Making Sense of Evaluations in Higher Education

The University of Northern Colorado, where I am privileged to work, along with countless other institutions of higher learning recently (within the last five years) transitioned from paper and pencil evaluations to web-based ones. The utilization of technology for course evaluations offers a multitude of benefits: significant reduction in the use of paper, easier to compile data and run reports, less intrusive to instructional time, and students can complete the evaluation on their time. However, there is one significant problem – students are not completing course evaluations, at least those attending the University of Northern Colorado.

The last 15 courses I have taught produced an average return rate of 19%. The highest return rate I received was 53% and the lowest was 0% (twice). I realize the importance of teaching related to an individual’s job status varies from institution to institution. However, at the University of Northern Colorado teaching is typically weighted at 60% of an employee’s contract and all professors are expected to excel in the classroom.

Assuming the trends observed at the University of Northern Colorado are indicative of return rate trends at other institutions, I await a wrongful termination lawsuit claiming a professor was dismissed for poor teaching when only 20% of the enrolled students completed evaluations. Clearly, there are a number of issues associated with such a low return rate:

•  To ensure the validity of the findings, researchers will either strive to document the views of the entire population or employ a proven sampling procedure to survey a portion of the population. The current practice at the University of Northern Colorado is failing to capture the voice of the entire population and is not employing any defensible sampling method. Instead, it is conceivable that only extreme viewpoints are represented in an evaluation (“He is the worst/best professor I have ever worked with”).
• Regardless of the professor’s overall rating, the evaluations lack validity due to low return rate. If I had a 10% return rate and all of the completed evaluations rated me as an outstanding professor I am unable to make any conclusions from this feedback. What did the other 90% think?

I could continue that list of issues associated with a low return rate, but I prefer focus on the legal questions. Can a university legally defend a position that a professor is ineffective in the classroom if that conclusion is based solely upon student evaluations and the return rate is below 50%? What if an assistant professor is denied tenure and promotion by her colleagues due a lack of evidence of solid teaching when a vast majority of the evaluations are not being completed by students? I look forward to hearing what other institutions are doing to increase evaluation return rates and I will be interested to see the outcome of this eventually unavoidable lawsuit.