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Professors need to work to full potential

There's nothing better in life than having a sense of security.

And if you're a professor at Bloomsburg University, security comes rather quickly in the form of tenure.

Tenure is a five-year process, according to Dr. Roy Pointer, BU President of Association of Pennsylvania State College and University Faculties (APSCUF). Faculty members are eligible for tenure after their fifth year teaching at Bloomsburg University, according to Pointer.

During the first five years of employment, faculty members go through a probationary period and are observed in class by other faculty members and the department chairperson two times each semester, Pointer said.

When they apply for tenure, observation reports written by the department, student evaluations and a self-evaluation are all given to a department tenure committee for approval, according to Pointer. This committee then decides whether or not to send the decision to the university-wide tenure committee.

The university-wide tenure committee, consisting only of faculty elected in a general election, then makes a recommendation to Dr. Kozloff, BU President, who has the final decision, according to Pointer.

Why aren't any students involved in the university-wide committee? It stands to reason that students have enough interaction with the faculty that they could aid in the decision. Why not take some key student members of the university from different media and campus organizations to help make the decision?

If a faculty member gets tenure, what does this mean? It means they can't be "fired on a whim," Pointer said. And, while it does make it much more difficult to terminate a professor, having tenure is not a "job for life," according to Pointer.

A tenured faculty member can feel free to discuss controversial political issues without the fear of being fired. This allows for greater academic freedom, Pointer said.

After getting tenure, a faculty member is not evaluated as often as non-tenured faculty members. A tenured faculty member only needs to be evaluated every five years and is not required to hand out student evaluations except during the evaluation period. A non-tenured faculty member is required to have student evaluations in all of their classes for the first five years, according to Pointer.

The lack of regular evaluations after tenure is done because the faculty member has proved themselves in the university's eyes as a good professor, Pointer said.

But I think that an evaluation every five years breeds laziness for a professor. Think about it. If you had a job and were only evaluated every five years, how hard would you really work? Now factor in that it's difficult to fire you because you have proven yourself in the first five years. Sure, professors have academic freedom, and some of them take that freedom to be academically lazy.

Academic laziness doesn't happen all the time, or even in the majority of professors, from my experience. But I have seen it happen more than I'd like to count, and department chairpersons are often up the creek without a paddle when tenure has been achieved. That is inherently the problem with tenure.

While the faculty member gets reviewed by other faculty members, there is only one means for students to get their voices heard student evaluations.

Let's look a little deeper into that concept. If a student has a poor professor, how can they give any feedback? If they write a letter, there is the possibility that it will get lost in the shuffle. And then they are only one student, which makes the odds further stacked against them.

Anyone will tell you that numbers speak for themselves. If nearly every student gives a professor "D"s or "E"s on the evaluations, their evaluation numbers will come up very low. Faculty, chairpersons and administration alike will see the cold, hard numbers that never lie. It's not a qualitative opinion. Evaluations are something that you can count and do all sorts of statistical evaluations to. Evaluations, in theory, are the most accurate and effective way to judge a professor's performance.

Then why aren't professors required to hand out student evaluations every class for every semester, even if they are tenured? It only stands to reason that if a professor is doing a good job and students are learning something, then the evaluations will be favorable. But, if either the professor or the class is poor, then the evaluations will certainly reflect that as well.

Evaluations provide a valuable medium for students, the consumers in this case, to give feedback on a professor's performance. Even if they aren't always used the way students would like them to be used, at least it serves as way to blow some steam off about a poor professor. It gives us a chance to tell the professor what they've done wrong and what they've done right. It gives us a way to be heard when students often feel like they don't get heard in the process.

And, if faculty are indeed quality and have nothing to hide, why are student evaluations not available to all students? According to Pointer, it was an agreement reached when the student evaluations were being put together. Student evaluations aren't available partly because they are only one part of the evaluation process, Pointer said.

Well, I agree with Pointer in theory, but practically and logically, I have to disagree from a student's perspective. As a student, I want to know what other students have to say about professors, and I could truly care less what the department chairperson or other faculty members thought of the professor.

If students say a professor is difficult but fair, I'd like to know that. If a professor is lazy and didn't know the material well enough, I'd also like to know that too.

Results of student evaluations should be available to any student on the Bloomsburg University web page. If the university is worried about non-students reading about faculty evaluations, then we can just give each student a User ID and password. In fact, we can just use the student's User ID and password for PlanetX.

Why evaluations shouldn't be seen by prospective students is beyond me. If I were a prospective student, I would definitely love to know how well faculty measured up, especially in the major that I was interested in. But evidently, everyone is too worried that people will see that we do have bad professors here at Bloomsburg. That would certainly be a big surprise for me.

As a student, I am extremely wary of what other faculty members and department chairpersons have to say about a faculty member. I'd think they would have more of a reason to sugar coat a professor's evaluation. I mean, they are working with the person everyday. It would be a lot tougher for them to come down hard on a professor than it would be for students to do the same.

Students have the ability to keep their responses anonymous, a very crucial piece of an effective evaluation. Students don't have to worry about their grades dropping because of a bad evaluation they gave a professor. All of the evaluations are sealed and returned to professors after the grades have been submitted, which is, again, essential to an unbiased evaluation.

But even when the evaluations are handed back, the faculty member gets the white comment sheets and doesn't have to share them with anyone else. This is a gross problem in the system.

If students decide to spend the time during an evaluation to write about how poor of a professor they had or how much they liked the material being taught, this is not something that only one person should see. And, certainly this one person should not be the person who is directly involved in the process. If only the faculty member sees the evaluation, students might as well shred the white evaluation sheets because there's no reason for them to even waste their time if no one other than the professor will see the comments.

Having an unbiased third party read the comments with the person affected is one of the most fundamental techniques for any effective evaluation. It protects the integrity of the comments and provides a means of discussion between the faculty member and others.

The department chairperson should review all the comment sheets with every professor at the end of the semester. The chairperson has the ability to begin to take action in the case of a poor professor.

Maybe instead of looking at academic freedom for professors, we should start looking at how tenure and the evaluation process are affecting students.

Job security is one thing, but I'd feel more secure knowing that I was being taught by professors who are here to teach and not to coast after they get tenure.