The Cavalier daily :: Thursday, April 22, 1971 :: University of Virginia Library

The latest edition of the Student
Council Curriculum Evaluation,
expanded for the first time to
include the Commerce and
Engineering Schools as well as the
College, is by any standard of
measurement, the best effort to
date. The most welcome
improvement, particularly for
students, is the fact that the
booklet is available prior to
pre-registration for the first time.

The timely availability of the
booklet is reason in itself to
congratulate those students who
labored for many long hours in
order to compile and collate the
raw data. It should not be difficult
to imagine the size and complexity
of the task when you think for a
moment about the number of
courses offered and the number of
students in many of them. It is by
no means an easy task but, the
editors, particularly Jim Bradshaw
editor-in-chief and his main
assistants, Don Langevoort, Glen
Urquhart and Genn Lockhart, all
deserve an expression of thanks.

Mr. Bradshaw and company
have made some changes in the
nature of the raw data obtained for
the evaluations, especially in the
use of a computer form. The results
from this change are mixed. In the
past, the entire form which
students filled out could be
completed with any form of writing
instrument. Naturally a computer
form requires the use of pencils,
which most students apparently did
not bring to class on the days in
which the forms were filled out. As
a result, the percentage of
completed forms as compared to
the total enrollment in the class is
disturbingly low, in some cases
below the ten percent figure.

Caution!

Hence, a word of caution is in
order. These figures are noted at
the beginning of each course
evaluation and the main which
follows should be read in terms of
the size of the response. Perhaps in
the future, pencils can be provided
so that the advantages of using a
computer to provide statistical data
can be retained while also insuring
that the return is substantial
enough to guarantee a reasonable
level of reliability.

One of the best features of this
year's effort, is the consistently
high quality of the written
evaluations which follow the
statistics. These are frequently the
most helpful aspects of the course
reviews for they pinpoint specifies,
both favorable and not so favorable
and also indicate the extent of the
class opinion regarding a particular
view. In the past, it has been
extremely difficult to maintain the
level of quality present in this
edition and this certainly ranks as a
major improvement along with the
timely publication.

One feature of the Student
Council evaluation in the past has
been the overall evaluations of the
academic departments generally
written by the department editors
after consultation with their staffs,
departments majors, and faculty
members. They are useful in several
ways, most notably in aiding
students in the choice of majors,
faculty members in improving
department programs, advising
systems and the like, as well as
providing some small measure of
recognition when a department is
highly regarded by its students. In
this last respect, the English.
History and Religion departments
stand out as superior ones, with
several others not far behind.

Again, as in the past, some of
the smaller departments get slighted
when the time comes for the
department-wide evaluations. It is
these evaluations which are the
ones written in the wee hours of
the morning when the mental
processes have begun to retire and
all that remains is the ability to
sling a little B.S. when the situation
calls for it.

Brief Introductions

In addition to the departmental
evaluations, there are introductory
essays on the three schools whose
courses make up the booklet.
Unfortunately, these essays tend to
be superficial. The College one, for
example, totals only five paragraphs
and offers little in the way of
suggested improvements and then
when there are suggestions made
they do not receive the
explanations and justifications that
seem appropriate. Time pressures
are again a factor here and maybe a
series of articles in this paper on the
respective schools by the three
editors would be a better
mechanism. In any event, the
expertise which the editors develop
as a result of their work on all the
courses offered by their schools
should not be allowed to go to
waste.

The first year seminar program
is evaluated for the first time this
year, certainly a welcome addition.
However, because of the nebulous
character of the seminar titles in
many cases, it would appear to be
necessary to provide some further
indication of the content of the
course. The evaluations which
appear in the booklet are limited to
short summaries of the response to
the instructor. Also, while mention
is made of thy fact that a different
form was used by the committee
for the seminars, one is not given
any further indication of the nature
of that form.

Rank With Best

Since its inception three years
ago, the Student Council evaluation
has come a long way to a point now
where it ranks with the best in the
country, particularly in light of the
lack of support which it has
received from some individuals. The
College faculty has, as a body
supported the efforts of the
Student Council in this area,
including the use of the data in the
determination of promotion
questions for faculty. Dean
Cauthen's support has been
unwavering. Then again, there are
those departments and faculty
members who rather than
attempting to improve the booklet,
have chosen to attempt to discredit
it as an indicator of student opinion
and have then ignored it with
respect to promotions.

It almost goes without saying
that the evaluation is not always
perfectly reliable. But, it certainly
is a better indicator of student
opinion than informal reliance on
conversations with a few students,
as some departments have admitted
doing in the past.

The biggest headache which the
editor-in-chief faces along with the
Student Council is the financing of
the booklet. While funds have been
sought from several sources in past
years, the entire burden has always
fallen on the Council and it's
already hard pressed funds. With
the high printing costs (this year's
booklet cost over $2700 for three
thousand copies), the burden is
hardly slight. Consequently it is
necessary to have one hundred
percent sales merely in order to
break even.

Free Distribution?

Ideally, the booklet could be
financed jointly with Council funds
taken from the Student Activities
money and money available to the
schools whose courses are reviewed.
Maybe then the evaluation could be
distributed free along with the
other course information. In many
cases, the information in the
evaluation is as important or more
so than the times at which the
courses meet, particularly if you do
not intend to attend the class
sessions.

Excellent Evaluation

The editors have done a
commendable job. The evaluation is
an extremely useful tool for
students planning their fall
schedules, faculty members revising
their courses, departments and
deans making promotion decisions,
and departments in revising their
offerings. Hopefully the evaluation
will finally begin to be used at a
point approximating its true
potential. This will only occur
though, if all these groups provide
criticism and comments on the
review and also financial support.
The evaluation is without question
well worth the one dollar price,
even in the hard pressed days after a
big weekend, and can be purchased
in Newcomb Hall, Mincers, the
Castle and Glass Hat, as well as the
Student Council offices.