Student Evaluation of Teaching

Excerpted from Administrative Policy: Evaluation of Teaching: Twin Cities, Crookston, Morris, Rochester.

Evaluation of teaching provides information to help improve teaching. One method used is the student ratings of teaching.

General Provisions for Evaluation of Teaching

- 1. All instructors will have their teaching performance evaluated.
  2. The results must be shared with the instructor being reviewed.
  3. The academic unit must maintain a record of the instructor's contributions to teaching, including cumulative summaries of student ratings of the instructor’s courses. Units must protect the materials as private data.

Student Rating of Teaching Form and Requirements

- 1. Every course with a University course number will be rated by the use of student rating forms every time it is offered.
  2. The standard student rating form will be used.
  3. All students present when the evaluation is conducted, or all students enrolled in online courses, must be provided the student rating form. Completed forms will be submitted anonymously. Students, regardless of the rating protocol or method used, have the option to:
    1. - opt-out of responding to one or more questions on the form; or
      - opt-out of completing the entire student rating form.
  4. Instructors may not be present when the evaluations are completed and collected. Instructors may only see the completed forms after their grades have been turned in.
  5. Students who have withdrawn from the course may not participate in the rating of that course.
  6. Student rating results will be available to instructors online. For online-administered SRTs, instructor reports will include open-ended comments. For paper-administered SRTs, only the multiple-choice item results are reported online. Comments will be available through the return of the original, completed paper forms to the instructor with any student demographic information removed.

FAQ: Can instructors administer additional evaluation items?

Instructors are encouraged to conduct early- and mid-semester course assessments for the purpose of receiving feedback about student learning during the term. Instructors may ask students to answer supplemental questions in the open-ended section of the standard rating form, on a separate sheet, or online. See Early Term Feedback on Teaching for more information about early- and mid-semester course assessments.