What is it about?
This study explores how university professors and students understand the evaluation of teaching quality and what they believe these evaluations should achieve. Based on interviews with 21 professors and group interviews with 33 students from seven degree programmes at a Chilean university, the study shows that teaching evaluation is most useful when it goes beyond standard questionnaires and takes account of the specific teaching context. Professors and students agreed that evaluations should consider how well teachers adapt their teaching to different subjects and student groups, how they interact with students, and the level of commitment and professionalism they demonstrate. The findings also show that students often see teaching evaluation as a bureaucratic requirement rather than as a meaningful process for improving teaching.
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Why is it important?
Teaching evaluations can influence professional development, institutional decision-making and the quality of students’ learning experiences. However, evaluation systems may lose their value when they rely too heavily on standardised student surveys or are mainly used for administrative purposes. This study highlights the need for a more formative, transparent and context-sensitive approach. It suggests that universities should combine different sources of evidence, communicate the purpose and consequences of evaluation more clearly, and use results to support reflection, feedback and professional development. These findings can inform the redesign of teaching evaluation systems not only in Chile but also in other higher education contexts facing similar challenges.
Perspectives
For me, one of the most important messages of this study is that evaluating university teaching should not be reduced to producing a score or meeting an administrative requirement. Evaluation becomes meaningful when it helps academics understand their teaching, identify strengths and areas for improvement, and make informed changes to their practice. I also believe that teaching quality cannot be assessed fairly without considering disciplinary differences, the characteristics of students and the particular conditions in which teaching takes place. Giving students a clearer understanding of why evaluations matter, while also incorporating multiple sources of evidence, may help transform evaluation into a genuine opportunity for dialogue, reflection and improvement rather than a purely bureaucratic exercise.
Felipe González-Catalán
Universitat de Barcelona
As a researcher specialising in educational evaluation and research methods, I consider this study particularly relevant because it addresses a persistent challenge in higher education: how to evaluate teaching quality in ways that are both methodologically robust and educationally meaningful. From an evaluation perspective, one of the study's most significant contributions is its emphasis on contextualisation. The participants highlighted the limitations of uniform evaluation instruments and the need to account for disciplinary differences, teaching contexts, and student characteristics. These findings support contemporary approaches to educational evaluation that advocate for context-sensitive and multi-source assessment systems. Methodologically, the study demonstrates the value of qualitative inquiry for examining complex educational phenomena. By combining individual interviews with professors and group interviews with students, it provides rich evidence regarding stakeholders' understandings, expectations, and concerns about teaching evaluation processes. In my view, the most important message emerging from the study is that evaluation systems should prioritise formative improvement rather than merely accountability and administrative control. Teaching evaluation has the potential to stimulate professional reflection, pedagogical development, and dialogue about educational quality, but only when its purposes are clearly communicated and when stakeholders perceive the process as fair, useful, and relevant.
Dr Francesc Martinez-Olmo
Universitat de Barcelona
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Evaluating teaching quality in higher education: stakeholder perspectives, Educational Research, June 2026, Taylor & Francis,
DOI: 10.1080/00131881.2026.2682829.
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