By Panku Sharma & Aliester Gwynne
As the price of education continues to rise, and the quality of instruction is strained under regulation, training, and funding issues, many students at UFV have taken to voicing their alarm and dissatisfaction. With appropriate administrative channels either hard to find or lacking efficacy, much of this protest has made its way online to Facebook confessional pages, Twitter threads, and ratemyprofessors.com.
A member of UFV’s tenured faculty, Professor Zuman Notlitch, holds the distinction of having a negative six rating on a website that only uses a five point scale. While he does boast a chillipepper, his page is plagued by criticism of confusing and biased lectures, unavailability, unfair marking, and what many students feel is overpriced and exploitative required readings.
While having been around since before UFV became an accredited university, Prof. Notlitch spends most of his time away for research in the fields of folklore and druidic ritual. Currently, he only teaches a single course which is offered every other year, HIST/ENGL 888: Influences of the Great Elder Ones on World History through Neo-Postfeminist Perspectives.
Among the many complaints, one is that the required textbook for the course, The Hungarian Scholomance, is a cost obstacle for students being able to take and participate in the course.
“There’s only one physical copy, which apparently was written on the skins of a long dead Gaulish tribe and of course is long lost,” said former student Sebastian Klein. “That leaves only ebooks which are like $600, and that’s after the Amazon Prime discount. I’m pretty sure he authored the damn thing too, how is that still allowed?”
“He’s one of those old timers who is so set in his ways he can’t be bothered to even use email,” complained another former student under the condition of anomonity. “Not to mention the whole class is four hours of lecture, with him dipping into Latin without warning, and stinking up the class with the red candles he always lights at his desk. They’ve got to be a fire hazard with all those robes.”
When pressed for comment outside of his classroom earlier this week, professor Notlitch was critical of the concerns and became increasingly animated. Citing centuries of failed peasant revolutions and his ascendency beyond material concerns, the professor retreated to his office wherein we could hear the distant wails of souls long lost and chanting in a guttural and unfamiliar language that could not be identified. Curiously, when attempting to upload recordings of this encounter, all equipment mysteriously turned to ash.
As it stands, while incredibly unpopular, the professor’s course is a credit requirement for both of its cross-listed program. When asked if student evaluations would have any effect on training or disciplinary measures against professors in the long run, anonymous sources within UFV administration were reluctant to give details, but did direct us towards the budget items detailing the purchase of new high capacity shredders.
