We at the Tribune are big fans of technology. The Internet, e-mail, instant messaging, cell phones and texting have defined our generation's formative years. But while we enjoy the ease that technology brings to our lives, we think that some things are better left to good, old-fashioned pen and paper — things like class evaluations.

We understand why the move was made last semester from in-class paper evaluations to online evaluations. However, we believe the university should consider returning to the original system.

While online evaluations streamline the process of compiling student responses for university administrators and professors, students are less likely to complete them. When class time is allotted for the evaluations and students have the evaluation right in front of them, students will typically fill them out. Online, however, students have to take their own time to log in to comment about their classes. Flooding students' e-mail inboxes with reminders about online evaluations eats up space and, frankly, gets irritating.

Online evaluations likely offer skewed perspectives on professors and courses. The students who take the time to fill out evaluations online are those who strongly dislike or really love their experience. The "middle ground" students who did not have strong feelings about a course or professor are less likely to sacrifice valuable study time to make their voice heard. Without the full range of perspectives, professors only have the very best and very worst reviews to consider. This makes improving class structure and curriculum all the more challenging.

If the university changed online evaluations in order to address these issues, we would be happy to support the effort. Using an online system that forces students to fill out critiques before they can view their final grades is one way to close some loopholes. The university should explore this to ensure reliable student review data.

The bottom line is that for evaluations to be useful, they should poll every student, or at least a great majority of students, participating in the course. By sticking with online evaluations, the university is selling its professors short. Instructors deserve to hear a wide range of critiques, and for now, the best way to achieve that is to return to the old pen and paper.