Know Your Students

Know Your Students (KYS) is a web application developed to help instructors plan and execute their courses, achieve greater equity of learning and grades, and improve the inclusiveness of large classes. KYS presents aggregate student demographics and academic data at the course level as well as student testimonials about their background and experience at UC Davis. It also provides ways to survey students in a course, examine inequities at the assignment level, and reflect on the language used in recorded lectures.

We hope, at the very least, the information presented in KYS will inspire empathy, and ideally will motivate and help guide course change efforts that improve overall student learning and equity. We want to hear about the ways instructors are using KYS to inform their teaching. 

All users only have access to the courses they have taught. Any instructor who would like access to the full set of charts and visualizations showing demographic information about the students you teach as well as historical grade gaps, can schedule a consultation with the developers and education specialists at CEE by submitting a request for "Know Your Students Additional Access" (click here to schedule a consultation).

KYS is not for department chairs, deans, administrators, other instructors, or anyone else to measure or judge performance. 

In the news

Web App Helps Instructors Know Large Classes

Purpose To Address Inequities in Learning

"Before instruction begins this fall, Laci Gerhart will give herself a head start in meeting the more than 900 students she will teach in two sections of an introductory biology course.

The associate professor of teaching in the Department of Evolution and Ecology will review her classes in Know Your Students, or KYS, a campus-grown tool that offers UC Davis instructors de-identified data on their students ..." 

Read the full feature by Julia Ann Easley | September 10, 2024

Contact

Development of KYS is driven by the feedback we receive from instructors. If you have an idea for a new chart or tool that you would like to see added to KYS please contact Matt Steinwachs at mksteinwachs@ucdavis.edu. We look forward to working with you!