campusreview . com . au policy & reform course – whomever they might blame for their anxieties or predicament .
We ’ ve seen UNSW attempting to publish this data online for students to see . What do you think about this ? That ’ s not really going to solve the problem . A lot of the feedback , it wasn ’ t really feedback , it was quite scurrilous , accusatory , defamatory statements , nothing to do with teaching at all . Publishing that online just provides another forum for airing some comment and a process which is invalid .
It ’ s not about the quality of their teaching , it ’ s not about the quality of the teacher , and it ’ s not about the quality of the segments . This narrative feedback is highly insulting and defamatory , racist , and misogynistic , you name it . It really is jaw-droppingly offensive and it ’ s very impactful .
A lot of the comments made about physical appearance were targeted towards older female academics . Did you find any other groups were targeted in these anonymous feedback surveys ? There were some clearly racist comments . When we shared these comments on The
Conversation , some of the responses said , ‘ Well , that could be valid ’, so comments about people ’ s accents , for instance . But these were followed up by our respondents who said , ‘ I don ’ t look stereotypically Australian , but I ’ m Australian born , bred and I have an Australian accent .’ And yet comments were along the lines that they could speak more like an Australian , which have absolutely got nothing to do with their teaching quality .
I understand your team is now looking at the physical and mental impacts of these surveys on academics . What are you finding ? It does seem given the large number of responses and how accessible this feedback was or these comments were , that this has become a common problem . And it ’ s highly impactful . The fact that we only got people that were teaching , that hadn ’ t left the university environment , probably suggests that we have missed some of those impacts .
After we released this study , people did respond personally and say that they ’ ve known people that have quit their job , they have lost employment or not had a contract renewed , or that the nature of the teaching evaluations has meant that despite being very experienced and qualified , they haven ’ t been able to go for promotion .
The fact that you can lose your livelihood creates a state of stress and anxiety . And for some people that have received the highly malicious comments or death threats , their state of anxiety has become quite chronic .
A further question looked at impact around occupational stress generally , and they go all the way to clear-cut examples of disorder . The way that we ’ re conceptualising it for some people is really around post-traumatic stress , so people are presenting with all of the constellation of symptoms that you might see with somebody who ’ s been exposed to some sort of life-threatening trauma .
Of course , we can ’ t say that people have PTSD , but they ’ re presenting with the sleep disturbance , loss of enjoyment , the depression , the emotional numbing , and they report experiencing panic attacks when the cycle of teaching evaluations occurs . Some people have said that they will be leaving the profession because of this .
Is the fact these evaluations happen not once , but several times a year , having an impact on academics ? The survey approach has become massified and institutionalised . Where once teachers might poll students about their experience strategically at different points during the teaching cycle , this has been taken right out of the teachers ’ hands now and undertaken institutionally . The institution benchmarks the teacher against mean ratings , so if you ’ re not above average or you ’ re getting the lowest quintile in terms of evaluation , then you ’ re often asked to explain yourself .
We also found that these survey results were , by and large , not just shared with the teacher concerned , but other people in the university hierarchy . It may be one thing for teachers to see this feedback and take it or leave it , but that ’ s not how these are used .
They are circulated ; they ’ re at least shared with supervisors and in some instances they ’ re shared quite widely across the faculty , if not the entire university . Individual courses are compared in terms of satisfaction and success , that ’ s just now routine .
These are done every teaching term . Some universities still may only have two predominant teaching terms , but others have six terms . So essentially , six times a year , people can be potentially exposed to these surveys .
We need to unveil those people that are potentiating hate speech .
I ’ m not suggesting that they ’ re entirely invalid , that there ’ s not something useful that might be gleaned from them . However , there is nothing useful to be gained by exposing teaching staff to these kind of scurrilous , defamatory , accusatory and punishing comments .
What impact do you think this has on interm students when the people educating them are under this type of stress ? The literature our preliminary findings do suggest that this does have a negative impact on teaching quality . When teachers are attempting to ingratiate themselves with students , that is going to have an impact on the quality of the teaching and learning experience .
It is really well known that your final grade can have a huge influence on teacher evaluation . So in terms of the numerical rating , that one grade point elevation can lead to quite a significant increase in teacher evaluations .
The whole process is invalid in the sense that these processes can be easily manipulated , and the consequences of attempting to manipulate and achieve higher ratings is that teaching and learning quality is diminished , there ’ s a potential for grade inflation , and there ’ s an overall corrosion of academic standards .
Since the government is cracking down on cyber bullying and online trolls , do you think we will see some significant changes in our educational institutions ? I hope there is change , because it ’ s not okay that people are exposed to these kind of comments at any time . I understand there is some legislation on the agenda , but I don ’ t know how it will impact on the teaching and learning processes .
I do know that the research we had and the publicity we had around this on The
Conversation , which got 200,000 reads within two weeks , shows that people are really interested and concerned . And I think in at least some universities , processes will be reviewed . ■
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