Students are encouraged to complete end-of-semester surveys rating their performance, their instructor’s performance, and the overall quality of the course. Below, I’ve included the responses I received from students during each semester I taught English 102 at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
Spring 2021
For the Spring 2021 semester, 17 out of 32 (53.1%) of my English 102 students completed this survey.
| Strongly agree | Somewhat agree | Total | Percent | |
| My instructor was consistently prepared for class. | 16 | 1 | 17 | 100% |
| My instructor used class time productively. | 17 | 0 | 17 | 100% |
| My instructor provided timely feedback. | 13 | 2 | 15 | 88.2% |
| Conferencing with my instructor was helpful. | 15 | 1 | 16 | 94.1% |
| My instructor was highly knowledgeable about the course subject. | 17 | 0 | 17 | 100% |
| Overall, my instructor was excellent. | 17 | 0 | 17 | 100% |
Students were also given the opportunity to leave anonymous feedback as a part of the survey. The answers to the question below have been edited for spelling and punctuation.
What did your instructor do especially well in teaching this class?
“Chelsea was incredibly accommodating being entirely online. Not only did she actively prepare for the course meetings every week with enough material and work to get through the day, but she went through the textbook and broke it down into more meaningful and manageable chunks.”
“Met people where they [were] at rather than holding people to the same perfectly cut rubrics.”
“She put a lot of effort into her teaching. She tried to help each student with any problem that may have come up.”
“She did a really good job of explaining topics that were unfamiliar to myself and classmates, and would find different ways to phrase things if concepts weren’t making sense.”
“Being so flexible with everything and understanding. She understood what we all were going through during this different/difficult time and knew we had things outside of the classroom that she just overall understood.”
“I love how she made everything so personal and she made it very easy to come to her with problems.”
Fall 2020
There was very low survey participation during this semester. Out of my 48 students, only 5 (10.4%) completed the survey.
Spring 2020
End-of-semester surveys were not distributed to students because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fall 2019
For the Fall 2019 semester, 36 out of 45 (80%) of my English 102 students completed this survey.
| Strongly agree | Somewhat agree | Total | Percent | |
| My instructor was consistently prepared for class. | 26 | 7 | 33 | 91.6% |
| My instructor used class time productively. | 19 | 10 | 29 | 80.5% |
| My instructor provided timely feedback. | 14 | 12 | 26 | 72.7% |
| Conferencing with my instructor was helpful. | 16 | 12 | 28 | 77.7% |
| My instructor was highly knowledgeable about the course subject. | 20 | 14 | 34 | 94.4% |
| Overall, my instructor was excellent. | 17 | 11 | 28 | 77.7% |
Students were also given the opportunity to leave anonymous feedback as a part of the survey. The answers to the question below have been edited for spelling and punctuation.
What did your instructor do especially well in teaching this class?
“I could tell that my instructor was very knowledgeable in the subjects we were learning. I can’t remember ever leaving class feeling unsure about what we were learning, unless in regards to the style of writing we were using, which she also did well to clarify and help me with. It was very helpful because I felt comfortable enough to talk in class and ask questions, and she always knew how to help me.”
“Making an open environment, providing insightful ideas, helping me understand my ideas and thoughtfully elaborating on them, and provided an opportunity for myself to grow as a writer.”
“She was very relatable and made it really easy to go talk to her if you had any questions or issues.”
“Chelsea did very well at responding to questions or concerns when asked. Also I believe that the one on one instruction/meetings was very helpful!”
“She was very organized and easy to talk to and bring questions to.”
“Good at getting the whole class involved. Good at reviewing terminology.”
“She always made me feel so confident about my writing which was so helpful because as stated earlier, I felt that I was a horrible writer. She definitely boosted my ‘writer’s self-esteem’.”
Chelsea Embree 