Med school evaluations

[Skillset]

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Hi everyone, i'm new to sdn, but i just wanted to know if anyone else out there feels like their med school's evaluation/feedback system isn't really effective. Someone in my class recently invited the whole school to an anonymous conversation site and what came out was that a lot of people feel like the administration doesn't necessarily keep the evals confidential. Is this just my school or have others been wondering about the same thing?

 

[Gheorgia]

Hi everyone, i'm new to sdn, but i just wanted to know if anyone else out there feels like their med school's evaluation/feedback system isn't really effective. Someone in my class recently invited the whole school to an anonymous conversation site and what came out was that a lot of people feel like the administration doesn't necessarily keep the evals confidential. Is this just my school or have others been wondering about the same thing?

You're not alone. There are hundreds of students in each class at my school. I just cannot imagine everyone leaving "constructive" or valuable feedback for the professors. I also cannot imagine the professors or the administrators having time to read every single one of them unless there was something egregiously bad in the feedback. However, you should keep the feedback "professional" and try to provide meaningful information. At the end of the year, your school might provide some kind of an award or recognition for the students who've left the most meaningful feedback.

 

[OpalOnyx]

At the end of the year, your school might provide some kind of an award or recognition for the students who've left the most meaningful feedback.

talk about NOT being anonymous!!

 

[Skillset]

You're not alone. There are hundreds of students in each class at my school. I just cannot imagine everyone leaving "constructive" or valuable feedback for the professors. I also cannot imagine the professors or the administrators having time to read every single one of them unless there was something egregiously bad in the feedback. However, you should keep the feedback "professional" and try to provide meaningful information. At the end of the year, your school might provide some kind of an award or recognition for the students who've left the most meaningful feedback.

Maybe its just me, but it seems horribly ineffective for a school to elicit feedback that is not anonymous- its like a policy-maker surrounding him/herself with "yes" men. My school claims evaluations are anonymous but noone is 100% sure...then again, i dont know what it's like in other schools.

 

[Sol Rosenberg]

At my school, evaluations are mandatory (don't get a grade unless you do them,) so they are likely not anonymous (need to put your student ID on the eval.) They say that the SID is just to keep track of whether or not you did the eval (and it's not on the eval itself, if that makes sense,) but I have my doubts. Oh yeah, the best part about our evals is that the course secretaries censor many negative comments so as not to upset the lecturers, etc. Poor babies. So, basically, the evals are just a way for the lecturers/course directors to stroke themselves off about how great a job they're supposedly doing.

Clinical evals are supposed to be blinded for 6 months, but this is bull****, as I was called out by a course director once for leaving a bad eval. about one of my residents.

 

[Skillset]

So, basically, the evals are just a way for the lecturers/course directors to stroke themselves off about how great a job they're supposedly doing.

Clinical evals are supposed to be blinded for 6 months, but this is bull****, as I was called out by a course director once for leaving a bad eval. about one of my residents.

That's pretty ridiculous- why are med schools trying to stifle honest opinions? seems a bit like high school to me...Im not surprised that someone in my class decided to use the anonymous discussion site to see what people actually think.

 

[Gheorgia]

Maybe its just me, but it seems horribly ineffective for a school to elicit feedback that is not anonymous- its like a policy-maker surrounding him/herself with "yes" men. My school claims evaluations are anonymous but noone is 100% sure...then again, i dont know what it's like in other schools.

Unfortunately a feedback is only "anonymous" in the sense that the professor won't see who wrote, but the secretary and the coordinator who put toegether and screen the evaluation definitely know who wrote it. And like Sol said, most evaluations are mandatory so you have to crank something out even if you don't have an opinion about a professor one way or the other. Try to be professional in your evaluations, students have definitely been called out on professionalism for writing things like "Prof XXX sucks" as if they were posting on Rate My Professor

 

[Frank Nutter]

One of our profs showed an excerpt from an old eval during lecture:

"Don't just fire him, KILL HIM."