Student Evals- delivery question

Anna Martinez and I just attended a session on Student Course Evaluations put on by OIM (Office of Information Management). They explained the various procedures for administrating this task in detail. One issue that came up in the meeting was that recently there have been a series of compromising situations in the university surrounding the administration of these evaluations. Faculty have coached students. Faculty have delivered the evals during an instructor paid pizza party. Students have openly coached fellow students in how to fill out the documents in a negative light. Students have filled out multiple highly negative evals. These and more issues have raised the question of how we safely and accurately deliver these evals in the classroom.

OIM and the Provost's Office representative present strongly recommend (and will probably require soon) that an outside party PROCTOR the administration of these evaluations. The goal is to have an unbiased representative of the College deliver the forms to the students, explain the instructions, watch over the assessment, and collect the results. They would rather the instructor not even come in contact with the forms and process until after grades have been delivered and student course evals have been returned to the department (college).

This is a radical break from our current method of delivery. I have always received these forms in my box for each course I'm teaching. At an appropriate date near or at semester's end I've taken time in my class where I've explained the instructions, asked a student in the course to act as a proctor, distributed the forms and left the room until the proctor had collected and taken a packet of the completed forms up to the 10th floor offices (Anna).

I've asked the Dean's Council to add this item to the agenda for discussion in that venue. We should find an outside proctor in the college for each course we teach- somehow and someway. I'll keep you informed of the progress on this matter that is important to each of us working in the classroom.

Any comments or suggestions on how to handle this matter?