In the present age, let the students evaluate their teachers has been widely used in the education sector. The students can judge their teachers whether are good or not. Even when the students are not satisfied with their teachers, they can vote to change the teachers. But, whether the students should evaluate their teachers has sparked spirited debate. Some people assert that students should evaluate their teachers, while many others argue that students should not do that. Then this easy will discuss both opinions in this debate.

People who think the students should evaluate their teachers argue that asking the students to evaluate their teachers can benefit for both the teachers and students, there are several benefits for the teachers. Firstly, the evaluation can contribute to helping them improve themselves in their teaching. Through the students’ evaluation, the teachers can recognize the weakness and strength in their working. Research indicates that students are the most qualified sources to report on the extent to which the learning experience was productive, information, satisfying or worthwhile (Theall and Franklin, 2001). Therefore, the evaluation from the students plays an critical role in improving the teachers’ effectiveness. Moreover, the students rating of particular teachers and subjects can be used by other students to select courses and teachers, and can increase the chance that excellence in teaching will be identified and rewarded (Aleamoni, 1981). Sometimes, the exceptionally good instructors are overlooked. Because there are some teachers who do not toot their own horn by asking students to pay attention to their teaching style, but they do their work hardly and do it well. Their efforts can be mostly seen by their students. Hence, the evaluation of students can help us recognise the good teachers and reward them. In the meantime, there are many advantages for students to evaluate their teachers. First of all, it can promote the students’ ability of judging a person objectively. Since, when they evaluate their teachers, they will think carefully and comprehensively. It can cultivate the right attitude when they are rating a person. Furthermore, if the students are encouraged to express their opinion on their teachers, they will be more thoughtful and confident. We can assume that if the students are not allowed to rate their teachers and just receive correct notions which are from the teachers. It is difficult for them to find their own way of thinking. Additionally, let the students evaluate their teachers, the students will become more respectful to their teachers. Through the communication between teachers and students, there will be less misunderstandings. Besides, students will certainly feel valued by the teachers when they find their suggestions are adopted. As a consequence, the students will think that their teachers are easy-going just like friends of them , on this occasion, the teachers will get much favour from students and the students would like to participate in the classes. Consequently, there is no doubt that the students should evaluate their teachers.

Even so, some others disagree that the students should evaluate their teachers. There are three main reasons for them. First and foremost, the students are immaturity to evaluate their teachers. Not only they are lack of knowledge in theory and practice on a course, also they may judge the teachers by using their subjectively view. Then, it may cause unfair result for teachers. For instance, there are some students who are not work hard and get low grade in their exams, there students will blame the teachers for their failure. So, the students will catch the opportunity of evaluating and give some drawbacks to their teachers. It may lead to unreliable estimation of teachers. Secondly, students’ evaluation is more likely to measure the teachers’ popularity rather than their ability. Some people claim that if the teachers are evaluated by the students, some teachers may attempt to please the students by lowering the requirements of study or making their classes easier. Then, the quality of education will worse off, the evaluation becomes meaningless. Last but not least, there are many variables that may affect the students rating. For example, the personality traits of instructors can have influence on the student rating. Research has shown that if personality traits affect students rating, it may be caused more by what instructors do in their teaching than who they are as a person.(Erdle, Murray and Rushton, 1985). Therefore, if students do not like the teachers’ personality trait, it may result in the bad evaluation of the teachers. But, the personality cannot stand for the teachers’ ability. The evaluation may mislead people and underestimate the teachers’ abilities. Meanwhile, the years of teaching experience, age and rank of the teachers have some effects on students’ evaluation. Feldman (1983) pointed out that the experienced teachers can usually received higher rating than those first-year instructors, and teaching assistants receive lower rating than professors.(Brandenburg, Slinde and Batista, 1977; Centra and Creech,1976). The students’ evaluation is not professional enough. So the students should not evaluate their teachers.

The teachers play significant role in modern world. They can have life-long effects on their students. Speaking for myself, I think the students should evaluate the teachers. Just as the reasons stated above, there are many advantages for students and teachers. The teachers can improve themselves. Also it increases the opportunity of finding good and potential teachers. Evaluating teachers is as imperative as the study. It can help the students learn how to evaluate a person. It can make the students become more thoughtful, confident and realize their value for the class. However, for the main purpose of evaluation is not to put pressure on the teachers, but to improve the education quality and let both the teachers and students can enjoy the teaching and learning process, respectively. And in order to better evaluate the teachers, we should combine the students’ rating with the information collected from different sources such as teaching portfolio, peer receiver, classroom-observations or self-evaluation (Ory,2001). What is more, if the students evaluate teachers by using student rating forms, the forms should be organized, reasonable and standardized.

References:

Braskamp, L. A., Brandenburg, D. C., and Ory, J. C.(2001) Evaluating Teaching Effectiveness: A Practical Guide. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage, pp.110-153.

Doely, T.(2008) Evaluating Teacher Effectiveness -- Research Summary. http://www.ferris.edu/fctl/Teaching_and_Learning_Tips/Research%20on%20Students'%20Evalution%20of%20Faculty%20Teaching/EvalTeachEffec.htm [2010,15 Dec.]

Eccles, C.(2008) High school students should evaluate their teachers. http://www.comportone.com/connie/articles/teachers.htm [2010,15 Dec.]

Simmons,T.L.(1997).
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