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Faculty VI - Planning Building Environment

Quality in Study and Teaching

General information

Faculty VI - Planning Building Environment uses the following instruments to evaluate its teaching and degree programs:

  • Course evaluations: Regularly evaluating courses is key to ensuring high-quality teaching. The academic chairs in Faculty VI evaluate their courses every three semesters.
  • Award for Teaching: Faculty VI honors the work of instructors who demonstrate outstanding and exemplary teaching. Endowed with 5,000 euros, this prize for teaching is awarded every two years.
  • Degree program evaluation: Upon request, the Office of Academic and Student Affairs in Faculty VI develops standardized degree program surveys and conducts group discussions with students and instructors from select degree programs. This allows the views of students and instructors to be recorded and assessed and the causes of potential problems to be identified. The results of these evaluations can serve, for example, as the foundation of any changes to degree programs.
  • Accreditation: TU Berlin has system accreditation and ensures the quality of its degree programs through regular internal reviews.

You can learn more about the framework conditions and how evaluations help maintain quality standards in the Quality Management Regulations (QMO).

Contact

Pia Wagner-Schelewsky

Advisor for the Appointment Strategy, Research and Evaluations

evaluation@fak6.tu-berlin.de

030 314-28705

Room A 103

Course evaluations

News

The course evaluation for the summer semester 2023 has been completed, 171 courses were evaluated. 109 instructors and their teams received feedback from a total of 959 completed questionnaires. In the winter semester 2022/2023, 118 instructors registered a total of 186 courses for evaluation and were able to collect feedback from 1,820 completed questionnaires.

Course evaluations for winter semester 2023/2024 are scheduled to take place from 15 to 26 January 2024. One third of our academic chairs are required to be evaluated during this period. However, academic chairs not scheduled for evaluation are also invited to participate.

Frequency

In Faculty VI, each academic chair must evaluate its courses at least every three semesters.

Here you’ll find the current evaluation schedule for Faculty VI - Planning Building Environment.

Survey instruments

Different evaluation instruments lend themselves to different types of courses. Faculty VI recommends using a variety of instruments:

  • We recommend independently organizing evaluations for smaller courses (i.e. expected response rate is less than five students). TU Berlin’s Strategic Controlling has provided information about possible feedback instruments.
  • An online questionnaire is available for larger courses. This is organized and evaluated by the Faculty’s Office of Academic and Student Affairs. Please also note: To ensure data privacy, only those surveys with a response rate of at least five or more students can be evaluated.
  • An online questionnaire has been available for practical and project formats since winter semester 2021/22. The questions and wording in this questionnaire take the special features of these formats into consideration. This questionnaire is used in all courses registered as practical/project formats. We welcome any recommendations for improvement. Please also note: Data privacy also applies to this format. Only those surveys with a response rate of at least five or more students can be evaluated.

Organization, implementation, evaluation

  • TU Berlin’s Evaluation Regulations recommend instructors collect student feedback after about two thirds of a course to allow time to discuss the results together and implement these for the remainder of the course. The Office of Academic and Student Affairs invites its academic chairs to an evaluation every three semesters and provides them with survey instruments.
  • Recommended procedure for standardized online surveys: Instructors receive a link for each questionnaire which they can then share with students (e.g. on ISIS or via email). Please inform students that participation is voluntary. The responses are automatically recorded and evaluated in the EvaSys evaluation software. Instructors receive their results in a report with data graphs. Upon request, the dataset can also be provided.
  • After the survey, instructors and students should discuss the results together in class and if possible or necessary, the feedback should be implemented.

Registering for course evaluations

Instructors register for course evaluations using an online form. All instructors will receive detailed information on this by e-mail.

Evaluation results

Results of current course evaluations are made available to registered users (Login via TU Portal).

Award for Teaching

Faculty VI’s award for teaching recognizes outstanding and exemplary teaching as well as exceptional commitment and dedication to students. It is endowed with a total of 5,000 euros and - after a pandemic-related interruption - will again be awarded every two years starting in 2023. During the nomination period, all faculty members are invited to nominate instructors. Nominations are reviewed by a jury and the recipients announced by the faculty board.

Thank you to all recipients for your dedication and congratulations on this recognition!

Faculty award recipients

2019

  • Prof. Dr. Stefan Heiland (Department of Landscape Planning and Development)
  • Dr. Isabell Stamm (Chair of Sociology of Organizations)
  • Lukas Herkt und Paul Walter (Chair of Design and Typology)

2017

  • Prof. Dr. Matthias Barjenbruch and team (Department of Urban Water Management)
  • Dr. Leonie Fischer (Chair of Ecosystem Science/Plant Ecology)
  • André Prziwarzinski (Chair of Conceptual and Structural Design)

2015

  • Prof. Dr. Nina Baur (Chair of Methods of Social Research)
  • Prof. Dr. Martina Löw (Chair of Sociology and Planning of Architecture)
  • Gerhard König (Chair of Methods of Geoinformation Science)

2013

  • Prof. Dr. Gabriele Dolff-Bonekämper (Chair of Heritage Conservation)
  • Dr. Sascha Buchholz (Chair of Ecosystem Science and Plant Ecology)
  • Dr. Traugott Scheytt (Chair of Hydrogeology)

Degree program evaluation

Upon request, the Office of Academic and Student Affairs can develop standardized degree program questionnaires to evaluate individual degree programs. Tailored questionnaires (either online or as hard copies) allow the views of students and instructors to be recorded and later used, for example, to reform degree programs. In addition to drafting the questionnaire and programming it in EvaSys, the Office of Academic and Student Affairs is responsible for organizing, conducting, and evaluating the survey.

Upon request, it can also conduct group discussions about teaching in Faculty VI’s degree programs with students and instructors. Using guidelines, each group first discusses the positive and negative aspects of its degree program (in a safe space). These discussions are recorded, transcribed, and evaluated (qualitative content analysis). The aim is to present any problems in detail, examine the reasons, and reconstruct participants’ perspectives. This qualitative approach is not representative (a discussion group comprises 6-8 persons). However, the level of detail provides input for joint discussions and the further development of the degree program.

Accreditation

TU Berlin has system accreditation, meaning it can evaluate its degree programs using its own quality objectives. All degree programs undergo an internal review procedure. Upon successful completion, they are registered as accredited with the Accreditation Council. The Office of Academic and Student Affairs assists with the degree programs in Faculty VI. Strategic Controlling provides an overview of the degree program evaluation procedure as well as a current review schedule.