Evaluate your teaching

Questionnaires are a way of gathering feedback from students or colleagues about many aspects of your teaching and papers, which can also feed into your Otago Teaching Profile. The Evaluation service offers advice, support and information on all aspects of the University of Otago's evaluation process, including collating results and reporting.

Ready to get started?

You can order evaluation questionnaires online by logging into Otago inFORM with your University username and password. Once you are happy with the design of your questionnaire, proceed to checkout and submit it. Once submitted you will no longer be able to alter the questionnaire. You will be sent a confirmation email with the request details for your records.

If you are unable to access Otago inFORM, contact the Evaluation Service.

The evaluation process

If your request only includes questions from the in-house Otago inFORM catalogues you will receive an instant email reply which contains a link to a preview of the questionnaire that you have ordered. If, however, you have included custom questions, the Evaluation service will review them before you receive this automated email (this can take up to 5 business days during busy times). Check the questionnaire link for accuracy and let us know if errors need fixed prior to it being emailed to participants.

After the questionnaire has closed, the Evaluation service will release a data summary on Otago inFORM. We will also email you an official University report summarising the responses (this can take up to 2-3 weeks during busy times). Please advise us if you have a particular deadline for your results.

Question types

You can select up to 30 questions from Otago inFORM's question categories (e.g., Content & workload, Teaching). You can combine questions from multiple categories into the one questionnaire (see Forms and resources for a copy of the inbuilt question catalogue). The following question types exist for you to use:

• Paper core - focus on the overall value of the learning experience and teaching within a paper.
• Teacher core - focus on the quality of different aspects of teaching. If you are on confirmation path or applying for promotion you will need to run the core teacher question set for all your main teaching responsibilities over a 3-year period.
• Coordinator/ Team leader - query your colleagues on your role as their leader/ coordinator (these questions are not for students).
• Workshop - focus on the effectiveness of single workshops (as opposed to entire papers).
• Additional - cover many aspects of course improvement and teaching quality.
• Agreed templates (e.g., BCOM standard, Animal ethics) - these question sets have been agreed within specific University faculties but are available for anyone to use.

Other evaluation types

Different situations call for different techniques. For example, to evaluate small groups, you might want to combine data from multiple questionnaires or use peer review or interactive group sessions.

Important note

Avoid running multiple questionnaires at the same time with the same students. This can cause confusion for students who may think that they have been sent an invite email twice and ignore one. It can also cause confusion about the purpose of each evaluation.

Need help?

If you would like assistance dealing with broader aspects of your teaching/course, please feel free to contact HEDC reception (479) 8492, or contact an academic staff member directly.