It turns out that faculty members can be snowflakes, too. Is this really necessary?
The College Fix reports:
Pitt to remove ‘negative comments’ from faculty surveysUniversity of Pittsburgh professors will be able to ask for “harmful” and “negative comments” to be removed from their student evaluations under a new policy.The decision has drawn criticism from a free speech expert.The new policy will allow for faculty to petition for the removal of comments they do not like, according to the Office of Measurement and Evaluation of Teaching.The types of survey responses targeted by this policy seem to vary throughout the report, ranging from “incendiary and harmful” comments about race and gender, to “negative” or “unactionable” comments,” according to The Pitt News.Faculty can ask a “panel made up of faculty, students, and teaching consultants” to review flagged comments, according to Lisa Votodian, who oversees the surveys.The panel could then decide to remove the comments and change ratings, Votodian said. She has not responded to an emailed request for comment in the past month asking for more information on the policy.The College Fix also attempted to contact Eric Arroyo, who briefed faculty on the new policy alongside Lisa Votodian, but he also did not respond in the past month. Both Votodian and Arroyo were asked for clarification of what types of comments can be removed and whether they have concerns of artificially raising evaluation scores via removal.The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression declined to comment on the free speech implications of the policy.However, legal scholar John Banzhaf said the removal of comments could create a free speech problem.“Giving anyone or any group the power to remove something which was said by another interferes with their free speech,” Banzhaf, a George Washington University law professor, told The Fix via email.
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