By: Hailey Colwell

While some students think graduating from the University of Minnesota with Latin honors should be a special achievement, others think the program has become too exclusive.

Only 10 to 15 percent of each class can graduate with Latin honors or with distinction — awarded to students with a high GPA — which limits the number of students admitted to the University Honors Program as freshmen.

The limit has always been that way, said Honors Program Director Serge Rudaz, and the University isn’t planning to change it.

Genetics, cell biology and development sophomore Jessie Master said the 10 to 15 percent cap may be unfair for students in smaller colleges like the College of Biological Sciences.

About a third of the College of Liberal Arts class of 2016 graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class. In CBS, 82 percent did.

Getting into the Honors Program is not just about grades or rank, Rudaz said. Students are admitted to the program through a holistic process.

“We look for commitment to a particular interest,” he said. “It can’t be just by the numbers.”

Master said she applied to be in the Honors Program for her sophomore year but didn’t get in. Still, she said she likes the competitiveness of the program.

“It would be pointless if they let everyone in, because then it wouldn’t be an Honors Program,” she said.

If she does eventually get in, Master said it would be a significant achievement.

Physiology major Ornina Bachour, who graduated magna cum laude with distinction, said even if there’s a cap on the number of students who can graduate with honors, students not in the Honors Program who performed well in high school should be allowed to take honors courses.

“They’re clearly qualified in terms of academics,” Bachour said.

Omar Ammash, a summa cum laude political science graduate with high distinction, said the enrollment cap makes sense because of the limited supply of honors advisors and seminars available to students in the program.

“It just wouldn’t be feasible,” he said.

Before the University Honors Program launched in fall 2008, there were separate honors programs in different colleges, Rudaz said. These programs had different expectations and were run in different ways.

“What it meant to get a Latin honors degree from the University of Minnesota really depended on the college that you graduated from,” he said.

Rudaz helped create the current program to make it simpler and more consistent for students to graduate with Latin honors.

As for the cap on honors graduates, Rudaz said “there’s no clamoring to change the rules.”

“It just makes sense,” he said. “It means that this is a serious endeavor and that students need to really be committed to this.”

By: Cody Nelson

In the last year, bikers on the Midtown Greenway in South Minneapolis have been attacked, robbed — and one man even had a Molotov cocktail thrown at him from an overpass.

With the Dinkytown bikeway set to open near the University of Minnesota campus in early July, city officials are taking safety precautions before the public is free to ride.

The path, which will run from TCF Bank Stadium to the pedestrian bridge crossing the Mississippi River near campus, will mainly rely on a high volume of riders and trail lighting to create a safe environment, said Stephanie Malmberg, the project’s construction engineer.

Malmberg said she anticipates the path’s ridership will be high, which could deter crime.

“It’s not the right environment to commit a crime,” she said. “There’s more people watching.”

Soren Jensen, executive director of the Midtown Greenway Coalition, said a group of volunteers patrols the trail every night to monitor for safety concerns and added the path also relies on lighting and high traffic.

Bikeways have set standards for lighting, but the Coalition has found some darker spots on the Midtown Greenway that still need better lighting, Jensen said.

“The real question is,” he said, “is it light enough to make the bad guys feel uncomfortable?”

Similar to the Midtown Greenway, the Dinkytown path runs along an old railroad corridor, which partially runs through a trench below street level. 

To address this potential issue, engineers added an exit at 17th Avenue Southeast, near the path’s midpoint.

“Anytime you’re in a railroad trench, it’s always good to have a few different opportunities for getting out,” Malmberg said. “You can never guarantee 100 percent safety.”

Don Pflaum, a city transportation planner, said designers for the Dinkytown path considered installing emergency phones and surveillance cameras on the path but couldn’t justify the high cost.

He added that most trails in the Twin Cities don’t use phones or cameras, but the Midtown Greenway has them because of the corridor’s more crime-ridden history.

Jensen said bikers should use their senses and call 911 if they see suspicious activity along a bikeway.

