His lectures presented the same material using nearly the same words. The only difference was in his speaking style. It was no surprise that student ratings of his enthusiasm improved, the professors write in a paper on their study. But they were stunned to find that Dr. Ceci had earned much better scores in the second semester for his level of knowledge, organization, fairness, and even the quality of the textbook. Yet student performance on the tests was about the same in both courses.
Institutions use student ratings to make decisions on tenure and raises.
Copyright 1997, The Chronicle of Higher Education. Reprinted with permission The following article on student ratings is reprinted with permission from the McMaster University Newsletter, May 1997 issue. Stanley Coren, of the UBC department of psychology, presented a frightening analysis of the results of two questions on UBC's course evaluation form. These two questions dealt with whether the professor had made any demeaning racist, or sexist, remar ks in the classroom. Results from his department showed that the worse the professor was ranked as a teacher, the more likely the students were to report that he had made sexist or racist remarks.