Just a quick question about Lecturers/Proffs

anonymous_joe

What's the deal with **** teachers in UCD?

Camn they be sacked or something if they're crap?

Or does the system that teachers operate under apply?

Red Alert

No, well there's plenty of crap (and plenty of good) lecturers around the place so i suspect that it's not incredibly easy to do that.

Are you saying that because someone set a bitch of an exam? Because some good lecturers set horrible exams, really horrible.

You should probably talk either to your SU Class Rep or you staff-student commitee class rep (if you have one). Does anyone else feel the same way about the lecturer you're ranting about or is it just you?

Pythia

As far as I know, it's impossible to fire the lecturers that have been here maybe 10 years plus. They drag their departments down and are usually given the less important classes (like 1st years) but there's nothing much anyone can do about them.

tintinr35

Pythia wrote:

As far as I know, it's impossible to fire the lecturers that have been here maybe 10 years plus. They drag their departments down and are usually given the less important classes (like 1st years) but there's nothing much anyone can do about them.

<snip> no mentioning of specific people please.


Edit i didnt mention any names did i, and it is common knowledge due to a highly publicised barring from the student bar............overmoderate much!

The_Minister

Many lecturers are crap teachers but great researchers.
Also there would probably be a protest if **** teachers were fired - enough people complain about Hugh Brady wanting "results" and "value for money", there'd be a protest if he started getting rid of people

TheVan

as far as I know, being here for the last 10-15 years means you can't be fired. However the new year is a year-to-year contract system so they can fire and hire at will....doesn't mean there won't be bad lecturers!

hullaballoo

I admit some of the teaching staff in UCD seem less adept at lecturing than others, but don't let this turn into an "Mr X is the worst lecture..."-type thread please.

dajaffa

These days they can fire people who haven't been here long. Apparently one of the physics lecturers (who is awful, even by physics standards) was let go at the end of last year, but they had to take him back cause they couldn't find a replacement. Therefore I had to endure his lectures *shivers*

besty

We've really had the full compliment of teaching ability in B&L. Some great lecturers and some dire ones.

Firespinner wrote:

Many lecturers are crap teachers but great researchers.

I would also agree with this, and I know TheVan, Hulla, Font22, padser, Roger_Bongos and JustCoz will have someone in mind for that!

humbert

I have to say I'm very curious but hullabaloo's right so I'm not asking, do you do physics?

besty

No, we're in Business and Legal 3rd Year.

humbert

Sorry, was a bit slow on the reply, I was asking dajaffa!!

Stepherunie

dajaffa wrote:

These days they can fire people who haven't been here long. Apparently one of the physics lecturers (who is awful, even by physics standards) was let go at the end of last year, but they had to take him back cause they couldn't find a replacement. Therefore I had to endure his lectures *shivers*

I do believe I know exactly who you mean - you got a better deal by actually having blackboard notes this year - last year we magically had symbols appear halfway down a page of his notes with no explanation.


One lecturer tooka very extended sick leave so never got brought up on the things that she did and then ended up with a large pay off and pension this year, how charming.

humbert

How do I not know about any of this??

Stepherunie

He had physios rads and premeds for experimental physics last year, dunno what it was called this year. That could also be a vicous rumour that he was but man was he appaulling. He owns a fibre optics company or something like that.

Eoin Macollamh

There's a staggering amount of misinformation in this thread. If you're interested in the university's policy on tenure, you could read this, which will answer most of your questions:

http://www.ucd.ie/personl/html/manual/promten.pdf

Essentially, if a lecturer has tenure they cannot be fired other than for reasons stipulated in their contract. I don't know about the wording of recent contracts but in older ones, the only reason for which one can be fired is "gross moral turpitude."

And this is as it should be. Tenure has a long history and exists in almost all university systems and for a very good reason: lecturers must be free to research and teach without fear of losing their jobs because of the content of that research and teaching. In other words: academic freedom and tenure go hand in hand. The time to weed out crap lecturers is before they are hired. Any alternative arrangement will result in a lower standard of teaching and research.

In more practical terms, any university that abolished tenure would see all of its best staff depart to other universities that continued to offer it.

Finally, there's this bit of nonsense:

Also there would probably be a protest if **** teachers were fired - enough people complain about Hugh Brady wanting "results" and "value for money", there'd be a protest if he started getting rid of people

There is no evidence that Hugh Brady is interested in "results" or "value for money." Furthermore, what exactly is meant by "value for money" if one's business is a university? Start thinking in those terms and the students become little more than "product," analogous to widgets to be churned out as quickly and efficiently as possible. Are you sure you want to embrace such a vision of education?

