Northern Kentucky University students will soon begin to evaluate all of their classes on the Web.
Beginning in the 2009 spring semester NKU’s entire student body will complete online evaluations instead of filling out paper evaluations.
As already tested in the fall semester of 2008 with the communication department students and having received more positive feedback than negative, the faculty senate has decided to go campus wide with online evaluations.
Comments made by the students in the online evaluations will help professors determine if he/she needs to change the course to fit the students’ needs.
‘I don’t think students always realize how much their comments are an impact,’ mathematics Professor Phil McCartney said.
Depending on the outcome of the online evaluations for each professor, the instructor’s salary could increase, he/she may receive a promotion, or he/she could be granted a tenure. Vice Provost Patrick Moynahan mentioned that the participation in the evaluations is a key component as the students impact the professors future.
McCartney added, ‘We’d like to have the participation increase (of online evaluations.)’
Through these online evaluations, students are provided with confidentiality as the comments are typed rather than hand-written. Students remain anonymous due to a unique identifying system created for each evaluation.
Online evaluations will allow students to exit the application and revisit multiple times to complete the evaluation. The professors will have the ability to determine the percentage of students that have completed the evaluation. Paper evaluations never allowed that factor to be revealed due to not every student being in class the day of evaluations.
In addition of benefiting the students, the online evaluations will contribute to the ‘green’ project by eliminating paper. In previous years, up to 20 feet of paper was being used in the evaluation process.
Moreover, the faculty will see results after the deadline for submission of grades to provide an opportunity for the professor to change and improve the course for the following semester.
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