Explorance Blue: Student Rating of Teaching Instructor Feedback Dashboard Overview

Prior to changes in teaching and learning due to COVID-19, Student Rating of Teaching (SRT) was up to 70% paper-based. Remote instruction created the opportunity to transition to predominantly online submissions that simplifies the process for students and permits added functionality for instructors.

The eXplorance Blue platform has an intuitive Instructor Feedback Dashboard: An interactive interface through which instructors can explore results for their current SRTs and across courses. As of the May 2021 launch, the IFD includes all courses taught by an instructor since the current, standard SRT form was implemented in Fall 2020. 

Logging into the Explorance Blue Dashboard

  1. Go to srt.umn.edu/blue and login using your University of Minnesota Internet ID and password.
  2. Select View Instructor Feedback Dashboard on the left-hand side of the homepage.
    Explorance Blue home page. View Instructor Feedback dashboard highlighted.
  3. Use the Instructor Feedback Dashboard (IFD) to explore results for your current and previous SRTs.

Using the Instructor Feedback Dashboard

The Instructor Feedback Dashboard presents data using thematic categories. You can drill down to specific SRT questions and comments for a given course/semester to review results and identify themes. 

Initial Login View

The initial login view of the Instructor Feedback Dashboard provides a view of the Aspects of Teaching graphs. The Aspects of Teaching graphs show the averages of all instructor SRT items and all course SRT items.
Explorance Blue IFD, Aspects of teaching tab. Filter options on the left, sample instructor items and course items graphs.

Course Filters 

The course filters on the left-hand side of the page allow you to filter the Aspects of Teaching graphs and Courses data by:

  • ACAD_GROUP_DESCR: The College your courses are associated with.
    • Note: You can use this filter if you teach courses in more than one college 
  • ACAD_ORG_DESCR: The Department your courses are associated with
  • CATALOG_NBR: Your individual course number
  • SUBJECT: The course designator
    Explorance Blue Course filters. 

Courses Tab

The Courses tab provides you with an individual breakdown of your SRT results by course. The data is further broken down by SRT Instructor Items, and SRT Course Items.

Note: If part of the graph you are viewing is cut off, zoom in or out on your browser window.

  1. Select Courses. 
    • Note: Use the arrows next to the Term/Year on the left-hand side of the page to review previous semesters/courses.
      Explorance Blue, Instructor Feedback Dashboard, Courses tab with course feedback information displayed. Sample instructor items yield rating of 5.83/6, Course items rating 5.7/6. Fall 2020 selection highlighted on the left with browse arrows on either side.
  2. Click into a course to review individual course SRT results broken down by:
    • Overall Instructor Items
      Explorance Blue Individual Course SRT. Tabs Aspects of teaching (displayed with sample SRT questions and responses), Comments, Breakdown by student demographics.
    • Overall Course Items
      Sample Overall course items (rating 5.67/6) with individual questions and horizontal bar graph of student responses.
    • Individual SRT Items
      Explorance Blue IFD, Courses tab. Four sample individual SRT items with horizontal bar graphs ranging from Strongly Agree to Not Applicable, with student responses and percentages.
    • Open-ended comments
      Explorance Blue IFD, Courses tab. Sample Fall 2020 Course with open-ended comments and students text responses.
    • Breakdown by student demographics
      • Note: The University of Minnesota does not collect student demographic information on the SRT. If you select the Breakdown by student demographics tab you will see a blank loading screen.

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