Online Teacher Evaluation by Students – Upgrading or Downgrading of the Process? Case study: West University of Timișoara
Abstract
In this article we analyse the main consequences of replacing the pen-and-paper questionnaires used for teacher evaluation by students with an online version, at West University of Timișoara. The students’ feedback is a legislative requirement, is carried out every semester starting from 2007 and, as of 2016, in our university, was transferred to an online platform. We are going to make a sociological analysis of this transformation, following two variables: the number of evaluator students and the level of the marks. Even though the online evaluation is more accessible for students, the general trend is a decrease in their involvement, with direct consequences on the validity of the feedback. Is it only a lack of interest of the digital-born students? Are other socio-cultural dimensions of the academic culture involved? What can be done to exceed the critical level of 30% participation? These are just a few questions that we will try to answer in our paper, with a rather more descriptive approach than a theoretical or conceptual one.
Keywords: students’ feedback, online, evaluation
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.24193/JRHE.2018.1.2
