CHANGES IN RATINGS FOR STAFF WHO EVALUATED THEIR TEACHING MORE THAN ONCE

ABSTRACT

It is reasonable to ask whether staff who have their teaching evaluated improve their teaching as a result, but this question is probably an unanswerable one. In the present paper, however, we look at whether staff evaluated on more than one occasion using the same type of teaching in the same subject improve their ratings. The study is based on ratings generated from over 2000 class groups evaluated during a four year period and involving about 72000 student questionnaires. About one quarter of these class groups satisfied the selection criteria (same subject and teaching method on two separate occasions) and were included in the analysis. We find that on average there is a modest increase in both subject and teacher ratings. Further analysis reveals that the change in the relevant initial rating on average decreases with increasing initial rating. There is no clear relationship apparent between the number of semesters between successive evaluations and the magnitude of the change in ratings.