43 Good teachers and teacher evaluation

In the previous post, we had discussed about some activities teachers in REC Calicut were involved in addition to the regular teaching work. But, even then the question of who is a good teacher remains. This question has been existing ever since teachers and students or disciples existed. Even now, a complete answer to this question is difficult to arrive at. A teacher who is  popular among the students  need not necessarily be good teacher  in the eyes of the administration, especially when teacher  evaluation  by students  has become mandatory  in several institutions.

From my   experience in teaching engineering for 40+ years in  a few institutions  in India and abroad, I have come to certain conclusions  on what should be the characteristics of a good teacher. These ideas are not my own, but has been evolved over this reasonably long period of time from my good teachers in three institutions I have studied ( TKMCollege of Engg, I.I.T.Madras and I.I.T.Delhi) and from the feedback from several  hundreds of students I have taught over these years and my personal observations. I am trying to present these here. I request my esteemed readers to   consider this carefully and express your opinions if you have any.  

First of all, what a teacher is supposed to do at any point of time cannot clearly defined. For example, what a teacher used to do in the 1940s or 1950s cannot be the same as what teachers have to do these days. If someone one teaches these days the same way as what others used to do  twenty years back,  students  may not even  care  to sit in the class of such a teacher. Earlier, the main job of a teacher was to collect and assimilate information or knowledge from his teachers and books over the years and present it into a form easily understood by his students. The eloquence and sense of humour of the teacher can definitely complement teaching, but essentially  the job of a teacher of 50s or even 60s were  knowledge collection and distribution. But nowadays, even school children can collect any amount information by a few clicks on the computer keyboard using Google  or other on-line  sources on the internet. The sources available to the teachers for knowledge collection may be equally available to the students as well. Therefore, present day students expect something more than what they can collect  from these sources.  Even in our college days, a few teachers used to come prepared with some notes and we were not able to get anything more than what is contained in these notes. In such cases, we used to prepare our own notes by reading as many books as possible so that we can do well in the examinations. If the teachers are good and teaches well, our efforts at home could be considerably reduced.  Many of our good teachers used to write almost everything on the black board and explain it once or twice so that at the end of the class, we might have understood almost everything on the topic under discussion. Essentially, good teachers   of yester years were those who used to ‘spoon-feed’ their students. Of course, then again, there was a debate whether it is right to spoon-feed or make students study the hard way, which is better. A teacher who motivates the students to study themselves were in a way better, especially for bright students. But for average and mediocre students, the teachers who gave everything in fast food style were definitely superior.

But now, a teacher cannot get away by simply collecting knowledge and distributing it. A modern teacher has to answer the inquisitiveness of all his students. He should be able to give something for the mediocre, average or even the brightest among students. For this reason, the role of a teacher has become more of a facilitator of knowledge rather than distributor of knowledge. Consequently, the teacher’s job becomes more challenging these days. Someone said, these days “A good teacher is one who makes himself progressively redundant”.  That is, a good teacher   makes his students learn things by himself.  The high power committee appointed by the Government of India with Prof. Yashpal has clearly indicated that present day teachers should be able to make their students create knowledge rather than simply distributing knowledge. With this in mind, several innovative ideas were introduced into our school level teaching but in several places, this attempt has failed due to the organized protest from the teachers in changing the status quo. Our school teaching should be modified to promote more creativity among our children. Then only they can independently find innovative ways of finding solutions for problems they face. The educational methods introduced by the British were good only in mass production of clerks as it served their purpose, but in independent India, this is not sufficient.

In many institutions, teachers are evaluated by students. This is based on a questionnaire prepared by the institution or adapted from those available from other reputed institutions. What are the criteria to be used in the evaluation and the nature of questions can be debated over and over again? Many universities have created   questionnaire of their own and these may be available for others to adopt. Essentially, all of these include the basic desirable characteristics of a teacher. If the students fill up these questionnaires seriously, the response will definitely be useful, but we have found that many of our students do not take it seriously and often take it as joke. Therefore, these questionnaires may not clearly indicate the capabilities or otherwise of the teacher.  In our institution, in the beginning, printed questionnaires were got filled by the students anonymously and collected by a teacher other than the one being evaluated. Later, these were computerised and results tabulated. Registration to the new  semester was not permitted unless the students fill up the teacher evaluation sheet. Then students started filling these up very casually so that the whole affair became a farce. For example, once more than 20%  of my own students chose to indicate that  I  do not start the  class in time. To tell the truth in my 40+ years of teaching, I have rarely gone to the class late or end the class before time. (Any one of my students reading this may  give their comments, please). This was really a shock to me. Therefore,  unless the students  take up these  with utmost   seriousness and maturity, the evaluation becomes meaningless.  Seeing this type of response, some colleges started getting these being filled only by students  getting marks above 60% or restricting to only to those who have  no supplementary  papers. (Kindly excuse me, I was not a bad teacher in REC Calicut and glad to report that my teacher evaluation score was above 80% very often. I was not in the 90% above mainly because I was not a popular teacher as I was known to be a  task master as I tried to get extract more work from my students.)

Another aspect regarding these teacher evaluation (index) is how this is being used. In my opinion, it is to be used for self-improvement by teachers, especially   in their early career. While I was   working as lecturer in TK M College of Engineering during 1968-69, we new teachers were asked to get a  typical questionnaire filled by our students  within three  months  of our teaching work. The response sheets were collected by the respective teachers and each one of us was asked to analyse the response and improve their teaching based on the feedback. Not even the Head of the department wanted to see the response sheets. I had a class of 60 students, my immediate juniors in the same college, their constructive criticism of my teaching was very useful for me in correcting many of my deficiencies and has definitely helped in shaping my teaching career.

However, in some institutions, a quantitative index obtained from these response sheets was used to be entered in their confidential records. In very rare cases, there were attempts to   create problems for the teachers whose index was below par. I do not think that this is the right attitude. If the  performance of a teacher is  not satisfactory, there should be other  ways of  improvement and in the worst, ease them out of the teaching career altogether. In REC Calicut, there was a discussion in the college council on the  questionnaire  for  teaching evaluation index. I presented my experience way back in 1968 in TKMCE and suggested that this   feedback from students should be used only for self-improvement and not for any other purpose.  In fact only one visiting professor from Canada supported my view. However, there was some complaint from certain quarters that this index was used to harass a  few teachers whose  index was  not so good.

In some institutions like certain IIMs, a specified number of points were allotted to each of the different type of work done by the teachers and  it was made mandatory that  the teachers should have a certain minimum  number of points every semester. Sometimes, these points  obtained had been used for promotion to higher posts as well. Recently,  UGC  also have come up with an academic  performance index   (API)  for career advancement of teachers.

Summarizing, it is very difficult to state in uncertain terms who is a good teacher. But still, it has now become mandatory that the teachers should acquire a minimum performance index for career advancement of teachers. The API has allotted points for teaching, research publications, short term courses organised and attended, projects undertaken, MTech and PhD guidance etc. In any case, gone are the days when teachers used to get promotions to higher posts by length of service or seniority alone as career promotion based on actual performance has come to stay. Survival therefore will depend on an ideal combination of good teaching, research and publications, projects, departmental developmental work and to a certain extent, even on taking up social responsibilities as well.

https://www.ugc.ac.in/pdfnews/5323630_New_Draft_UGCRegulation-2018-9-2.pdf