Instructors often are interested in how to assess students' preparation, how to evaluate their work and effort, how to maintain efficiency with an overloaded schedule, how to grade, and so on. While the instructor is often ultimately responsible for evaluating students, they are not the only source of evaluation. Here, we will examine different sources of student evaluation, as well as how technology may impact the process.

Students Assessing Themselves: Self-assessment can be an important part of the total process. It will reveal to both the instructor and the student how much they have become self-directed learners. Remember, however, that the students' perception of their own progress may not be what it appears to an instructor. Self-assessment allows for a global look at personal growth. Some instructors utilize self-evaluation at midterm and the end of the semester. Others use it as closure for the course. During self-assessment, it is often helpful to refer students to the guidelines, course outline, and grading rubric provided at the beginning of the course. They may compare the information to the outcomes of their personal behaviors. Palloff and Pratt (1999) suggest asking how well students feel they have met their learning goals, how well they feel they performed overall, and what grade they think they have earned. On page 158 of their text, they provide a helpful list of possible questions for students:

• What was most useful to me in my learning process? What was least useful?
• Did I achieve my learning objectives in this course? If yes, what did I achieve? If no, what got in the way of achieving those objectives?
• What did I learn about my own learning process by taking this course?
• How did I change as a learner through my involvement with this course?
• Do I feel that what I learned in and through this course will have application in other areas of my life? If so, where will I apply this knowledge?
• How well did I participate in this course? Am I satisfied with my level and quality of participation? Did I see myself as an active member of the group? Did I contribute adequately to collaborative assignments?
• How would I evaluate my performance in this class overall?

Students Evaluating Peers: Another helpful source of evaluation information is from a student's peers. It is particularly valuable for those courses emphasizing frequent discussion or collaborative work. This peer evaluation could be submitted privately or used as feedback for students from each other throughout the course. It is particularly useful for students if regular feedback can occur with faculty support that will facilitate groups in resolving their conflicts.

Community Involvement and Evaluating Students: Courses that include lab exercises might utilize videotapes, CD-ROMs, DVDs, or other types of computer simulations. Some courses, however, require lab exercises or assignments where students need either specialized equipment or more direct supervision while they are learning specific skills or processes. In distance education courses, instructors and students may make arrangements to use community facilities and/or preceptors to supervise students. The instructor usually provides the supervisor with objectives, guidelines, and performance evaluation standards. It is critical that students are made aware of these special computing or community requirements before they enroll in the course.

Instructors Evaluating Students: Evaluation of students should be multi-faceted. To the mix of self-assessment, peer evaluation, and (if appropriate) outside supervisor evaluation, we add the instructor's own evaluation of the students' performance within the course. Hopefully, this does not just include examinations. Within an online course, evaluation may also take into account student performance on assignments, individual or group projects, and participation in online discussions. Palloff and Pratt (1999) also recommend that the online instructor take into account the needs and learning objectives students identified at the start of the course, their educational level, their familiarity with technology and online learning (and any problems that may have occurred as they adjusted to the use of technology), and issues related to writing (i.e., the differences between email and chat). 

Let's move on to course evaluation.

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