UH West O‘ahu - Course Evaluations
The Assessment and Institutional Research (AIR) office is charged by the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs to administer three types of online course evaluations at West O‘ahu: Mid-Semester (MS), Accelerated Term (ADS), and End-of-Semester (EOS). Please note that directed reading and research courses, laboratory courses that are evaluated through their complementary lecture courses, aerospace studies courses, military science courses, and student development and other courses that do not follow the current class schedules (fall, spring, summer, or accelerated term) are not evaluated at West O‘ahu. All other courses are evaluated regardless of class size.
A standard set of course evaluation questions (.pdf) is used for all course evaluations at West O’ahu. When course evaluations are administered by The University of Hawaii Online Course and Faculty Evaluation system (eCAFE), instructors may include additional questions from the catalog of questionnaire items (found under "Catalog of Items"). The catalog also contains course evaluation questions for Writing Intensive (WI) and distance education (DE) courses. eCAFE provides course evaluation results by course, division, and campus. Additional information about publishing course evaluation results can be found in the FAQs prepared by eCAFE. eCAFE will keep instructors informed about the course evaluation process throughout the evaluation period. Also, instructors may track their course evaluation response rates during the course evaluation period by logging into eCAFE (www.hawaii.edu/ecafe) with their UH username and password. To increase student participation in course evaluations, instructors are asked to encourage their students to fill out their course evaluations each semester.
Mid-Semester (MS) Course Evaluations
The Mid-Semester (MS) course evaluations provide feedback to new tenure-track instructors. Only newly hired tenure-track professors are subject to the MS course evaluation requirement for two consecutive semesters (excluding summers). The AIR office administers MS course evaluations for West O‘ahu. The course evaluation results are returned to the instructors and their Division Chairs.
Accelerated (ADS) Term and End-of-Semester (EOS) Course Evaluations
UH West O‘ahu offers up to three terms of Accelerated (ADS) Term courses throughout a regular 16-week semester. Each accelerated term lasts approximately six weeks. Except as otherwise stated, End-of-Semester (EOS) course evaluations are conducted for all full-term (16 weeks) courses. EOS course evaluations are required of all faculty and lecturers. EOS evaluations offer summative feedback on courses to instructors and serve as a record of teaching performance. To that end, it is used in contract renewal, tenure and promotion, and other personnel matters as appropriate. The UH system eCAFE team administers both ADS and EOS course evaluations for West O‘ahu at the end of a semester, even though the First and Second ADS term courses are completed prior to the end of a full term. ECAFE returns all course evaluation results for ADS and EOS term courses to instructors (via their eCAFE accounts) at the end of the semester. It is the responsibility of instructors to transmit (or grant access to) their EOS course evaluation results to their division chairs and to other parties as needed for purposes that require these results.