A Signed Professor Evaluation

Professors have a unique and important place in a student’s life. We should never underestimate the deep and at times life-long impact of the student-teacher relationship. Yet although the role of professors exists both in the classroom and in an advisory capacity, it seems that many are unaware of the importance of the latter role.

I am a senior at a highly ranked liberal arts institution, and one of the wonderful opportunities it affords is undergraduate research. There are no graduate students pursuing masters or PhDs, so we mere bachelors candidates are able to work directly with professors on interesting and innovative projects. In the political science department we are given the option of writing an honors-level thesis — three semesters of research compiled into 100 pages, give or take, of quantitative and qualitative analysis.

Despite years of paper-writing and exam-taking, this is no easy feat. We have not been trained in rigorous research methods nor are we by any means experts in our field of study. Yet we are capable of producing high-caliber work with the professional guidance of our advisers and readers. The thesis adviser-advisee relationship is a close one — they are a team. As such, the relationship requires collaboration, commitment and compromise: a marriage of minds, so to speak. As with any relationship, a certain amount of struggle is expected, but as any academic will attest, nothing worth achieving was ever done without overcoming a few obstacles.

At the end of January, I broke my relationship with my then-thesis adviser when, after putting in months of work, he attempted to put an end to my research endeavors. He assured me of my incapacity to develop a product of substance and the imminent failure that awaited me. Speaking in what he said was my best interest he offered to downgrade my thesis to a research project; since the standards of grading were much lower, he said that I could put in less effort and achieve a better grade.

My former thesis adviser almost convinced me to give up. But after 12 years of schooling and four years of determination, hard work and success in college, I realized that now was a hell of a time to decide to lose faith in myself. In my final letter to him, I explained that I am very capable of producing high-caliber work, that I deserve to work with someone who will support me in my endeavors and that I believed given his pessimism toward me that it was in both our best interests to discontinue working together. What I received in return was a snide remark: This is fine with me. I hope you’re correct.

At the end of the year we are asked to evaluate the quality of our professors. With this experience looming over me, I take the opportunity to further question how we evaluate our professors.

This past year, a professor of mine — passionate, engaged and beloved by students, who inspired me to conduct my current research — had his tenure opposed on the basis (as far as I am aware) that he had failed to meet the quota of published research. Following his dismissal, over 200 students signed a petition directed to the College’s board of trustees expressing their shock, bewilderment and disappointment at its choice to let go of a professor who had so deeply influenced and encouraged our young academic community. He is gone, and students continue to struggle to understand how any aspect of our institution, which first and foremost is concerned with the education of its students, could act to devalue the importance of a professor who encouraged student growth through the academic process.

This is not necessarily a widespread problem. The professors that helped me through to May 3, the day I handed in my 95-page thesis to the political science department, were flexible, invested and put the learning process first — no matter how slow and inefficient the writing process. They reminded me what I should have known the moment I was denied an opportunity to grow as an academic: education is a process, mistakes are inevitable and rest assured, no one who was afraid of failure ever learned anything. And although I recognize my experience was extreme, I am not alone in feeling that many professors accept advisory roles without understanding what this relationship entails, and how important it is in shaping students’ academic experience.

My former adviser may be a qualified academic but I cannot in good conscious call him an educator. I can only hope that the College will find the wisdom to promote the development of both professorial roles and advocate for our education.