I rarely check Ratemyprofessors.com for all kinds of reasons: a) there aren’t a lot of rating for me; b) the ratings for me are not very good; and c) no chili peppers. What’s up with that?
But I did find this (relatively?) new feature appealing, Professors strike back. I think these are hill-arious. I especially like this response to the critique “I’d rather poke my eyes out with needles.”
I have said similar things in my weaker moments….
Last Fall, my students in english 328 chatted about how often they look at Ratemyprofessor.com before they register for classes. Unbeknownst to me, most are not only familiar with the site, but believe most of what they read there. Interesting, eh? After that conversation, I looked at the site and found some good and some not so good comments about me entered by students over a 3 + year span. What I thought was interesting was that the ‘not so good comments’ were stunningly weird, at least to me. It kind of made me wonder if I and some of my students were inhabiting parallel universes. I couldn’t fathom why they reacted to the class/or to me the way they did. Which I guess just goes to prove that entering personal opinions on public sites is a tad problematic for all concerned.
I wonder what the public reaction would be to a site on which faculty decided whether or not each of their students was worthy of a chili pepper.
What most troubles me about RateMyProf is not the content of the comments — (many of which seem to have been written at 2 a.m. by people in less-than-sober states based on the number of errors in the writing and on the sheer silliness of the comments: “I hated my literature class because the prof made me read books and then tested me on the reading. The nerve.” Or, “I loved this class because I never had to do any reading and hardly ever showed up, but still got an A. The professor was really cute and told funny stories.”) — but the public nature of the site. I did not sign up to be a public figure. Unlike politicians or celebrities, who know when they begin their careers that public scrutiny is part of the job, most professors are private people. It makes me uncomfortable that there is a public site on the Internet where I, as a human being, can be “rated” like a toaster or a car by anonymous people who may or may not have taken my class. There is something very mean-spirited about the site, which lists and celebrates the snarkiest, most snide insults aimed at professors. It is hurtful.
Do I wish there were a site where I could rate the hotness of my students, even in jest. No. Ew.
Well, it’s not quite the same, but there is http://rateyourstudents.blogspot.com….