“Don’t try to just power through it,” he said.

Workers are currently putting the finishing touches on the Dinkytown Greenway, installing lighting, signs, striping and some landscaping.

The path is expected to open in the first week of July. 

By: Meghan Holden

Students have pushed for more sustainable food and purchasing transparency at the University of Minnesota for two years. Conversations have increased, but some still aren’t satisfied.

The student group U Students Like Good Food has increasingly worked with University Dining Services to bring more sustainable foods on campus in the last year, but the group is still hoping to implement the Real Food Challenge calculator.

The RFC calculator would track UDS food purchasing and make the information available to the public.

 “There’s a huge interest in changing the food on our campus,” said Laura Dorle, president of the group and an environmental sciences, policy and management senior.

UDS has been working with the student group more frequently in the last year, and they’re hoping to move forward with the food calculator this summer, Dorle said.

UDS officials were unavailable for comment.

In 2012, UDS purchased about 176,000 pounds of local produce, 26,000 pounds of local meat and 1.2 million pounds of local dairy products, according to their website. However, the website did not give an exact definition for “local.”

Jason Hill, bioproducts and biosystems engineering assistant professor, said “local foods may be good in some ways and bad in others,” because it could be preferable to buy food from a sustainable company far away than from a large, local corporation.

The University’s Andrew Boss Laboratory of Meat Science has maintained a “fairly regular order” with UDS, said Ryan Cox, assistant professor of meat science and faculty coordinator for the meat lab.

UDS hasn’t purchased quite as regularly from Cornercopia, the University’s student organic farm.

Last year, UDS purchased $50 worth of food from Cornercopia. The year before, it spent about $1,000. The student farm is trying to establish a better relationship with UDS, said Courtney Tchida, Cornercopia’s farm manager.

Cornercopia and UDS planted about 80 pounds of potatoes last month, which Tchida said will go to dining centers in the fall.

Executive Chef Thomas Boemer of Corner Table, a Minneapolis farm-to-food restaurant, said there are a lot of opportunities for the University to incorporate local foods.

“You have to take small steps to head in the right direction,” Boemer said.

By: Branden Largent

Sousada Chidthachack grew up as part of an immigrant family and went to college to live out her mother’s dream of having her own career.

Chidthachack’s mother ran away from her childhood home in Laos, crossing Thailand and finally arriving in the United States so her future children could have more opportunities.

“I’m reminded every day that it’s a struggle,” Chidthachack said. “I saw my parents struggle.”

She’s pursuing a Ph.D. in math at the University of Minnesota with the dual goal of achieving a family dream and inspiring students with backgrounds like hers.

One way of doing this is through a new math tutoring program at the University.

The Great Lakes Higher Education Guaranty Corporation gave the University STEM Education Center $300,000 to start the Prepare2Nspire program, which will provide tutoring and mentoring for underrepresented middle and high school students, said Lesa Clarkson, an associate

professor in the University’s Curriculum and Instruction department.

The program will train University undergraduates to tutor and mentor eleventh graders this fall to prepare them for college math, said Clarkson, the program’s principal investigator.

Those eleventh-graders will then tutor and mentor eighth grade students in algebra.

Prepare2Nspire will work with students from North Community, Thomas Edison, Patrick Henry, Heritage Academy of Science & Technology and MetroTech Career Academy high schools, Chidthachack said.

Applications for undergraduate tutors and mentors are still open. Positions will be decided in July, and training will begin in August, said University graduate student and project manager Forster Ntow.

The project is funded by a one-year grant. If the program is successful, Clarkson said, she hopes to get the funding to continue it.

She said the program will target Minneapolis students who are potential first-generation college students, ethnic minorities and students who qualify for free and reduced lunch.

“Just because a student is from a poor family doesn’t mean they can’t be successful,” said Chidthachack, the program’s recruitment and retention operator.

