The Undergraduate Student Government Academic Assembly said Monday that the Student Rating of Teaching Effectiveness (SRTE) surveys will be put online for two colleges in the fall.

The idea has already been tested in pilot programs for biology and integrative arts classes, and Jeff Markowitz, Council of Commonwealth Student Government academic affairs director, said the surveys would be put online for an undetermined Commonwealth Campus and a University Park college in fall 2005.

One reason for switching the SRTEs to an online format is a hope that it will increase the form's accessibility to students, he said.

The SRTE is a survey of confidential and private information concerning professors and class content, but an additional short-answer portion of the SRTE could also be used to help students decide whether to schedule a course with a specific professor.

Smeal College of Business Rep. Leslie Hubbard said she would like to know what departments do with the SRTEs after students complete them.

"I feel like I'm filling out these forms for nothing," Hubbard said.

The results from the SRTEs are considered confidential, but changes have been made due to SRTEs results, Assembly Adviser Don Leslie said.

"They do take what the students say about these classes seriously," Leslie said.

"Those things do happen, you just don't see them because they're behind the scenes," he added.

By posting the SRTE forms online, there is a risk that people would fail to fill them out, Assembly Vice President of Operations Brad Hoagland said.

The suggestion of making the SRTEs longer is another concern, he said.

"One of the issues of putting the SRTEs online is, how do you get students to fill them out in the first place?" Hoagland said. "Making them longer would only make this harder."

Tammy Rishel, vice president of programming, said students could at least find out professor ratings.

"More people will look to find out if they liked a professor or not," Rishel said.

Hoagland said an alternative could be to improve other course evaluation forums. There is currently a course evaluation on www.dailyjolt.com, but Hoagland suggested adopting a new system that more people may use.

Smeal College of Business Faculty Sen. Jeff Kranzel said professors for courses that offer only one section or professor could be held to a higher standard if student feedback is available.

"You as students have a voice, and you can go to your department head and say, 'I have a problem,' " Leslie said. "Part of the SRTE process is to get good at teaching. The training in teaching occurs in the classroom."

Some students said they would rather have an online SRTE.

Amy Schwartz (senior-telecommunications) said an online version is better because at the end of the semester, students may not feel like filling them out during class.

Katelyn Weeks (senior-telecommunications) said she thinks more people will do the SRTEs online because they will have more time to think about the questions.

But Nick Allgyer (sophomore-secondary education) said SRTEs do not accurately represent students' feelings toward a professor.

"They don't represent the class in a good way, even if you like the teacher," Allgyer said.

"There is not enough criteria," he added.

Collegian staff writer Bethany Fehlinger contributed to this report.