Re: copyright and student notes taken in class...

On 10/1/99, Barbara Ruhmann <brruhmann[_at_]ucdavis.edu> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 30 Sep 1999, C.E. Petit <cepetit[_at_]usa.net> asserted:
> >
> > Third, I fail to see any remedy other than injunction available
> > to the professors. Many professors do not teach, or carry only
> > a minimal teaching load.
>
> As a matter of fact, many professors have teaching assistants who
> actually conduct the classes. Are they assumed to be using the
> professor's words, or only his benevolent guidance, and they are
> using their own words or variances thereof?

Both of the above responses certainly do no reflect accurately my 27 years on the faculty of a pretty good research-oriented university.

Everyone I know does teach, some only at the graduate level but many at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. As for whether the teaching load is "minimal," I don't know what that really means. It is of course correct that professors at research-oriented universities do not teach as many classes as those at schools whose mission is almost purely teaching. Also, we don't allow teaching assistants to teach. Some lower division undergraduate courses are staffed by Ph.D. students, however.

Perhaps my experience is colored by the fact that I am in a professional school where high-quality teaching is emphasized quite strongly (in addition to research). My experience does indicate, however, that the same is pretty much true in the liberal arts. The sciences, economics, and mathematics at my university do seem to use a much higher proportion of Ph.D. students to teach lower-division undergraduate classes. And there are problems with this, especially in mathematics.

One other thing: I know that the chairman of the university's Intellectual Property Committee, who also is an extremely productive researcher and the holder of an endowed chair, teaches a lower-division undergraduate science course of 400 students. And he does the teaching.

John Allison
University of Texas
Graduate School of Business
<allisonj[_at_]mail.utexas.edu> Received on Sat Oct 02 1999 - 15:12:33 GMT