One reason the program started, Clarkson said, was to make sure underrepresented students don’t fall behind with the state’s math regulations, which have required eighth graders to complete Algebra I since 2007.

The funding will be enough to tutor and mentor 135 eighth- and eleventh-grade students during the coming academic year.

“If we can prepare students better in math in high school,” Clarkson said, “then students have the opportunity to be more successful.”

Clarkson said getting students interested in math is important because it’s becoming a necessary skill in many careers.

“Math is just not optional anymore,” she said. “It’s so easy to give up when you don’t have the support when you’re trying to learn math.”

Chidthachack said she, Clarkson and the other program leaders will collect qualitative and quantitative data on student progress throughout the year.

In addition to participating in the project, Chidthachack is working on writing a book about her life story as another way to reach out to underrepresented students. She said she hopes the program, as well as her own personal story, will inspire young students to pursue higher education in math-related fields.

“That’s why this mentoring is so huge,” she said. “It’s so much more than just a math program.” 

By: Branden Largent

Traditionally, the University of Minnesota hasn’t incorporated diversity topics into its science courses.

Now, some faculty members and administrators want to change that.

Faculty members from the University’s College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences, the College of Biological Sciences and the College of Veterinary Medicine are working to include diversity in their curricula, said Karl Lorenz, CFANS Diversity and Inclusion program director.

CFANS will also introduce “intercultural competency” into orientation classes for its incoming freshmen, Lorenz said.

Faculty members are identifying specific courses within each of the college’s majors, Lorenz said, where students will learn about different cultures, social justice and equity, and how to collaborate across cultural differences.

For those courses, students take an intercultural development inventory that assesses their cultural competency at the beginning and end of each semester, said Department of Forest Resources assistant professor Joe Knight. The inventory measures the increase in student interest and competency in diversity topics.

Knight teaches the 1000-level course, Issues in the Environment, and restructured it to include the development inventory last year. He hasn’t received the assessment results yet, but said student discussions about diversity improved over the past two semesters.

Lorenz collaborated with the University’s Institute for Diversity, Equity and Advocacy to bring its workshop on integrating diversity into syllabi in science departments on the St. Paul campus.

“Students have to be able to work across difference,” Lorenz said. “A college that emphasizes the sciences has to bring that ability to work across difference into the classroom.”

The workshop is designed to show faculty members how they can introduce diversity into courses through assignments, learning materials and class discussions, said University associate professor and workshop leader Catherine Squires.

She said diversity can be incorporated into classes, even when they don’t fit into the University’s diversity liberal education requirements.

“Diversity matters in teaching, no matter what your subject is,” Squires said.

Lorenz said instructors often think it’s more difficult to create a diverse curricular experience for students in science-based colleges because science faculty members often weren’t taught to incorporate diversity into their teaching.

He worked with the workshop’s leaders to modify its content for a more science-savvy audience. Squires said there are more faculty members from the sciences than from CLA who are interested in attending the workshops.

Most faculty members are interested in bringing diversity into their classrooms, Lorenz said, but don’t have the skills to do it by themselves.

Because the University is primarily white, students need to be prepared to work in more culturally diverse environments, said Associate Vice Provost for Equity and Diversity Louis Mendoza.

“[The University] needs to mirror the complex, multi-racial, multi-ethnic society we live in,” Mendoza said.

Faculty members who attend both workshop sessions receive a $250 stipend, Mendoza said.

The money is used as an extra incentive to buy new classroom materials or attend conferences, he said.

Although the University is still working out how to educate its faculty members on diversity topics, it has more diversity requirements than some of its peers.

At Northwestern University, there are currently no diversity requirements. Frances Aparicio, director of Northwestern’s Latina and Latino Studies Program, said an academics and education working group proposed in February to include a diversity requirement for all undergraduates by 2015.

The University of Minnesota’s Office for Equity and Diversity isn’t looking to implement a diversity policy for every class, Mendoza said, but rather to suggest how faculty members can integrate diverse perspectives into their classes.

