TeacherReviews.com Forced Offline 664
MrCawfee writes "Dylan Greene's site Teacher Reviews which allows students to post reviews of their professors. The site was taken down because a professor complained about comments made against him, and threatened to sue. Here is an exerpt from his blog: 'Yesterday and tonight I talked with a professor who was extremely upset with what written about him on TeacherReviews. He had several inappropriate reviews that made unfounded accusations and inappropriate untruthful remarks such as calling him "Bipolar Paranoid Schitzophrenic."' You can read his blog here."
No more fun for me then.... (Score:3, Interesting)
1st Amendment? (Score:2, Interesting)
Not surprising (Score:5, Interesting)
This becomes especially easy if the students can't voice their discretions publically. I don't think a single university publically displays the stats of student reviews after a semester with a prof. The profs can complain all they want but in the long run it's the students who will suffer.
making student evaluations public (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Problem is... (Score:5, Interesting)
I can't think of a scenario in which someone's career could be ruined by a Slashdot troll.
Re:Ebay precedent? (Score:2, Interesting)
He is taking the safe route for now, and taken the whole thing down so he can review the whole situation.
Re:Problem is... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Other sites? (Score:3, Interesting)
Nobody did it. I think that says something about how much people respect him.
Re:Ebay precedent? (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think sites should be LIABLE for what people post, but because of the unique nature of the Internet, once something is posted on a site it's likely to stay there and be easily accessable, in ways past forms of communication weren't. That gives sites like Teacher Reviews, and even places like Slashdot, unique responsibility.
If I tell a friend that Mr. Example Teacher is an ass, word may or may not spread, and the comments may or may not be linked back to me. But it takes an active effort by many people for the comment to spread. And if it's not true, it will probably fizzle out. Even if it isn't true and does NOT fizzle out, rumors are very specific forms of communication that most people don't take serriously.
On the other hand, if I post a comment to Teacher Reviews, 30 seconds of my time has created something that may stay there for ever and ever. And, unlike rumors, there's no way for others to say, "I don't think this is true, but I heard that...." All the comments are posted as equals.
So I would say if something libelous is posted to a website, while the webmaster isn't responsible for the actual content, I would say they're responsible for removing it in a timely manner, once notified of the content.
Speaking of Teacher Reviews specifically, I think if a bad review of a teacher was posted (talks slow, bad assignments, boring) then Teacher Review does not have a responsibility to take it down. On the contrary, they have a responsibility to leave it up if they want to achieve their goals of a student-reviewed teacher database. But I would say labeling a teacher as a "Bipolar Paranoid Schitzophrenic" could be considered libelous. I don't think it's unreasonable that it be asked to be removed.
Bringing it back to Slashdot...
This site is in a very odd position, in that much of the postings here (for example, about SCO or Microsoft) could easily be considered as libel. But unlike Teacher Reviews, they're (usually) posted as jokes. And Slashdot has a moderation system and a reply system so posts that are blatently untrue get shouted down by more accurate responses.
I'd say Teacher Reviews, unfortunatly, took the only realistic course of action. They took the site down, and are taking time to regroup. I'd be sad if some of the suggested implimentations actually happen (hiding teacher reviews from Google, or non anonymous reviews) but I think things like emailing professors reviews or having a better process for review removeall are very reasonable.
All in all, I hope Teacher Reviews is able to continue. It's a great site and a very nifty idea.
-Trillian
PS I didn't find a way to work it gracefully into my post, but I think the teacher who threatened to sue, even after the review was removied, is an ass. I'll risk the possibility of getting Slashdot sued, and go so far as to say he sounds like one of those crazy Bipolar Paranoid Schitzophrenics you've been hearing so much about recently....
Re:Schools (Score:2, Interesting)
-Trillian
PS Would also like to use this as an opportunity to complain that their site didn't render correctly in Mozilla. Just me, or anyone else have this problem?
RIT Professor Evaluations (Score:3, Interesting)
We ended up exporting all of our comments (over 7000) to TeacherReviews. We figured they already survived one lawsuit, so they would be around longer than us.
Looks like we were wrong... the RIT only review site is still online, read-only though: http://professor.ritstuff.com [ritstuff.com] Username: pguest Password: pguest
RateMyProfessors (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Schools (Score:5, Interesting)
Well.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Disclaimer - The foregoing is only to be used for the purpose of discussion and should not be construed as legal advice related to any current or future problem, nor should it be relied upon by anyone without consulting a licensed attorney.
