Please see the message below from Associate Provost for Curriculum Markus Dubischar and Millie Barry, Academic Project Coordinator:
Dear Faculty Colleagues,
Student evaluations of teaching are one of several means by which teaching is assessed at the College, providing input to faculty members to develop and revise their courses. As you are aware, 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 fall 2025 lecture, laboratory, and seminar courses with an enrollment of five (5) or greater, through the web-based evaluation tool Anthology Course Evaluations.
Due to Thanksgiving break falling in the second to last week of classes, the standard open evaluation period for fall 2025 will take place from Wednesday, November 19 through Friday, December 5 in order to ensure 10 instructional days are available for the administration of evaluations. Those who wish to delay the administration of evaluations until later in the semester should utilize a custom survey availability window, as outlined below.
Please consider setting 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. Anthology Course Evaluations is a web-based platform, so 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. Administering the online course evaluations completely outside, or at the end, of class are generally considered less effective practices.
The online evaluation feature of custom survey availability windows debuted in fall 2024 for Lafayette Course Evaluations. As a reminder, in order to utilize this feature, custom survey availability windows must be set prior to the open evaluation period beginning on Wednesday, November 19. Without a pre-set custom survey availability window, course survey availability will default to the entirety of the standard open evaluation period. Once surveys become available to students for completion, faculty members can no longer adjust survey availability. More information and detailed instructions on how to set custom survey availability windows can be found on the Lafayette Course Evaluations website.
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 Office. In lieu of sending an email, faculty should complete this Google Form no later than Wednesday, November 12 so that the course evaluation team is notified in sufficient time.
If you have questions about course evaluations, visit courseevals.lafayette.edu for more information. If you cannot find the answer there, please feel free to contact us at courseevals@lafayette.edu.
All the best,
Millie Barry‘10
Academic Project Coordinator
Markus Dubischar
Associate Provost for Curriculum