"Good" is not good enough for TAs

[Emilee]

A couple of weeks ago, I received my student evaluations for the semester. I received an average rating of "good" on EVERY category that I was rated on. At this point, I felt good about my evaluations. This was my first semester teaching at this university and I thought I did pretty good given the limited resources I had to work with.

Last week, I got an email stating that I urgently needed to meet with my department. I was not on par with the rest of the other TAs, because I had scored a "little bit" under the average for all of the TAs. My total average (literally) was a half point below the average of all the TAs (and my average was within the standard deviation).

I do not know what to do at this point. I have a hundred things to do as a grad student. I not only have to teach, but I have to do research for my lab, do my own research, and be a student. Now I have to add "convincing my students to rate me as 'very good' on everything" to my list. This is stressing me out. My class is a requirement for most of the students (so not everyone wants to be there). To make matters worst, summer TAships are very competitive. Now that I have been branded as a "bad" TA, I am doubtful that I will get any summer TAships.

Has anyone experienced this before? Any advice?

[Thales]

In my experience, much of your student ratings will depend on your evaluation techniques.

Make your expectations clear, do not rely too heavily (or at all) on student-led presentations, and give every student an A (ha!). You should see a drastic improvement in your ratings.

[lewin]

Your professors need a primer on measurement error.

While their request sounds ridiculous, here are suggestions:

1. Ask one of the departmental complainers to sit in on one of your classes and critique you.

2. Be warm and enthisastic. These highly predict teaching evaluations.

3. Sit in on other TA's classes and see what they do differently.

[2017 Applicant]

Ouch, this sounds like a nightmare. If it's a required class for the university, I'm surprised that you're not being congratulated on getting "good" averages.

At the school I'm going to, they also have peer and professor evaluations of TA's. This seems like a better measurement, as professors and other grad students don't have a chip on their shoulder that they would so love to pass on to the person that has been trying to help them pass all along. I think someone else in another thread posted an article about how useless student evaluations are - I tend to agree.

[Thales]

Re: uselessness of student evaluations -- agreed.

These things tend to correlate almost perfectly with the sort of marks you award your students.

[wtncffts]

Ouch, this sounds like a nightmare. If it's a required class for the university, I'm surprised that you're not being congratulated on getting "good" averages.

At the school I'm going to, they also have peer and professor evaluations of TA's. This seems like a better measurement, as professors and other grad students don't have a chip on their shoulder that they would so love to pass on to the person that has been trying to help them pass all along. I think someone else in another thread posted an article about how useless student evaluations are - I tend to agree.

While I completely agree with the unreliable nature of student evaluations, I think peer and professor evaluations have their own problems. Obviously, the biggest problem is that, presumably, neither of these have actually experienced the conference/tutorial/section, or perhaps only a few sessions. The professor of the course will or should be familiar with how the TA prepares for the course and whatever feedback comes from students and the TA, but won't be personally familiar with the strengths and weaknesses of the TA actually doing the job.

Peer evaluations suffer from that same problem, as well as the simple fact that fellow grad colleagues will likely be much more positive than perhaps is merited: they're more likely to be friendly or collegial with each other and have a sense of community and shared perspectives that will colour their judgement. I know when I was a TA a lot of the discussion amongst us had to do with the failings and misadventures of our undergrads, and almost an attitude of 'Us', the grad TAs, and 'them', those silly undergrads, develops. I would be very reluctant to have to evaluate the job performance of fellow TAs in any kind of objective measure.

[Eigen]

Re: uselessness of student evaluations -- agreed.

These things tend to correlate almost perfectly with the sort of marks you award your students.

Do your institutions not correlate the mark received in the class with the evaluation itself? My old school did this, and it really helped identify the "I got an F so the teacher was horrible" evaluations from the "I got an A, but I think the teacher was bad" reviews. Or the converse- people that get Fs saying the teacher was still quite good from people ranking the teacher highly because they got an A.

