Student Voices in the Tenure Process

At large universities like Harvard or Princeton, undergraduates get used to having important decisions made without their say. Princeton, however, has introduced a greater measure of student input into its tenure process by putting letters from students regarding the performance of their professors in official faculty files. This letter-writing program is not new; but Princeton is now actively advertising, in the daily college newspaper and via e-mail, its students’ privilege to write about their professors. We hope this promising program works at Princeton, and we expect Harvard’s administration to watch and learn from Princeton’s experiment in gathering more student voices in the tenure process.

At a research university with dozens of big-name professors who are constantly breaking new ground in their fields, it is quite easy to forget about teaching skills when it comes time to tenure faculty. The current system does not entirely ignore a professor’s ability to teach, but we question the reliability of the measures used in tenure process to gauge teaching skills. By looking primarily at CUE Guide figures, those involved in tenure discussions can certainly get a taste of which teachers garnered a couple of quickly jotted positive comments or a few more fives than fours on the rating survey’s scale.

But these data should only be a starting point. A student who is rushing to finish the short survey before he or she is able to leave class or section rarely will produce comments of real value for such a weighty process as that of tenuring professors, and even the rare student who goes in-depth does not have the time to really flesh out his or her thoughts. On top of that, there are real problems with sampling bias, as you have to attend the last section to fill a survey out, and CUE Guide rating inflation—rarely do students give lower than a three for teaching skills.

However, a letter crafted on the student’s own time might begin to close the gap between impression and reality. As part of Princeton’s system, any student can write a letter with his or her appraisal to Dean of the Faculty David Dobkin. These letters are put in professors’ files, which are reviewed yearly and also when professors are being considered for tenure decisions. While a letter from one student might be only a small part of evaluating a professor’s career, it still gives one more piece of evidence for tenure committees to consider.

Of course, this system is also flawed. If Harvard were to consider adopting such a policy, there would be large question marks on how to deal with anonymity—to provide the student with freedom for true expression without letting the system be abused. Plus there would be the matter of how and when the University should collect such letters. Further, there would be a large sampling bias to these letters, since only the students who have extreme opinions—be they positive or negative—about the professor will likely bother to write.

But even with the problems these types of letters would have, more student input is still the right idea. Many parts of the tenure process are quite subjective; a recommendation on behalf of another professor can easily be just as misleading. Like all references, student letters should be taken with these possible prejudices in mind and should be evaluated in conjunction with the other available information on the professor.

Without knowing how a professor actually engages with his or her students, inside and outside of the classroom, the University cannot make the best tenure decisions. While student letters have yet to be proven the most effective method for evaluating teaching skills, it is an idea to consider. Watching Princeton’s experience with student letters will help Harvard gauge the program’s value, and we expect Harvard’s administration to keep its eyes peeled.