<p>Quite frankly, as long as professors teach some of the more advanced courses, why is it a concern if postdocs and grad students teach intro classes? Let alone professors, to a Stanford math graduate student (to take my favorite example), material in intro classes is trivial, and a grad student, who’ll eventually apply for postdoc positions, likely would jump at a chance to put another teaching of a solid coures on the resume. And, at that, would probably try to do a good job. Professors at Stanford, like those at my home school Berkeley, likely are most often hired because they are brilliant minds, not for their immense teaching credentials, and may not care as much. At best, they will be interested in encouraging talented Stanford X, Y, Z majors (of their field of specialty) once they reach the appropriate level, and certainly I think a minority would be interested in teaching the courses that I think could be relegated to TA’s. </p>
<p>As Hippo points out, a majority of courses are taught by professors anyway. I don’t see the issue. There may be other aspects to Princeton or something that make it seem very undergraduate focused, but I’m not sure what that means, and until someone qualifies, I will have a hard time understanding complaints about a lack of undergraduate focus.</p>