Any student who thinks this administration has their interests more at heart than do the lecturers, really ought to spend more than a few minutes reflecting on the matter.

ozt9vdujny3srf

Ok, its fine to have a discussion about teaching methods, but anything anyone says that could even be remotely considered as libelous, will be permanently banned.

Sangre

Doing law I can most certainly tell you, a great academic mind does not a great lecturer make.

Paul Tergat

besty wrote:

No, we're in Business and Legal 3rd Year.

What are the lecturers like in third year b n l? generally good (although it may not apply to us next year as theyve changed the system of choosing law subjects and we have nice exams at xmas!:mad: )

panda100

I know in medicine when I first started they used to have an annual best lecturer award as voted by the students...When I was in pre med and 1st year Dr Philip Nolan won it two years in a row cos he was an ace physiology lecturer and would always chair the comedy debtes for med day and bring all kinds of wiitticisms to the proceedings. But they dodnt do it anymore which is fairly annoying cos I think its good when students have their say. Generally though after everytopic we do we get an evaluation sheet where we can say our likes,dislikes and reccomendations on that topic...Generally though its only the good leturers that give out these evaluatio sheets......Do they do these evaluations in other courses??

anonymous_joe

OK, I never meant this to be a 'X is ****' kind of thread.

My curiosity arose from the fact that some, not all, of the teaching we got this year was dire, and a few complaints were made to that effect. Was just wondering what could be done about it.

General consensus seems to be, it's the same as in schools, give the **** teachers to the first years, they're not important...

Font22

its just like it was in school. theres always a mix.i remember having to ask our principal in school to get us a new english teacher three months before the leaving cert cause the replacement we got didnt know any of our core texts etc.
but its true what they say about college, you have to do most of the work yourself but it doesnt help when the lecturer is awful. i find the subjects i havent enjoyed have been accompanied with bad lecturers.

anonymous_joe

Know the feeling.

Stepherunie

panda100 wrote:

Generally though after everytopic we do we get an evaluation sheet where we can say our likes,dislikes and reccomendations on that topic...Generally though its only the good leturers that give out these evaluatio sheets......Do they do these evaluations in other courses??

One of our lecturers gives them out on his course and on the overall running of the course - very detailed information was given this year for feedback.

I've had a few lecturers who gave them out, one of my physics lecturers last year gave them out every month or so and took on board pretty much immediately anything that people suggested - really helped improve things I have to say.

I think it should be mandatory in the college that these sheets should be given out at the end of every course - it's the only way that students have of voicing there opinions - good and bad and sometimes you get lecturers who don't realise that students have problems with there teaching methods.

Red Alert

Sadly it's the good lecturers who take stuff like surveys seriously. In trinners the QA office run surveys on the different schools and some of the feedback they get is quite good. On the other hand I prefer lecturers who make their own survey as it shows they put a bit of work into it.

I've noticed a few people who are excellent when there's only two or three people in (out of 30) but who can't hack it when there's a full class or in front of 200 people. One guy was really helpful last year because only me and 2 others used to show up for him, and his section was the reason i passed that paper. But it was obvious that he wasn't suitable for a whole theatre-full of people. They should try and put people to stuff they're suited for as i'm sure it's no more pleasant for them than us.

I want to be an academic later on and I'd hope to try and get to know the class well enough that i'd get some decent feedback on my lecturing style.

elmyra

I have to say I've been blessed and have had very few bad lecturers, but when you do it seriously impedes your ability to learn.

In first year I had an incredibly bad lecturer for one of my subjects, she seemed very shy and spoke very hesitantly and in a low voice. Her overheads were always handwritten and her writing was incredibly hard to read and it was incredibly difficult to hear her over the sound of groups of people exiting mid-lecture (which always happened). I eventually stopped going because what she said seemed to have nothing to do with her area of the course anyway.

On the other hand, this semester I had a tutor (who is also a professor) in the English department and I turned up every week without fail because the guy is legendary. He had a tutorial plan completed by our first tutorial and one for everybody in the audience, left it up to us if we wanted to look at a different text, had really rounded discussions on each one and was incredibly helpful with essays. He included everyone in the tutorial (and it was a really diverse range of age and ability) and even had a laugh with us and constantly made his office hours known if we wanted to come by about anything. I'd safely say it's the best teaching I've received in UCD and I only wish he had handed around surveys so I could let him know. He's the reason I'm actually considering an attempt at answering on Ulysses in an exam situation...if that isn't inspiring I don't know what is.

Anyway...since teaching clearly has such a clear and huge effect on your learning experience and ability to do well, I really don't think it's acceptable for anyone to get lumped with a bad lecturer, first year or not. A department should definitely take notice if a class has gone to the trouble of making a complaint.