Introduction
Online Course and Instructor Ratings
The Evaluation System is designed specifically for conducting formative and summative (end of term) evaluations of your course sites. However, it can also be used for more general surveys. An evaluation consists of a series of scaled (i.e. rating) questions, multiple choice with single answer questions, multiple choice with multiple answer questions, and/or free text questions, which are delivered to site members over a fixed time period (typically a few days).
The Evaluation System runs under Sakai version 2.2 or higher.
It allows colleges, departments, and instructors to manage their own body of questions which are part of a combined end of term evaluation. This allows colleges and departments within a larger institution to collect targeted information from their students, while preserving a consistent set of questions used through the institution.
Evaluation results can easily be reviewed within a single course, across colleges or departments, or across the entire university. Results can be reviewed for a single evaluation covering a short time period, or can be displayed for a series of evaluations conducted across a larger time period.
The evaluation system contacts students to notify them of upcoming evaluations automatically, and to remind students to complete an ongoing evaluation. The notification scheme is intended to increase the response rate.
The Evaluation System tool is primarily designed to allow an institution to measure/evaluate/rate courses. Ease of access for evaluation participants and protection of data (results) are also primary concerns. Use of the tool by instructors and non-institutional groups is a secondary design concern but is being factored into the current round of development.
More information about the work being done is available at Evaluation Status. Check out the System Development Info and Links below as well.
More Information
Project Team
| Name |
Institution |
Role |
Details |
 Aaron Zeckoski |
CARET, Cambridge, UK |
Project Lead/Developer |
Design/Tool/Logic/DB/Integration |
 Richard Ellis |
University of Michigan |
Developer |
Email/Scheduling/Logic |
| Gonzalo Silverio |
University of Michigan |
Designer |
Tool/HTML/CSS |
| Lisa Emery |
University of Michigan |
UM lead/Tester |
Design/Testing |
| Sean Michael DeMonner |
University of Michigan |
UM Project Manager |
Project Management / Testing |
| Rick Moyer |
University of Maryland, College Park |
Developer |
Testing Externals |
| Ellen Yu Borkowski |
University of Maryland, College Park |
UMD lead/Tester |
Design/Testing |
Kapil Ahuja |
Edtech, Virginia Tech |
Developer |
Tool/Eval Settings |
Will Humphries |
Edtech, Virginia Tech |
Developer |
Tool/Reporting |
Rui Feng |
Edtech, Virginia Tech |
Developer |
Tool/Template |
Shaun Fleming |
University of Maryland, College Park |
Developer |
AJAX |
Note: Name = No longer on the project or inactive
System Development Info and Links
History
The VT Online Rating System (VTORS) was developed from code received from Columbia University
in mid 2004. The system was previewed in early 2005. The system was piloted in Fall 2005. The system is currently being redesigned and rebuilt as a Sakai tool. This work was started at Virginia Tech.
