The Course and Teacher Evaluation Council survey is the multifunctional Swiss Army knife of evaluation at Northwestern. It is a satisfying reversal of the normal hierarchy of evaluation. It gives students a chance to grade the graders. We use them to commend entertaining lecturers, put down passionless professors and select our classes. Faculty members use CTEC feedback to improve their teaching and bolster their egos. And administrators say they even consider CTECs when hiring faculty.
The Weinberg College Student Advisory Board is now scrutinizing the CTEC survey system, largely because submission rates have plummeted since the introduction of online CTEC surveys.
But SAB’s investigation probably will overlook what makes the CTEC Web site a real treasure: It is a collection of humorous, dramatic and reflective assessments. A few gems:
The CTEC Web site is perhaps the only remaining bastion of unadulterated honesty at a school at which students are increasingly wary of offending professors. Not all of that honesty is negative. A student in Terry Sheppard’s Organic Chemistry class, for example, wrote: “An added plus is that (the professor) looks like Billy Corgan…. So if you are depressed that the Pumpkins broke up, having Sheppard everyday will be like therapy.”
Students also use CTECs as a platform for evaluating classmates. One Analytical Studies student wrote, “If anything, the course was brought down because of some of the students, who didn’t have the same base of theoretical knowledge as some of the others. I’d love to see what (Prof. Richard) Ashley could do with a small core of brilliant graduate students.” Maybe they could write a magnum opus, or at least discover the cure for self-importance.
Fortunately, not all CTEC reviews consist of petty disdain. A student in Cindy Gold’s Acting II: Analysis and Performance wrote: “Shakespeare with Cindy is a must! She really knows her stuff and gets you really excited to play around with Shakespeare.”
Humor also has its place in Macroeconomics. Someone wrote, “(Prof. Mark) Witte is a great lecturer, but his tests are hard and will mess you up like Ray Lewis in a nightclub alley.”
My favorite comes from M. William Karlins’ Analytical Techniques. The sole comment was simply, “Jellybeans.”
Students also use CTECs to advance political causes. A student in David Abrahamson’s Literary Journalism class wrote: “(This class) reaffirms that Medill is, in a few respects, still a school for aspiring writers. Abrahamson’s so good it’s a wonder that (former Dean Ken) Bode hasn’t driven him away.”
Other comments speak directly to readers. One student in Marc Carlson’s Seapower and Maritime Affairs wrote: “Are you in ROTC? No? Then why are you reading this?”
At a Feb. 5 advisory board meeting, it was suggested that students who don’t complete CTEC questionnaires should be unable to view their grades on CAESAR.
But forcing students to complete CTECs would compromise the anonymous honesty and lowbrow literary gems that make current CTECs special.
To that prospect I say only this: jellybeans.