Instructor-Initiated Student Feedback

The Instructor-Initiated Student Feedback service is similar to end-of-quarter evaluations offered by departments, but there are some crucial differences. This service offers:

A way to gather confidential information about your teaching. Your results will not be released to your department or anyone else without your permission.
A way to ask questions that will be most useful to you. You can choose a standard set, select from the CETL’s list of items, or develop your own questions.

This service is free to all UCD instructors (faculty members and teaching assistants).

Confidentiality: Information from student feedback is the property of the faculty member (or TA). The CETL will not release any feedback information to a department without written consent. If a TA initiates the feedback, he or she may choose whether or not to have the information communicated to the instructor.

Important note: You can also use this service to ask your students to provide the instructor with evidence of other students’ participation in group project work. A peer-evaluation can be completed on Scantron forms and processed at the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning.

Why would I use this service?

You may want to use this service if:

you want to evaluate a new technique, a new textbook, or a new class in a way that isn’t possible with your departmental evaluations;
you want to ask questions that may help improve your teaching but may not be appropriate for a review committee or for personnel action; or
your department does not provide you with end-of-quarter student evaluations.

How do I use this service?

Request this service at least two weeks before you would like the forms processed. For example, if you plan to use this service to get student feedback about participation in their group work in week 5, remember that you must request this service by week 3 or earlier.
Come in to the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning to pick up forms (or use campus mail).
Have an assistant administer the survey and return the forms to the CETL.
A summary of the scaled questions and all the original forms will be returned to you early the following quarter.

Student feedback forms

Forms: You can choose from a number of standard question forms or create your own custom form.

General
- Short (15 items)
- Long (27 items)
Specific to type of course
Other

Recommendations for item selection:

Select items tailored to the type of class (e.g., lecture, lab, studio, etc).
Strive for a comprehensive evaluation of the course.
Include questions that pertain to specific aspects of the course that are of special interest (e.g., evaluations of the web site, guest lecturer, a set of slides, a new lecture topic, etc.).
If the items in the catalog do not address a topic of interest, write your own items or ask the CETL to do so.
Include questions that ask for written comments.
Include fewer than 20 items.

To request any of the above forms (including a custom form), please contact Barbara Mills at bjmills@ucdavis.edu or at 752-7995.

Strategies for course improvement

The most efficient strategy for improving your course is to meet with a CETL teaching consultant to go over the results. CETL teaching consultants have extensive experience with student evaluations and with helping instructors improve their teaching.

However, should an instructor choose to do it alone, CETL suggests the following steps:

Examine items with particularly high and low ratings in order to gain a proper perspective on students’ perceptions of strengths and weaknesses.
From the lowest scoring items, focus especially on those that address areas in which the instructor wants to improve.
Plan a specific course of action to improve teaching in each of those areas. (Note: In planning improvement strategies, it is often helpful for instructors to draw on their identified strengths.)

Role of the CETL

The CETL will, upon request:

assist instructors in developing student evaluation surveys;
review the course evaluation with the instructor; and
suggest strategies for course improvement.