Course evaluation packages will soon be sent to your professors and instructors, who have been asked to bring them to class between November 10 and 21, 2014. Student representatives will be called upon to distribute one questionnaire to each student in each class, collect them when they are completed, and deliver them to the EngSoc office. Your Course Critiques Directors (coursecritiques@engsoc.uwaterloo.ca) will work with student volunteers to prepare the packages for computerized scanning and processing. It’s a process that has been repeated every semester for over 40 years. And yes, it’s quite a big undertaking, but it’s one we believe is well worth it.
On the day after grades are due, a package is mailed to each course instructor with a summary of the numerical data plus the original completed questionnaires so that they can read the comments you’ve written on the back. Instructors rely on your input to help improve their teaching. Department chairs use summaries of course evaluation results to inform tenure and promotion decisions. And the Associate Dean, Teaching uses course evaluation results to inform course improvement efforts. Results are also posted online (see links at https://uwaterloo.ca/engineering/teaching-learning/course-evaluations) so that you and future students may review the results.
A new feature has been added to the Engineering Teaching web site. A teaching award nomination form is now available for students who want to support the nomination of an excellent instructor for a teaching award. Visit http://uwaterloo.ca/engineering/teaching-award-nomination to access the form (login required).
Your thoughtful and candid responses to course evaluation survey questions have a big impact. Instructors rely on your feedback to help improve their teaching. The faculty and departments use your feedback to make tenure and promotion decisions. And your feedback helps the Associate Dean, Teaching to gauge how effectively our teaching supports our students.
Thank you for your time, your feedback, and, most importantly, for your continued support of this longstanding and valued process.
Sincerely,
Bjorn Dawson, Course Critiques Director
Devansh Malik, Course Critiques Director
Gordon Stubley, Associate Dean, Teaching
Leave a Reply