[newms]

I haven't been a TA yet, but I read a tip elsewhere on this forum that perhaps you could pass out the evaluation forms when your 'bad' students (the ones that give you the most trouble, are usually late, don't do their work etc) are not there, and your best students are. So maybe you could do this at the very start of the class. I think there's a problem with having someone being rated as 'good' being not good enough, because 'good' tends to be the rating people assign when they are satisfied with performance.

[breakfast]

One thing I have heard other TAs do is do a sort of "midterm" informal evaluation about halfway through the semester. If you get some negative feedback or suggestions to improve, you can implement those ideas/suggestions before the official end-of-term evaluation, and hopefully turn a few of the negatives into positives.

[2017 Applicant]

True, peer reviews can be biased too. But I should have mentioned that the peers doing the evaluations at my future school are "Senior TA's." Part of their job is to train other TA's, form teaching assignments, and plan these evaluations. I get the impression they're less biased than having every graduate student sit in on a classmate's recitation, as they have a reputation and job to keep. Also, they are probably more isolated form the people being evaluated (younger grads) since they seem to be ones on their way out.

Breakfast, I've had some professors use midterm evaluations. I think they would be great for improving the class in areas that really matter. Unfortunately, I don't think they will improve final ratings. First off, the final forms are more anonymous. The teacher never reads the comment sheets directly, and even if he or she did it would be well after the class was over. Midterm evaluations go directly in the professor's hands, and so lots of kids don't have the courage to say what they would normally. I have had fellow undergrads tell me how they're going to rip a professor apart on evaluations, not even halfway through the term! Forget confronting the professor about the issue while you have time to change things. Instead, take satisfaction in (trying) putting a stain on his reputation. These are the kind of juvenile attitudes that go into student evaluations.

As for grades factoring in to the evaluation, I don't see how that could be done while retaining anonymity. My undergrad institution would have us self-report the grade we expected to receive (never realized why until now). However, the kids who are likely to tear up a proficient TA are exactly the kind who expect to receive an A for minimal effort. So no help there.

My goal is to be as outgoing of a TA as I can. I feel like my field (math) is easier not to lose favor with students, because there's very little subjectivity involved in grading or answering questions. But hearing horror stories about bitter undergrads has got me scared. I'm holding extra review sessions, making study guides, anything I can to appeal to the mercy of these kids.

[The Dudester]

I think student evals are an awful way to gauge a teacher. There are a number of studies proving that the rating of the teacher can be directly pegged to the grade the student expects.

Maybe they can be a component if they include substantive comments, but it sucks to hold it against someone who is working hard.

[far_to_go]

One thing I have heard other TAs do is do a sort of "midterm" informal evaluation about halfway through the semester. If you get some negative feedback or suggestions to improve, you can implement those ideas/suggestions before the official end-of-term evaluation, and hopefully turn a few of the negatives into positives.

Agreed. If you can make a few tweaks midway thru the semester in response to feedback from student evals, the students feel like you care. This can definitely bump up your end-of-semester evals.

I've done this myself, and it's quite simple. I distribute index cards and ask students to answer the question "What's working about this class, and why?" on one side. On the reverse, I ask them to answer the question "What's not working, and why?" It's anonymous, of course, and takes only about 5 minutes of class time, but it can be really helpful. I've even had students mention it positively on their end-of-semester formal evals.

[newms]

Agreed. If you can make a few tweaks midway thru the semester in response to feedback from student evals, the students feel like you care. This can definitely bump up your end-of-semester evals.

I've done this myself, and it's quite simple. I distribute index cards and ask students to answer the question "What's working about this class, and why?" on one side. On the reverse, I ask them to answer the question "What's not working, and why?" It's anonymous, of course, and takes only about 5 minutes of class time, but it can be really helpful. I've even had students mention it positively on their end-of-semester formal evals.

Thanks for the suggestion. This sounds like a really good idea and I think I'll try it out.