Pitt will begin using a new software platform called ClassRanked to administer OMET student course evaluations, with a pilot program underway this semester.
OMET surveys, administered by the Office of Measurement and Evaluation of Teaching, are taken by students and used to help faculty understand the effectiveness of their course and what aspects of it they should adjust. Pitt is transitioning to a new software platform, ClassRanked, to collect and process the data gathered from OMET surveys and convey it back to the professor.
According to Lisa Votodian, survey assessment manager in the Office of Measurement and Evaluation of Teaching, ClassRanked will host the same anonymous student course evaluations but includes additional tools for professors, such as QR codes for students to instantly access the surveys and dashboards that will track the responses in real time for faculty use.
Pitt currently uses Explorance, a third-party vendor, to run OMETs. Explorance Blue is a software platform that assists with the collection, analysis and distribution of information. After about a decade with the system, a committee of roughly 30 faculty, staff and administrators began reviewing alternatives and recommended ClassRanked, according to director of the University Center for Teaching and Learning John Radzilowicz.
“We’re getting so much more functionality, and we’re even going to save some money, so it’s a win-win from our perspective,” Radzilowicz said. “I think faculty are actually going to be very happy.”
Votodian said schools will keep their existing questions, faculty can still add their own questions, and students will continue to access surveys through Canvas and email reminders.
“I don’t think students are really going to notice much change,” Votodian said. “For faculty, though, they’re going to see a lot more bells and whistles. But [we will] still be emphasizing our current processes and policies [because] student anonymity is very important, and we respect that.”
According to Votodian, students will notice a different interface when they open the survey, but incoming and new students will not know the difference.
“It’s a different software, [so] when they log in to [ClassRanked], it’s going to look different if they’re familiar with OMETs,” Votodian said.
Votodian said a pilot program is underway this spring semester in approximately 80 courses. Students in those classes may see both the traditional OMET survey tab and a ClassRanked tab in Canvas. A full transition is planned for the summer semester, with complete implementation by the fall, according to Votodian.
“We just [said] that any faculty who wanted to participate in a pilot was welcome to do so,” Votodian said. “Come fall [semester], which [has] our larger course offering and number of surveys that we do, everyone will be going through the ClassRanked system.”
Some faculty at the Feb. 18 faculty assembly meeting shared concerns about ClassRanked. According to John Stoner, co-chair of the educational policies committee, some were concerned with a lack of shared governance when making the switch and worried that OMETs would become more like the site Rate My Professors, allowing students to see each other’s evaluations.
“That was, I think — at least in part — what was driving the concern,” Stoner said. “Will students have more access to data that gets into the system?”
Radzilowicz provided clarification that ClassRanked is only the software being used to run OMETs.
“We’ve just changed that software package behind the scenes, and it’s going to benefit us tremendously,” Radzilowicz said.