I guess I can kind of see both sides (Score:1, Interesting)
I'm a non-trad student. I've gone back to school after a long absence. I'm back not because I have to be, but because I want to be. As such, I actually look forward to classes again (heck, beats being at work...).
I've encountered some really, really bad instructors. Some who I beleieved were coasting through the class with as little effort as possible. Depending on how the instructor ran the class, their reviews on that site could be positive (easy class, I've heard of some giving all students A's or B's just for showing up) or negative (prof just doesn't seem to care about whether or not students get it).
At the same time, the best instructor I've EVER had is listed, and he was drilled hard. When I read the reviews, I realized why - the guy actually asked you to think. His programming examples couldn't be solved just by reading the book, you had to do some creative thinking and test things a bit on your own in order to make it work. I learned more in that class than in any other so far, but the guy's ratings don't look that great because the class is hard.
So on the one hand, the review site can be a very good feedback method for allowing you to see who you may or may not want to take classes under. But at the same time it doesn't appear that professors have any recourse on the site. Perhaps if there was somewhere that a professor could put up a bio, or a synopsis of his teaching methodology, it might help to frame the comments a bit better.
How'd you like to reverse the roles? (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm a professor, and I've seen the same mix of praise, criticism, and just plain garbage in reviews of me published on one particular public web site. It's the same old story: any unmoderated site is soon overrun with trash.
The galling feature of all the "Rate-A-Professor" sites I've seen is the anonymity they provide. I wonder how many students would post messages like "You suck!" if they had to attach their names at the end? But they never do ...
Let me put the shoe on the other foot -- suppose that someone started a "Rate-A-Student" web site, where professors could post messages anonymously like "Mr. Smith came to class only four times all quarter, and snored his way through two of those. He showed no initiative, failed completely to understand the concept of square roots, has abysmal handwriting, and shows little sign of being able to communicate with his peers." The site could advertise to employers -- "Hey, want to check up on that guy who applied for your Network Administration opening? Check out comments made by those who worked with him for months!"
How long would a site like that last?
Re:stupid idea really... (Score:1, Interesting)
There are always going to be students who are angry, some may not be justified, however, some of that anger has, at the very least, legitimate roots. It is my observation that professors are educated but frequently closed minded and ignorant when it comes to teaching style and methods. It is helpful to find those that have actually taken learning to teach seriously.
While I find some instructors are quite good, most are average and there are, frankly, a few who have no business teaching. It is almost funny how out of touch with reality some college professors are and how little they understand about how people learn.
I can derive the kind of information I need from anger and insults, as well as reviews, and I look for it when choosing classes, especially those outside of my department. I want to know specifically what other students think. I want to know if the instructor is egocentric, unqualified, insensitive, a nutbag, whatever. Without sites such as teacher reviews one has to rely only on direct communication with other students.
Would the same work for the other side? (Score:1, Interesting)
I can see it know: "Name: Spoiled Half-Ass Mr. Half-Ass was in several of my classes and he is a world class turd. etc. He never turned any assignments in on time and cheated on his final exam. Do not hire this useless waste of his parents' tuition money."
who was the prof? (Score:1, Interesting)
Because I have a sneaking suspicion that I might know who wrote that...
[cue mystery music]
Re:Schools (Score:3, Interesting)
e.g. "Would you take this course again?" (out of ten)
10 out of 10 ("Hell yeah, 80% for no work!")
vs "How would you rate the professor's attitude torwards his students?"
3 out of 10 ("He was always late, abusive, but he still gave out great marks!!!")
I Got Shut Down The Same Way (Score:5, Interesting)
Um, How does Slashdot handle this? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Legal? (Score:4, Interesting)
1. It is true that libel and slander are not allowed because they can harm people's reputations. BUT, just hurting reputations isn't bad enough. The libel or slander must also be untrue. If it is true, then no matter how harmful it is to the victim, it is okay. Truth is a perfect defense. It is legal to speak the truth as far as libel and slander are in question.
2. Also, if there is no real harm to the victim's reputation, then it is okay. This can happen if, for example, no one would believe the libelous or slanderous statement. Famous people and government officials are more likely to not suffer harm (or to have to put up with it) than ordinary people.
