Washington University is using online course evaluations as a new tool to monitor academic integrity on campus.

Course evaluations now include two questions on academic integrity instead of asking students to report on their expected grade for the course.

According to administrators, these changes were not made in response to changes observed in student conduct, but rather represent an attempt to make course evaluations easier to use and more informative for students and professors.

“It’s really just a matter of attempting to streamline the process to make it easier for students, to really encourage that participation. We’re going to look at revising [it] again in the spring based on some feedback,” Jennifer Kohl, dean of the College of Arts & Sciences, said. “[There are] no real problems or anything, [we’re] just gathering information.”

A longer, University-wide survey about academic integrity was sent out to the student body earlier this year. The survey, given approximately every five years, is part of Rutgers University research that involves 30 colleges nationwide.

Dean Dirk Killen, a member of the Academic Integrity Board, said the board chose to include questions about academic integrity on course evaluations in hopes of receiving a greater number of responses.

He said while only 10 to 15 percent of students responded to the longer, University-wide survey between 50 and 75 percent typically fill out course evaluations.

“[It] seems like it would [give us] a better picture, just to supplement that information,” Killen said.

He noted that the Rutgers survey has generally shown a high consistency in student attitudes and behaviors regarding academic integrity over the past 20 years, and that the data is not particularly alarming.

“The only thing that came out of the survey that was a little different from years past is that there was a greater concern about student use of back files,” Killen said. “These are just student responses, so this doesn’t mean that there is evidence that that happened, but students are more concerned about it. They are responding to something that they are aware of, that they see.”

Online course evaluations have been a resource available to students and faculty at the University since 2004.

They provide professors with anonymous feedback from their students, and give students both ratings for professors and courses and the opportunity to comment on their own experiences.

Many students said they fill out at least some of their course evaluations, especially for courses where they feel their feedback is more meaningful.

“I don’t fill them out for every class. I do for smaller classes when the professor says to, just because there aren’t as many students. I’m a social loafer in large classes I guess,” senior Courtney LeCompte said.

Freshman David Wang approaches evaluations similarly.

“This is my first semester, but I just fill out the evals for professors who ask me to. It’s not too bad. It takes a few minutes,” he said.

Kohl said that evaluations are important to building and improving the University community, and hopes that making changes to course evaluations in response to student feedback will help to increase student participation.

“The biggest [task] that we have from the administrative side is looking for ways to get students engaged, to get students to participate, to give their feedback to make a difference,” she said. “As we look at the Wash. U. community and we look at the ways that we can make improvements to course evaluations, we’re always looking for opportunities and avenues to get students engaged so that we can get more participation, because the more participation…the greater impact it has.”