I don't really like to genuinely toot my own horn (saying that alone actually makes me wince)... but we let students evaluate their TAs at the end of the semester. For the most part, it's to let students feel empowered, and it does also help safeguard against abuse or problems.
Generally speaking, students don't put a whole lot of thought into it. But you always get that one student who just hates you because they did poorly, or you said something they didn't like (such as, "No, I cannot change your grade from a C to an A; you'll have to do better"). So they give you an across-the-board bad ranking in the categories of "My TA was knowledgeable," "my TA was helpful," "my TA presented the material in a way I could understand," "my TA was a fair grader," "my TA wanted me to be successful in this course," "I would recommend my TA to a friend." There also used to be a question about, "My TA emphasized safety." Guess they scrubbed that.
Anyway, students rate these questions as, "Strongly agree," "agree," "neither agree nor disagree," "disagree," and "strongly disagree." As I said, in a packed class, you usually would get the one who just slates you with "strongly disagree" on everything. But this time... I got 100% "strongly agree" in all categories. And two of my students also made written comments. I'd like to share them (the comments are anonymous, but I can guess who one is).
"My TA, [Moff], was extremely helpful. He was very thorough with what was expected as well as his recitation. I feel like I learned more during recitation than during my actual chem class. Some of the other lab members have said the same thing. He had multiple ways of explaining things. I feel like he actually cared about the students learning rather than a paycheck. I would highly recommend him to a friend. "
"[Moff] was super helpful this semester and I learned so much from taking his lab and attending his office hours. He was always willing to help us with any questions we had, even if it was material from a different chapter. He constantly encouraged us to come to him for help and I often did. He made the labs a lot of fun and always maintained a happy environment even when none of us were awake at 7:50 in the morning. I would definitely recommend him to friends and those taking gen. chem lab. I hope to see him next semester as well! "
Sorry for blogging a bit; that just kinda made a nice start to my Friday.
Your regularly scheduled Moff will return later. <_<
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