Faculty Course Evaluations Policy

The following written policies are currently in place and pertain to the faculty course evaluation process.  The Faculty Files Office in the Office of the Provost is responsible for implementing the provisions of these policies.  The specific protocol for implementing these policies is the responsibility of the Provost/VCAA based on consultation with the Personnel Policies Committee. 

Faculty Personnel Policy - Article 9, Professional Responsibilities, Section 3N

Arranging for student evaluations of all classroom teaching for each term is a regular part of the responsibilities of full-time faculty members.  The form utilized may be the Campus accepted form or an alternative form approved by the Department or Program, the appropriate Dean, and the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, completed by students anonymously and unavailable to the faculty member until grades for a given semester have been transmitted to the Registrar.  Where an alternative is used, the Provost’s Office shall summarize the results and forward the summary to the Personnel File where it shall be retained permanently.

Faculty Personnel Policy - Article 9, Professional Responsibilities, Section 3O

In addition to using the required standard evaluations, some faculty, departments, and programs develop and have students administer supplemental evaluations of courses and teaching.  Since supplemental evaluations are formative in nature, faculty may choose how they are administered and documented.  If faculty elect to develop and use a supplemental evaluation form they may use the standard course evaluation distribution and/or collection process.  The supplemental evaluation packets may be deposited along with the standard course evaluation in the course evaluation drop boxes.  After final grades for the semester are submitted to the Registrar, the Provost's Office will return the evaluations to the faculty member.

Procedures

There are five different types of classes for which course evaluations are administered in a given semester - first-half, second-half, team taught, irregular and full-term.   The Faculty Files Office in the Office of the Provost is responsible for overseeing the evaluation process for all courses each semester, as well as compiling the data for alternative course evaluations, except for Library faculty (see Library process below).

Blended Courses, Irregular Term, First-Half, Second-Half & Full-Term Course Evaluations

The Faculty Files Office sends an email announcement approximately five weeks prior to the last day of class to instructors teaching onground and blended courses requesting they notify that office if they prefer to have their course(s) for that term evaluated through the online process. 

Onground Course Evaluation Process

Faculty who intend to have their course evaluations completed in the classroom will receive an email announcement approximately three weeks prior to the last day of class that course evaluation packets are ready for pick up.  All course evaluation packets should be personally picked up by the faculty member.  If a faculty member is unable to pick up their packet personally, they should provide the name of the person who is to pick up the packet to the Faculty Files Office. 

Adjunct faculty packets may be picked up by the Program/Department Chair or Secretary.  Faculty members should check packets for accuracy of the enrollment count on the day of distribution.  Extra evaluation forms should be removed from the packet by the instructor and returned to the Faculty Files Office.

Instructions for administering course evaluations in the classroom are included with each evaluation packet.  Faculty are asked to identify a student to be responsible for administering, collecting and depositing the completed evaluation packet in one of the course evaluation drop boxes, which are located throughout classroom buildings and identified on the instruction sheet.  Faculty are required to leave the classroom while students complete their evaluations.

The Faculty Files Office is responsible for collecting the completed evaluation packets from the drop boxes and for entering the data into the course evaluation database.  This data is not available to faculty until grades for a given semester have been transmitted to the Registrar. 

Once all data entry has been completed, the Faculty Files Office generates a summary report for each faculty member’s permanent personnel file for each course taught during a given semester.  An email notification is then sent to the faculty notifying them that their evaluation summaries are available online and the course evaluation forms, which include handwritten student comments, are then returned to the faculty member.  Current and historical evaluation summaries can be accessed through the following url:  https://uisapp-s.uis.edu/evaluation/.  Through this site faculty are able to access their individual, department and college summaries and can also access campus-wide summaries.  Student handwritten comments are included in the database, but can only be seen in the individual faculty view (secure access) and are not included in the summary entered into the personnel file. 

Online Course Evaluation Process

Faculty teaching online courses are required to use the online course evaluation system. Approximately three weeks prior to the last day of class faculty receive an email announcement from the Faculty Files Office notifying them that the online evaluation system is available for students to begin completing their evaluations.  This notification includes the submission deadline date.  It is the faculty member’s responsibility to provide their students with the instructions regarding access to and completion of the evaluations. 

Data is unavailable to the faculty until grades for a given semester have been transmitted to the Registrar.  Once all data entry has been completed, the Faculty Files Office generates a summary report for each faculty member’s permanent personnel file for each course taught during a given semester.  An email notification is then sent to the faculty notifying them that their evaluation summaries are available online. Current and historical evaluation summaries can be accessed through the following url:  https://uisapp-s.uis.edu/evaluation/.  Through this site faculty are able to access their individual and cumulative, department, and college summaries and can also access campus-wide summaries.  Student comments are included in the database, but can only be seen in the individual faculty view (secure access) and are not included in the summary entered into the personnel file. 

Team Taught Courses

The process for team taught courses is identical to that for other courses, except that each instructor will be evaluated individually.

Alternative Course Evaluations

Faculty may seek approval to use an evaluation instrument other than the campus approved form by completing the Request for the Use of Alternative Evaluation Form (See Attached).  This document must be approved by the Department or Program, the appropriate Dean, and the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs. 

Faculty are asked to identify a student to be responsible for administering, collecting and depositing the completed alternative course evaluation packet in one of the course evaluation drop boxes, which are located throughout classroom buildings.  The alternative course evaluation administration process is expected to be identical to that used for the standard course evaluations.  Faculty are required to leave the classroom while students complete their evaluations.

Data is unavailable to the faculty until grades for a given semester have been transmitted to the Registrar.  The Provost’s Office shall summarize the results and forward the summary to the Personnel File where it shall be retained permanently.  The completed raw data is then returned to the faculty member.

Supplemental Evaluations

In addition to using the required standard evaluations, some faculty, departments, and programs develop and have students administer supplemental evaluations of courses and teaching.  Faculty may choose how supplemental course evaluations are administered and documented.  If faculty elect to develop and use a supplemental evaluation form they may use the standard course evaluation distribution and/or collection process.  The supplemental evaluation packets may be deposited along with the standard course evaluation packet, labeled with the faculty member’s name and course prefix/number/section, in the course evaluation drop boxes.  After final grades for the semester are submitted to the Registrar, the Provost's Office will return the evaluations to the faculty member.

Library Evaluations

The following written policies are currently in place and pertain to the faculty course evaluation process for library faculty.  The Library Dean’s office is responsible for summarizing the results of these evaluations and forwarding the summary to the Personnel File where it shall be retained permanently.

Faculty Personnel Policy – Appendix 11, Library Faculty Tenure Guidelines, TEACHING, Section 2

Workshops/Bibliographic Instruction - Library faculty teach course-centered modules of various types at the request of instructors.  The librarians have developed a standardized formal evaluation process to document workshops.  The Library Dean’s office administers this teaching evaluation in a manner similar to that employed for other teaching evaluations.

Faculty Personnel Policy – Appendix 11, Library Faculty Tenure Guidelines, TEACHING, Section 3

Credit-Bearing Courses - Faculty teach (in rotation) UNI 401, Library Research Methods, and occasionally participate in team-teaching or solo teaching of other disciplinary courses such as WMS 402.  The standard course evaluation process is employed.  Teaching credit courses is usually in addition to the official contractual workload for Library faculty.