41–50 of 276 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
fwiw, there's a tenure track for lecturers at UCs
but as the post notes, it's underutilized in Berkeley's Mathematics Department > "We explained to you before you accepted the position that the idea of employing a full-time lecturer is controversial in our department."
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would like to see the Department's response too. Hopefully, they reply with their reasons rather than attack the argument that Coward has written here.
For legal reasons I doubt they can reply at all.
I didn't have to take Math 1A or any math course for that matter, but I did have to take an AC course per University requirements. I wasn't looking forward to it.
I ended up taking the Southern Border with Professor Shaiken. That was by far one of the most educational and interesting courses I had taken at CAL.
I too would like to see the University's side, but I am inclined to believe they can't respond for legal reasons, and if they could their response would be far more vanilla then Prof. Coward's side.
Keep in mind how you would handle this situation if you managed a large and well-established dev team with procedures and policies you worked hard on and are proud of. It is not enough for a team member to be fantastic in a solo role. I'd be more interested in hearing from other faculty than I would from the students, who don't much experience actually working with Coward.
A software dev team requires far more one-on-one interaction between "faculty members" than teaching does (where faculty are the ones producing the software and the students are the users). And in any case, if someone on a dev team got significantly better numbers by bucking the trends, I would be obligated to try and understand their methods and help them gain greater acceptance. It doesn't make sense to remove some…
Did that turn out bad for the team? Not really. Life goes on. And sometimes its just a good learning experience for both parties.
Unpopular opinion, but I think he's being overly dramatic. "My Fall 2013 Math 1A students were tracked into the next course in the sequence, Math 1B, and it was found that their average grade in Math 1B was 0.17 grade points higher than that of those students who took Math 1A with another instructor." 0.17. Not even a whole point. Student evaluations don't really count since those are highly subjective. Students tend…
"Academic politics is the most vicious and bitter form of politics, because the stakes are so low."
Unpopular opinion, but I think he's being overly dramatic. "My Fall 2013 Math 1A students were tracked into the next course in the sequence, Math 1B, and it was found that their average grade in Math 1B was 0.17 grade points higher than that of those students who took Math 1A with another instructor." 0.17. Not even a whole point. Student evaluations don't really count since those are highly subjective. Students tend…
By my reading of the essay, he was hired as teaching faculty, so he is not being judged on his research or reputation within the research community.
Keep in mind how you would handle this situation if you managed a large and well-established dev team with procedures and policies you worked hard on and are proud of. It is not enough for a team member to be fantastic in a solo role. I'd be more interested in hearing from other faculty than I would from the students, who don't much experience actually working with Coward.
I taught math as an adjunct at a Big Ten university with a prestigious math department several years ago. I never once met with any member of the faculty, even my supervisor, and nobody ever observed my teaching. All of the sections of the course that I taught had the same syllabus and exams. I had students from other sections sitting in on my lectures.
As for hearing from faculty, oddly enough I was on the other side of the issue as well, since I also taught the 3rd year "weeder" course in electrical engineering. My students were woefully unprepared in math despite N semesters of calculus in the math department. Once during a break in the activity, I asked my engineering students how the university could improve engineering education. Their consensus: Better math teaching.
Unpopular opinion, but I think he's being overly dramatic. "My Fall 2013 Math 1A students were tracked into the next course in the sequence, Math 1B, and it was found that their average grade in Math 1B was 0.17 grade points higher than that of those students who took Math 1A with another instructor." 0.17. Not even a whole point. Student evaluations don't really count since those are highly subjective. Students tend…
That's worth confirming with a lawyer. AFAIK most states require employers to let you copy your personnel file.