AN INTERVIEW WITH LARRY MAXEY - The University of Kansas

student expectations. I think this came about at the same time that we instituted
formalized student evaluations of teaching. I am a very big supporter of student
evaluations, by the way, but it did change the dynamics. When I was in school, you
respected the professor and you had no idea of being any kind of a friend or having any
sort of a relationship with them at all. You never questioned the grade, because that’s the
way it was. Nowadays, I think professors not only want to be respected, they want to be
loved and are deathly afraid of what students might say on the student evaluations. I
think it has had a real effect on the grading scale. When I came as a new faculty member,
I remember going into a music history meeting and saying, “Tell me about grading here.”
For the most distinguished professor in the group, the grade point average for his classes
was 2.0, meaning he gave an equal amount of As and Bs and Ds and Fs. The other
professors in the department had class grade averages of 2.2 to 2.4. Nowadays if you
graded like that you would just be crucified by the students. Even though the students are
still very good, they really are used to being treated with kid gloves when it comes to
evaluation. So nowadays in an academic class, what used to be a C is now a B, I think.
Q: Have you been on university committees?
A: Yes, I’ve been active on all levels of committees, the department, EPPC, (Education
Policies and Procedures) and Promotion and Tenure, Faculty Evaluation, Faculty
Executive Committee, ,etc. At the School level, I have been on Promotion and Tenure
and the committee which evaluates summer research grant proposals. At the university
level, I was on Promotion and Tenure for one year filling in for someone, as well as
Academic Policies and Procedures. I was on the University Council at one point, and I
was on the Calendar Committee for a number of years.
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