3. Due to a special law, 47 USC 230, no one can sue a web site, ISP, or other Internet information provider, if all that they have done is to print libel that someone else made and gave to them.
For example, if I libeled someone here, then Slashdot is not responsible, and cannot be sued. I can still be sued though. And if I ran Slashdot, then Slashdot could be sued, since there was not a 'someone else' to give the libel to them.
This is a slightly new law. Under the old rules, a book publisher could be held responsible for the libel of an author since they were closely involved. A book seller probably would not be, however.
In sum, the web site here is OK and cannot be sued as long as they did not write the review that started this event. The professor is wrong to try. The professor can sue the person who actually wrote the review, however. I don't know who would win in that situation, because I don't know enough about it.
Re:Blog text - before it gets slashdotted (Score:5, Interesting)
and if this professor is so scared of negative reviews, perhaps he should review his arrogance quotient.
Does said professor seriously think that opinions about him don't get discussed between students in private discussions? Does he think he's immune to that? Does he think that his status makes him immune to being judged? Who the fuck does he think he is?
One of the problems in education nowadays is that bad teachers are *not* being reviewed they way they should be. The very fact that he resorted to a lawsuit against this website makes me think that there's probably a lot of truth to what was being said about him. I realize that he's busy ( I hope he is) but the proper response would have been to rebut the accusations against him, to defend himself against them, publicly (he's a public figure, after all).
I'm not putting it very well, but if he has someone critizing him in such a way as to damage his public reputation (if he *really* thinks those accusations are unwarranted) then the recourse is *not* suing the website (could just as well have been a magazine, or newspaper article) but to retaliate against them *publicly* in speech, not against a website that is simply offering another form of free speech.
Excuse me for not being completely coherent but I'm pretty damned mad, mostly because I wish forums like that had been available when I was in college. We had *plenty* of bad professors (mostly tenured).
Political Correctness and the "It's NOT FAIR" whine rears it's ugly head again. I can just imagine what some of my professors would have said about him. It wouldn't have been complimentory, that I can assure you.
What I can assure you of, is that the most common quote among the really good teachers I had, would have been Shakespeare. You know which one.
This one goes into my notes under "Decline and Fall of America".
SB
Re:Schools (Score:5, Interesting)
The evaluations are presented as a series of statements, which the student ranks from 1 (bad) to 5 (good). They post the average rating for each statement, organized by course and/or instructor. The information is restricted to University affialiates, so heres an example of an evaluation summary for a random professor (name removed):
Course: Honors Calculus II, section xxx
Students Responded: 13
Students Enrolled : 19
Overall, this was an excellent course. 4.43 A-
Overall, the instructor was an excellent teacher. 4.85 A
I learned a great deal from this course. 4.31 A-
I had a strong desire to take this course. 3.60 B
The workload for this course was (5=LIGHT...1=HEAVY) 2.81 C
Students felt comfortable asking questions. 4.31 A-
Graded assignments reflected the material covered. 4.06 B+
The grades in this course were fairly determined 4.30 A-
Students' difficulty with the material was recognized. 3.67 B
My expected grade in this course is (5=A...1=E) 4.21 A-
The course requirements were clearly defined. 4.25 A-
The instructor presented material clearly in lectures/discussions. 4.69 A
Generally speaking, students are fair with the evaluations (unless the prof is just awful...) - I really like that they ask several questions about the professor and the course (rather than simply "How was the professor? 1-5"; it helps to make more objective decisions about the course and the professor. The questions depend on the department (Elec. Engin. and Comp. Sci. has 20-30 evaluation statments for some courses).
Oddly enough, the worst professor I've ever had told us that 'we didn't need to come to class' for one of the last days of the course. Turns out he gave out evaluations that day, and very few people were in class. The next term, somebody checked the evaluation stats for the class, and saw that while there were only a few people in class that day, 100+ students responded with evaluations (with VERY high ratings). He told the department, and an investigation revealted that the professor filled out the forms himself (with very high ratings, of course). He was promptly fired. Sweet, sweet revenge :-p
Use a trust method (Score:5, Interesting)
Along these same lines they could implement a peer review process for review submissions. A new user's review could be kept in limbo until, say, 10 other reviews (perhaps once they reach a certain level of "trust") have given the ok to it. Effectively these Trusted Reviewers would act like moderators and weed out the intentionally inflamitory reviews, spam, or poorly written reviews from the well-written and on-topic reviews. The anti-spam project Razor [sourceforge.net] uses something similar to this called the Truth Evaluation System or TeS. It's all done automaticly, using spam reports and revokes to ascertain what a registered user's confidence level should be.
