“As the semester ends, the time to evaluate professors draws near. Every student who has ever finished a semester at the University of Akron knows that either this week or next, they will be filling out one of those wonderful little bubble sheets. Students should take full advantage.”
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As the semester ends, the time to evaluate professors draws near. Every student who has ever finished a semester at the University of Akron knows that either this week or next, they will be filling out one of those wonderful little bubble sheets.

Students should take full advantage.

Seriously, is there any better way to address a horrendous professor than to write a short essay in the extra space provided, fully airing out every grievance and flaw in his or her teaching style? Other than straight up telling them to their faces that they suck, there is no greater satisfaction.

Truthfully, some professors are less than stellar. Revealing the painful truth of their abysmal teaching methods can only be beneficial, as students deserve to have good instructors. Bad instructors need to either step up, or quite simply, get out of the way.

Students know when they’ve been stuck with a horrible professor. It’s a terrible feeling for a student to know that they are fully capable of acing a course, but the task becomes Herculean due to a poor professor.

Take astronomy, for example. It doesn’t seem like an academic juggernaut, right? Just track a few stars, complete a couple labs and finish all the homework.

Wait. Turns out it’s going to be harder than it needs to be. Sure, the professor knows his stuff, as he has been teaching astronomy for quite some time. But in all fairness, he has been teaching it so long, he probably witnessed the Big Bang personally. He often forgets the formulas that students need to track stars, and forgets what he’s talking about mid-sentence.

Students shouldn’t have to put up with that. When a professor can’t keep track of his or her own thoughts, it’s definitely time for him to hang it up.

Now, this certainly isn’t the only issue facing students. One of the biggest problems some professors have is the inability to engage their students in meaningful discussion.

Having the class look at Powerpoint slides for almost two hours is one of the least engaging things a professor can do. There is no reason to dedicate a class to a Powerpoint, because they tend to be just summaries of the readings that students do for homework.

There happen to be the delusional professors as well, those who think students are simply dying to get into their class. Let’s be honest, the number of students excited about math or humanities is comparable to the square root of -1. (And for those who don’t know, that’s an imaginary number.)

Lectures that span the entire length of class are just as bad, especially when the professor isn’t interesting or personable. The lecture just becomes a monotonous drone, and students are essentially forced to bust out their laptops and send Facebook messages to each other. Invariably, they are making fun of their lame professor, and laughing at them after class.

Students deserve to have engaging professors who inspire critical thinking, not boring windbags who give bland lectures, or professors so old that vultures follow them, knowing they’re almost ready to keel over.

Bad professors reflect poorly on the university, and do not bring out the best in students.

Ultimately, they need to improve their methods immediately, or just step out of the way.

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