Spring 2023 Course Evaluations

Dear Faculty Colleagues,

Student evaluations of teaching are one of several means by which teaching is assessed at the College, and they provide input to faculty members to develop and revise their courses. Faculty members are encouraged to consider their evaluations in judging the effectiveness of their teaching. (see Faculty Handbook Section 4.2.1.1) 

The standard College evaluation form will be administered to students in all spring 2023 lecture, laboratory, and seminar courses with an enrollment of 5 or greater, through the web-based evaluation tool Anthology Course Evaluations (formerly known as CoursEval). Evaluations will be open from Monday, April 24th through Friday, May 5th. 

Below are a several reminders regarding the administration of surveys:

• Please be sure to set aside time to administer course evaluations at the beginning of a class session during the open evaluation period to obtain better response rates and a more representative class sample. 
• As Anthology Course Evaluations is a web-based platform, please inform your students about when you are planning to administer evaluations in class and remind them to bring a web-enabled device with them. 
• Should your students complete their evaluation of your course earlier than desired, you can inform your students that they may review and edit their completed survey responses any time during the open evaluation period.
• Administering the online course evaluations completely outside of class time or at the end of class are generally less effective practices.
• For additional information, please visit the Lafayette Course Evals webpage on procedures and recommended practices. 

Per Section 4.2.1.1.2.1 in the Faculty Handbook, faculty members who wish to refrain from using the standard College evaluation form must communicate their reason in writing to the Provost’s Office at provostoffice@lafayette.edu . Please do so by Monday, April 3rd so that the course evaluation administration team is notified in sufficient time.

Please also consider administering anonymous mid-course evaluations if you have not already and consulting the CITLS resource on this topic.

If you have questions about course evaluations, visit courseevals.lafayette.edu. If you cannot find the answer there, please feel free to contact us at courseevals@lafayette.edu.

All the best, 

John Meier
Provost

Millie Smith
Academic Project Coordinator