The purpose of this paper is to examine evaluations of teaching from viewpoints of lecturers and students to reveal perceived differences in teaching performance.
A survey is administered to lecturers and students in a large‐scale university in Taiwan. Valid samples include ten lecturers and 250 students. Upon obtaining consensuses from lecturers, 25 students in each course are randomly selected to fill out questionnaires. Lecturers are requested to fill out questionnaires designed for instructors only. Factor, cluster, and multivariate analyses of variance are applied in analyzing the survey data. Five dimensions of evaluations of teaching are extracted from students' viewpoints, including content of materials, learning condition, interaction, attitudes, and responsiveness. These five factors are used in the clustering procedure to segment courses into superior‐ and inferior‐quality.
Results indicate surveyed students in the clusters of superior‐ and inferior‐quality courses have statistical differences in seriousness of evaluations of teaching performance and how they believe the suggestions will be taken into consideration in modifications of teaching styles. However, lecturers of superior‐ and inferior‐quality courses are not statistically different in their viewpoints in how they value evaluations of teaching performance.
Survey data in this paper are obtained from a single university. Students are able to distinguish courses of different quality in various dimensions, but lecturers seem to believe that they have done well in teaching and will not know differences in teaching performance perceived by students as of superior‐or inferior‐quality.
For efficient utilization of student evaluations of teaching in educational institutions, gaps in perceived differences in teaching performance from lecturers and students need to be identified and filled.
End‐of‐term student evaluations of teaching are used in educational institutions for assessing how well instructors do in helping students to learn theoretical and practical aspects of knowledge. Findings in this paper can be used to form a baseline for educational institutions to improve applicability of student evaluations of teaching.
