Tips on Increasing Response Rate

Advice from WI10 Instructors with High Response Rates

From simple encouragements to well-placed reminders to rewards for high response from the class as a whole

"(1) I brought it up at the beginning and end of three consecutive classes.
(2) I told them that the CAPE responses would potentially impact the future of the course - who taught it and when it would be offered.
(3) I included an (ungraded) problem on the last homework assignment asking the students to fill out the CAPE form. The other problems on the assignment required them to go online, so I knew that the students would be near a computer when they read the CAPE request. (I also knew that the request would be read by students who did not attend lectures.)
- Professor Lawrence Saul

"I told them that their evaluation/suggestion would be very helpful for me to improve my teaching and the course materials/assignments and that students in future quarters will greatly benefit from their contribution. Since I am a junior faculty member (my first year), I asked them to share their thoughts with me so that I could learn about the students at UCSD. I also emphasized that their active participation in the new electronic CAPE will eliminate the high cost of having a paper-based CAPE (salary, paper, time, etc.). During the last class meeting, I added reminders about CAPE in the beginning and the end of my lecture slides. Lastly I emailed them a day before CAPE was closed as a final reminder, also wishing them good luck on their finals."
- Professor Eun-Young Jung

"I had a website that I used to post announcements for the course, and I posted links there to the CAPE statistics pages and made the whole thing sound like a competition -- "let's get a better response rate than other LIGN classes". I posted a couple of reminders with links to the updated stats, and I also announced it in class."
- Professor Eric Bakovic

"I reminded my students every time when we have a lecture in the last couple of weeks. I posted the reminder on our course website along with the study guide in the final week. In short, I just encouraged my students with lots of effort."
- Professor Qin-Hong Anderson

"If 90% of the students responded to the CAPE survey they got to all drop their lowest exam/quiz score. Other options include dropping the lowest homework, lab or quiz grade."
- Professor Lelli Van Den Einde

"...offering the entire class [the incentive of replacing the lowest quiz grade with 100%] if over 75% of them would respond to the survey...It might have made a difference, too, that I mentioned the survey a few times and urged students to complete it."
- Professor Anthony T. Edwards

"I shared with my students how important it is for me as a teacher to receive substantive feedback from my students. I told them that their feedback helps me to shape and improve my teaching."
- Professor Gabriele Wienhausen

"I sent 2 or 3 email reminders to the class."
- Professor John M Newsam

"I basically reminded students a bunch of times in class, and I also sent an email to them on the last day with a link to the evaluation page. Moreover, I told them that giving feedback would only improve the class for future generations of students taking that class."
- Professor Prashant Bharadwaj