Craig Hassel, Food Science and Nutrition associate professor, said the workshops have helped faculty members consider how to implement more cultural context into their science curriculum.

Hassel teaches a freshman seminar where students can visit a Native American reservation and learn from elders in those communities about issues like nutrition and indigenous crops.

“Very few people would get that experience if we didn’t make a specific effort to include that in the curriculum,” Hassel said.

Lorenz plans to share how CFANS brought intercultural competency into its curriculum with other University colleges.

“If the function of education is to prepare tomorrow’s leaders,” Mendoza said, “… then we need to have somebody who can represent the interest of a wide variety of social groups.” 

By: Janice Bitters

While some at the University of Minnesota will see tuition freeze for the next two years, the cost of attending school will increase for all students.

The Board of Regents approved President Eric Kaler’s budget Friday that will hold tuition at $12,060 for resident undergraduates until fall 2016.

The freeze comes with an increase in student services fees and additional fees increases for certain students, classes and programs. Tuition will also rise for non-resident and graduate students.

“The hallmark of this budget is our commitment to affordability and access for Minnesota resident undergraduate students,” Kaler said at the Regent’s meeting.

While many were pleased with the tuition freeze, some — like state legislators — were irked by the additional costs to students.

Widespread cost increases

In addition to a nearly $100 student services fees increase, Kaler’s 2014-15 operating budget will raise fees for all Carlson School of Management students and international students.

All Carlson students will have a $500 fee per semester in addition to their tuition. The fee was instated last year at $250 per semester.

Full-time international students will see a new, $125 fee.

“This is really a fee designed to provide additional services to help these students be successful academically, so it would be for things like advising or tutoring,” said Julie Tonneson, associate vice president for budget and finance.

Some course fees and study abroad program costs will also increase, she said.

Room and board will increase by more than $300 for University housing next year to compensate for higher food costs and the cost of the new dorm on 17th Avenue, according to the operating budget.

Despite the additional housing cost, the University’s housing is still less expensive than at many colleges around the country, said Richard Pfutzenreuter, the University’s vice president and chief financial officer.

State legislators have praised Kaler’s budget for holding the line on resident undergraduate tuition, but some are concerned by the fee increases.

“I am pleased that the University kept their commitment to keep the tuition flat,” said Sen. Terri Bonoff, DFL-Minnetonka, who heads the Senate’s higher education committee. “But I would have preferred that the student fees were not raised.”

Rep. Gene Pelowski Jr., DFL-Winona, Bonoff’s counterpart in the House, has been especially critical of the University’s finances in the past year.

“I think, especially in the last few years with the recession, the solution has been to raise fees,” he said. “But why don’t they go away? There might be better ways to do it.”

In addition to fees increases, many students won’t see a tuition freeze.

Tuition will increase for non-resident undergraduates and graduate and professional students. First-year resident law students will have the highest increase at nine percent.

The professional program increases caused Regent Laura Brod to vote against Kaler’s budget, saying she didn’t agree with the high tuition and high financial aid model the large increases created.

“I feel like we shouldn’t have a Kelly Blue Book for tuition,” she said. “We should know what [tuition] costs and … have students know what the cost is to them.”

Andrew McNally, incoming president of the Council of Graduate Students, said graduate tuition increases could be detrimental to the University in the long run, because highly qualified students might choose to go elsewhere.

“Particularly at a University, grad students are what makes it function,” he said. “They do so much of the research at a major university — they are a major draw for the faculty.”

Additional student aid

Though a number of student costs will increase, some sources of student aid — from scholarships to health resources — will receive more funding in the coming year.

The budget includes nearly $3 million for merit-based financial aid programs. Some of the funds will help recruit students from non-reciprocity states, who pay higher tuition.

In light of a nine percent uptick in counseling service requests in the past decade, the budget also sets aside funds for mental health resources from Boynton Health Service next year, according to Ferdinand Schlapper, Boynton’s director.