Why can't something like this be implemented to solve their problem? It still doesn't prevent a person from commiting libel but it does help weed out the intentionally imflamitory reviews and blatent personal attacks on educators. I've often commented on how I think such a review system should be used on Slashdot for the moderation system. I think all negative-scoring reviews should be confirmed by a second moderator before the post is scored. This would be best accomplished by not penalizing the moderator for participating in the confirmation process by losing a moderator point.
Way to give into the first sign of presure... (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:How'd you like to reverse the roles? (Score:3, Interesting)
raises/promotions + firings + who teaches what + "Do we offer this class next semester" are all based on anonymous evaluation. Otherwise kids are too scared to say anything because they're afraid of reprisal, and we never get the feedback we need.
Your "drop the hammer on the other foot" idea is intriguing though, I'd love to see something like that
Re:Schools (Score:3, Interesting)
Terp Underground [terpunderground.com] isn't officially sanctioned by the University, but it's fairly good at providing reviews of professors and courses.
Trouble is, doesn't seem like many of the newer students are using it, so the info is becoming out of date as professors/courses change.
Re:Not surprising (Score:3, Interesting)
How much would you bet on that? [washington.edu]
A shame -- it really helps (Score:2, Interesting)
Although some students leave worthless feedback, and some people use it simply to find the easiest professor, I think sites like these are needed -- after all, it's your education, and if you're a good student, you'd want to make the most of it for your money. I guess I feel you're almost entitled to it. If you don't have a good professor, then you simply aren't as motivated, skip class, slack on the homework, and come out learning very little. In some classes, books can only take your knowledge so far; from thereon, it's the professors that make the difference. So if universities are there to promote knowledge and further understanding, shouldn't sites like these be the next logical step?
- shadowmatter
Re:Schools (Score:5, Interesting)
The most significant failing of the metamoderation system on Slashdot is related to the fact that the metamoderators don't or can't verify the accuracy of a moderation. A link to goatse disguised as a mirror of the article could well be moderated "informative", and a metamoderator would not necessarily bother to check that the link actually was informative.
However, in the hypothetical situation I presented, all metamoderators would be able to directly attest to the accuracy of the "moderation" (the review). Therefore, the only major failing of the described system would be people consciously describing inaccurate reviews as accurate, and these people would (hopefully) be statistically insignificant.
The Obvious Solution (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Blog text - before it gets slashdotted (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, and it will be reviewed on Amazon.com (and other places as well), if it's bad, users will be forthcoming in saying so. The teacherreviews is (or should be) about their performance as a professor. In much the same way I might ask a friend to recommend an accountant, teacherreviews helps me choose a college/course to attend.
tenure's effect on teaching (Score:2, Interesting)
As a not-yet-tenured computer science prof, I think this is a misleading, even backward, account of how tenure affects teaching.
Do you really think that untenured profs are under pressure to teach well? At a research university, our tenure case depends much more on the ability to get grants and do influential research. Of course we untenured folk are expected to teach and do everything else well, too, but given that time is finite, we're usually advised to teach adequately without wasting too much time on it, and make sure the research is brilliant. So you ought to expect that it's untenured faculty who neglect teaching in favor of research.
You're correct that tenure may further reduce the incentive to teach well. But hey, it also reduces the incentive to get grants, do research, speak politely to one's colleagues, etc. So why do you conclude specifically that teaching will lose out to research once the pressure's off? Here are some guesses that are more logical but still misinformed:
This is sort of true, but there are many other pressures on how profs allocate their time. Taking away the tenure issue doesn't suddenly free us up to do what we like. There are always a zillion things that have to be taken care of today.
Fortunately, this cynical proposition doesn't at all match my experience of CS profs. Faculty who make it to tenure tend to continue working very hard. They generally have a strong work ethic and identify with their jobs. Usually they also have a sense of duty toward their undergrad students, grad students, and grant sponsors.
