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Professors who have scored poorly on official student evaluations and
informal rating websites now have a way to vent their frustrations with
undergraduates.
RateYourStudents.blogspot.com,
a newly-created website, allows irate instructors to post scathing
anonymous comments about the students whom they have taught.
The website’s editor identifies himself only as “The
Professor” and says he is a tenured faculty member at a small southern
college. He says he initially founded the site in response to the
popular RateMyProfessors.com, which allows students to anonymously review—and sometimes to publicly humiliate—their instructors.
RateMyProfessors has attracted over five million postings and
may be used by some students when selecting courses—especially at
schools that do not publish official internal ratings such as Harvard’s
Committee on Undergraduate Education (CUE) guide.
“The Professor” reported that he scores a 4.6 out of 5 on
RateMyProfessors, and he said his creation of the alternative site is
not motivated by any personal vendetta.
In its earliest days, posts on the new RateYourStudents were mostly angry diatribes.
For instance, one self-identified English professor from
Wisconsin wrote, “To G: My pity. I truly doubt that you could read
this. In fact, I truly doubt that you have opposable thumbs. Density:
Off-scale; skull has its own gravitational field.”
Some professors have even gone so far as to wish harm upon their former students.
A professor from Wichita, Kan., wrote, “Mean Miranda, here’s a
lump of coal. Mean Mitch, here’s one for you, too, but this one has a
jagged edge I hope you snag your finger on.”
More recently, though, “The Professor”—who spoke to The
Crimson by phone yesterday—said his site has evolved into more of a
dialogue than a diatribe. He said that 30 percent of the e-mails that
his site receives are now from students.
He also said the comments have become “more and more positive
over time,” as students propose ways for professors to better
understand their pupils.
“The Professor,” who said he is a 20-year veteran of college
teaching, said that hostility between teachers and students stems from
today’s test-driven society, in which students see higher education as
a chore rather than opportunity.
But some Harvard professors have a more optimistic take on the present state of student-teacher relations.
The former dean of Harvard College, Harry R. Lewis
’68, wrote in an e-mail, “I am old enough to know that students I might
have, though annoying, can turn into fine adults, if given time and
encouragement to grow up.”
But Lewis, who is now the McKay professor of computer science,
added, “I just wish they would all turn their cell phones off in class,
that’s all.”
“The Professor” said that internal ratings such as Harvard’s
CUE guide are “the greatest thing in the world” because they present
more statistically accurate ratings as opposed to RateMyProfessors,
which he said attracts extreme comments.
According to the editor-in-chief of this year’s CUE guide,
Lyndsey M. Straight ’06, less than 5 percent of classes at Harvard get
decidedly negative evaluations in the published guide.
At Harvard, professors must choose to have their course
evaluations published in the CUE guide, but the guide has become so
ingrained in Harvard culture that most professors opt to include it in
their reviews, according to Straight.
“On the whole professors are really enthusiastic about the CUE guide,” according to Straight.
—Staff writer Kristin E. Blagg can be reached at kblagg@fas.harvard.edu
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