Student Course Evaluations

All course student evaluations are conducted online using a system called Watermark Course Evaluations & Surveys (formerly known as EvaluationKit).

Please note: As of March 2020, we no longer have an evaluation system that supports paper-based or scantron-based evaluations. All evaluations, for all modalities of instruction or workplace evaluations (such as counseling), are now completed using the same online system.

Timeline of Student Evaluations

The TERB Office launches the course student evaluations online between about 50-75% of the course. This equates to roughly the following timeframes based on the 16-week semester:

Full-Term Courses (16-weeks)
- Student evals run: Week 8 through week 12.
Fast-Track 1 Courses (first 8-weeks of the semester)
- Student evals run: Week 4 through week 6.
Fast Track 2 Courses (second 8-weeks of the semester)
- Student evals run: Week 4 (week 12 of the 16-week semester) through week 6 (or week 14 of the 16-week semester).
4-Week Courses
- Student evals run: Week 3
12-Week Courses
- Student evals run: Week 6 through week 9.

Eval Notifications, Access, and Reminders

Student evaluation notification, access, and reminders:

Email Notification
- Students receive an email notification when the survey is launched. The email comes from the sender name: “Faculty Evaluations (TERB)” and the email address: facultyevaluations@instructionalservices.palomar.edu
- There is a link in the email that students click on to complete the evaluation.
Canvas Dashboard Notification
- When students log in to Canvas the screen is greyed out except for a big notification that asks them to complete the evaluation.
- Website for Students: How to access and complete the course evaluation
Canvas Course Menu Item
- Faculty can enable a menu item in their Canvas course that allows students to access the evaluation directly from the Canvas course menu. To enable the menu item, faculty need to go to their Canvas course, click on Settings, then Navigation, and then enable the menu item titled “Student Course Evaluations”. Faculty will not be able to see the menu item in the course, the menu item will only be available to students when there is an evaluation they need to complete and it disappears after they have completed it.
- View: How to enable student course eval in Canvas course menu
Reminder Emails
- Students receive reminder emails every couple days until the evaluation is completed.

Faculty receive an email notification when student evaluations are launched and they also receive reminder emails that include data about the response rate.

Strategies to Increase Student Response Rates

Faculty: Please Encourage Student Participation

Faculty opportunities to support an increase in response rate:

Put a note in your syllabus explaining that you are being evaluated and encourage your students to complete the evaluation
Remind students in class to complete the student evaluation.
Post an announcement in your Canvas course encouraging students to participate.

Faculty Observers of Face-to-Face Classes: Encourage Student Participation on the day of the Observation

On the day of the F2F observation:

Ask the Evaluee to step outside.
Explain to students the importance of student evaluations.
Provide the opportunity for students to ask questions about the evaluation process.
Encourage students to complete the Evaluation.
Explain to students how to access their course evaluation.
- They can access the evaluation through the email they received from facultyevaluations@instructionalservices.palomar.edu (display name shows as “Faculty Evaluations (TERB)”)
- They can access the evaluation through the notification on their dashboard in Canvas.
Optional Script for observers to use in F2F classes
Optional Strategy: The following website could be presented to the students in the class to provide them information about the importance of student course evaluations and pictures of how to access the eval: For Students: How to access and complete the course evaluation

Special Evaluations

The majority of evaluations are specific to students enrolled in a course and thus use the main functionality of the evaluation system, which is to send the eval to specific students based on course enrollment. However, certain types of faculty and courses require an alternative method to evaluate the students. For special circumstances, the evaluation is provided in one of two ways: 1.) A link or QR code is provided to access the survey (one link for all), or 2.) TERB is provided with a list of email addresses and the survey is sent out electronically to be completed by just those who have been entered through their email address.

Evaluation Results/Reports

After the course student evaluations conclude, the TERB Office provides the course student evaluations to the Evaluator(s) to utilize for writing the final evaluation report.

After grades are submitted, the course student evaluations are provided to the Evaluee by their evaluator.