LAWS 9100
Race, Policing, and the Constitution · 1 instructor on record · 4 sections
Boston College's ratings are bunched at the top — the median instructor averages about 88 out of 100 on the raw scale, and 44% of them clear 90 — so a raw score cannot separate anybody. Every figure here is ranked against BC classes and that rank is re-expressed out of 100, which is what turns a raw 88 — the middle of the university — into a figure that says where somebody actually stands. On this scale 77 is the median, 84 the top quarter and 91 the top tenth. Workload is then an adjustment on top of that, worth nothing at all for an ordinary one. Lighter work than 22% of BC classes.
The class itself, averaged across everyone who taught it — who taught it is the board below.
How is this worked out?
That is what a student picking a section is actually choosing between: the board carries each instructor's own score for this class, and the score above is the class averaged across all of them.
Boston College's own “intellectually challenging” question. It is not a measure of difficulty, grading or workload.
How is this worked out?
Boston College's own “intellectually challenging” question for this class only — students answer it positively about courses that stretched them, so it measures intellectual challenge and NOT grading, workload or quality. Almost every BC class scores high on it, which is why it is shown as a rank rather than a score.
One of Boston College's five workload bands, not a number of hours. Higher means more work, not worse.
How is this worked out?
Boston College reports workload for this class only as one of five bands, not as a number of hours, and it does not publish what the bands mean — so this site will not translate it into hours. Higher means more work, which is not the same as worse.
The well documented phenomenon of police violence against African-Americans and other people of color now stands out as one of the most vexing and intractable social justice issues in the United States. Viral videos have shined a light on the pervasive brutality of racialized policing, a problem that once was visible only to the victims and the communities where it occurred. Legal scholars and practitioners have been drawn into the lively public debate about how, under a legal system ostensibly guided by principles of equal justice under the law, such behavior is allowed to continue without consequences for the perpetrators. The question central to this debate is whether the Constitution and established legal procedures provide a sufficient and reliable restraint on racialized police violence against people of color. Some activists, distrustful of a legal system that too often fails to hold police officers accountable for conduct that violates a persons civil and human rights, doubt the vitality of existing legal and policy responses to the issue. In the alternative, they tout remedies that include defunding or abolishing the police altogether. Others, advocating a more moderate approach, insist that by reforming existing law, policy and practices, the problem of police violence can be sufficiently mitigated. In this course, the readings and discussion will focus broadly on this debate over the role of the law in combating racialized policing. First, students will consider the extent to which the Fourth Amendment (which defines the rules of engagement for threshold encounters between the police and civilians) and the Equal Protection Clause (which prohibits discrimination based on race) offer viable protections from racialized police violence. For this segment of the course, the class discussion will highlight Terry v. Ohio and Whren v. United States as students consider whether neutral Fourth Amendment principles like reasonable suspicion to justify a stop and frisk may be implicated in the prevalence of racial profiling and other forms of racialized policing. In the second segment of the course, students will explore established accountability measures, including criminal prosecutions under state and federal law, departmental discipline, civil rights actions under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and federal consent decrees under 34 U.S.C. 12601, with the goal of understanding the limitations of each as a check on racialized police violence. In the last segment of the course, students will review a sampling of the post-George Floyd proposals for reimagining policing and insuring accountability for wrongful conduct. Here, the discussion will challenge students to critique the broad expanse of ideas emanating from the reform movement, the proposals for defunding the police and the demands for abolition of the police altogether.
| Instructor | Curve | Easiness | Challenge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Geraldine HinesLaw | 9499 raw · 4 records | 68−2 to the score | 86th |
There is no ranking to read here: Geraldine Hines is the only instructor with evaluation records for LAWS 9100, so the number is a record, not a position.
Also taught by Geraldine Hines
1 other class| Class | Instructors | Course score |
|---|---|---|
| LAWS 2110Critical Perspectives: Law, Context, and Professional Identity | 3080 records | 66 |
Other LAWS classes
All of them| Class | Instructors | Course score |
|---|---|---|
| LAWS 2110Critical Perspectives: Law, Context, and Professional Identity | 3080 records | 66 |
| LAWS 8667Legal Practice Externship | 251 records | 91 |
| LAWS 2150Law Practice 1 | 1032 records | 84 |
| LAWS 2155Law Practice II | 1032 records | 83 |
| LAWS 8130Advanced Legal Research | 829 records | 92 |
| LAWS 2190Professional Responsibility | 926 records | 74 |
The line
All 13 items · means across 4 recordsBars are ranks, not raw scores. Nothing here is graded good or bad.
What each item asks
- Explains Clearly
- The instructor was effective at creating an understanding of difficult subject matter.
- Available
- The instructor was available for help outside of class.
- Motivating
- The instructor motivated me to do my best work.
- Sparks Interest
- The course stimulated my interest in the subject matter.
- Organized
- The course was well organized.
- Clear Goals
- The learning objectives for the course were clear.
- Useful Later
- What I learned is applicable beyond this course.
- Assignments
- Assignments and exams contributed to my learning.
- Fast Feedback
- I received feedback on my work in a timely manner.
- Useful Feedback
- The feedback I received on my work was meaningful.
- Workload
- How much work the course took outside class, on Boston College's five-band scale — the band boundaries are not published, so this is not a number of hours.
- Challenge
- The course was intellectually challenging.
- Attendance
- Attending class was necessary to do well in this course.
Why these numbers are curved
Both the number and the bar are the rank against every comparable record we hold, printed back out of 100. BC's questions all have a median around 4.5, so on the raw scale every cell here would read in the high eighties and every bar would be nearly full — thirteen numbers that tell you nothing. Each cell prints its raw BC figure and its percentile underneath, so nothing is hidden by the transform. Every bar is one ink colour — nothing here is graded green or red. The hatched bars are not ratings at all: a higher number on either describes a different course, not a better one.
Game log
4 sections · newest first| Instructor | Term | Sec | Instr | Course | Work |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Geraldine Hines | Fall 2025 | 01 | 97 | 93 | 60 |
| Geraldine Hines | Fall 2024 | 01 | 100 | 100 | — |
| Geraldine Hines | Fall 2023 | 01 | 100 | 100 | — |
| Geraldine Hines | Fall 2022 | 01 | 98 | 90 | 60 |
How to read this board
Instructors are ranked on their record in this class only, never on their average across everything they teach. Scores are out of 100 — Boston College's 1–5 agreement scale, ×20, the way these numbers were printed for years. Workload is BC's own five-band figure, not a number of hours, and is shown as a rank. A dash means the question was not reported, and is never a zero.