Teaching Evaluations

Students - opportunity to have their voices heard and to contribute to improved teaching and curriculum.
Instructors/Faculty/Staff - obtain feedback teaching, improve the quality of courses, curriculum.
Contact Information

Students

Calendar
Frequently Asked Questions

Calendar

	SP/SP-SU/SU 2011	FALL 2011	WINTER 2012	SP/SP-SU/SU 2012
Midterm feedback
Students fill out evaluations		Oct 7 – Oct 14	Feb 8 - 14

Final evaluations
First-half seven-week courses
Students fill out evaluations		Oct 17 - 23	Feb 16 - 22	June 14 - 20

Full-term & second-half seven-week courses
Students fill out evaluations	Aug 10-17	Dec 2 - 14	Apr 6 - 18	Aug 8 - 15

Law School courses
Students fill out evaluations	Aug 16-23	Nov 27 - Dec 12	Apr 9 - 23	Aug 10 - 16

The above dates are guidelines that most evaluations follow.

Frequently Asked Questions

Calendar

	SP/SP-SU/SU 2011	FALL 2011	WINTER 2012	SP/SP-SU/SU 2012
Midterm feedback
Departments submit orders		Sep 6 – Oct 5	Jan 4 – Feb 6
Students fill out evaluations		Oct 7 – Oct 14	Feb 8 - 14
Instructors view reports		Oct 19 (Tentative)	Feb 20 (Tentative)
Final evaluations
First-half seven-week courses
Departments submit orders		Sep 6 - Oct 3	Jan 4 - Feb 1	May 1 - 22
Instructors review and modify orders		Oct 4 - Oct 14	Feb 2 - 14	May 23 - June 12
Students fill out evaluations		Oct 17 - 23	Feb 16 - 22	June 14 - 20
Instructors and departments view reports		Jan 3, 2012 (Tentative)	Apr 25 (Tentative)	June 25 (Tentative)
Full-term & second-half seven-week courses
Departments submit orders	May 3 - July 11	Sep 6 - Oct 21	Jan 4 – Mar 5	May 1 - Jul 9
Instructors review and modify orders	Jul 12 - Aug 5	Oct 22 - Nov 23	Mar 6 – Apr 2	Jul 10 - Aug 6
Students fill out evaluations	Aug 10-17	Dec 2 - 14	Apr 6 - 18	Aug 8 - 15
Instructors and departments view reports	Aug 19	Jan 3, 2012 (Tentative)	Apr 25 (Tentative)	Aug 20 (Tentative)
Law School courses
Departments submit orders	May 3 - Jul 11	Sep 6 - Nov 23	Jan 11 – Apr 7	May 1 - Aug 6
Students fill out evaluations	Aug 16-23	Nov 27 - Dec 12	Apr 9 - 23	Aug 10 - 16
Instructors and departments view reports	Varies	Varies	Varies	Varies

The above dates are guidelines that most evaluations follow.

Teaching Evaluation Process Overview

Students, faculty and staff all have a part in making the evaluation period a success every term.

Teaching Evaluations Quick Reference Guide

Update Templates/Add Questions

When core templates need creating or modifications, instructors working with their evaluation coordinators can design their core evaluation templates by selecting the questions from our Question Catalog A maximum of 30 rating questions and 5 open-ended comment questions is the limit.

Contact ro.evaluations@umich.edu with new template and question requests, or changes. The Registrar’s Office – Evaluations staff will modify existing templates or create a new evaluation templates for you. Information to include in the email:

Subject or Academic Org code
Template number (if it's just a change) or type 'New Template'
Description of the change including a description of the text before the change and after the change would be helpful
Your contact information (email and/or phone) in case there are any questions with the request

After the new templates are setup, department evaluation coordinators will be able or order evaluations using the new templates.

Check/Manage Orders

Department staff can check their orders by using the Mpathways > Curriculum Management > Teaching Evaluation Summary page. Use the page’s download feature to create a spreadsheet with all the evaluations for the previous term or year. It is a good practice to refer to last year’s or last term’s evaluation orders when creating orders for a new term. Another good practice is to wait until after the 3^rd week of the term before ordering evaluations to minimize evaluation problems due to instructor changes in curriculum set up.

