A guide for course evaluations
Some ideas to consider
You’ve probably gotten a deluge of emails asking you to fill out course evaluations. You’ve got a lot on your plate right now with finals and such, so here are a few questions to ponder so you can optimize your subject evaluations. You’ve gotta make sure instructors and departments hear your feedback.
Were there enough TAs and LAs for the course? Were the lines at office hours too long? Did psets take forever to be graded and returned? Let ’em know in those evals so they can allot more TAs in the future. This is your chance to help future students out and make sure the class has the resources it needs to do better!
Did the professor have bad handwriting or rely too much on poorly made slides? Make a note of it.
Did you find a certain lecture or recitation technique especially effective? Course evals won’t explode if you provide positive feedback, too, you know, so pass along the good vibes.
Are you a visual learner, and is some class’s approach to chemistry just not cutting it for you? Explain your problems in the comments section.
Did a particular TA do an extra awesome job of explaining concepts to you? Give them a shout out. It’ll make their day, I promise.
Sometimes it can be hard to remember all the feedback you might have for a course at the end of the semester. One strategy I’ve adopted is to start a Google Doc, and as soon as something noteworthy — good or bad — happens in a class, I make notes that I’ll copy-paste into my evaluations at the end of term. That way, the feedback is fresh, and it saves me time at the end of the term while still allowing me to submit useful feedback. This method can be a good cathartic tool, too, after something unfortunate happens in a class like a bad interaction with a TA or an unfair exam. Go to the Doc and write it all out. I highly recommend this strategy.