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6 Best Practices for Writing Good Course Evaluation Questions

Written by Explorance. May 7, 2013

Recently, we examined at the types of tactics you might want to consider undertaking in order to decrease the likelihood of respondents failing to complete their course evaluations. Among the factors that we examined in detail included taking measures to enhance accessibility, ensuring relatively short completion time, and having ‘Skip Navigation’ enabled to avoid having to enter your personal information numerous times and at numerous points.

While it’s great to be able to design course evaluation forms that are easy to complete, what good is it if you don’t get the information you need? With that in mind, here are 6 tips to ensuring that your course evaluation forms fit your specific purposes.

6 tips to writing course evaluation forms that get the answers you are looking for

Make sure your students are evaluating your classes on relevant points of interest:
The whole idea of this process is to determine what areas of improvement are needed and require focus. One way to ensure that you are evaluating all points of interest on different criterion is to consider having distinct evaluations that cover different topics. This way you can avoid rater fatigue. Another option is to clearly state the assigned purpose at the top of the teacher assessment.
Create questions that are clear and make sense:
One thing to consider is that very often ineffective course evaluations arise due to the fact that questions are not focused in purpose. So consider avoiding double-barreled questions that inadvertently ask you to evaluate on two criteria. For example, asking if the professor was both insightful and available during designated office hours in one single question would not be effective phrasing. Asking for separate ratings questions on the professor’s ability to make the materials understandable and being available for office hours ensures that each question is answered adequately and without any resulting ambiguity.
Avoid leading questions.
Any hint of bias is bound to either confuse the actual question or skew results. For instance, a course evaluation question that asks “The University of X is considering making alcohol available in the main student building. Given the impact on student behavior, what do you think of this proposal?” assumes that there will be an impact. A better way to approach this would be to first ask their opinion on this proposal, and follow up with questions on whether this proposal would impact behavior, and another question as to how.
Provide room for closed and open-ended questions:
The chief advantage of this approach is that it allows for an answer to a specific question, along with a follow-up question that allows for detailed feedback. As we have mentioned before, leaving room for comments allows one to pick up insights that your institution would not otherwise gather. Having an understanding of the inherent reason behind the answers enables administrators to solidify feedback or data that would allow them to address the root cause of the problem.
Give specific direction when asking for open-ended feedback:
Very often students are in such a hurry to finish the evaluations that they race through the multiple choice or fill in the blank portions, only to find themselves stuck in the comments section. Now while this practice is certainly not encouraged, this is a reality that must be dealt with. In order to combat this, giving specific instructions for open-ended feedback is always encouraged so as to guide students towards the specific type of feedback that you are looking for, at least in terms of orientation.
Use appropriate scales as units of measure:
Beware of imposing a structure that does not fit what you are examining or asking. Use previously collected data as availability permits to guide you towards compiling a scale that is as comprehensive as possible, but leave space for the student to indicate another option that may have been overlooked.