Are Grades Inflated for Good Teaching Evaluations? Evidence from Bangladesh

Abstract

The hazard of excessive reliance on using student evaluations of teaching effectiveness, namely, teaching evaluations, has been found to be a contributing factor towards grade inflation. As performance evaluation of faculty members are largely dependent on these teaching evaluations, there is a significant incentive for course instructors to give higher, potentially inflated, grades to students in return for favorable teaching evaluations as positive reciprocity. The likelihood of grade inflation is further exacerbated for part-time and adjunct faculty members, who rely more on good teaching evaluations than their full-time compatriots. This study investigated the question of whether the use of teaching evaluations has been a contributing factor towards grade inflation at a certain private university in Bangladesh. Analyzing the data for 98,362 student evaluations of more than 3,653 course sections, taught by more than 350 faculty members, this study examined the relationship between teaching evaluation and average class grade for courses offered during Spring 2012, Summer 2012, and Fall 2012 semesters at this university. As a novel econometric analysis in such research, instrumental variable estimation is undertaken, whereby statistically significant results indicate a positive relationship between teaching evaluation and average class grade for courses, after controlling for latent variables, such as teaching quality and other independent variables. The conclusion that higher grades beget high evaluation scores regardless of teaching quality indicates grade inflation for ensuring good teaching evaluation.