Management Development

SET Project: Student Evaluations of Teaching, Measuring and Enhancing Course Quality and Teaching Quality

This research conducted by Ad Scheepers, SET Project: Student Evaluations of Teaching, Measuring and Enhancing Course Quality and Teaching Quality, shows that student evaluation should be viewed as a process, as a cycle. One of the important steps in this cycle is the interpretation of the data, and that obviously depends on the aim identified when constructing the instrument. This can go from improving the teaching, quality assurance or appraising teachers.

The literature review allowed to pull out some interesting recommendations on each of the SET process stages. Most of the previous studies do not focus on the whole SET process but are fragmented. The main concerns centred around reliability, validity, and bias.

During the field study, current practices were studied in 50 European and non-European business schools for the different SET process stages. The main conclusions on establishing a good practice are:

  • Use a multidimensional instrument for assessing teaching effectiveness and quality rather than one global measure.
  • Do not make the questionnaire too complicated and use core dimensions and a minimal number of items per dimension to guarantee reliability. This will also increase response rates.
  • Check reliability regularly and systematically. This will also counter bias.
  • Response rates are a big concern, but it does not have to be problematic. Either the sample should be sufficiently representative or SET should be made mandatory and an integral part of a course or module.
  • When SET is used for HR purposes, such as tenure and promotion, additional sources of information should be available and used.
  • The quality of SET will greatly improve if SET is seen as a process with linked, coherent stages, and when it forms a closed loop. One ‘actor’ should be appointed as accountable for the whole process.

The findings of the research as well as full project report are noted in the recent project report.

See more EQUAL supported projects here and do not hesitate to contact us regarding suggestions of important topics or questions related to quality and business education.

Project: Entrepreneurship Education in Business Schools – France

The Entrepreneurship Education in Business Schools: Best practices and recommendations project aims to address the gap between the growing number of entrepreneurship initiatives in Business Schools in Europe and the lack of guidance on how to support this type of education. In addition, it attempts to promote processes of creative research and innovation that must be the base of the future of business education. Among others, the main goal of this project is to provide guidelines for business schools on improving entrepreneurship education.

The first phase of the project, led by Chartered ABS and Asociación Española de Escuelas de Dirección de Empresa (AEEDE), covered literature review, the methodology of the research, and focused on Spain. The second phase is now presenting the research on French Business Schools, which was led by Chapitre des Écoles de Management of Cenferénce des Grandes Écoles (CGE). It looks into the practices and methods of the Entrepreneurship education in three business schools in France: South Champagne Business School (SCBS), EDC de Paris, and Toulouse Business School (TBS). The methodology is based on a qualitative approach, including secondary data collection and qualitative interviews with entrepreneurship managers from the Business Schools.

The findings of the research as well as recommendations for entrepreneurship education are noted in the recent project report.

To better understand the entrepreneurship education practices in Europe, currently, the third part of the project addressing Business Schools in Italy is ongoing under the lead of Associazione Italiana per la Formazione Manageriale (ASFOR).

See more EQUAL supported projects here and do not hesitate to contact us regarding suggestions of important topics or questions related to quality and business education.

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