Faculty Focus

HIGHER ED TEACHING STRATEGIES FROM MAGNA PUBLICATIONS

student evaluations of instructors

Two Ways to Make Student Feedback More Valuable

Unless they have a real problem with how the course was run, most students fill out end-of-course evaluations so quickly there’s often very little valuable information in them. Here are two ways that Wayne Hall, psychology professor at San Jacinto College in Texas, elicits helpful feedback on his courses:

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Retirement Reflections: Things I Will and Won’t Miss After 33 Years of Teaching

I am just about to retire from Penn State and leave my faculty position teaching undergraduates. I’ll still be working; there’s this newsletter to edit and a world of faculty who still need advice, ideas, and encouragement to do their very best in the classroom. But you don’t end 33 years of college teaching without thinking about those things that will and won’t be missed on campus.

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Student Evaluations of Instructors: A Good Thing?

These student evaluations are so much a part of our system and have become so routine for our students and faculty that I have seldom questioned their value or necessity. But are they really (as Martha Stewart might say) “a good thing?” […]

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