PressEthic

Oh it's not so bad! Common people! Students talk about teachers and school everyday on the internet, at the dinner table, everywhere! Either way, the things they have to say about them are going to be heard, and the website is just another way voice their opinions. After all, don't we have the right to freedom of speech? And to the professors, don't go on picking on students just because we say something bad about you, it happens all of the time! Kind of like high school. It's only natural that students hate teachers because you all give us homework and tests and you all make us do exactly what we don't want to do...work! If you don't want to us to say things about you and give you bad reviews, learn to interact with us more and catch our attention. Don't give us pointless work just to keep us busy. Make everything we do in class something we can actually use in the future. And lastly, don't treat us like children. We're college students! We are mature enough to show you respect if you are willing to treat us like young adults and not like second-graders. And to the students, you are now in college and have responsibilities other that partying and getting drunk. Act your age and maybe you will get the respect you deserve as well!

Ok, let's start a Rate My Students website!!! Next, get my professors to start paying me for every unit I take with them. And they can use Rate My Students so that they are sure to get students that ensure their success as a teacher.

RateMyStudents.com? Um, that's called "grading"!

Neither should your stupid comments. Stay off the net please! :(

Mr. October 8th is a LOSER and should stay off the net.

Of course professors hate this. It would mean they would have to actually be held accountable for the quality of their work and prove to the public -- who pays most of their salaries (even at privates when you include the impact of direct student aid into tuition revenues) -- they are actually doing something.

Today, there is NO (repeat, NO) evidence that students are learning anything in their college classroom. (Even at Harvard, where professors are merely not messing their students up instead of contributing to their learning. See the work of economist Alan Krueger for proof of this).

Want evidence of the fact that professors don't care about learning because there is no accountability? Ask your typical professor what they think of assessment. Their usual response will be hostility, then compliance, and, at best, indifference. There is direct evidence that the typical professor simply does not care about learning and is, in fact, hostile to it.

Except for the current administration in Washington DC, I can think of no other profession that is so hostile to proving they make an impact on people (remember again, there is NO; NONE; ZERO; ZIP) evidence of the fact that by merely sitting in your typical college classroom you will learn more than if you checked out a book at the library or read about the subject on wikipedia.

Thanks to the internet, the days of 35-hour work-weeks, crappy teaching based on outdated models of how people actually learn, and professors avoiding learning in the classroom will mercifully be over!

this poster doesn't seem to understand that professors do "rate their students." It's called grading and it follows students wherever they go. quite publicly. with actual results in the real world.

never mind those letters of recommendation that students frequently need written. it IS unfortunate that those are not made public without compromising their value.

boo-hoo for all those tenured profs. who can't take any criticism from a silly website, which has not to my knowledge resulted in either paycuts or layoffs.

besides, don't you think your colleagues already know about all of the snotty things your students say about you? trust me, they do.

chillax, my friend

I'm wondering why you feel the need to cut people down like that. Have you never made a typo? If you haven't, fabulous, but there's no need to be rude.

Amen

Clearly a professor who thinks his students are in as much of a position of authority and power as he is ...

Well, I guess we will be as powerful as you envision us to be when:

1) you are paying US $40,000 a year, 2) we are offering YOU a garbage education in return, and 3) we have the power to ruin YOUR gradepoint average and prospects of future employment ... 4) all while YOU have nothing to say on the matter, and apparently, not even the 1st amendment right to share your hard-earned experience with others like you.

Anyway, the author of the previous comment may have misspelled the worder 'wonder', but at least, unlike you, he has an argument based on solid reasoning instead of corrupt and protectionist motives. If you'd channel some of that ivory tower elitism and false sophistication into really understanding the subject you teach and how to express your ideas to people with dissimilar perspectives you might actually mitigate the need for such websites -- last I checked, "building bridges of understanding" with different peoples and cultures was an ideal to which academia payed great lipservice ... and lo and behold, when it comes time to practice what you preach to those that are at your mercy and have little voice of their own, you balk, pretending to be victimized by the simple idea of free speech. Students are people too, so maybe you or your colleagues could start affording them some of that high ideal which you spend so much hot air talking about.

