Say there's some professor at a prestigious university in Beijing who hasn't even finished grading his papers from a couple of semesters ago.

Nobody in his department will call him on it. Why?

He's got a big reputation and he's almost never around the campus. Try getting a letter of recommendation out of him. No way.

Yet he's famous, and appears on CCTV. He loves the limelight, and he lectures at other universities and in front of foreign groups to pick up some extra cash and their adulation. He's on a couple of big government committees, where he yacks away, so endlessly in love is he with the sound of his own voice.

Meanwhile, his frustrated students from past semesters can't get their grades. Some have had their graduate school applications sullied from missing pieces to their puzzling academic records.

Folks, he's not a composite character. He exists. What's worse: This fellow just doesn't care.

That's why anything to make professors more accountable is a good thing.

When I taught in journalism in California, some of my colleagues calculated the day that they felt the fewest number of students would be in class. That's the occasion upon which they'd pass out faculty "student" evaluations. But that was using an old-fashioned method, pencil on paper.

What's more, they felt insulted when they got the results. Some said they didn't even read them. There was no accountability anyway. The evaluations meant nothing.

Technology has caught up, at least in China, and the evaluations are being taken seriously

It's thanks to the Internet that laggard professors who need to improve their teaching methods can't escape the report card they so richly deserve. More and more, students are being allowed to evaluate their professors online so the teachers can be asked to improve their teaching or subject knowledge.

Other students, too, can use the tallied information to decide whether the professor is worth the time and trouble before they enroll in a particular class.

"With a rough idea about the teacher's teaching ability, I will no longer be blind before selecting a course", said Li Xingren, a freshman at Donghua told the website eastday.com.

That's why three professors have recently lost their promotions at Donghua University in Shanghai. Another trio at Shanghai International Studies University were asked to go back to the classroom and to help one another improve their skills.

All had received bad marks over the internet from students, and other students likely would've ignored their classes had something not been done.

At Donghua, the students employ an "A" through "D" system to grade their old prof's teaching skills and overall knowledge of subject matter. That means if the lecturer just sat in a chair all semester, reeking of scotch and rambling from a yellowed folder of old notes, the academician is a goner.

Donghua officials say the evaluation system has teeth. Whatever a professor's rank or experience, a grade of "D" automatically results in some sort of punishment or even a request to resign.

"The online evaluation system includes the opinions of a large number of students, and therefore reflects an accurate picture of things", said Diao Huiyao, of SISU, agreeing that an online system is effective.

Professors ought to face the music with an open mind. After all, a heart surgeon who loses every other patient won't stay a heart surgeon for long. There's always another line of work to be had, say the meat counter at the local supermarket.

The same should apply to teachers. There's no right to teach, as the famous, non-paper-grading, bally-hooed professor from Beijing believes.

"So long as we can get our job done properly, students will reward us a fair result", Yao Fumin, an SISU faculty member said.

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