Rather than bemoaning the hidebound, luddite, or traditionalist nature of faculty, anyone who wants to encourage innovative teaching and scholarship at their college or university should instead ask, what are the institutional barriers to experimentation here, and how might they be lowered? The new course evaluation policy is simple: all faculty members who have completed two full years of teaching will have the option of designating one course every two years as "course response form-optional." In such courses, the standard evaluations will be distributed to students, and collected, but returned to the instructor only (who may then stipulate whether or not they should be included in their central administrative files). Like the student who chooses to take a particular course pass/fail in order to mitigate his or her fear of exploring unknown territory, an instructor who is trying something new now has the option of teaching an "ungraded" course.
http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2012/08/06/essay-urging-new-option-faculty-course-evaluations
