{"id":692,"date":"2011-08-26T08:18:14","date_gmt":"2011-08-26T15:18:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.glencora.org\/?p=692"},"modified":"2012-01-28T00:11:07","modified_gmt":"2012-01-28T00:11:07","slug":"grade-inflation-and-teaching-evaluations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/2011\/08\/26\/grade-inflation-and-teaching-evaluations\/","title":{"rendered":"Grade inflation and teaching evaluations"},"content":{"rendered":"

I recently got my teaching evaluations back for a graduate course on approximation algorithms that I taught in the spring quarter. \u00a0They were significantly better reviews than I’ve received in my previous courses (which were okay – slightly above the College average). \u00a0I chalked it up to it being the first course I taught for which all the students in the room were taking it as an elective. \u00a0They wanted to be there. \u00a0If they didn’t like the course or me as a teacher, they probably wouldn’t be there. \u00a0The grades in the class were also higher than I’ve ever given before – all A’s and B’s. \u00a0I abhor grade inflation, but this might be thought of as grade inflation. \u00a0For an elective graduate course though? \u00a0I truly believe the performance should be almost uniformly high. \u00a0But perhaps the high evaluations were because of this higher-than-normal grade average?<\/p>\n

In my last go at the undergrad algorithms course, the course evaluations were filled out the week after the second midterm, on which the students did not do very well at all. \u00a0(Yes, I probably made the midterm too difficult.) \u00a0My teaching evaluations? \u00a0Super low. \u00a0I do see how one could game the system …<\/p>\n

Starting this fall, OSU is moving to electronic teaching evaluations. \u00a0If a student does not fill in an evaluation, they will get their grade several weeks late. If they want their grade as soon as humanly possible, they will first have to fill out an evaluation. \u00a0I predict that the number of filled evaluations will go up and I also predict that evaluation scores will drop. \u00a0I further predict that “bad” lecturers will see a bigger drop than “good” lectures. \u00a0Why? \u00a0Currently, evaluations are filled out in class. \u00a0So, to fill out an evaluation a student must be present on a given day. \u00a0“Bad” lecturers likely have lower attendance rates and students who do not like the course\/lecturer are more likely to not attend lectures. \u00a0I’ll try to remember to report back …<\/p>\n

\"From<\/a>
\nCreated by: Masters Degree<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I recently got my teaching evaluations back for a graduate course on approximation algorithms that I taught in the spring quarter. \u00a0They were significantly better reviews than I’ve received in my previous courses (which were okay – slightly above the College average). \u00a0I chalked it up to it being the first course I taught for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3747,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[106159,1000],"class_list":["post-692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-evaluations","tag-teaching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3747"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=692"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":882,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692\/revisions\/882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/glencora\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}