Student's assessment

The new guidelines for the teaching evaluation forms, approved by the responsible units in the last hearing in October 2015, are available at this link.

From the academic year 2013/14, the University collects the student and instructor evaluations exclusively through an online procedure. Following the ANVUR indications, it uses the templates contained in the guidelines from 06/11/2013. The web application, available after login on the student and instructor portal, allows to formulate the evaluation in a few clicks and in multiple sessions. Upon registration, second- and upper-year students are required to fill in a course-of-studies sinopsis and an analysis form for each exam they have passed in the previous year.

As soon as two thirds of the programmed lecture calendar is completed (student form and instructor form) and up until the first exam session (instructor form), students and instructors are requested to fill in the evaluation form for the courses taken and taught, respectively. It is mandatory that all students complete each teaching evaluation before they take the corresponding exam. In the case of instructors, filling in the forms by the deadline is their institutional duty.

Upon login, students will see the courses whose exams they have not yet passed, based on their courseplan, their year, and their study career; before filling the teaching evaluation, each student must declare (under their own responsibility) whether they have attended at least 50% of the lectures; in either case, the student will be able to express his or her opinion on the teaching activities carried out by the University.

The questionnaire is made of 26 questions: 11 demographic ones, describing the student, and 15 evaluation ones, for the specific course; the latter ones will follow the ministry format.

Evaluation reports are processed for each course, starting from a minimum of 10 evaluation forms, to guarantee student anonymity and the statistical significance of the expressed evaluations; evaluations for those courses which collect less than 10 forms are used in the overall evaluation of the course of studies. At the end of the process, and consistently with the topics and timeframes established by ANVUR, the University distributes a report summary to the interested parties (instructors, head of course programs, department heads), which are published in a dedicated web page and accessible through the University portal for maximum diffusion.

The results are also fundamental information and analysis tools when the Quality Ensurance Group for each course of study drafts the evaluation report.

The evaluation reports on teaching and facilities for the academic year 2013/14 are all (or mostly) positive (link). For individual courses, the evaluation of clarity, interest generated by the instructor for the taught discipline, and the credit-to-courseload ratio is overall good: on average, the sum of “yes” and “more yes than no” is about 78%; in these fields, only one or two courses display critically low scores. The feedback on the availability and punctuality of instructors is excellent.

In the acadamic year 2014/15 (link), the evaluations on teaching and facilities essentially confirm those for the previous year. The evaluations on clarity and interest have slightly improved (to 80%). Availability and punctuality of instructors is still rated excellent. The course breakdown reflects these aspects, but keeps on showing issues correlated to certain courses.

The collection of the opinions of graduating students on the overall course of study is based on forms administered by AlmaLaurea.

The informations available from the AlmaLaurea questionnaire from 2013 include the answers of 23 graduates from the Master’s program. The average age at graduation is 26.7 years, the average grade 110. The average duration of the studies is 2.7 years. 26.1% has spent a study period abroad and 17.4% has prepared a substantial portion of their thesis abroad. The average number of months dedicated to the thesis was 9.3. 86.9% is overall satisfied with the degree program (39.1% definitely and 47.8% more satisfied than not), and with the interaction with the faculty (13% definitely and 73.9% more satisfied than not). 78.3% states that the courseload was sustainable (17.4% definitely and 60.9% more yes than no). 82.6% states that would sign up for the same course of study in the same University.

The AlmaLaurea questionnaire from 2014 is based on the answers of 17 graduates from the Master’s program. The average age at graduation is 26.2, the average grade 109.7. The average program duration is 2.9 years. 41.2% has spent a study period abroad, whilst 35.3% prepared a substantial part of their thesis abroad. The average number of months dedicated to the thesis was 10.9. 41.2% of students obtained scholarships. 76.4% is overall satisfied with the degree program (17.1% definitely and 58.8% more satisfied than not), and 76.5% with the interaction with the faculty (11.8% definitely and 64.7% more satisfied than not). 70.6% states that the courseload was sustainable (11.8% definitely and 58.8% more yes than no). 64.7% states that would sign up for the same course of study in the same University.