On Evaluation Inflation

You know, teachers are talking all the time about grade inflation, but I've never heard anyone talk about evaluation inflation.

Some students and I were talking tonight about the phenomenon of professors being evaluated by their students. There are silly things that professors do to get better evaluations (grade the first paper easily and the second one much harder, but after you've already received your evaluations). Some professors' raises hang on student evaluations (one student told about a professor who brings a photograph of his wife and kids and sets it out during the evaluations). Suddenly, the professors are being forced to cater to their students, students who don't always yet know what's good for them. Alas, the democratization of education. It seems to me that education is exactly the sort of thing that ought not be democratized.