The Authority of the Student Evaluation Questionnaire

The student evaluation questionnaire is a method of student feedback compatible with assumptions about effective organisational control contained recent higher educational policy texts and guidelines issued by statutory agencies. It is also coherent with the criteria for, and is conducive to the means of, external scrutiny of institutional management procedures. One of the many objectives set for the student evaluation questionnaire is to facilitate the lecturer's professional development in teaching. This article argues that the assumptions that underpin the student evaluation questionnaire and the claims made for it within developmental research on this method of student feedback require substantial critical analysis. With reference to the views of two lecturers, the article concludes that the contemporary use of the student evaluation questionnaire as a means of summative and comparative appraisal has several negative implications for lecturers' understandings of teaching and their professional self-development as teachers.