Does a rose by any other name smell as sweet? Assessing student evaluation of teaching ratings pre- and during the COVID-19 lockdown: an Australian study

Abstract

The sudden sweep of the COVID-19 pandemic that led to significant lockdowns, and only gradual re-openings of societal interactions, forced the higher education sector to make significant changes in teaching and learning practices. Australian universities were no exception to this process. The adoption of almost universal online teaching in the face of lockdowns was one of the main changes executed by these universities. During this transition, instructors and students faced a plethora of challenges, with the former needing to master the necessary technological tools in a short period of time, especially with respect to creating and teaching online courses, while the latter had to deal with the socio-economic impacts of being unable to interact with their milieu in an orthodox fashion. This study examines students’ opinions about the effectiveness of their learning experiences prior to and during the pandemic period, within an Australian context. Utilising a pooled OLS methodology, we estimate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on student evaluation of teaching for a number of courses taught at an Australian university. We find statistically higher evaluation of teachers in the area of organisation, focus and inspiration during the pandemic period (where online teaching predominated) compared to the pre-pandemic period. This bifurcation is accentuated in favour of instructors from English-speaking backgrounds (ESBs) and for those teaching postgraduate courses.