Mia Dopa

As part of our recent site visit we brought back some of our graduates to impress the site visit team.  A few faculty, myself included, took our alumni to lunch.  As we were walking with the group of former students one of them pulled me aside to express his thanks for the quality of the education he had received in one of the advanced lab classes he took from me.  He indicated that he had come to realize that he was better prepared for his graduate studies than many of his current colleagues.  He also complemented one of my colleagues for the quality of their teaching.

The reason this conversation stood out was that this student had nothing good to say about either my colleague or myself when he was a student in our program.  He actively and successfully campaigned in favor of low student evaluation scores to be given to both of us.  

So, now out of some sense of shame he was going out of his way to acknowledge the quality of our work.  Perhaps my supply of the milk of human kindness was running low.  I suggested to the student that while I appreciated his comments, they would have more impact as a note to the department chairperson indicating that as hindsight is 20/20 he wished to amend his youthful (two years ago) evaluation of the teaching of some of the faculty.

As I have noted before, asking a student to evaluate a course or instructor near the end of the semester is like asking a pregnant woman her opinion of the childbirth and of her husband during labor.  Unfortunately in the case of course evaluations we make employment decisions based on then "in labor" answer and don't ask again at the time of the second birthday party.

T.S. Hall