Students` view points about priorities in teacher evaluation

Introduction. Using students' view points for teacher evaluation is a common method. But regardless of its abundant usage, research results indicate that students ideas about teachers is influenced by some factors which have not a close relation to the evaluation subject and is merely related to the teacher's specifications. Determining the views of students of different fields about priorities in teacher evaluation. Methods. A questionnaire consisted of 7 parts and 43 questions was used to gather the needed data. Questionnaires were distributed with the help of educational departments of colleges and were gathered by the same way. In each college one of the staff helped the researchers to explain the objectives of the study and the method for filling in the questionnaires for students. Results. Results indicated that the majority of students (85/2 %) selected "mastery of contents " as the most important priority in teacher evaluation. Also most of them (85/2 %) believed that" mastery of contents" was the most important priority in teacher evaluation in teaching skills,78/5% selected "having self esteem" in personal characteristics, 69/8 % selected "establishing an intimate relationship with students" in communication skills,36/9% selected " respecting the time of start and finish the class in respecting the educational principles and laws, and 34/2% selected " performing an exact and comprehensive exam at the end of the term "in evaluation skills. Also 33/3% of samples thought that the results of present evaluations were nearly conformed with the reality and 10/3 % of them thought that there was no conformity between the present evaluations and the reality. Conclusions. The present results indicate that, although students distinguish some very important factors for teacher evaluation, but all the things which are necessary for a good teacher based on the scientific criteria were not selected as the most important criteria by the students and this may cause a decrease in validity and reliability of the students' ratings.