ARTICLE INFO

Article Type

Descriptive & Survey Study

Authors

Gharatapeh   A. (1)
Rezaei   M. (*)
Pasdar   Y. (2)
Asadi   F. (3)
Safari   Y. (4)
Nazari   M. (5)






(*) Biostatistics Department, Health Faculty, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
(1) Education Department, Health Faculty, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
(2) Nutrition Department, Health Faculty, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
(3) Environmental Health Engineering Department, Health Faculty, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
(4) Lesson Planning Department, Paramedical Faculty, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran
(5) Educational Psychology Department, Psychology Faculty, Kerman Branch, Islamic Azad University, Kerman, Iran

Correspondence

Address: School of Public Health, Isar Square, Kermanshah, Iran. Postal Code: 68198-51351
Phone: +988338264447
Fax: +988338263048
rezaei39@yahoo.com

Article History

Received:  May  24, 2015
Accepted:  September 9, 2015
ePublished:  October 25, 2015

BRIEF TEXT


At present, universities of medical sciences use different evaluation forms which are different in terms of used items and scoring [1-4]. … [5-20] SEEQ is an accurate and generalizable questionnaire for different periods and different disciplines [21].

Many studies have evaluated different dimensions of SEEQ questionnaire [17, 18, 20].

The aim of this research was to compare the teaching quality aspects by Student Evaluation Education Quality questionnaire and student survey questionnaire.

This is a descriptive and correlational study.

Students of Health School of Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences (Iran) were studied in the second semester of the academic year 2012-2013.

All students in the School of Health (n=251) were studied and students who were in the second semester of training in the field were omitted from the study.

Data collection was carried out through a Persian version of Student Evaluation Education Quality (SEEQ) and the student survey questionnaire in relation to the evaluation of faculty members of Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences. Instructors, who were teaching several courses for the students in the same level of education, were only evaluated by students once and based on both questionnaires. Totally, 762 evaluation forms were collected. In order to compare the teaching quality aspects in different educational groups, at first the obtained scores from SEEQ and survey questionnaires were gathered separately for each faculty members and then the scores obtained for each dimension were collected in all faculty members of that department and the achieved mean was the criteria for the quality of that teaching dimension in that department. This questionnaire contains 41 questions. 31 questions of this tool measures 9 dimensions of efficient teaching including learning (questions 1 to 4), teacher`s interest (questions 5 to 8), organization of the content (questions 9 to 12), relationship between the instructor and student (questions 17 to 20), content comprehensiveness (questions 21 to 34), examination (questions 25 to 27), assignments (questions 28 to 29), and overall evaluation (questions 30 and 31) and 10 questions measure characteristics of the students and the course as bias potential variables. In this study, of 10 mentioned questions, 5 questions including difficulty of the course, workload and activities associated with each course, students` interest to the course, prediction of achieving good score in the course and the popularity of each university instructor in each course were measured. By the researcher, 2 questions regarding demographic characteristics of the faculty members including working experience and scientific degree and 3 questions regarding demographic characteristics of students including the field of study, educational level and gender were added to the questionnaire. SEEQ questionnaire items were graded in a continuum of five-point Likert Scale (very good=5 and very weak=1). Survey questionnaire contains 15 questions and 3 dimensions including personal characteristics of university instructor, teaching method and the scientific level of the university instructor. For data analysis, descriptive statistics including frequency tables and calculation of numerical parameters (Mean and Standard Deviation) were used. In order to compare the evaluation score in the two methods, Paired T-test was used. And for other variables, Levene's test, Independent T-test and ANOVA were used. To compare the quality of teaching, Chi Square, Mann-Whitney, and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used. To investigate the relationship between teacher evaluation score with the variables based on SEEQ and survey questionnaires, Pearson Correlation Coefficient and Turkey test were used.

