Fifteen years ago, Omega University implemented a new procedure that encouraged students to evaluate the teaching effectiveness of all their professors.

The following appeared in a memorandum from a dean at Omega University.

“Fifteen years ago, Omega University implemented a new procedure that encouraged students to evaluate the teaching effectiveness of all their professors. Since that time, Omega professors have begun to assign higher grades in their classes, and overall student grade averages at Omega have risen by thirty percent. Potential employers apparently believe the grades at Omega are inflated; this would explain why Omega graduates have not been as successful at getting jobs as have graduates from nearby Alpha University. To enable its graduates to secure better jobs, Omega University should now terminate student evaluation of professors.”

At first glance, the argument seems to be convincing to some degree, but further reflection reveals that it suffers from several logic mistakes that make it by no means plausible. The statement draws the conclusion that student evaluation of professors should be stopped. To substantiate the conclusion, the author points out that there is a significant rise in students’ grades due to the fact that teachers are afraid of being underestimated. In addition, the higher grades lead to the unemployment of graduates of the school. Merely on the basis of such mistaken reasoning and insufficient evidence, the argument is rife with holes, and therefore unpersuasive as it stands.

Firstly, the argument attributes the rise of students’ grades to the implement of student evaluation of professor. However, this may not be the only reason for the phenomenon. There are many factors that can contribute to higher grades. Perhaps the school is encouraging students to study harder by increasing the amount of scholarship, or tightening the standard of conferring degree. Another possible situation may be that teachers are more likely to teach attentively as they want to get higher evaluation, thus improve their teaching quality, which allow students to learn more knowledge efficiently. Therefore, the exchange between teachers and students is not necessarily the only reason for raising grades.

Even if it is student evaluation of professors that result in the shift of scores, it doesn’t mean that students of Omega University are unlikely to be employed because of the inflation of grades. Here the author mentioned another school, Alpha University, to compare with Omega University. I must point out that besides grades, there are many other factors that have significant impact on how successful students may be at getting jobs, such as education quality, the behavior of past students and the reputation of the school.

Perhaps Alpha University has long ranked better than Omega University, and no matter whether Omega University encourage students to evaluate the teaching effectiveness or not, the employment rate of Omega is doomed to be lower than that of Alpha. Or perhaps Alpha pays more attention to students’ career development and holds lots of activities aiming at improving their competence in finding jobs.

Even assuming that the lower employment rate is the result of inflating grades, the suggestion of canceling the evaluation is not the only or best solution. Perhaps both professors and students of Omega have been used to such measure and it has already formed equilibrium between the two groups. They may prefer to maintain the status quo and this makes it difficult to forsake the measure. Moreover, if Omega ranks lower than Alpha in university rankings for years, it undoubtedly needs a long time effort to improve in various facets such as the quality of teachers and students, the education system or even the ethos of the university. There are also some alternatives to undermine the negative impacts of student evaluation of professor. For example, the salary and bonus of professors should not be merely linked with students’ evaluation. The school is also supposed to carry out some activities such as job trainings to help students become more competent when finding employment.

To sum up, the arguer fails to substantiate its claim that student evaluation of professor should be eliminated because its analysis do not lend strong support to what the argument maintains. It fails to consider other reasons for the dropping rate of employment of students of Omega and therefore fails to put forward various necessary measures to mitigate the problem. If the argument had included the given factors discussed above, it would be more convincing and logically acceptable.