High-Resolution Course Feedback
coursefeedback.org
What it is
High-Resolution Course Feedback (HRCF) is a free web service that gives instructors weekly anonymous student feedback about class mood. Each week it randomly selects students to provide feedback, with the aim of gathering representative responses while reducing survey fatigue. Students receive survey requests in their inboxes through unique links. Four default questions ask what students liked, what remains confusing, what the teaching team should know, and for a course experience rating on a five-point scale. Instructors can add questions for topics they want to address that week. Surveys open Monday at noon PT, reminders go out Thursday at noon PT, and the instructor digest arrives Sunday at 4pm PT. The digest includes participation rates, responses grouped by question with visualizations, and a graph showing class mood over time. HRCF says it does not track which student submitted which feedback. To get started, users create an account with an institutional email, submit a course survey form, and send a school profile page and generated course ID for review. A roster, custom questions, and admin list can be prepared while approval is pending.
Spec sheet
- What it does
- High-Resolution Course Feedback collects anonymous, recurring student feedback so instructors can adjust an active course.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Purpose
- HRCF provides weekly anonymous student feedback to help instructors understand class mood and adjust teaching.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Audience
- The site describes the service as built for educators and invites instructors to use it for course feedback.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- 2026 study sample
- A 2026 observational study examined 103 HRCF course offerings, 42 computer-science courses, and 24,216 enrollments across four years.Read 15 Oct 2026 · arxiv.org
- Account onboarding
- Getting started requires an account created with an institutional email address.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Anonymity
- The site says each student receives a unique, secure response link and that it does not track which student provided which feedback.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Anonymous access
- Students receive anonymous survey requests directly in their email inboxes.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Authentication
- The reference configuration supports Firebase email authentication and Google OAuth, with institution-specific OAuth settings recommended.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Class sentiment
- Weekly mood graphs show how reported class sentiment changes over time.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Course approval
- Users submit a school profile page and generated course ID for review and approval of a course survey.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Course settings
- The course settings page manages weekly custom questions, student rosters, and course staff.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Custom questions
- Instructors can add topic-specific questions each week.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Default question 1
- The standard survey asks students what they have liked about the course so far.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Default question 2
- The standard survey asks whether anything from class remains confusing.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Default question 3
- The standard survey asks whether there is anything the teaching team should know.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Default question 4
- The standard survey asks students to rate their weekly course experience on a five-point scale.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Default questions
- Surveys include four default questions about what students liked, what remains confusing, what the teaching team should know, and a five-point course experience rating.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Digest participation metric
- The digest reports the number of students surveyed and the number of responses received.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Digest response collection
- Responses are grouped by question and accompanied by visualizations.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Digest timing
- Instructors receive the weekly feedback digest Sunday at 4 p.m. Pacific Time.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Getting started
- Users create an account with an institutional email, submit a course survey form, and send a school profile page and generated course ID for review and approval.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Instructor dashboard
- The repository describes an instructor dashboard for requesting surveys and managing approved surveys.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Instructor interviews
- The original study interviewed nine instructors about their experiences using HRCF.Read 15 Oct 2026 · web.stanford.edu
- Limit: first-use effects
- The 2026 study found no measurable change in average student ratings after first-time HRCF use.Read 15 Oct 2026 · arxiv.org
- Limit: large classes
- The 2026 study found no statistically significant association for courses enrolling 250 or more students.Read 15 Oct 2026 · arxiv.org
- Limit: scope of improvement
- Repeated use was associated with small learning-related rating gains in courses below 250 students, but not with instructional-quality or course-organization ratings.Read 15 Oct 2026 · arxiv.org
- Limit: survey fatigue
- The 2026 study reports that interviewed students generally did not want to complete surveys every week because they expected to tire of them.Read 15 Oct 2026 · arxiv.org
- Open-source status
- The published research describes HRCF as an open-source student feedback mechanism.Read 15 Oct 2026 · web.stanford.edu
- Original deployment
- The 2023 study deployed HRCF in 31 college courses involving 6,835 enrolled students.Read 15 Oct 2026 · web.stanford.edu
- Privacy claim
- The site says each student uses a unique secure link and that the system does not track which student submitted feedback.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Recent scale claim
- Yunsung Kim's site says HRCF had been used in more than 120 Stanford courses representing over 31,000 cumulative enrollments.Read 15 Oct 2026 · yunsungkim.com
- Reminder timing
- Reminder emails are sent Thursday at noon Pacific Time to students who have not responded.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Research publication
- The original HRCF paper was published in the ACM Learning@Scale 2023 proceedings, pages 81–91.Read 15 Oct 2026 · researchr.org
- Sampling design
- The baseline design surveys each student exactly twice during randomly selected weeks of a term.Read 15 Oct 2026 · web.stanford.edu
- Scheduling requirement
- The reference deployment expects monday.py, thursday.py, and sunday.py to be run on the relevant weekdays, typically through a scheduler such as cron.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Self-hosting setup
- The repository requires operators to provide Firebase settings, email credentials, administrator addresses, and student email-domain configuration.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Server automation
- Server scripts schedule surveys, populate databases, send emails, approve surveys, and set default questions.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Setup while awaiting approval
- While a course survey is under review, users can set up the course roster, custom questions, and admin list.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Setup while pending
- Roster, custom questions, and administrator settings can be configured while approval is pending.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Smart sampling
- The system randomly selects students each week to obtain representative input while reducing survey fatigue.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Student access
- Anonymous survey requests are sent directly to students’ inboxes through unique survey links.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Student feedback page
- The repository includes a feedback page where each student can submit responses anonymously.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Survey opening
- The weekly survey opens Monday at noon Pacific Time.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Survey schedule
- Surveys open Monday at noon PT, reminders go out Thursday at noon PT, and instructors receive a digest Sunday at 4pm PT.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Timely feedback
- Weekly feedback is intended to let instructors respond to course issues during the term.Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
- Web stack
- The public repository says the web app uses React and Cloud Firestore.Read 15 Oct 2026 · github.com
- Weekly digest
- The digest includes participation rates, responses organized by question with visualizations, and a class mood graph showing sentiment over time.Read 7 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
Plans and prices
Free course survey Free course survey · course roster · custom questions · admin list Read 15 Oct 2026 · coursefeedback.org
Strong points and limits
Strong points
- Weekly randomly selected feedback
- Instructors can add custom questions
- Digest includes participation and visualizations
- Free course survey plan
Limits
- Requires an institutional email to get started
- Course and school details require review and approval
Who it suits
HRCF is for educators who want recurring anonymous student feedback and a view of class mood over time. Instructors can add questions to focus a weekly survey on particular topics.
Verdict
HRCF gives instructors a regular feedback cycle with a defined survey schedule and a weekly digest. Getting a course underway involves submitting information for review, though setup can continue while approval is pending.
Where Specifiction places it
- Course Evaluation Software#7 of 218.3
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