<p>Reprise: Ratemyprofessors.com average for all Big Ten and Ivy League schools:</p>
<ol>
<li>Ohio State 3.46</li>
<li>Purdue 3.29</li>
<li>Michigan 3.28</li>
<li>(tie) Iowa 3.26</li>
<li>(tie) Wisconsin 3.26</li>
<li>(tie) Indiana 3.22</li>
<li>(tie) Nebraska 3.22</li>
<li>(tie) Illinois 3.21</li>
<li>(tie) BROWN 3.21</li>
<li>Minnesota 3.19</li>
<li>CORNELL 3.17</li>
<li>(tie) Michigan State 2.98</li>
<li>(tie) Penn State 2.98</li>
<li>HARVARD 2.95</li>
<li>PRINCETON 2.85</li>
<li>PENN 2.65</li>
<li>Northwestern 2.65</li>
<li>YALE 2.59</li>
<li>DARTMOUTH 2.54</li>
<li>COLUMBIA 2.37</li>
</ol>
<p>"CAMBRIDGE, Mass, Friday, August 13 — Reaction was muted across the Ivy League today to news that the once-mighty Ivies had fallen far short of the upstart Big Ten conference in the annual Big Ten-Ivy League Academic Challenge. Schools from both leagues compete for the highest Overall Performance by Classroom Professors as measured by the prestigious Ratemyprofessors.com academic rating service. Trophies are awarded to the top individual school and to the conference with the highest median score.</p>
<p>"The Big Ten took both individual and conference prizes in this year’s competition. Ohio State topped the field with a commanding 3.46 score, easily outdistancing Big Ten rivals Purdue (3.29) and Michigan (3.28) for individual honors. No Ivy came in higher than 8th, and 7 of that conference’s 8 members finished in the bottom half of the field. In the conference competition, the Big Ten’s median score of 3.215 blew past the Ivy League’s anemic 2.8 rating. </p>
<p>"Some observers thought the group competition was even more lopsided than the final tally suggested, because the Big Ten’s overall score was dragged down by the poor showing of conference laggard Northwestern, which finished in the bottom quartile along with Ivy also-rans Penn, Yale, Dartmouth, and Columbia. Some Big Ten provosts were rumored to be questioning privately whether Northwestern was still capable of competing in the Big Ten academically, or whether it was sinking inexorably to Ivy League levels. Those rumors could not be confirmed as no Big Ten provost was willing to speak on the record. Speculation has swirled in Big Ten circles that Northwestern may be weighing a decision to leave the conference voluntarily rather than risk a humiliating expulsion if the classroom performance of its professors does not improve.</p>
<p>"In Ivy League country, expressions were mostly stoic as news of the Big Ten’s decisive academic triumph spread. Ivy League provosts would not speak for the record except to offer their perfunctory congratulations to the Big Ten victors. A few Ivy undergrads questioned whether the Big Ten had an unfair advantage in the competition because Ratemyprofessors.com rates professors on a scale of ‘easiness,’ with easier professors getting higher marks. But Big Ten officials were quick to dispel that notion, pointing out that while students often use Ratemyprofessors.com to identify the easiest professors, ‘easiness’ does not count in the professor’s ‘overall quality’ score which is based solely on a professor’s ‘helpfulness’ and ‘clarity.’ </p>
<p>"Critics, including some at Big Ten schools, nonetheless argue the conferences’ use of the Ratemyprofessors.com rating as a proxy for academic quality, or even for the quality of the classroom experience, is misguided. </p>
<p>"‘When I teach I’m looking for something beyond clarity and helpfulness,’ said one Big Ten prof currently visiting at Harvard who declined to be identified for this story. ‘Call me old-fashioned, but I still think content matters; you can be clear and helpful while not teaching your students very much, and as long as you give a lot of A’s you’ll get exceedingly high marks for overall quality as well as easiness on Ratemyprofessors. That may be what some students want, but my own view is that the professor’s job is to get students to grapple with challenging material, to tackle complexity and uncertainty, and above all to get them to think, and to learn how to think. Those things don’t always win you high marks in clarity, and certainty not in easiness. It makes me question the usefulness of the Ratemyprofessors rating, but given the Big Ten’s smashing victory in the Academic Challenge, I suppose that’s not a popular view among my colleagues right now.’ </p>
<p>“One of the few Ivy Leaguers to speak candidly about the humiliating Ivy defeat was Harvard senior class president Hampton Rogers ‘Biff’ Ellsworth IV. ‘We may no longer be competitive in football or academically,’ Ellsworth said. ‘But scr** it, they’ll never beat us at crew.’”</p>