Now let me dispel any privacy defenses you might try to hoist: You ARE a public figure. In fact, you are not just an employee, but the primary provider of a commerical service with a pricetag of about $40,000 a year ... and its time you lived up to your position of authority and acknowledged your commercial and social responsibilities ... namely, you better be putting in the hard work and effort to provide your students with an education worthy of a $40,000 price tag ... and if you aren't, be prepared to receive the word of mouth advertising and reputation you have earned in the free market.

What you do is a business like any other, with the same ethical considerations and obligations as that of any other commercial entity that advertises its goods or services for sale to the public -- the only exception in your case being that your service costs $160,000, or as much as a house, over a 4-year period. With numbers like that, I would expect calls for consumer protection eminating from Eliot Spitzer's office day and night, and perhaps the issue should be brought to his attention. Whether he seeks to pursue it to its just conclusion all depends on how much influence the teacher's union in NY exerts on him, and how much power they have to convert an issue of business corruption and fairness in advertising to a matter of political exigency.

As you can see I am as skilled as you in the art of verbal false-sophistication, though I don't make a living off of it, so criticising my irrelevant spelling or grammatical mistakes would be as futile as my criticising yours. Perhaps that'll make you think about the legitimate issues the previous poster brought up before being ridiculed by you (have a little understanding Teach, he's not nearly as enlightened or educated as you, he's still learning, lol). As for disclosures on my part, I am a first year student come back to school after years of independent study and research, as well as costly life experience in the U.S. and abroad, 25 years of age, speak 5 languages, some of which are dead, have a 4.0 GPA and I have never gotten less than a 90 in any class. I find most of what my teachers throw at me child's play, and my dissatisfaction comes not from an inability to understand my teachers' lectures, but from asking deeply-thought-out questions that any person adroit in scientific method or critical-thinking would discern as crucial to understanding, only to be met with blank stares or deflections from college professors who clearly have done little to grasp the material they teach. Of course, I have plenty of professors who ARE the quality product as well, and put their heart and soul not only into sharing knowledge already acquired, but also contemplating and discovering new areas of knowledge with their students. So sites like ratemyprofessors.com asre needed, insofar as I, and many other students, would like to know who those true knowledge-seekers/sharers are before we dish out $40,000 for a year's worth of education with imposters, or perhaps $2400 for a winter intersession, or $10,000 for a summer session as a visiting or transfer student. As consumers and Americans protected by the 1st amendment, we are imminently entitled to that. As for any concerns you might have about erroneous or false information posted on a professor-rating site, I can only say that 'caveat emptor' applies to the free information we 'buy' on a website such as ratemyprofessors.com as much as it does to the $40,000 education we are forced to pay for. Its a free market of ideas and opinions out there, as much as anything else, and most students are astute enough to critically analyze the individual merits of other students' comments, as well as form a reasonable impression based on the aggregate of opinions posted. I for one do not form an opinion unless a reasonable 'staistical sample' is available, and I think the whole point behind Ratemyprofessors.com was to create a clearinghouse large and well-traficked enough to afford a "sample size" large enough to make reasonable decisions. And as for your concerns for privacy ... I am a private citizen and anyone could go and post insulting or defamatory comments about me on ANY message board they chose. If I was sufficiently hurt by such comments, I suppose I could go and file a defamation suit, in which case I would have to prove that their comments contained FACTUALLY FALSE (in fact not just false, but intentionally FALSIFIED) information intended to damage my reputation -- people's opinions of me, or of my behaviour or the quality of my services would be out of bounds. I'm sure you are a big boy or girl, as am I, and have lived amongst people long enough to have learned to deal with others' negative opinions of you, even when grossly unfair. So, to free myself of the high-minded tone of this post let me just say, "get over it." And if someone by some small chance actually violates your privacy by posting something about your PRIVATE life, for instance that your wife is fat or that your kids are mongoloid or some other nonsense that none of your students would even know unless you told them (in which case you made it public) or they were stalking you (if you have a red chili in your rating then MAYBE you should worry, lol) -- then feel free to avail yourslef of our legal system and file a lawsuit. Frankly though, I could care less if your wife needs a gastric bypass or little Jimmy has an extra chromosome. I just want to make sure I don't get screwed out of my money or the education it payed for. My condolences on your wife and kid though. :-)