762 students filled out the evaluation form. 150 of them were male and 588 were female and 24 did not mention their gender. 60(7.9%) of students were in the associate level; 657 (86.2%) were in the undergraduate level and 45 (5.9%) were studying in the MA level. Also, 131 evaluation forms (17.2%) were filled out by public health students and 433 forms (56.8%) were filled out by students of Environmental Health. There was a significant difference among some dimensions of the quality of teaching in the academic departments, so that on the basis of survey questionnaire on the dimension including individual characteristics of the instructor, teaching methods and overall total score of evaluation, a significant difference was observed between different departments and the faculty members of Environmental Health Department achieved higher scores in the mentioned dimensions. Based on SEEQ questionnaire, students of Environmental Health gave more scores to the faculty members in all dimensions and the departments of public health and professional health were in the next ranking. And the difference was significant in the dimension “instructor`s interest in teaching and organization of content”. No significant difference was observed in other dimensions (Table 1). Based on SEEQ questionnaire, a significant difference was observed between the evaluation score of the instructors and associate professors in favor of those with associate rank. And a significant difference between instructors with coaching rank and associate rank was observed in the survey questionnaire. Based on both questionnaires there was no significant difference between the evaluation score of the assistant professors and the instructors and associate professor. Also, the total score of faculty members' evaluation by the SEEQ questionnaire was higher than survey questionnaire. There was no significant difference between male and female students in giving evaluation score to the faculty members. There was a significant different between the faculty members` evaluation scores in terms of students` level of education in both research tools i.e. based on survey questionnaire graduate students gave less score to their masters compared to the students in associate and undergraduate levels; this is while, based on SEEQ questionnaire, graduate students and undergraduate ones gave higher scores to their masters compared to the students in the associate level. In general, students in educational levels gave higher scores to the faculty members based on SEEQ questionnaire compared to the survey questionnaire. There was a significant difference between the scores of faculty members evaluation based on different disciplines that is students of Environmental Health gave higher evaluation scores to faculty members and students of Public Health and Professional Health were in the next ranks in this regard. Totally, students in different disciplines gave higher evaluation scores to their faculty members based on SEEQ tool compared to survey questionnaire (Table 2). Based on both questionnaires, the working experience of faculty members showed a significant correlation with the overall evaluation score. Based on survey questionnaire, the evaluation overall score of faculty members had a direct relation with their popularity, but this relation was not significant. This is, while, based on SEEQ questionnaire there was a significant and reverse relation between overall evaluation score of faculty members and their popularity. Based on both tools, no significant relation was observed between the course difficulty and the faculty members evaluation scores. No significant difference was observed between the workload related to each course and the evaluation scores of faculty members. While, based on SEEQ questionnaire, this relation was direct and significant. Also, no significant difference was observed between prediction of achieving good scores in each course and faculty members' evaluation scores based on both research tools. No significant difference was observed between the interest in the course and the evaluation scores of faculty members based on survey questionnaire. However, this relation was significant and direct based on SEEQ questionnaire (Table 3).

The faculty members of environmental health department obtained higher scores in different dimensions of teaching based on both questionnaires compared to the faculty members of public health and professional health. And based on the dimensions of the current questionnaire, this difference was significant in faculty members' personal characteristics, teaching method and overall evaluation score. The most important criteria from the view point of students were communication skills and teaching methods of faculty members. Faculty members and students mentioned the mastery of content as the priorities of teaching method; and in personal characteristics, students have emphasized the power of expression and transmission of the content by the faculty members [6]. Similar results have been obtained in another study [22]. … [23] According to the SEEQ, the faculty members of Environmental Health Department achieved higher scores in interest in teaching and organization of content and showed a significant difference with the faculty members of other departments. 60% of students consider the working experience and research activity of the faculty members as highly to so highly involving in giving evaluation score to the faculty member [24]. There was no correlation between the score of teaching quality and faculty member’s working experience [25]. The results of evaluation score of faculty members based on their faculty ranking according to both tools showed that there was a significant difference in the overall evaluation score of them. More than 60% of students consider the faculty ranking of the faculty members as highly to so highly involving in the evaluation of faculty members [24]. The popularity of the faculty members had a significant and reverse correlation with their evaluation scores based on SEEQ questionnaire. 60% of students consider faculty members` popularity as highly to so highly involving in faculty members` evaluation. Intimacy and friendly behavior of the faculty member is not effective on the lack of organization or the weak use of motivational strategies by the same faculty member [26, 27]. The SEEQ questionnaire is less influenced by probable bias, and this issue has been also shown in other studies [20]. Based on both research tools, there was no significant difference between male and female students in giving evaluation scores to the faculty members. Females give more attention to the personality traits of their masters compared to males [28]. There is a significant difference between evaluation scores of faculty members based on students` level of education in both research tools. A significant difference was observed between the views of students about the faculty members` evaluation in the basic and clinical medical level and associate and undergraduate level [24, 28].

To score difficult courses, instead of scoring through equal weighing method, proper methods based on the obtained factors should be used.

Of the limitations of this study were the course content, level of difficulty of the course, the time of the course and physical environment of the classroom.

Both questionnaires have acceptable reliability, but SEEQ can better highlight the multi aspects of teaching and is more efficient in demonstrating the strength and weaknesses of teaching quality of faculty members.

All students and faculty members are appreciated.

No financial source has been used except the planning source and there is no conflict of interest.

In order to observe the confidentiality of information related to the faculty members, questionnaires were coded.

The paper is the result of a research project approved by Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences.

TABLES and CHARTS

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