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vv_01/21/20253 repliesview on HN

I'm not sure about the situation elsewhere, but in Lithuania, it feels like professors produce articles or tackle topics solely to check a box. Most of the content generated by universities here seems completely irrelevant and ends up being discarded after completion. The courses are very bland and uninformative too.


Replies

pca00613201/21/2025

I sometimes just wonder, a lot of professors are bad at teaching because they don't have to be good at it. Is it the same for universities? It feels like reputation for universities are quite detached from the courses they have or teaching quality. Rankings focus a lot on quantitative measures, but teaching quality is hard to measure quantitatively. The output of universities, i.e. the quality of their students, depend on both the teaching quality and "IQ" of their students before admission, which is mostly a feedback loop because universities with good reputation get the best students... Optimizing for teaching quality also means that professors spend more time on teaching and less on research, which may reduce their research output and reduce the ranking, which has a more immediate effect on the reputation than teaching quality.

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vkazanov01/21/2025

Oh don't you worry, most of them are like that almost everywhere.

friendzis01/21/2025

There is a box to tick to keep tenure. Academics tick that box.

System behaves as designed. Situation normal: all fucked up.