How can I make the student feedback process successful?
You as the instructor will decide when and how (within the student feedback window for the term) the students in your class(es) will complete the Student Feedback on Teaching. Your students may complete the Student Feedback survey on their own from any computer, phone, or tablet, or you may choose to set aside class time for the students to complete the Student Feedback survey (if your class does not meet in a computer lab, you could invite students to bring their laptops, phones, or tablets for this option). Please see the Best Practices document for these and other suggestions.
When will the online student feedback surveys be available for students to complete?
Student feedback surveys will be open to students during the last two weeks (not including the final exam period) of each fall and spring semester. Academic Affairs will insurvey students/faculty of the student feedback period for winter and summer terms.
How will students access the student feedback surveys for their courses?
When the student feedback survey is available for students to complete, they will receive an email from the Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys system that will contain a table with their courses and links to the student feedback survey for each of the courses. They will also receive prompts when they log in to Canvas, and reminder emails will be sent during the open window.
Which courses that I teach will participate in online student feedback process?
To protect the anonymity of the students, only courses with enrollments of 7 or more will participate in the online student feedback on teaching (MOA #98, II. D.). Some non-traditional courses (e.g. Student Teaching, Department 099 Seminars) do not require participation in the online Student Feedback on Teaching process. For non-traditional courses (such as those denominated Lecture/Studio, Clinical, Internship, Practicum, Field Based Course, Nursing Clinical, Professional Practice Practicum, and Advising Seminar) for which the majority of the questions may be irrelevant or not applicable, instructors are not required to, but have the option of, administering the student feedback survey (MOA #98, II. C.). Instructors should provide instructions on whether a non-traditional course should be evaluated.
What does it look like for students when they complete the feedback survey?
The following video produced by Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys shows the student survey view for a hypothetical course. Note: to access the video, you’ll need to be logged into Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys before clicking on the link.
How can I learn more about using Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys?
Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys has an extensive list of articles and videos in the Help Center, which you can access from within Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys by clicking on the question mark in the upper right corner of the opening page of Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys and then clicking on the “Help Center” that appears.
How do I access Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys?
There are three ways you can access the results of student feedback. In all cases, you will login with your TCNJ username and password.
1. TCNJ Today Website (tcnj.edu)
Visit the Student Feedback in the banner at the top of the page (where you can also access Google Apps, Canvas, PAWS, etc.).
2. Via Canvas
Log into Canvas.
Select the course for which you wish to view the results of student feedback.
Click on “Instructor Course Evaluations” on the left side menu; you will be taken directly to Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys without needing to login to Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys.
3. Email from Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys
When the results of student feedback are available for you to review, you will receive an email from the Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys system that will contain a link to log into Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys.
You can learn more by accessing this video or this pdf tutorial.
What do I do if I can’t see my course on the Watermark home page?
The home page for Watermark has a limit on the number of courses it will display. To view your entire list of courses, go to the Results menu at the top of the page and select Project Results.
How do I add my own questions to the student feedback survey?
Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys allows you to add your own questions to the set of questions students complete for all courses. Per MOA #120, the results of custom questions are not accessible to anyone but the instructor; unlike the survey that is common to all courses, chairs and deans will not be able to access the results of custom questions.
The use of custom questions in Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys is a two-step process. First, instructors create a custom question survey consisting of one or more questions, and then they attach that survey to a course. Instructors can create custom questions and surveys at any time, but can only attach surveys to courses the week before the period during which students complete the surveys (see this table for these dates). Once an instructor creates a survey, it is saved in the instructor’s account and can be used in subsequent semesters.
You can learn more about creating custom questions by reviewing the following, which are specific to TCNJ:
Video on adding custom questions
PDF tutorial on adding custom questions
In addition, you can review the following general resources produced by Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys on creating custom questions. Note: to access the article and video, you’ll need to be logged into Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys before clicking on the link.
Video: Custom Questions for Administrators & Instructors (Please note that the custom questions widget mentioned in this video is not currently functional in Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys at TCNJ)
Article: Instructor: Survey Builder – Types of Survey Questions
How can I track the response rates for my courses?
The following article produced by Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys explains how to track the response rates for your courses. Note: to access the video from the link below, you’ll need to be logged into Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys before clicking on the link.
Article: Response Rate Tracker
Note: In Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys, a “Project” is the student feedback for a specific term (e.g., Fall Undergraduate, Spring Graduate, Summer 2).
How can I view the results of student feedback for my courses?
When the student feedback results are available for you to view, you will receive an email from the Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys system that will contain a table with your courses and links to the student feedback survey for each of the courses. You can also access Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys through Canvas or through TCNJ Today (see above) at any time so that you can review the results for past courses evaluated via Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys.
