This study explores how university professors and students understand the evaluation of teaching quality and what they believe these evaluations should achieve. Based on interviews with 21 professors and group interviews with 33 students from seven degree programmes at a Chilean university, the study shows that teaching evaluation is most useful when it goes beyond standard questionnaires and takes account of the specific teaching context. Professors and students agreed that evaluations should consider how well teachers adapt their teaching to different subjects and student groups, how they interact with students, and the level of commitment and professionalism they demonstrate. The findings also show that students often see teaching evaluation as a bureaucratic requirement rather than as a meaningful process for improving teaching.