Lecture appraisal is a way to complement a professor’s teaching skills and offer students lectures of high quality by estimating the contents of lectures themselves. In most universities, as well as the UOS, lecture appraisal happens as a rite of passage at the end of semester. Because lecture appraisal in the UOS is anonymous, even though students appraise lectures before the end of semester they don’t need to worry about being faced with a disadvantage in getting their grade.
Recently among universities, there has been a trend of opening to the public the lecture appraisals. Following the Dongguk University’s opening to the public of it’s lecture appraisal results, the first in Korea, the Seoul National University, the Yonsei University, the Korea University, the Sogang University and so on are now considering opening to the public partial or entire results of lecture appraisals. Also Students Unions of major universities such as the SungKyunKwan University, the Kyunghee University, the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies and so forth are now starting to request the university to open to the public the lecture appraisal results.
A poll of around 200 UOS students showed that 146 of them agreed with opening to the public the lecture appraisal results. There are several reasons, the first is to reflect the results on to the next semester and the second is to acquire of lecture information. “It is not efficient to ask seniors or friends about lecture information such as the curriculum, homework, teaching style or examinations. If lecture appraisal results were open to the public, students could get a petter picture of the lectures more easily than before and take the class what they wanted.” said Lee Woo-seok (Dept. of Physics ‘07). If lecture appraisals opened to the public, it could help students apply for lectures next semester.
Instead of asking advice of seniors or fellows about lectures, students will be able to check the results of the lecture appraisals for last semester themselves and apply for lectures. “If university makes public the lecture appraisal results, that will make professors improve their teaching skills, then we can take higher quality classes.” said Shin Eun-ji (Dept. of Public Administration ‘07).
There can be problems in appraising relationships between students and professors, but there are some professors who teach students the same way every year or are not prepared for lectures enough. So the opening to the public of lecture appraisal results may have an effect on improving the quality of lectures. If continuous feedback is fulfilled as professors estimate students using exams and students estimate the professor’s teaching skills, students’ satisfaction of lectures will be higher than ever.
But there is something about opening to the public the lecture appraisal results that all of us should not overlook. Because estimating lectures may seem like estimating professors, an upright role of students who participate in lecture appraisal is very important. Some persons look upon students who are estimating professors themselves with critical eyes. The purpose of lecture appraisal itself is affirmative but it is important that students have to participate in this appraisal with objective and impartial eyes.
There is no doubt that the current lecture appraisal system of the UOS needs improvement in certain areas. In respect of this, Lee Sang-bum, President of the UOS, plans to make public the results of lecture appraisals step by step in reasonable manner. And furthermore ‘an age-limit system of professor’s positions’ and a ‘research mileage system’ will be introduced to strengthen competitiveness.
Student participation in previous lecture appraisals was 69.17%. Before opening lecture appraisal results to the public, the objective and positive participation of students is requested and improvement will need to be made to the lecture appraisal system itself. If this happens, opening the lecture appraisal results to the public can help the development of the UOS rather than hinder it.
Ho Hyun-ji Reporter
ghguswl88@uos.ac.kr