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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Unless you choose community college, the competition and vetting of professors is very solid.[/quote]

It's actually the opposite - community college profs are often great. And if they aren't they are fired.

University professors have tenure. They cannot be fired and they are often forced to teach lower level classes against their will when they would rather be doing their own research. Incompetence and hatred for students ensues. This is the state school experience in a nutshell. If you survive the experience you are a much stronger person for it.

Those middling high cost schools such as American University are very much the opposite of this. So, if you want to save your kid from bad teachers and experiences get out your checkbook and send them there.

Otherwise tip off your kid that they should aggressively drop and add classes.

I had some of the worst and incompetent  on purpose profs in the early engineering years at UMCP - it was actually abusive because young people have no say or control or choice. It's strange to take people's money and give them incompetent jerks and huge class sizes. It does teach one survival but I still resent the incompetence - it's like stealing money from the state of Maryland. If you don't want to do your job, don't draw your salary.[/quote]

1.  "It's actually the opposite - community college profs are often great. And if they aren't they are fired."  This is not true.  Some community college profs are excellent, but there is a greater percentage of mediocre or unmotivated (can't/isn't interested in keeping up/publishing) profs in cc.

2.  "University professors have tenure. They cannot be fired and they are often forced to teach lower level classes against their will when they would rather be doing their own research."  Many of your child's profs are assistant profs (tenure track, but not tenured yet).  Profs are closely monitored, and student feedback DOES matter.  A prof who receives consistently poor feedback is never going to get tenure, so the profs who end up teaching the lower level courses (usually these are assistant profs or grad students) are very invested in ensuring that their instruction is of top quality.  The best tenured profs are teaching upper level courses in their specialty, and their expertise and interest in discussing their area usually ensures a pretty solid student experience.

You don't know much about university administration, and you are clearly not a college professor yourself.

And, OP, you will make not only yourself, but also your child, look foolish and unhinged if you try to intervene at the college level.  If your child is telling you her grades are poor because her prof is incompetent, this probably means your child let the ball drop and messed up by missing too many classes/not keeping up with work.
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