Board Chair Linda Cohen said she’d like to see preventative measures taken on the issue, including educating freshmen on mental health resources during orientation.

Funding for on-campus construction

The board voted unanimously to adopt Kaler’s six-year capital improvement plan and his capital improvement budget for the coming year.

This funding includes the final addition to the University’s Biomedical Discovery District, which will receive $63 million in the coming year, bringing the total funding for the district to nearly $300 million.

The building’s cost drew questions from several board members, but Regent John Frobenius said it makes sense to him.

“If you think about the importance of issues in the world … this may in fact be one of the most important buildings and projects the University gets in,” he said.

An additional $2 million  in Kaler’s plan will be allocated to finish construction on Northrop Memorial Auditorium. The new Recreation and Wellness Center and the 17th Avenue residence hall will also be completed in the coming year.

Much of the University’s planned construction for next year has been delayed due to the failed bonding bill in the Legislature in May.

Board reviews leadership

In addition to approving both budgets, the board elected new internal leadership and reviewed Kaler’s performance during his second year in office.

In a split vote, the regents selected Richard Beeson as chair. Beeson, who joined the board in 2009, will replace Cohen in July.

After the vote, Cohen delivered Kaler’s review, describing his performance as “stellar” and adding that his decision-making style has “increased the pace of change within the University at a critical point in its history.”

Last year, Kaler got a similarly glowing review from the board, plus a three percent raise, which he donated to undergraduate scholarships.

The board will consider any potential pay increase for Kaler this year during their July meeting, according to University spokesman Matt Hodson.

By: Meghan Holden

The Book House is relocating to a new home just around the corner, but it’s not done fighting for Dinkytown.

Its large collection of used and rare books will be moving to a small space above Varsity Bike and Transit in Dinkydale Mall. Owner Kristen Eide-Tollefson said they plan to open by mid-July.

Book House employee Matt Hawbaker said the compact space will be about one-third the size of the current store.

The new store will take over the space that the Dinkytown Antiquarian Books bookstore once occupied.

Because of the tighter space, the Dinkydale Mall location will be a more curated collection of books, and they’ll be focusing on more online sales, Hawbaker said.

Employee Kevin Sell said they previously considered moving to Prospect Park but decided to stay nearby because “they are an essential part of Dinkytown.”

Eide-Tollefson said the store needs to be out of its current 14th Avenue location by the end of June. The Opus Group plans to break ground on a 140-unit apartment building there in August.

Monte Bute — who’s been coming to the Book House once a week since the first day they opened in 1976 — said he’ll continue going to the new location, but he’s sad about the move.

“Book House is one of the anchors of Dinkytown,” Bute said. “What you find here is serendipity.”

The new location will allow the Book House to have a more selective stock, Eide-Tollefson said. But the new space may not be permanent.

Hawbaker said the Book House hopes to move back into a larger place in the future, but it seems unlikely if Fifth Street is rezoned for new construction, as Opus has proposed.

Developers open spaces in Dinkytown for their offices, he said, and small-business owners can’t afford the higher prices.

Although Book House employees said they’re happy the store will stay in Dinkytown, they’ll still be fighting against the development of the Opus project.

“This deal is not done,” Hawbaker said.

Community group Save Dinkytown’s petition for an environmental assessment of the Opus apartment project will be addressed at the zoning and planning committee’s June 6 meeting. The city of Minneapolis denied the application for an assessment, saying the group didn’t provide enough evidence that the project would negatively impact the environment.

There won’t be a public hearing, but a Save Dinkytown representative will have an opportunity to address the committee, according to the meeting agenda online.

Bute said these wars with developers aren’t new and Opus doesn’t understand the culture of Dinkytown.

“The Book House is an idea that’s bigger than [the] Opus project,” Bute said.

By: Meghan Holden

Opening a tanning salon in Dinkytown was a no-brainer for owner Debbe Tomberlin.

U-Tan, located in the basement of Five Guys Burgers and Fries on Fourth Street Southeast, opened in early May during what Tomberlin calls a “dead season” for indoor tanning.