You may be thinking: Ok, tenured profs may keep working hard, but won't they spend all their time on research once they can get away with it? Don't professors just prefer research? Obviously profs at research universities do enjoy research -- after all, we emerged from a Ph.D. still liking it enough that we took a job where independent research was required. But we also enjoy teaching (or at least mentorship) -- otherwise we'd have gone off to do research in industry, at twice the salary and half the hassle. So don't assume we'd all just like to ditch the teaching in favor of research as soon as we can.
Now, it may well be that your original conclusion happens to be right, and tenured profs do focus more on research than untenured profs. But here are three possible explanations for such a correlation (if it exists):
Doubtful (based on conversations with many tenured faculty). Tenure is unlikely to change my priorities at all. I do what I do because I like to do it and because other people (especially students) depend on me to do it. If you get tenure, nothing changes, and you're very relieved about that. You just go on doing what you were doing before.
This explanation has some merit (since a few great, committed teachers do get thrown away like this), but it doesn't go too far. In my experience, most faculty who are denied tenure were trying to play the research game and are not noticeably better teachers than the
Re:Problem is... (Score:3, Interesting)
At my university, we also have a prof rating website (www.bruinwalk.com/professors/). The reviewers do indeed tend to be self-selected, tho on our boards, the top segment of the class also (thankfully) seems motivated to post. However, the biggest difference may be that the online reviews tend to be posted after the course grade is known. That can have unintended consequences.
As a professor myself, I have had mixed feelings about this board. However, some recent changes, and also this slashdot discussion, have encouraged me to look at our site more favorably. Those are:
* The site now shows distributions of scores, instead of just listing average stats. The frequency distribution can be most illuminating.
* A poor review, coupled with a "s/he's too hard!!" complaint can have a most salutary effect on the composition of your next class
* Compared to what I've seen on other sites, the student comments on my school's site -- even and especially the negative ones -- appear to be quite mature. Sure, there are a few childish and transparent ones, but they're the exception (and, besides, likely to have the opposite of the intended effect).
Certainly, there is no universally perfect teacher or class. I think all anyone can ask is that posters be honest in their comments. I've read hundreds and hundreds of student comments (not only my own, but also in committee work), and I have to say that I am pretty impressed with the students' candor.
Re:Schools (Score:3, Interesting)
But here's one thing to consider: kids talk. Kids of all ages and in all types of schools talk about their teachers and who sucks and who doesn't. And you can usually tell when someone's a slacker and just wants to get an easy A. Trust me, if the kid asks for Mrs. Soandso and the kid is a slacker, the teacher is a slacker too.
Fighting liar with liar (Score:2, Interesting)
When word got around that some departments were actually taking comments about teachers at face value, I decided to engage in some creative culture jamming to demonstrate the fact that just anyone could post just anything. So I started adding reviews for professors who did not, in fact, exist, or at least were never employed at MSU. Highlights included this army ROTC instructor [msuteachers.com], this history instructor [msuteachers.com], and this French instructor. [msuteachers.com] I also included a review of Paul Erdos in the Math department-- one of the departments that had been taking the reviews a bit too seriously-- and found it mysteriously deleted. But at least they realized that there is no "fact-checking" mechanism on that site.
In retrospect I can't say whether I had any effect on school or society, but it at least provided a few hours' entertainment.
Rate Yourself (Score:2, Interesting)
One teacher saw that he had a few negative comments, so what did he do? He rated himself about a dozen times and his rating went up. At lunch time that day, we discussed the site and voted each other up. We also voted a few of our more annoying "colleagues" down. I had a good rating before, but now my rating is almost perfect
As long as anyone can post without registering this will always be a worthless tool. Make it so that you have to register and tie that registration to an *ISP* or *university* email address (no hotmail
Re:Schools (Score:2, Interesting)
From some 2000 classes, I rarely had times where there was nothing negative, or nothing positive. It was very clear, though, which professors were significantly worse in the eyes of the students. When 10-20% of the class expresses very vehement negative opinions of the professor and the rest seem lukewarm at best, it's pretty clear that the professor needs some help (As an aside, Brandeis' forms are handwritten, so many students are, rightly, afraid that their professors will recognize their handwriting and change their comments appropriately. It is even more telling when students will write extremely negative things despite this fact.).
So after having read some 15 or 20 thousand reviews, I think I can say that while there is definite work that can be done to improve the entire system, the system is, at its base, solid.
