1. How is my privacy protected?
2. Who can see what results?
3. Can I be required to take a survey? Can I be rewarded?
4. What is CIOS and why should I participate?
5. How many of these email reminders will I continue to receive?
6. How do I log in?
7. How do I complete a survey?
8. Why does the survey look different?
9. Can I write as much as I want in the comment box?
10. Do I have to answer each question on the survey?
11. What if there is more than one instructor for a course?
12. What is TAOS and how is it different from CIOS?
13. Who can I contact about additional questions or suggestions or technical trouble?

1. How is my privacy protected?

Your responses to the CIOS and TAOS surveys are confidential. The Office of Academic Effectiveness takes student privacy seriously.

The data used for the CIOS and TAOS are stored by the vendor, SmartEvals, hosted by Gap Technologies,Inc.  SmartEvals also takes measures toward privacy protection according to its privacy policy.  See here: Smart Evals Privacy Policy

Back to Top

2. Who can see what results? 

Back to Top

3. Can I be required to take a survey? Can I be rewarded?

A student may not be coerced in any way to take the survey. The survey's integrity relies on voluntary responses. So, while instructors are allowed to give incentives and rewards for survey completion, they should not ask for proof of completion. Instructors can login to the system to monitor current overall completion rates through Digital Measures, but they do not see whether individual students have completed the survey.

Thus, all incentives or rewards must be given to the class as a whole, regardless of whether or not individual students complete the survey.

If you feel you are being forced to take the survey, or forced to individually identify yourself as having taken the survey, then you should contact the Office of Academic Effectiveness so that we can communicate with your instructor and/or the appropriate administrative personnel.

Back to Top

4. What is CIOS and why should I participate?

The Course-Instructor Opinion Survey is a tool that we use to provide feedback for instructors, administrators, and, most importantly, students. Opinion surveys are important tools for institutions of higher learning, as:

• Instructors use the survey information to help improve teaching and learning in their courses
• Administrators use the survey information for teaching assignments, to support other decisions regarding teaching and learning at GT, and as part of promotion and tenure decisions
• Students use the survey to voice their opinion about the efficacy of courses or instructors and use that compiled survey information to view ratings of instructors in past terms when making decisions for registration, etc.

For more information about CIOS, please visit the Main Page.

For more information about why you should complete your surveys, please see this brief presentation.

If you are feeling as though you have been filling out there surveys for years without seeing results, please first note that change is sometimes slow. However, the only way you can expect a faculty member to change is to give feedback, so please continue to fill out your surveys. Further, many faculty, but not all, do regularly make changes based upon their CIOS results, and these surveys are used for more than just an opportunity for students to voice their opinion; you and your fellow students can access survey results for selected courses when planning for registration via the SGA Course Critique website, and CIOS makes a difference when administrators are making teaching assignments and promotion or tenure decisions. Such decisions and why they are made may not always be made known to students, but they do happen and your input has direct influence on that process.

Back to Top

5. How many of these email reminders will I continue to receive?

SmartEvals, the vendor that administers our CIOS and TAOS, automatically sends out emails at the opening of the survey period, and every 2-4 days thereafter depending upon survey length. If you have courses that fall under different survey periods, you may receive emails regarding each survey period. You will stop receiving these emails once you have completed all of your surveys. To check whether you have completed all of your surveys, simply login to SmartEvals and look on the main page; it will either display surveys you need to complete or note that you have completed all of your surveys for this survey period.

Back to Top

6. How do I log in?

The student login page may be accessed through the following link: http://gatech.smartevals.com Your login and password is your GT account and password. This is the same login and password used for Mail, T-square, and other GT services.

Back to Top

7. How do I complete a survey?

You would first need to log in. The survey contains several multiple-choice questions, for which you select the appropriate radio button, and several free-form, open ended questions. Additionally, there are spaces for comments after each survey section and the course as a whole if you like. All questions and comments are optional. Once you have completed a survey, click the SUBMIT button at the bottom of the page. This will process and transmit your survey.

If you have additional surveys that need to be completed, you will be asked to do them at this point.

Back to Top

8. Why does the survey look different?

If you are familiar with the old CIOS system, then you may have noticed that the CIOS runs through a different system now and has some small differences in functionality. The main purposes for this change were to increase the usefulness of your feedback for both instructors and administrators, to improve the user interface, to allow for flexibility for when we implement a survey period and how many different survey periods we could implement, and so that we could implement a coordinating TAOS for teaching assistants.

For more information about the history of CIOS visit the History Page.

Back to Top

9. Can I write as much as I want in the comment box?

Yes.

The new system we've implemented as of the Summer of 2014 includes an improved user interface that allows for unlimited characters within the comment boxes. If you are familiar with the old CIOS system, then you may recall that at one time CIOS comments were limited to a set character limit per comment box. Now, however, you may say as much or as little as you like. As before, comments are completely optional.

If you do choose to comment, be sure you put the comments in the appropriate boxes. The comments are for you to tell the instructor your direct opinion. Instructors can see the comments you provide concerning the course, instructor, and overall. Administrators (department chairs, deans, etc.) will only see numerical responses. The Office of Academic Effectiveness personnel can read the regular comments you provide concerning the course, instructor(s), and overall.

Back to Top

10. Do I have to answer each question on the survey?

No. Just as with the comments section, the questions are all optional, so you can skip questions or select N/A, whichever you prefer. However, you must click the submit button for your responses to be stored in the system.

Back to Top

11. What if there is more than one instructor for a course?

With the current system, you will have only one survey per course, but in multiple instructor courses, you will have separate questions for each instructor of that course within that one survey. As with any other questions or comments, questions concerning any or all instructors for a course are completely optional.

Back to Top

12. What is TAOS and how is it different from CIOS?

TAOS is the Teaching Assistant Opinion Survey (TAOS) and is an instrument designed specifically to collect data related to student perceptions of Teaching Assistants at Georgia Tech. The TAOS survey questions about TAs are somewhat comparable to the CIOS survey questions about regular instructors. Each instructor and TA has their own section of the survey. We implemented TAOS so that students could provide feedback to the departments and the Institute about Teaching Assistant effectiveness, to provide TAs with feedback to improve future performance, and to provide evidence of TA teaching effectiveness in general. For students and TAs in participating departments, all user interfaces and functionalities will operate in the same manner as described for CIOS.

Back to Top

13. Who can I contact about additional questions or suggestions or technical trouble?

Helpdesk, troubleshooting:
Email: cioshelp@gatech.edu
Phone: 404-385-1292