Popular Professors

The debate over whether universities are run along the calculus of the market place reappeared again in the latest Stanley Fish blog posting in the NYTimes, where he argues that professors do not have an obligation to educate a politically engaged population.

Fish focuses the argument against the long-standing assumption held by some professors that they need to teach their students to think critically, which in many cases means question the government or the way society treats the oppressed. For Fish and the politically engaged professors he criticizes, the debate centers very much on what is said in the classroom.

But the real issues concerns how universities are managed. Market forces influence what teachers say in the class only indirectly from behind the scenes. The most important economic concern for a professor is that every seat in his class is filled. He or she can say what they want, so long as the class has high enrollment.

From an administrative perspective, class need to address student interest. A department needs draw students, regardless of what it teaches. More important than whether a professor is conservative or liberal is that he or she be popular.

This obligation to fill seats guides the curriculum far more than any ideological debate. It discourages faculty from teaching difficult subjects; it spurs grade inflation.

Why teach a complex topic where students will score badly when you can teach a fun course where everyone earns a high grade? The demand to be cool, exciting, on the cutting edge of market popularity shapes classroom discussions far more subtly than any conscious decision to align the syllabus with a social agenda.

The obligation to fill seats also drives professors address the students more directly. It forces him to keep up with popular culture and new media. It even cajoles the old professor to writing a blog.