Effects of grading leniency and low workload on students' evaluations of teaching: Popular myth, bias, validity, or innocent bystanders?

Two studies debunk popular myths that student evaluations of teaching (SETs ) are substantially biased by low workload and grading leniency. A workload bias is untenable because the workload-SET relation is positive. The small grade-SET relation (.20 for overall ratings) has many well-supported expla nations that do not involve bias. Some SET factors (e.g., Organization, Ent husiasm) are unrelated to grades, and the highest relation is with Learning (.30), implying valid teaching effects rather than bias. Structural equati on models confirmed that perceived learning and prior characteristics (cour se level, prior subject interest) account for much of the grade-SET relatio n. The relation is also nonlinear, so that high grades (sometimes misused a s a leniency measure) ate unrelated to SETs. Contrary to dire predictions b ased on bias claims, Workload, expected grades, and their relations with SE Ts were stable over 12 years.