How to share constructive feedback to your course instructors

Giving feedback isn’t always easy. As you head through the final days of the term, you might be reflecting on your learning experiences in your courses—what you learned, what you might change, and what you think could improve it in the future.

Feedback like this is incredibly useful, not just for your course instructor but to help improve courses for future students. It’s also the focus of your course feedback surveys, which are sent out near the end of the term. If you’ve struggled in how to frame your experience in a constructive way, we’ve got some tips below to make it useful for everyone.

• Use concrete examples. Specific points about your own experience can help a course instructor understand your perspective of the class.
• Say more, not less. Explain what worked for you in the class design, or what you thought needed improvement.
• Be specific. Give feedback on course materials, with examples and specific points for the instructor to consider.

Want to see it in action?

Before: Great class!
After: The way you connected concepts to the real-world helped me understand.

Before: This course sucked.
After: It would be helpful to have the reading material earlier – I didn’t have enough time to prep.

Before: You talk too much.
After: There wasn’t an opportunity for the groups to share our thoughts and findings. This was disappointing after so much hard work.

Before: Best teacher ever!
After: The combination of research, discussion and field work was exciting and challenging.