My biggest changes to the system would be:
Of course, it's always hard to push change through on the university level, which is why I was so glad to see such review websites, and I'm saddened to see this one go.
A natural comparison would be Doctors (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, some of the technophile doctors liked this idea a lot, and it had started with one of them. Lots of the rest of them resented the site as a marketing idea that was beneath them as professionals. When they were asked to provide a personal essay to describe their interests, for example, they sent a taciturn phrase or two at most. The HMO took a fair amount of heat from its doctors about the project.
The idea of patient feedback was floated, in talking about this site originally, but got totally panned by even the technophile docs. The idea of patients with a grudge was obviously on their minds -- and the potential positive of patients who were able to choose doctors based on, say, other patients' descriptions of how communicative they were, that was a complete non-starter. Even the positive votes definitely wanted to control the content on the site completely. At the highest levels of the HMO mother ship, they were just wanting to save on calls asking for a woman internist who spoke Spanish, and to get a little marketing capital too.
I had plenty of profs in college who were totally uninspired classroom speakers. Those people don't want to have students telling each other about them any more than the ordinary word-of-mouth can let that happen.
Speaking as a professor... (Score:5, Interesting)
For example, I have a profile on ratemyprofessor.com , which is something similar to this site. I was reading the comments, and they were somewhat amusing. For example, one of my reviews said that I spoke so well I should be elected the prime minister of the UK. (Keep in mind that I'm an American teaching at a US university, so this is clearly facetious.) There were a lot of more reviews which were clearly put there for the purposes of humor. Some were serious, but there's no way to know.
The real problem with these types of sites is that anyone on Earth can write a review. At least with the official evaluations at the end of the semester, you need to be in the class to give input. This can be written by any random crank. I cannot stress enough that any information you get on a site like this is useless, because it can be written by anyone.
Furthermore, a lot of students give really high marks to easy professors because it is easy to get an A. I know that I didn't, because I am a hard-ass. On the other hand, if you just want an easy A, I certainly don't want you in my class. So maybe this will select out some people I don't want. Again, though, if you want to learn something, you don't want the easy guy.
All in all, deciding which professor to take based on a site like this is like deciding whom to vote for based on a Slashdot poll. And for exactly the same reason. It's probably better than reading tea leaves, but not much.
Now, as far as this professor goes, I don't know why he would get bent out of shape. At the end of the day, very few professors care at all what the students think, and for those that care at all, don't care much. I don't know why he gives two fucks what is on some random site.
I can say for myself that I have gotten some good feedback from evaluations and I have tried to incorporate suggestions into my teaching style. But this is a rare event. More than 99% of student feedback I have received is completely useless and was a waste of time, most typically it's someone with an axe to grind.
And I think a lot of students fool themselves into thinking that this feedback will actually matter in the long run. Let me put it this way: it is almost inconceivable that student evaluations can affect a professor's life. If he is tenured, then the probability is exactly 0. If he is tenure-track, then only if his research is borderline will these kinds of evaluations come into play, but I would say that this plays a role in fewer than 1 out of 1000 cases. Again, like I said, if you want to give constructive critism to a professor that you think might take it to heart, give it a shot. But I have seen tons of "axe-grinding" evaluations, even of me, and I can state unequivocally that they are a waste of graphite.
And by the way, the reason for this is simple. If you're at a good school, the school isn't good because you, the undergrad, is there. You are there because the school is good, and the school is good because the international reputation of the research is strong. Research is what matters. End of story.
Re:Schools (Score:3, Interesting)
Everyone in his class hated him, they gave him almost exclusively 1's and 2's (on the 1-5 scale - 1 being bad). Then they looked at the stats published in the library the next semester, and saw all 3-5's, with NO 1-2's.
That was just DUMB on his part. If he had put at least one 1 and one 2 in the falsified evals for each category, then if somebody looked at the results on their own, they might have assumed that they were the only one who gave such a low rating. By having zero 1's and 2's, anybody in the class could see that something was wrong without the need to conspire.
The class quickly did get together and found that the ratings were universally horrible. This got escalated to the dean and very quickly created a sticky situation. Fred was up for tenure, and was given the opportunity to resign, which he took (I guess he is now at another university).
