Opposing Views

Do the Best Professors Get the Worst Ratings? 

This Psychology Today article is by the co-author of a study finding that less seasoned instructors who "teach to the test" do better on student evaluations than more seasoned instructors who "instilled the deepest learning in their students."

Everyone Hates Course Evaluations 

Read about something that most professors love to hate: course evaluations.

Needs Improvement 

Student evaluations of professors aren’t just biased and absurd—they don’t even work. This slate article discusses the reasons why student evaluations are misleading, ending with a suggestion that if we must have them, they not be anonymous.

Student Course Evaluations Get An 'F' 

Recently, a number of faculty members have been publishing research showing that the comment-card approach may not be the best way to measure the central function of higher education.

Student Evaluations Are Worthless 

This is an unpublished blog post, but it does include a list of dozens of articles -- many of them peer reviewed -- on the subject.

Student evaluations of teaching are an inadequate assessment tool for evaluating faculty performance

2017 journal article challenging the validity of student evals.

Student Evaluations Offer Bad Data That Leads to the Wrong Answer 

NYT article arguing that student evals are unrelated to what they purport to measure: student learning

Zero Correlation Between Evaluations and Learning 

New study adds to evidence that student reviews of professors have limited validity. This website details the results of two meta-analyses finding that 1) student evaluations are not linked to student learning, and 2) student evals are actually harmful since they are biased against women and minority instructors.