Student evaluation comments spring 2022

Students have submitted 1072 evaluations of their instructors, courses, and course materials. The responses were primarily from the national and CTEC campuses. There are four open answer questions on the evaluation form.

• Changes Needed: Please write down specific suggestions you would like to make for this instructor.
• Changes Needed: Please write down specific suggestions you would like to make for this course.
• Changes Needed: Please write down specific suggestions you would like to make for the course materials in this course.
• Other Comments:  If you have any other comments you would like to share about your course, distance learning, your instructors, or your experiences at COM-FSM, please write freely here. Your answers will be read and kept strictly confidential.

Many students choose to leave the open answer comments blank, or write in "none", "N/A", or "No comment." 

Instructor comments 

After removing the blank responses and those who wrote "none" or some variation of "no comments" there were 362 comments made by students.

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Three-quarters (270) of the remaining comments had a comment along the lines that the instructor was good. Only 92 evaluations of 1072 total submitted evaluations had specific comments on recommended areas of potential improvement. There were very few broader themes in these comments.

Lead among the few broader themes was that of timeliness. Students wanted to see more timely responses from faculty to messages and submitted assignments. Included also in this area were comments requesting that faculty be more timely in their arrival to class, and to message students if they are going to be late. 

Another repeated request was for better directions. The comments gave the impression that this applied more especially to online courses. Some commenters asked that the instructor not simply repeat the original directions, or point the student back to the original directions. Those were the directions that the student did not understand in the first place. What may seem clear in the mind of the faculty member may not be as clear for the student. 

A third area of student concern appeared to also involve the online sections and requested being given more time to complete assignments. This area also included requests to faculty to not put up a large number of online assignments in one day, for example, on a Saturday with due dates early in the upcoming week. Students are often not online on the weekend and wind up with insufficient time to complete the assignments. 

In the category other were, for the most part, one off requests from students. There were a couple requests for faculty to be more cognizant of transportation challenges and not lock the door to deny access to late arriving students. 

These three broad areas do not apply to all faculty - these comments represent a very small portion of the evaluations submitted. These areas may provide food for thought.

Course comments

After the removal of 269 comments of "none", there were 278 comments made on the course by students. 

Sixty percent of the comments were that the course was good, or great, or even perfect. The remaining forty percent fell into a number of different categories. The "More" category was a grab bag of everything except "more time." Students wanted more activities, more assignments (to help improve grades), more field experiences, more projects, more group work, more hands-on experience. 

Under "More time" students wanted more time to complete assignments and more flexibility. Students who work during the week need more time than an assignment made on Monday and due on Friday: they need the weekend as that is the one time they have the time to get college assignments done. 

As seen in the earlier sections where students wanted better directions from their instructor, here students wanted better explanations of the course subject matter, alternative explanations.

Twenty-three students felt their online course would benefit from moving to residential instruction. Six students felt their residential course would be better if delivered online. 

Tech issues included a comment on the slowness of Cengage and its need for fast Internet, confusion over how grading works in Schoology, a recommendation that a course move to Canvas, and a request for software to be updated. There was no one unifying theme in this category.

Other was a diverse grab bag of comments some related to the course, some more related to the instructor. Students expressed a desire to see more equity, building of community, personal connections, support for struggling students, more engaging discussions, and more motivating. Students want timely feedback,short and clear video lectures, and alternative instructors for a given course. These recommendations should not be seen as evidence of a lack of these things, on the contrary, that these are primarily one off comments suggests that these are not pervasive issues. 

Course materials

After the removal of 338 comments of "none" there were 237 comments made on course materials by students.

Three-quarters of the students again felt that the materials were good, appropriate, and relevant. MindTap was specifically singled out for praise by five students. There were very few recommendations for improvement. 

Seven students expressed the opinion that the text for the course was not relevant to the course, including a comment that the text did not provide support for the material that was on the quizzes and tests. 

Five students wanted to see either the text or the materials used in the course updated. Another five wanted to see the textbook made more affordable, with one noting that they no longer eligible for financial aid so textbook costs are out of pocket costs for them.

Eight students wanted to see more or better, more appropriate materials or technologies used in their course. 

The other category was again a collection of one off comments that frequently were directed more at the course or instructor than at the course materials. Comments included requests for more examples, a request to not put the syllabus only in Cengage, a request for the textbook to be online, a request for an online textbook to be available as a hard copy, a request that state campuses obtain textbooks more quickly, and a request for more buses so more field trips can be supported. 

The larger picture is that 73% of the students who chose to comment made a comment to the effect that the materials associated with the course were good, appropriate, sufficient, relevant, and should continue to be used. 

Other comments

Of the surveys submitted with comments in this field, 207 surveys had variations on "no comment" or "none". 

Again, the most common response among the remaining 337 comments was that the course was good, or the instructor was good. These included the course was fun, the instructor was interesting. There were a significant number of responses that were originally lumped into the "good" category where the course or instructor was good because the student learned a lot. Comments of the type, "This course was good because I learned a lot" were sufficiently common that they are broken out into their own category.

The second most common response category was an area not seen in the previous sections - the giving of thanks to the instructor. 64 of the responses thanked the instructor, or, some instances, the college. A small number of these included an apology for not having done better in the course. 

There was again a close split in comments advocating a return to residential instruction and those advocating moving more courses online. The take home message is not that students prefer one mode of delivery over the other, but rather the importance of getting students into their own preferred mode of delivery. 

Other was a very diverse collection of one off comments including a request to not have assignments due on holidays such as during spring break, more timely updating of the online gradebook, a request to use Canvas in online courses, a concern that students living on campus do not feel safe at all times, a comment that living in the residence hall is fun, a request for improved WiFi, and more real world examples of how the material is useful beyond college. One student requested both more tech training for students and more areas on campus dedicated to studying for the students. There were also requests for more time, more timely feedback, and more chances to improve a low grade.

While this report has tended to focus on comments in areas where improvements might be made, one should not lose sight of the bigger picture. Positive comments dominate the open answer responses on the survey, in all four areas. As humans we all tend to focus on the one negative comment rather than the 270 positive comments. This would be a mistake. With over a thousand comments submitted the overall takeaway is that the college is blessed with excellence in instruction, fantastic and caring faculty members, and well designed learning experiences.