Certainly for many of MIT's professors teaching is not a priority, but you can't get tenure if you're not an adequate teacher. I also witnessed no cheating when I attended; as you note, it's self-correcting behavior for typical MIT majors.
Harvard's something of a special case in that they're notorious for not promoting from within; that is, Harvard tries to hire the very best in the world they can recruit to be full professors, and assistant, associate, whatever their lower levels are hired with the understanding Harvard's not going to grant them tenure. (I'm sure there are exceptions to this generalization, but that what I've been told is the pattern, at least in their Arts and Sciences unit).
I wouldn't expect stellar teaching to be common in such an environment, and my Harvard friends seldom if ever raved about the quality of teaching.
Harvard's something of a special case in that they're notorious for not promoting from within; that is, Harvard tries to hire the very best in the world they can recruit to be full professors, and assistant, associate, whatever their lower levels are hired with the understanding Harvard's not going to grant them tenure. (I'm sure there are exceptions to this generalization, but that what I've been told is the pattern, at least in their Arts and Sciences unit).
I wouldn't expect stellar teaching to be common in such an environment, and my Harvard friends seldom if ever raved about the quality of teaching.