Student evaluation of teaching has been a valuable means of feedback, offering a potential contribution to the improvement of student satisfaction, learning outcomes, and faculty performance in higher education institutions (Serdyukova, Tatum, & Serdyukow, 2010). Its results are not only used for the purpose of developmental decisions but also and even more commonly employed for personnel decisions including hiring, tenure, promotion, and annual review (Gravestock & Gregor-Greenleaf, 2008). As a result, the validity and reliability of student evaluation to distinguish teaching effectiveness in higher education have been a major area of concern of several studies in educational research (e.g., Davidovitch, 2009; Heine  & Maddox, 2009; Spoooren & Dimitri, 2006).

Though current literature presents inconclusive findings regarding the trustworthiness of student ratings of courses (Zakka, 2009), it is still supported to be implemented in practice but cautiously considering that teacher effectiveness cannot be evaluated with a single method (Kulik & McKeachie, 1975; Wagenaar, 2005). One of the key aspects requiring attention in practice to improve the effectiveness of student evaluation of teaching is to ensure a reasonable response rate to evaluation survey, preventing results to be biased (Kherfi 2011; Nowell, Gale, & Handley, 2010). Online evaluation is particularly considered to pose a threat to this end because it is often associated with lower rate of response compared to traditional paper-pencil practices (Avery, Bryant, Mathios, Kang, & Bell, 2006; Dommeyer, Baum, & Hanna, 2004; Donovan, Mader, & Shinsky, 2007).

The college to be investigated in this study has been practicing online student evaluation of teaching since 2009, as well. Given that the response rate to online course evaluation form was declared to be unsatisfactory in School Administration Board Meeting in 2011, it seems that the university governance is in need of suggestions for increasing student participation. Consistent with this end, this study attempts to explore the reasons why students participate or not into online course evaluation. In a way, describing who are involved or not, it can also provide a means to evaluate the probable bias in the results. Overall, it is expected that the findings, hearing the voice of the students, can contribute to improvement of online practice of student evaluation of teaching, leading to solutions, not only valid for this particular case but also  for other higher education institutions across the Europe.

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