Despite the slow start, Tomberlin said she’s confident her salon will be successful with students in the area because of the demand for tanning and her low prices.

Tanning gained popularity in the early 1980s  and has since become a $4.9 billion industry. A 2010 National Health Interview Survey found that 44 percent of white Midwestern women ages 18-21 tan.

Joshua Miller, district manager of Darque Tan  on Washington Avenue, said the luxury-style tanning salon relies on students during the school year, although it’s not their most popular location.

SOL Tan and Spa on Como Avenue also has a primarily student-based clientele. Co-owner Grant Vaith says the large student population in Como brings in a lot of customers to the salon.

Zach Wagner, a U-Tan customer, said he started going to U-Tan because it was close to his work in Dinkytown and it’s cheaper than other tanning salons in the area.

Salon staff agreed most customers tan for cosmetic reasons, but many students are seeking relief for mood disorders as well.

A lot of customers with seasonal affective disorder come in during the winter, Tomberlin said.

“Tanning makes you feel good,” she said, adding that some customers are referred to tanning by their doctors for SAD treatment.

DeAnn Lazovich, epidemiology professor and co-leader of the Masonic Cancer Center’s Prevention and Etiology Program, said UV radiation from tanning beds does seem to increase endorphin production but suggested people get endorphins from alternative sources, like exercise.

Tanning risks

The School of Public Health and Masonic Cancer Center’s 2010 study  on indoor tanning found that people who use tanning beds for any amount of time are 74 percent more likely to get melanoma — the second-most common cancer for adolescents and young adults  — than those who don’t use tanning beds.

Liz Bailey, SOL Tan and Spa assistant manager, said she started tanning in high school and was aware of the risks involved.

“I would prefer to be tan rather than pale,” Bailey said, adding that most people who tan know the potential risks of getting skin cancer.

SOL Tan and Spa, Darque Tan and U-Tan all discourage their customers from tanning if they’ve had skin cancer.

“Tanning has gotten a bad rep,” Tomberlin said. “There’s good and bad in everything.”

Some customers have switched to sunless tanning options, such as spray tans, to avoid skin damage.

Miller said 20 percent of their clientele use spray tans — a 10 percent increase from three years ago.

Spray tans are a good option for people who don’t tan easily, Miller said, and they will likely become more popular in the future. 

By: Cody Nelson

If Congress doesn’t act soon, almost 200,000 Minnesota students could see interest rates double on their college loans.

The Stafford student loan interest rate is set to double July 1, but the Republican-led House of Representatives and the White House are pushing opposing plans to address the issue.

Each year, thousands of University of Minnesota students take out Stafford Loans, the most commonly used type of federal student loan in the nation.

The main bill moving through the House, authored by Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., would set market-based interest rates for loans, allowing the rate to fluctuate from year-to-year with the government’s cost of borrowing.

The plan, which caps interest rates at 8.5 percent, passed the U.S. House on May 23, but President Barack Obama’s administration said he won’t sign the measure if it reaches his desk.

The Democrats have proposed multiple plans, but Obama and others support a bill that would extend the current 3.4 percent interest rate another year, giving Congress more time to work out a long-term solution.

Both sides say something needs to be done as student debt grows.

Last year, more than 15,000 University students took out unsubsidized Stafford loans, according to Office of Student Finance data.

Also, the 64 percent of University students who graduated with debt in 2012 owed a median of  $27,334.

The University isn’t lobbying for or against the issue, but the school has expressed support for Kline’s bill, said Channing Riggs, director of University Federal Relations.

The University wants four principles from Congress’ solution: a flexible interest rate, a long-term solution, a cap on interest rates and a way of paying that doesn’t take from higher education funding, Riggs said.

“We applaud Congressman Kline because I think it was a very reasoned approach,” she said, adding that Kline’s bill has their desired principles and “pays for itself.”