I was the ed-in-chief of the college newspaper at the time, and I knew most of the people personally and was present for one meeting with the dean - this is a true story.
I wasn't sad to see Fred go - he reamed me out for cutting through his physics lab to get to another chemistry lab (which in fact could only be accessed by going through either his lab or somebody else's). Fortunately, the acting chemistry department head (who I worked for at the time) walked in - he was himself cutting through to get to the other lab. Fred proceeded to start reaming him out, at which point I ducked and ran for the door. Suffice it to say that at my college the chem dept had a LOT more clout than the math dept, and Fred was brand new and the acting chem dept head was well-liked and had been around for a while. I don't think that Fred started off on the right foot - several chem dept faculty were on his tenure committee and were quite interested when they heard about the evaluations incident.
So, yes, this stuff happens. And yes, when it happens the college is very interested in it. And yes, the reason they are interested in it is becase they want to keep it quiet. So yes, when these situations are handled it gets buried. In fact, Fred was threatening lawsuits, which is probably why the college just let him resign without disgrace.
I'm sorry that now some other class had to deal with him since it was covered up. However, he probably isn't around any more - he was a horrible teacher and sooner or later somebody will start wondering why he moves around every three years...
rating system (Score:1, Interesting)
That way, the professors can't cry "he's a meanie, he doesn't like me" and ratings will be very easy to tabulate.
It is about time this happened. I had several professors that were extreme assholes, just because they could be and get away with it. What better way to get back at them then to rate them so no one wants to take their classes.
We had no one that was ballsy enough to participate in a consensus. They were afraid of backlash from the professor's buddies.
Maybe the days of the "lame professor who is also an arrogant prick" problem are nearly over. They need to go. There is no room in the ed system for these assholes.
l8,
AC
Don't do us any favors, sheesh. (Score:1, Interesting)
Remember when Digital did the DejaNews archive? That worked so well, nobody else bothered to archive news. Then when they decided to take down DN, there was serious potential to lose news archives, and some actually were lost.
Re:Problem is... (Score:2, Interesting)
Really, most schizophrenics are not that extraordinarily weird. It's a poorly understood disorder. Most schizophrenics are what you'd classify as shy (or to the extreme--reclusive). They have a hard time with their emotions, and aren't comfortable in large groups, have disorganized speech and thought patterns. Schizophrenia IS NOT mutiple personality disorder, mind you.
Not all schizophrenics have wild hallucinations, but most do have a vivid imagination, and that can keep them occupied. When they're staring off into space, they're in their own world. Sometimes it's difficult to get them out, and they don't respond to communication, or say something that has nothing to do with anything. They're just concentrating on something in there. I imagine that you'd be amazed at what's going on inside of their mind sometimes, if only they had the capacity to reliably communicate it.
Paranoid schizophrenics you gotta watch out for, though. They're far more likely to do strange / violent stuff. And even then they're more likely to do damage to themselves.
But, I'd say that most schizophrenics certianly have the capacity to be "reasonable persons", if they're on the right medication, or if they can reliably control it themselves. The latter (control it themselves) is the better option if they can get away with it. While the medication might help the delusions, I understand that it has a very bad numbing effect. Like anesthesia for the mind; it slows down and dulls all of the senses, and what little emotion they had before is likely to be all but gone.
Anyway... Chances are good that you know a person or two that can be classified as schizophrenic. It might affect about 1% of the people in the world at one point in their lives. It's notably more common in people of Norweigen and Irish decent (for better or for worse, I'm decended from both Irish and Norweigen ancestors, among others).
Re:Bwahahahah.... (Score:3, Interesting)
The final paper assignment was to write a 20-page paper on the given topic. The topic could easily be subdivided into four sections, and in a dramatic stroke of irony, the professor had put people into groups of four to complete the assignment.
Plan seems simple, right? Everyone writes five pages, we wrap on a nice little introduction and conclusion, and merge our references into one nice section at the end. I wrote my five pages early on and thought everything was in the bag.
No. The other group members contributed five badly-written pages, and the content on three of them overlapped with what someone else in the group wrote. Suddenly all the redundancies turn an easily-done 20 page paper into an 8 page paper which needs lots of work at the very last minute.
What scared me was how these people might write code later. There was a failure to analyze the problem, figure out what other people were doing, and fill in the gaps... just like every group-oriented software project I've ever taken part in.