If you are so dissatisfied with the quality of education you are receiving why don't you transfer to another school? $40,000 a year buys a lot of education, especially in NYS--a state with more educational options than practically any other. If an individual professor sucks, then why don't you drop their class after the first week? If a professor (or the entire academic profession, the way you would have us believe) is ripping you off, then why haven't you at least tried to file appeals with your school's grievance committees? If you are so much in favor of a marketplace of ideas, then why do you post anonymously on RMP and this blog? Shouldn't customers in a marketplace have a right to know who is offering the goods? If life isn't fair then why do you whine so much about unfair teachers and unfair grades and lost tuition dollars, all of which are things to be expected in an unfair world?

Most importantly, how do you explain your phenomenal bad luck in getting so many "bad" professors, especially if you have the option to drop their classes if they are so obviously awful? Maybe you need to look closer to home to explain your poor academic record then blaming others.

Yawn...boring...

Here, you'll be needing this pretty soon. http://www.mcdonalds.com/usa/work/search.html

http://rateyourstudents.blogspot.com is not just a rating site, but a place where faculty and students talk about how to make the "working" relationship in a college classroom better.

I had the same problem when I tried going to it from the school computer, but the next day it worked fine from my home computer. Either it was temporarily not working, or my school disabled access to it. Were you trying to access it from a school computer? Maybe your school banned it. :(

"I expect to see it directed in the manner I see fit." What? As a student, I hate those kinds of airheads next to me. Not the first clue about anything but judgemental as hell...I pay attention to my profs, and if/when I don't like one, I take a different section.

I like to not waste money. Yes, I suppose that makes me an airhead doesn't it? Gosh, you are smart. And quite frankly, I do not give a damn who you hate, it really makes no difference to me. Knowing who you hate does not help anyone. And not the first clue about anything? The whole point of going on Rate My Professor is so that I can GET A CLUE. Perhaps that means I am being "judgemental" about what classes to take, but my dear, I think you will find that you are judgemental about things in life. Things like racism are over the line, but if we went through life never judging anything, it would make things very difficult for us. When you have to make a choice between certain things what do you use? Judgement! Not to mention that calling us "airheads" is a bit judgemental in itself. And you listen to your profs? Awww, good for you, you get an extra sticker today. Paying attention does not necessarily give you an A. I pay attention in all my classes, and I do not always get an A. I do all my homework in all my classes, and I do not always get an A. But you have a good point in your last sentence "If/when I don't like one, I take a different section." However, I don't know if this is just my school, but if I start taking a class, discover I dislike it, and then try to switch, it is already too late. Either the other times are inconvenient, or the classes are already full. Think about that. I am just trying to succeed, and this is the way I succeed. This is the way many people succeed. And since it is obviously not the way that YOU do, and you "hate those kind of airheads" then why don't you leave us airheads alone, and let us do what works for US. I am not forcing anyone, especially you, to use Rate My Professor. I'm just trying to defend and keep open an option that helps a lot of people.

Hay it's a little wierd that their is a noa and a nora. are you the smae person? arging with yourself isnt' healthy

Excuse me, but multiple personality disorder is a very serious condition. It is rare but serious. I would appreciate it if you did not make light of such a serious condition. Please visit the following website if you wish to learn more about it. Perhaps if you were more educated you would realize the severity of your comment.

http://www.healthatoz.com/healthatoz/Atoz/ency/multiple_personality_disorder.jsp

Dont you mean the "seriousness" of my comment?

that cracked me up for some time!

That is the point, if you don't like them and/or is a bad teacher, you just wasted time and money. RMP helps save time and money.

