Faculty will be considered fair when they set quantifiable measures for meeting standards at all levels of grading, expect students to do well, give extra help to those students willing to try, and allow some leeway for rewarding effort. Just as students will work as hard as necessary to get the grade they want, they will be as responsible as they have to be in following classroom rules and procedures. Students rate classes with strict policies as fairer than those with lax policies, even when the strict professor gives low grades. Being the students' best friend Many faculty members, especially new ones or ones who are unsure of themselves, desperately want students to like them and therefore seek to become the students' friend. Then, in order to reestablish the proper position of authority, they must try to be overpowering in the classroom.
Students are uncomfortable with a professor who becomes overly friendly.
Special harm is created when the professor's friendliness is extended to some students and not to all. A particular problem reported by students is faculty members dating students, which is unfair to both the student involved and other students. Other faculty, sensitive to both ethnic and gender issues, tell jokes about overweight people or allow students to make negative remarks about gays and lesbians. Faculty members who genuinely want their classrooms to be places where all students are comfortable should be open to feedback on any remark or behavior in the classroom which shows insensitivity. A professor who prides himself on his excellent teaching recently described a technique which allows him to learn the names of some of his students in order to actively engage them in class discussions.