully examine the data and continue to determine which faculty have had the best response rates. We will then ask them to share other strategies that have worked well for them with their Department Heads and Deans and, with their consent, continue to publicly acknowledge what worked well.
Thank you again and best wishes for a successful remainder of the semester.
Thulasi Kumar
Assistant Vice Provost for Institutional Research and Effectiveness
Sally Reis
Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
For more information, contact: Cheryl Williams at (860) 486-1910