If professors are "products" to be evaluated in terms of "helpfulness" or "congeniality," then why don’t students worried about such factors opt for community colleges or even on-line colleges like the University of Phoenix? From a purely economic standpoint a vo-tech degree is much cheaper than a four-year degree and community college professors are often easy graders with relatively light workloads. Such colleges also cater to returning students or students with work and/or family responsibilities. An associates degree can also lead to a good paying job and community college credit can in many cases count as transfer credit to a four year institution, if a student wants to opt for a traditional liberal arts degree later. This approach is cost effective and would remove much of worry about getting professors that are too hard or unsympathetic. Why are students so concerned about tuition and carrer based considerations and burdened with so many responsibilities risking four year or graduate level degrees when cheaper, safer educational opportunities are out there?

I think "helpfullness" and "congeniality" are qualities that should be exhibited by all professors. By far, the MOST IMPORTANT purpose of being a professor is the development of human capital. Being "unhelpful" and "rude" -- as many professors are to their students, seeing them more as problems to be dealt with than opportunities -- only hinders the development of human capital.

I do agree, though, that you do have a point. If students are so concerned about T.A.'s, student-professor contact time, small class size, etc. they should opt for community colleges first and transfer later. (In fact, research proves there is no variability in learning outcomes or future salaries between students who start at community colleges and even the most selective private universities; see Pascarella & Terenzini and Alan Krueger).

The problem is reputation, a myth professors perpetuate by dying to teach and do research at the "best" universities, despite the fact there is NO evidence they do a better job of producing learning outcomes. In fact, since these universities, like NYU, only take the best (and therefore richest students), they impact they make on students is negligible.

Additionally, since those resources could be better spent developing the human capital of lower-income students, who selective universities largely ignore, the public funds these institutions receive are a waste.

It is only a matter of time before professors get shot down from their ivory tower, landing in the moat in which the rest of us exist - a moat where you have to actually show you are doing the job you say you are doing, instead of finding creative ways of avoiding it.

Your response has so many generalizations that it is laughable. MOST professors are rude? Professors have created the cult of prestige attached to the ivy leagues? Professors aren't accountable for their actions? What a load. Most of the professors I work with bend themselves over backwards to help their students, they just don't give away grades for no work. Alumni and school admins. play as much as of a role if not more in the creation of ivy leagues, graduates want their prestige too, after all. Professors are evaluated every year in terms of their teaching effectiveness and research, at least until they recieve tenure. Any survey will tell you that the majorrity of professors aren't tenured and are rigorously examined every year. Now on RMP they are being evaluated byh whiners and slackers too, with no way to know who their attackers are or to defend their records.

Profs. are there to educate, not so much to please. If you wish entertainment watch TV or got to Las Vegas. Neither is a professor "a product>" He/she worked his butt off to get where s/he is, and to learn more than you about the subject s/he is teaching. S/He went through much scrutiny in order to be hired. Does the student have these credentials? If so, let him teach the class, and let the professor become, say, a plumber or a policeman. Plumbers and policemen are not evaluated by their customers as academics are.

Professors are not "products" nor are college students "customers" who deserve good service. If a student wants a college degree - which signifies they have successfully achieved a certain standard of education - then they need to be able to work to those standards. It is amazing how students think they should be able to control the direction and level of difficulty of their college classes.

The problem with a site like RMP is that there is no quality control; any one can say anything. But most importantly, contrary to what many students think and the rights they think they are entitled to, professors are not "public" figures with public accountability. I am not saying that they should not be accountable at all (and some of them truly suck, are irresponsible, and shouldn't be teaching), but it is up to the institution they teach in to determine that accountablity.

You are missing the point, universities of all levels are overruin with lazy, incompetant professors. They couldn't make it outside acedemics, so they hide in school and do as little as possible. That is what RMP does, steers students who invest a ton of time and money away from these jokers. We paid for a service and expecting quality teaching is not unreasonable. Quality teaching to me means: can explains concepts clearly and concisely, with an eye to the bigger and small picures;approachable; interested in teaching;fair and consistant grading(this does not mean easy, in fact I rate my easy teachers relatively low because of the lack of challenge);makes themselves available outside of class reasonably often(when I get a prof that allows walk in pretty much all day, I know he is interested in teaching). We have a right to this level of service because we paid for it. Profs complain about students who don't want to learn, we complain about profs that don't want to teach, but they get paid and can keep their jobs even though they have no business in front of a classroom, is that fair?

