Re: Uncl: course/instructor evaluations

["Richard W. Tarara" <rtarara@saintmarys.edu>]

-----Original Message-----
From: Van E. Neie <ven@physics.purdue.edu>

> Sure, we know we need multiple approaches to course evaluation, but let's
> not discount the importance of student evaluations in a least one aspect of
> these evaluations.


In other words, how good of an entertainer is the instructor?  :-)

Let's face facts, this is exactly what is often being evaluated, AND it is
probably an important part of our effectiveness is the classroom.  I believe
that this is becoming MORE prevalent and MORE important as time
progresses--students of the TV/Multimedia age don't have the patience,
attention spans, interest for more serious and scholarly approaches.   Such
is the world we must deal with.  My objection to student evaluations rests
mostly on the fact that most students don't take them seriously.  We
recently changed from a fill in the numbers form to one where students had
to write _all_ their comments.  We were instructed to allow extra time
because such forms require more to fill out.  Students still finished the
forms in 3-5 minutes and we've learned nothing more or new from these forms
(IMO).

Rick