Student Evaluations and Consumer Orientation of Universities

SOURCE : Journal of Nonprofit & Public Sector Marketing Vol. 8(1) 2000
By Robert E. Wright

SUMMARY

This paper examines student evaluations of instructors to determine how increased responsiveness to one set of consumers(namely the students) may affect the ‘‘product’’ delivered to other consumers(namely the future employers of students). First the author tries to explain according to what type of measures do the students rate the instructors. He cites from papers of many academicians throughout his article like the one from from Williams and Ceci (1997) who suggest that emphasizing communication skills produced significant improvements in ratings of an instructor by students in all areas of teaching for a class, despite the fact that the material and lecture format remained identical, as well as student performance. These cited articles suggest that student consumers may rate faculty using a different set of criteria than other constituencies. They also mention that there is a problem with consumer orientation since workplaces are also consumers of the product of colleges and universities, and workplace professionals may use different measures to rate the performance of faculty than students. Using the conclusions of the previous papers of other authors as a reference point, Robert E. Wright surveys students from four different instructors at a medium sized business school. In his study student evaluations of instructors on the nine different service quality attributes namely willingness to help students, competency, credibility, degree of caring, degree of friendliness, effectiveness in communicating, reliable, fair in grading, and overall appearance; as well as students’ reported study hours, grades, and age were regressed on overall instructor ratings, using ordinary least squares. Overall, these results indicate that there may be other factors besides simply the learning the student obtains during a course which are related to the student’s evaluation of a professor. These other factors may be somewhat related to effectiveness in teaching, but may, in some cases, be unrelated to effective teaching. These results indicate that a well dressed, attractive professor with excellent communication skills, who gives grades higher than students think they actually deserve (and thus is perceived to be fair) may receive high teaching evaluations, regardless of the amount of actual learning taking place. Students may be more interested in evaluating the process of the learning experience rather than the outcome, despite the overwhelming importance of the outcome (knowledge gained) to their future. To the extent that teaching evaluations are measuring other factors than simply the effectiveness of teaching of the instructor, they may be of limited usefulness in promoting ‘‘excellence in teaching’’ at the university level. Extensive and exclusive use of teaching evaluations may, in fact, promote behavior contrary to that desired. Students may be entertained by instructors who emphasize ‘‘fun’’ in the classroom. However, this may result in a lower level of learning related to skills expected by another ‘‘consumer’’ of the university, the employer. It is of critical importance that universities realize that students are only one of the constituencies which the university must consider in its marketing efforts. Employers of graduates may have very different expectations of what makes a ‘‘good’’ instructor than do students. Similarly, taxpayers and legislators may also have differing expectations of instructors. Widespread use of student evaluations without significant input from other important ‘‘consumers’’ of the service of a college education may lead to provision of a service which meets the ‘‘short term’’ needs of only one set of consumers, while short changing other consumers.

TANER ULUĞ - 106604215

HABER :

Bu biranın 40 yıl hatırı var!

Efes Dark lezzeti kahve aromasıyla birleşerek, bira ve kahve severleri Efes Dark Brown'da buluşturuyor.

Efes Dark, bir ilke imza atarak bira keyfine yeni bir boyut kazandırıyor. Türkiye'nin ilk kahve aromalı birası olan Efes Dark Brown, kahvenin gizemiyle bira keyfine yeni bir soluk getiriyor. Efes Dark keyfi kahve tadıyla doruğa çıkarak, tüketicilere çok özel bir lezzet sunuyor.

Türkiye'de bira pazarı ve kültürünü geliştirme yolunda pek çok ilke imza atan Efes, yine benzersiz bir deneyim yaşatmak üzere şimdi de Efes Dark Brown'u tüketiciyle buluşturuyor. Yoğun bira ve kahve aromalarını birleştiren Efes Dark Brown, 6-8 derece arasında ideal lezzet doygunluğuna ulaşıyor.

Tüm dünyada en çok tercih edilen tatları birleştiren Efes Dark Brown, "farklı zamanların farklı içeceği" olarak konumlandırıldı. Yeni lezzetleri denemeye açık tüketicilerin tercih ve beklentileri göz önüne alınarak geliştirilen Efes Dark Brown, sınırlı sayıda seçkin satış noktalarında.

http://haber.mynet.com/detay/is-dunyasi/Bu-biranin-40-yil-hatiri-var-/18Mart2008/X1205832134859

YORUM :

Efes yeniliklerine tüm hızıyla devam ediyor. Efes Ice’dan sonra artık bir de Efes Dark Brown var. Türkiye’de kahve kültürünün evrimleşmeye başladığı şu zamanlarda çok yerinde bir hamle yaparak Efes Dark Brown’ı piyasaya sürdüler. Burada önemli olan nokta Efes’in etkin pazarlama çalışmalarıyla ve iyi bir zamanlamayla, Efes Dark Brown’ı “farklı zamanların farklı içeceği” olarak markette konumlandırmayı başarmış olmasıdır. Çünkü bu başarısı sayesinde onu takip etmek isteyecek rakiplerinin konumlarını da belirleme fırsatı yakalayabilecektir. Bunun yanısıra açıkça görülmektedir ki Efes’in Dark Brown’ı piyasaya sürmesi, çeşitliliği artırarak ve bu yolla biraya olan ilgiyi canlandırarak bira tüketimine ivme kazandırmayı amaçlayan stratejik bir hamledir.

TANER ULUĞ - 106604215