Re:Yale students made a better version of its course catalog...
by jobu on Friday January 17, 2014 @08:21PM
(#7079601)
> Taken out of context, even a single vindictive or poorly composed review can be fatal to an instructor's career.
Really? Is this something particular to Yale?
Instruction was almost an afterthought at the Universities I attended. (Professors were there to get grants and do research.) Many of them only taught the mandated minimum number of classes (often poorly) and even though it was widely known which profs were terrible it seemed have little effect on their careers.
Re:Yale students made a better version of its course catalog...
by absolution on Friday January 17, 2014 @07:23PM
(#7079435)
The site required Yale credentials to log in
Requiring these credentials seems like a perfectly legitimate way to protect this information. Later in the article it mentions other reasons that were more likely to have contributed to the decision that they made.
Re:Yale students made a better version of its course catalog...
by bonemachine on Saturday January 18, 2014 @02:28PM
(#7081907)
The main point is that the evaluations are the University's property. It would be irresponsible of them to entrust their protection to a third party -- especially when that third party seems to have set up their site without obtaining the University's permission first.
Sounds like they have perfectly valid concerns, actually.
When it comes to protecting restricted (and potentially rather damaging information) -- which also happens to be the University's property, anyway -- it's generally prudent to suppress the source, and ask questions later. Taken out of context, even a single vindictive or poorly composed review can be fatal to an instructor's career. Failing to take action to suppress their unauthorized distribution can also invite nasty lawsuits.
So this doesn't seem to be about "the man" stepping in and quashing student creativity and initiative (as much as some may prefer that narrative). If anything it seems that Yale did the right thing, in this case.