Instructors can check to see if an evaluation has been ordered from either Wolverine Access > Faculty Business > Faculty Center or from their Teaching Questionnaire page under their workspace in CTools. If an evaluation was not ordered for your class, then contact your department’s evaluation coordinator.

In most cases, if the department allows it, primary instructors can customize their evaluations by adding questions from the Wolverine Access > Faculty Center page. Not all questions are a good fit for our question catalog. The CTools 'Forums' or 'Polls' tools may be better suited handle certain questions. The information for using these tools is online under CTools > Help.

Teaching Evaluation Reports

Reporting Timeline
Report Types
Medians and Quartiles
Improving Teaching — Strategies and Resources
Requesting Evaluation Reports and Data

Reporting Timeline

Typically, students complete evaluations during the last full week of classes. The evaluations then close before the start of examinations. After the majority of final evaluations for the term close, CTools interfaces that data back to Mpathways. Report access is turned on after a brief processing period. Instructors can access the reports after the grades for the class has been submitted in Wolverine Access > Faculty Business > Faculty Center.

The Individual Response Report is deleted from the system at the end of the following term. See the report availability datasheet for details.

Report Types

There are three standard Teaching Evaluation reports:

Instructor with Comments Report - a combined summary report that includes both quantitative ratings and student comments;
Instructor Report - a summary that tabulates all quantitative ratings on a single page;
Individual Response Report - a detailed report that displays individual student ratings and comments.

Medians and Quartiles

The Instructor Report and Instructor with Comments Report provide university wide and school/college wide medians along with the medians for the class. The reported medians are calculated by finding the median from a frequency distribution.

These two summary reports also provide quartiles that allow instructors to compare their rankings with other similar courses university wide and within their schools/colleges for questions 1 through 4.

Improving Teaching — Strategies and Resources

Resources to assist you with interpreting or making use of your results:

Center for Research on Learning and Teaching (CRLT) – Faculty Consultations
Center for Research on Learning and Teaching (CRLT) – Teaching Strategies & Resources

Requesting Evaluation Reports and Data

To obtain Teaching Evaluations prior to Fall 2008 or to request department or school/college wide Teaching Evaluation data in different formats (for example, Business Objects reports, Excel spreadsheets, comma separated values (*.csv) files) contact ro.evaluations@umich.edu.

Response Rates Reports

Response Rate Reports are available at a summary level by school or college and at a detail level by department.

School/College Response Rates

Fall 2011 - Fall 2010 Rate Comparison
Winter 2011 - Winter 2010 Rate Comparison
Fall 2010 - Fall 2009 Rate Comparison
Fall 2009 - Fall 2008 Rate Comparison

Rates for Academic Year 2010-11
Rates for Academic Year 2009-10
Rates for Academic Year 2008-09

Response Rates by Department

Fall 2011 - Fall 2010 Rate Comparison
Winter 2011 - Winter 2010 Rate Comparison
Fall 2010 - Fall 2009 Rate Comparison
Fall 2009 - Fall 2008 Rate Comparison

Rates for Academic Year 2010-11
Rates for Academic Year 2009-10
Rates for Academic Year 2008-09

Due to technical difficulties with the Teaching Evaluation System, Winter 2009 response rates are not complete and therefore are not available.

Increasing Response Rates

Individual instructors are often best situated to increase the response rates for their evaluations.

Tell students directly how much you value their feedback. Let them know how you have incorporated past feedback into your courses. Assure them that all evaluations are anonymous and that instructors do not see results until after final grades are submitted.
Use the real time response rate feature on the CTools Evaluations Dashboard to keep track of your class specific response rates on a day-to-day basis during the evaluation period. Let your students know what percentage of the class has responded and that you would like to get feedback from everyone.
Add the 'Evaluate This Class' tool to your course site. This tool allows you to add a direct link to the Evaluations Dashboard, where students fill out their evaluations, from your course site. It also gives you the option to provide a personalized message to students. For more information, see the CTools Teaching Questionnaire Online Help.
Include evaluation period dates, if appropriate, in your course syllabus or class schedule for future terms. See the Teaching Evaluation Calendar for important dates.

Frequently Asked Questions

Contact Information

Office of the Registrar – Evaluations
1210 LSA Building
500 South State Street
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1382
734-647-3626
ro.evaluations@umich.edu
http://ro.umich.edu/evals