There are lazy, incompetent people in any profession but to say that academe is "overrun" by such types is ridiculous. Have you visited every college campus in America and taken classes with every faculty member at these institutions? Are you some sort of expert on academe that has published articles on teaching effectiveness? Where are you getting this information? Or are you just throwing out generalizations and sterotypes.

Yes, it is certainly nice when professors are accesable and accomodating. I would like to consider myself as one of those teachers. But to say that all professors that don't fit your particular model are failures in life? What a joke. Should I dismiss all students that don't ace my classes as failures that are in college because they couldn't cut it in the real world?

Also, a lot of the posts here seem to be from students that complain that their hard earned tuition dollars are being wasted on "bad" profesors and that RMP is their only recourse. I suppose this would be true if the students in question either paid for college entirely out of pocket or from the GI Bill or something similar. But so many students recieve funding from parents, scholarships, federal backed student loans with nice low interest rates--even the fact that public universities and many private schools are tax supported--all help make college affordable. Maybe therefore RMP should only allow students that are paying for college themselves the privelege of evaluating professors, and students enjoying any form of financial aid should not be allowed to say anything at all. Yet somehow I don't think that students would go for this.

Anyone who takes a class should have the 'privelege' of rating a professor, you are paid with public dollars, so you should be accountable in public. Yyour comments are so ridiculous I find it hard to believe you are educated. Yes, I have taken classes at quite a few universities, and in my experience the bad are more common then the good. Granted, no matter how good(or bad in your case, most likely) that a teacher is, some will not like you. It might just be that they need a different style, and RMP could help steer them towards someone who can teach them. Some people don't deserve to be a student, just like many PHD's do not deserve to teach. A hallmark of a good teacher is someone who can take constructive critism, good or bad. Life is hard get a helmet. Then again if you had the talent, drive and toughness, you likely wouldn't be stuck in acedemia, would you? That doesn't apply to all teachers of course, but many are there because they failed in real life and are hiding out.

Any objective, empirical proof as to the claim that academics in general don't have talent, drive, and toughness? Any hard evidence that professors are only in academe because they failed in life and are hiding out? Any books, articles, or websites you could point us to that validate these claims? After all, this sounds like a hell of a news story if its true. Or are you just blowing smoke and whining? If so, don't worry, your future job as a researcher at FOX news is guaranteed.

In a large sense Professors are accountable to the public, to the general public that represents the majority of the tax base and demands high academic standards from public colleges and universities. Being responsible to whiny students that want easier classes and more compliant professors isn't quite the same thing.

We Professors can take constructive criticism, we do it every semester with our student evaulations. If the majority of comments on RMP offered such constructive criticism then maybe you would have a point. But when so many students make so many vindictive comments just to get even for bad grades, then Professors have a right to call the situation what it is, bogus.

Yes, I totally agree, life is hard (BTW, cool expression about "get a helmet"). So suck it up if you get a challenging or even antisocial professor, take your grades like a grown up, and quit whining on posts like RMP about how "unfairly" you have been treated. After all, life is hard, bring a helmet.

Well since most professors ignore evals and their job is rarely based on them, what is the point?

Bottom line: We pay exorabant amounts of money, isn't it reasonable to expect a good return on the investment?

A bad professor can not only ruin a GPA, he/she can make it nearly impossible to continue in that field because the student hasn't been exposed to the necessary knowlege and skills to advance.

RMP does what it intends to do and does it very well: helps students find the good teachers. After dozens of classes, I have yet to see a profs ratings unfair. The are dead on accurate.

To bottom line your bottom line: When you invest money, you risk it. If you loose money you can't go to your broker and whine about not making a profit. Tuition dollars don't guarantee a good grade or even a passing grade, just the chance to make a good grade if you work hard. Students need to get out of the mentality that paying money guarantees them a good grade or a diploma.

