5 Ways in Which Instructors Can Use Course Evaluations to Their Benefit

Course evaluations are an extremely powerful tool for helping to improve the quality of teaching and learning at academic institutions.  Administrators can monitor the feedback on teachers to see if they are measuring up to student expectations and also identify areas for professional improvement. However, what about the particular benefits from your point of view as an instructor? Using online course assessments provide you with a multitude of benefits, five of which will be highlighted here.

1. Personalized questions:

   One of the major benefits of using an online course evaluation system is that you have total control over the questions that are asked. You can add your own tailored queries and also select from a bank of standard university-wide questions. This gives you more flexibility and allows you to customize the assessment to reflect your course and curriculum, focusing on criteria that you wish to evaluate.

2. Quick access to results:

   Powerful online course evaluation systems allow you to quickly obtain detailed reports regarding student expectations and perceptions. This is critical as it enables you to respond rapidly to correct any issues that may exist. This builds trust with students as it shows that you truly want to make the course as enriching an experience as possible.

3. Gather better quality data:

   Conducting online evaluations not only affords greater levels of privacy for students, but also allows them the convenience of responding at their leisure. This allows for insightful feedback as students have more time to reflect on their experiences.

4. Get more detailed reports:

   Using an automated, integrated system like our own Blue/Evaluations allows you to do more thorough analysis and get reports that you can easily use. Moreover, a comprehensive, integrated system such as Blue enables you to track results over time and combine feedback from across multiple courses to get a well-rounded view of your strengths and weaknesses. You can also access archived assessments in order to further view progress over time.

5. Administer multiple evaluations:

   You don’t have to wait until the end of the term to gather student feedback. Using an automated system allows you to easily schedule assessments throughout the term and make adjustments along the way. At any point in time you can evaluate how your students feel about your curriculum or teaching style, which enables you make quick adjustments to the benefit of your students.

How do you like to structure your course evaluations? What areas do you like to focus on?  What benefits have you encountered as an instructor? Let us know!