Riggs said she believes Congress will compromise on a short-term solution and address it next year during the Higher Education Act reauthorization.

University President Eric Kaler, in an interview with the “Minnesota Daily” Tuesday morning, said he also supports Kline’s bill.

But Brandon Lorenz, a spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said Kline’s bill could lead student loan interest rates to double, which he said isn’t acceptable.

“Congressman Kline is pushing a bill that would raise interest rates … and that’s just not the kind of vision that helps middle-class families afford college,” he said.

Mike Obermueller, Kline’s Democratic challenger for the 2014 election, said the bill is a “really unfortunate and bad policy” for students.

He said student loans helped get him through school, and the non-fixed interest rate in Kline’s plan could create problems for students with small budgets after graduating.

“The idea of your loans going up, even $100 a month, can make a big difference in your budget,” he said.

Riggs said some critics say Kline’s bill is too complicated for students because it makes the loan interest rate different each year.

“You do have to sign up for new classes, and you have to find some place new to live,” she said, “and you have to do your loan again.”

While the University supports Kline’s proposal, the Minnesota Student Association is pushing to continue the 3.4 percent interest rate for another year or more, said incoming president Mike Schmit.

Keeping a low, fixed interest rate is in the students’ best interest, he said.

“Student debt is the highest it’s ever been … doubling our interest rate is not the way to fix that,” he said. “Students aren’t the people who should be penalized in this situation.”

By: Roy Aker

Tyler Johnson wrote thoughtful responses on the four Student Rating of Teaching forms he filled out this spring.

But he noticed other University of Minnesota students turn the forms in blank, mostly in larger lecture-style classes.

“Being that it’s the only real way for students to voice their opinions of faculty, I think it’s important to actually write something useful,” the business and marketing education junior said.

SRT forms, the most widely used evaluations at the University, are usually filled out by students during their final weeks of classes and are used in the tenure and promotion process.

About 148,000 forms were scanned by the Office of Measurement Services during fall 2012, representing more than 6,500 courses on the Twin Cities campus alone.

Thomas Dohm, OMS director, said three-quarters of the paper-version SRTs are filled out completely by students, but online evaluations have a much lower percentage.

The evaluations include student release questions at the end that ask about course load and value of assignments. Various students and groups, including the Minnesota Student Association and student representatives to the Board of Regents, have pushed for more transparency in releasing that data.

Professors currently have the right to decide whether to release that section to students — only about 10 percent do.

But Johnson said he thinks the website Rate My Professors is just as useful as SRT forms.

Anthropology professor William Beeman disagrees.

“Anybody who picked their classes by going on to that site exclusively would be rather foolish,” Beeman said.

Johnson said he “knows that some students use the site to just complain,” but students don’t have any other way to judge a class before registering.

“It’s a calculated decision,” Johnson said.

‘Not a popularity contest’

While still an undergraduate at Wesleyan University in 1968, Beeman said he designed the first faculty evaluation form ever used for tenure decisions.

Beeman, now the chair of the University’s Department of Anthropology, said he uses similar forms regularly to gauge the performance of both himself and other professors in the department.

Political science professor Larry Jacobs pays close attention to the written comments.

He said most students write that the course contains too much reading. But he said he pushes his students and that increased reading is part of the transition into college.

“For me, it’s never been a popularity contest,” Jacobs said. “The best outcome for me is when a student comes out of a class saying, ‘You know, I’ve learned a lot.’”

Beeman, who receives SRT forms for each professor in his department, said the forms are used in decisions of tenure, promotions and awards.

He noted that faculty research activities and accomplishments also are taken into account.

Chemistry professor Christopher Cramer said “it’s a little bit of a pity” that the forms are used in the promotion and tenure process.

He said it may create poor incentives to “teach to get good evaluations” and that the process may be connected to the grade inflation curve that started in the 1970s.

The data is still useful, Cramer said, but shouldn’t necessarily be tied to salary and promotions.

“It’s a risky enterprise,” he said.