TaxProf Blog

Thursday, June 24, 2004

Brian Leiter (Texas) today reprises his piece, Why Is it So Easy To Get Tenure in Law Schools? Here’s a sample:

[O]utside the ranks of the top 15 or so schools, most law schools tenure almost everyone they hire; and even within the top 15, a tenure review comparable to what one finds at Princeton or MIT is unheard of. One consequence: while the tenured ranks of the best philosophy departments are full of first-rate intellects (even if one might quibble about whether so-and-so’s work is really “that significant”), the tenured ranks of the best law schools (including Yale and Harvard) are uneven, including not only first-rate intellects but also intellectual lightweights.

Wednesday, June 23, 2004

Tax Prof Jack Bogdanski (Lewis & Clark) is pulling the plug on Jack Bog’s Blog on July 6 (its 2-year anniversary). Although only occasionally about tax law and law schools, Jack Bog’s Blog was one of only three active blogs (to my knowledge) run by tax law professors. With Victor Fleischer’s A Taxing Blog on hiatus since October, Jack’s departure leaves Tax Prof Blog and Mauled Again carrying the Tax Prof blogosphere banner. With nearly 150,000 visitors in its 2-year run, Jack’s Bog’s Blog will be missed.

Wednesday, June 23, 2004

Law professors handle student evaluations of their teaching in various ways. One makes a ceremonial show of tossing them in the trash unopened. Another assiduously pores over each one, trying to extract pearls of wisdom to improve her classroom performance. A third worries that a drop from 4.5 (out of 5.0) to 4.4 will adversely affect his tenure chances.

Eric Rasmusen (Indiana) muses on his blog:

Why, then do we rely so heavily on student evaluations? It is hard to believe that professors and administrators do not realize how weakly they measure the amount a teacher has taught his students. Even if they did not, if good teaching was the objective, surely we would pay some attention to the syllabi and what kind of tests were given and use objective evaluators — students or faculty observing single class sessions — which we do not do in any serious way. Rather, I think that “good teaching” means “contented students” for the people who rely on student evaluations. Student evaluations are indeed a good way to measure this. And it is a reasonable objective. Administrators are trying to sell a product, and if you view the student as a customer rather than as someone to whom you have a moral obligation, you want to design a product that he wants. The student will likely want a course that has a low workload and gives him a pleasant feeling of accomplishment while being described as difficult course on an advanced topic. Professors have incentives similar to administrators– it is more fun teaching contented students, and while it is quite difficult to know how to make students learn (I know that after 20 years I still don’t know when I have succeeed and when I have failed, or even whether I, as opposed to the students’ own efforts, make much difference), it is much easier to figure out how to make students pleased.

Mike Rappaport (San Diego) adds:

Interestingly, at one law school I know, the student evaluations ask the students many questions. Not a single one of them, though, asks how much the student believes he learned overall in the course. They ask all kinds of things, like how well the professor integrated current events, but not how much was learned. Hard teachers, who give a lot of work, would benefit from this question being asked. And so would the students.