Issues In Student Rating Of Teaching And Improvement Strategies

Teacher evaluation is an important aspect of educational administration and critical measure to improve education quality and teacher development. As a major method of teacher evaluation, student rating of teaching has been adopted by more and more schools. It is the representation of the school managers respect for the right of the students and the wish of communication between teachers and students and should be able to positively influence the development of both students and teachers. However, in reality, teachers are usually skeptical and even afraid of the misused or abused student rating. Thus evaluation could hardly enhance their development. In the meantime, students are considered merely a means of evaluation, regardless of their emotion and requirement in this process. In brief, nowadays student rating of teaching has not been fully utilized as a method to improve teacher-student interaction and mutual development. Therefore, it is significant to study how student rating of teaching can positively improve teacher development.First chapter of the thesis defines the research topic, scope, and main concepts and discusses the reason and background of studying student rating of teaching (SRT). Though SRT has become a popular method of teacher evaluation, its necessity and importance is still under argument. Besides, the operation of SRT has caused a series of problems that bring confusion and worries to teachers. All these indicate that this research topic is theoretically and practically significant. In order to conduct a solid research, a literature review is conducted to understand current trends and topics, which will be discussed separately in following chapters.The second chapter describes the study of SRT in several high schools in Kunshan using survey and interviews. The report consists of five parts, SRT's general condition; its major principles and purposes; its necessity, objective condition, and significance; its influences; its outcomes and remaining problems. This chapter provides field evidence to my qualitative study. Literature, survey, and interviews are combined together to greatly improve the quality of the study.The third chapter analyzes the main problems and reasons of SRT. They are categorized into four topics: the instrumentalizing tendency of SRT's purposes; immaturity of students; marginal condition of teachers; and unscientific evaluation questionnaire and procedures. The reasons are discussed in the macro level of national educational condition, educational administration principles, school administration organism, and in the micro level of evaluation methods and strategies.Chapter 4 proposes strategies to improve SRT. In order to entirely realize the value ofSRT and raise this value, it is first important to construct a developmental SRT. In regards to utilizing SRT to describe and measure education objectively and eventually improve student and teacher development, strategies are proposed in the fields of regulation construction, evaluation questionnaire design, evaluation result analysis and application, the roles of teachers and students in SRT, and integration of multiple SRT methods.Chapter 5 concludes the thesis. School administrators could only make SRT an impulse of educational administration and teacher development when they overcome utilitarianism, realize the meaning of "evaluation is development", and consider teacher development as the foundation and core of SRT. Strategies for teachers to satisfy student's needs are also proposed. It is specially emphasized that teachers should actively mingle daily educational life with SRT in order to create an equal and harmonious teacher-student relationship and improve the mutual development of teachers and students.