You can review the results of student feedback in Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys through:
1. Standard reports that include the results for:
-
- the standard survey questions asked of all students.
- any optional custom questions you added to the survey.
- the mean of means for course and instructor questions from the standard survey.
Video: downloading the standard report
PDF tutorial: downloading standard reports and creating
2. Custom reports that you create.
These reports allow you to explore feedback in greater detail than is presented in the standard report. For example, you can compare results for the same course across semesters or you can examine the open-ended comment of students who indicate low interest in the course material.
Video: creating a custom report to compare a course across semesters
Video: creating a custom report to examine subsets of students
PDF tutorial: downloading standard reports and creating custom reports
The following article and video produced by Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys, which demonstrate how to access the results of student feedback on courses you’ve taught. Note: to access the article and video, you’ll need to be logged into Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys before clicking on the link.
Article: Project Results – Instructors
Video: Instructor Results for Instructors
Note: In Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys, a “Project” is the student feedback for a specific term (e.g., Fall Undergraduate, Spring Graduate, Summer 2).
What about cross-listed courses?
Survey responses from students in cross-listed courses are aggregated and results are not displayed for the individual courses. One of the courses is denoted the “parent” course, and the other cross-listed courses are denoted “children” courses. Results for all of the cross-listed course are displayed as the results for the parent course; results are not displayed for the children courses (they are combined with the results from the parent course to produce the parent course results). If the combined enrollment of the cross-listed courses is at least 7, then students in each of the cross-listed courses will be able to complete the survey, even if the enrollment in their cross-listed course is less than 7.
If you see only one of the cross-listed courses in your list of courses, that is the parent course. You can ensure that all the cross-listed courses were included by looking at the response rate in the standard report. The denominator in the fraction used to generate the response rate should equal the total number of students in all of the cross-listed courses.
How can I share my student feedback with reappointment and promotions committee members?
As noted in MOA # 98, faculty are allowed to share their student feedback results with relevant reappointment and promotions committee members. Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys differs from PAWS in that you will not grant access to the results of student feedback to reappointment and promotions committee members but you will instead upload to Faculty Process pdf files of the standard report (see above) of student feedback that you have downloaded from Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys. (If you need to share student feedback collected through PAWS, please see this tutorial.)
To share results, including any custom questions (if applicable):
1. Login into the “Student Feedback” application available in the today.tcnj.edu application ribbon.
2. Create and download a standard report (choose Detailed Report + Comments), which will produce a pdf file of the report.
3. Rename the pdf file
The file name should follow the form StudentEvaluationsCourseAbbreviationandNumber_YearSemester.pdf. For example, student feedback for FSP 161 taught in Fall 2020 would renamed to “StudentEvaluationsFSP161_2020Fall.pdf”.
4. Upload the renamed pdf file to your packet in Faculty Process.
To share results, without including your custom questions:
Per MOA #120, faculty members are not required to share the results of custom questions with anyone. If you did add such questions to the survey but do not want to share the results with reappointment and promotions committee members:
1. Login into the “Student Feedback” application available in the today.tcnj.edu application ribbon.
2. Create and download a standard report (choose Detailed Report + Comments), which will produce a pdf file of the report.
3. Redact the results for custom questions by removing the results or covering them with an opaque box.
To redact the results yourself:
Use pdf-editing software (e.g., Adobe Acrobat Pro or Preview on a Mac)
or
Convert the pdf file to a Word document (e.g., via Adobe Cloud), remove the custom questions in Word, and then convert the Word document back to a pdf (e.g., via Adobe Cloud).
If you are unable to redact the results yourself:
If you do not have access to software to redact the questions, or have difficulty doing so, you may send the pdf file(s) to studentfeedbabck@tcnj.edu at least one week before you need to upload them, and Academic Affairs will redact the results of custom questions and return to you a pdf file with the redacted results.
4. Rename the pdf file
The file name should follow the form StudentEvaluationsCourseAbbreviationandNumber_YearSemester.pdf. For example, student feedback for FSP 161 taught in Fall 2020 would renamed to “StudentEvaluationsFSP161_2020Fall.pdf”.
5. Upload the renamed pdf file to your packet in Faculty Process.
How can I get help with Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys?
Once you’ve logged into Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys, there are a number of articles and videos that provide help with most aspects of the platform. Just click on the question mark in the upper right corner of the page. Go to “Help Center” when it appears below the question mark.
You can also send an email to studentfeedback@tcnj.edu with your questions, comments, or suggestions.
Additional Resources