This is one of four opinion published in the mail home edition of The Daily Campus. The series is as follows: Internationalizing SMU, Pride & Unity, Class Ratings and Lack of Reading Days.

Moving into the second century of Southern Methodist University, I am excited that the administration has made improvement of academics one of its top priorities.

However, in making progress to improve our school’s academic standing and the education that is offered to its many students, I propose that one of the great obstacles to this goal is the current system of professor evaluations.

As they function now, professor evaluations are a grossly under-used tool. At the end of each semester, students are asked to fill out evaluations of their professors for that term. These evaluations are (presumably) compiled, organized, and then used for school personnel decisions such as tenure-track – this is an understanding of the current system as it has been relayed to me by several professors.

The single greatest problem with this organization as it stands now is that the results of these evaluations are not even partially published for the benefit of the students. Were this done, students would be able to make more informed choices when selecting their courses, finding those classes that would be truly rewarding. Instead, we are forced to rely on unreliable information from fellow students and the extremely polarized reviews found on ratemyprofessor.com or similar websites.

I can understand the faculty point of view on this subject: they are here to grade students, not to be graded by them. The accountability that such a system would enjoy would also offer a temptation for grade inflation and undue deference in the classroom in order to please students, especially when the results of such evaluations could have pervasive impacts on a professor’s reputation.

But I respond that, whether SMU embraces it or not, online assessments abound anyway. There has been a proliferation of online evaluations published and maintained by third party websites in the past few years, and I don’t honestly see that trend changing in the near future. If this information is going to exist and is going to be used by students, why should it not at least be institutionalized within the school?

I believe that allowing students access to professor evaluations would align with SMU’s stated goal of improving academic standing. Students would enjoy their classes more and would more easily find those professors whose style they can appreciate. Several other members of the Student Senate and myself hope to make progress in this regard this year, and as we move forward I believe that changes in this policy will be beneficial and appreciated.