Fall Dining Options Voted On
Duke Partakes in Historic Relay
In its final meeting, DUSDAC voted on food trucks and Merchants-on-Points vendors for the Fall | Page 2
Duke is no stranger to the Penn Relays, the world’s first relay meet and the largest track meet in the nation | Page 4
The Chronicle T h e i n d e p e n d e n t d a i ly at D u k e U n i v e r s i t y
tuesday, april 21, 2015
www.dukechronicle.com
ONE HUNDRED AND tenth YEAR, Issue 113
A closer look at course evaluations
‘All I do is tell stories’
Alex Griffith and Gautam Hathi The Chronicle
Darbi Griffith | The Chronicle Al Buehler taught one of his last classes in his office in Cameron Indoor Stadium Monday afternoon. Buehler has been at Duke for 60 years.
Longtime professor and coach to teach last class Wednesday Patricia Spears The Chronicle After 60 years as a Duke coach and professor, Al Buehler is retiring. Buehler will teach his last class, a freshman seminar entitled History and Issues of American Sport, Wednesday from his office in Cameron Indoor Stadium. Hired as the head cross country coach in 1955, Buehler took the helm of the Blue Devil track and field program in 1964 and coached the U.S. track and field teams at the 1972, 1984 and 1988 Olympics. During his 45 years as a coach, Buehler built relationships across racial and gender
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lines and has relayed many of his experiences to his students. “You ask these kids in here, all I do is tell stories,” he said. Buehler’s own running career began when he was in junior high, but before that he often raced his father. “I never beat him in my entire life,” Buehler said. In high school, Buehler’s physical education teacher, a World War II veteran, returned to the United States and started a cross country team. Jim Kehoe, a former track coach at the University of Maryland, saw Buehler at a competition and invited him to run for the Terrapins. Buehler graduated from Maryland in 1952. “I’m constantly looking at these plaques and these awards and these letters from Buehler’s coaches,” said freshman volleyball player Anna Kropf, who is taking Buehler’s class.
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INSIDE — News 2 Sports 4 Classified 5 Puzzles 5 Opinion 6
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During his time as the head coach of track and field from 1964 to 2000, Buehler coached Ellison Goodall, Trinity ‘78—the first woman to run track at Duke—and worked with North Carolina Central University head coach LeRoy Walker, inviting his team to practice on Duke’s track. Buehler’s cross country teams won six Atlantic Coast Conference championships. A member of the Duke Sports Hall of Fame, Buehler said he will miss teaching, calling his 60 years as a faculty member the greatest accomplishment of his diverse Duke career. In addition to his duties as track and field coach, Buehler served as chair of the physical education department during his tenure at the University and taught classes ranging from boxing to badminton. His wide range of experiences give him no shortage of anecdotes during his lectures. See Buehler on Page 2
Serving the University since 1905
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Students can view ratings for almost 17,000 courses taught since 2004 through the Student Accessible Course Evaluation System, but they might be missing some of the most valuable information. Although the average course rating out of five on SACES—which corresponds to the qualitative ratings students indicate on ACES— is 4.34 and the average instructor rating is 4.46, professors ultimately decide whether or not their evaluations are available to students to SACES. As a result, the information on SACES is not necessarily representative of all student evaluation submissions and 75 percent of all classes for which ratings are available have instructor ratings of at least 4.22. “The instructors can decide which course to have put into SACES but cannot select or deselect individual items,” Matt Serra, director of the Arts and Sciences Office of Assessment, wrote in an email April 13. The “opt-in” system in which professors determine whether or not information becomes available after seeing student-submitted data was last voted on at a meeting of the Arts and Sciences Council in late 2004. A close vote at the meeting rejected a Duke Student Government proposal to link to the independent website www.ratemyprofessors.com. Although professors can still determine whether or not students see the results, Serra, said Lee Baker, dean of academic affairs for the College of Arts and Sciences, is always provided a report each term with the evaluation results and can request reports on certain faculty when necessary. The data is also reviewed as part of an annual faculty review process. “Each term [Baker] is made aware of those instructors in the top and bottom five percent in both quality of instruction and intellectual stimulation,” he said. Part of the dilemma faculty face when
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See Evaluations on Page 3
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