I have done the same Trac paperwork at the same institution as Toby Miller, and I think he is making a fuss over nothing (“My university has asked me to keep a diary of my work, and I hate it”, Opinion, 19 November). Yes, it is a bit of a drag to account for one’s activities, but we’re public servants so it’s not unreasonable to be asked to give such an account every so often. There certainly are harmful bureaucratic trends, but this is not one of them.
In response to Miller’s complaints, T. Devinney says that this sort of thing is like the unreasonable burden of having to satisfy an external examiner. What is wrong with getting academics to check that their peers think that their syllabuses make sense? That Devinney’s external examiner was using his book in class is a good sign that she knew the subject, not that she was an inferior being who should never have been asked to give an opinion on what Devinney proposed to teach.
Gabriel Egan
De Montfort University
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