You actually believe that, ". . . if you had the talent, drive and toughness, you likely wouldn't be stuck in academia . . ." ? Wow. I teach because I feel inspired to engage in meaningful developments with young adults today by way of education, and I've always thought that good teaching was a genuine "talent" and definitely requires "toughness." Such statements, like so many above, reveal the students' arrogance toward and disrespect of instructors today. Read such statements as this and then ask yourself if it is really the professors who are the pompous ones? Professors and students are individual people. I've yet to see any data in here demonstrating that it is either professors or students who in the end are clearly better citizens, kinder persons, harder workers . . . better human beings. There are a lot of insults and demands, though little talk about the worth of the RMP website.

Yes, professors can sometimes be lazy and arrogant. (I too was a student of course. We have all been behind the classroom desk.) What students don't know, though, is the other side because they've not (yet?) been instructors. If you do go on to train toward teaching at any level yourself, you will be confronted with the data circulating in academic training today (at all levels) regarding the "increased incivility" of students today. Read Plato's concern with democracy, and it's an interesting parallel. Your comments here are testimony to an inflated sense of entitlement and thus the disrespect and disruption of any real (though admittedly imperfect) leadership.

What exactly does all of "your" money (and I know it's not mainly your money at all) entitle you to? All day walk-ins? Calls at home? Individualized learning plans for all 40 of you in all 5 classes that we teach? Should we poll you on the first day to see if you like small group discussions or independent work and then tailor mediums reflective of your learning styles? Should we let you pick the chapters we read in each class? Maybe have groups who read together different chapters depending on interest - up to, say, 8 different curriculum groups in a class? Should we have lecture for some in the class, small group discussion for others, hybrid (1/2 online and 1/2 in the classroom) for some? Should we combine all of these things? Should we have you grade yourselves based on what you think you've learned for your money, and according to your own areas of interest in the course? I'm not being sarcastic. I've had each of these suggestions proposed by students who are (like many of you) quite preoccupied with their rights as a student. And, having taught at both the four-year and community college, I can say that in my experience such student demands are more pervasive at the four-year universities. It results from an inflated sense of personal-empowerment and, fortunately, this does not represent the average student. Such entitlement and incivility, though, is on the rise from Kindergarten through higher education. Dealing with this, staying positive and fair, remaining clear on your passion for the subject matter and student success DOES take toughness and talent.

My opinion is that RMP is pretty worthless because it lacks quality control. Professors DO go in and post their own comments on themselves and one another (those they like and those they dislike), and students who get confronted on plagiarizing also go in and vent unreasonable trumped-up accusations. I go in and am almost amused (though also disturbed) to see the self-postings of a colleague who is all too consumed with posting his own vindicating comments about himself; it's ridiculous, and I agree that such professors (as he in many ways) shouldn't have such positions - though this website is of no help here. And then, yes, groups of students (or the same one multiple times) can go in and exagerrate one's greatness as well. Sure we can look for the trends and take them with a grain of salt, but is it even worth that? I only have positive comments on there to date, but that's certainly not because no student has ever a legitimate complaint. (I'm human with almost 200 students a term.) I don't believe that this website would pass any qualitative analysis in the Social Sciences, nor in my own.

Sooner or later ratemyprofessors.com will get sued. Professors have a right to privacy too. This website is ridiculous. If it were a pay-site that you had to sign up for to log into, that would be one thing. Info about professors should at least have that layer of security from the outside world. People should have to pay to see ratings, or at least sign up for the site and log in and out. People not signed up should not be able to view comments.

If the site were truly for the students, then students should have to somehow show they are truly students to log in.

How fair is it to spend the money on tuition and books, and then spend 15 weeks, only to discover that he/she sucks? Until schools finally start holding bad professors accountable, RMP performs a needed service. For the record I have NEVER seen the overall rating of a professor be wrong. Sure a few jerks post drivel, but most are honest, serious evals. If a prof can't take that, maybe he should learn to teach.

Does it take fifteen weeks to determine whether a professor sucks? How often do you attend class? If a professor continues to suck after the first class or so drop the course and get a refund for your textbooks.

There can be serious financial and acedemic penalties for doing that.

RMP helps to avoid the bad professors before you even begin.

Most universities have several drop dates, the first of which incurs no penalties. Bookstores also have return policies, provided you return the books after the first week of class. If you wait until the end of the semester to find out the professor sucks, whose fault is that?