Every semester, thousands of students open up the website Rate My Professor before picking their courses. Some rely on the site to figure out which professors are tough, which are easy-going and which could make the difference between a stressful semester or a smooth one.
With the millions of reviews throughout the whole site, the question stands: how useful are these reviews, and should they actually make a difference in whether or not a student chooses to take their course?
Rate My Professor allows students to rate different teachers based on class difficulty, teaching style and overall quality, amongst other things. Many students, therefore, find the site extremely helpful when choosing their classes to get an idea of what to expect.
Ratings can highlight professors who make their coursework more manageable, versus those who might have heavier coursework. For many students, trying to balance out all their different workloads is very important and can make all the difference for the semester.
For students, course selection can be overwhelming. With limited class spots and time to register, many students see online ratings as a sort of shortcut to make the decision-making more manageable.
First-year nursing student Mark Zharov uses Rate My Professor every time he goes to register for his classes.
“I also look at the comments and if there’s an outlier who hates the course because they failed it, I feel like it’s more on them than the professor, so I ignore the review,” Zharov said.
However, both students and professors alike agree that some ratings can tend to be extreme, both negatively and positively, making it difficult to get an accurate take on the class. Reviews can be influenced by a single assignment, grading policies, personal bias and more. Some use the platform to take out their frustrations, making it tricky to know whether a rating truly reflects a professor’s teaching style.
“Some things that I see on Rate My Professor are rants; it gives students an outlet, but I don’t think it’s an accurate representation of the professors,” said Professor Teena Edwards, who teaches COM 102 as well as COM 504.
Dr. Pawel Popiel, whose name is not on Rate My Professor, has a similar take on the platform.
“It carries more weight in the decision-making than maybe it should. I think it’s important to take the platform with a grain of salt,” Popiel said.
It is important to note that the website does not have a profile for every professor, and some professors have not been rated at all. This platform relies entirely on student submissions, which can lead to misinformation and biased representations. If you are going to use the platform, it is important to skim through enough reviews to understand how the course actually is, rather than taking the first bad review as a sign not to take the class.
“I had gone into COM 102 believing my professor was going to be harsher when it came to grading, but it ended up being the complete opposite,” Zharov said.
Ultimately, the usefulness of Rate My Professor varies from student to student. Some use the platform as a lifeline for picking classes, while others disregard their peers’ reviews so they can create their own opinion on their professor and the class itself.
