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Rating your professors

In the following article I would like to inform students of a decision made at the most recent council meeting of the UPEI Student Union about the administration’s inactivity on the subject of mandatory student evaluation ofteach- ing at our university.

At the Senate meeting of the university held

on October 15, 1993, the Report from the Senate Committee on Evaluation of Teaching was pre- sented and then sent to the Faculty Association for further review. At that time the student senators present were unaware of the history behind this committee- more specifically, we were unaware that this committee was struck in 1987 and that this was only the third time it has reported to senate. Another fact that does not please us is that the original report of this committee was already reviewed by the Faculty Association at that time. This is the same pre- amble as I gave to our council meeting, and as aresult of this we have decided by a unanimous vote of council to proceed with an independent evaluation of teaching organized from the stu- dent level. This is a plan which has been in existence at the Student Union for several years,

but we believe that the present situation neces- sitates our bringing it into action. A project of this magnitude requires the help of students. What would be ideal is for there to be a repre- sentative from each class at the university who is willing to pass out these evaluation forms randomly to a given percentage of his or her classmates. We are not aiming at a complete survey on our very first try. Instead, we would like to hit some of the major classes on campus. For example, two versions of the same course taught by different professors are ideal targets. Emphasis will also be placed on courses re- quired for the most degree programs.

This evaluation of teaching will be done no matter what the faculty association and senate decide to do with the recommendations of this report. While we still want the university-

Macleans

10/X-Press/November 11, 1993