Preliminary Evidence On The Relation Between Mid-Semester Instructor Feedback And Students Perceptions Of Class And Instructor Variables

Abstract

Student evaluations of teachers (SETs) are commonly used in many universities as a measure of instructor performance. However, there is controversy regarding the validity of SETs. Research has identified and studied many variables that might affect students ratings of teachers and their perceptions of the class environment, and the results are mixed regarding the relation among and effects of the variables. Obtaining mid-semester instructor feedback might affect how students perceive the instructor, especially if a particular concern is consistently identified and the instructor responds to the concern. Additionally, student performance might increase. Thus, mid-semester instructor feedback is one variable that might have a significant impact on SETs but it has gone unstudied. This paper contains the results of a study designed to determine the impact of mid-semester instructor feedback on student evaluations of the instructor and various variables of the class environment. The results indicate that students in classes that used the feedback (IF) did not perform better than students in classes that did not use the feedback (NIF); however, students gave higher ratings to the instructor and certain class variables in the IF courses than in the NIF courses.