At the end of each semester students generally are given the opportunity to evaluate courses and professors, all with the understanding that their opinions will be kept confidential.
If students choose to add further comments or advice to other students, Web sites, such as RateMyProfessors.com, are available.
Two universities have taken it a step further by now offering students a chance to discuss professors, courses and the experiences they have had with them on their own school’s Web site.
Williams College has had this policy since 2002, and Northwestern University is looking to follow in its footsteps, according to their campus newspapers.
According to Northwestern’s campus newspaper, the faculty senate will look over the measure.
Williams College offers this opportunity only to students at the university, and students are able to remain anonymous when posting.
Bob Hooper, professor and department chair of the geology department, said those sites all depend on how students use them.
“Evaluations pick out teaching problems,” he said.
Hooper also said students do pay a lot of money to attend college and should, “demand high quality education.”
He added, though, for students who may be choosing classes from these evaluations, professors who are labeled, “difficult, rigorous or tough” are not bad professors.
Nola Schmitt, associate professor in nursing, said she is concerned that students aren’t taught how to fill out evaluations and don’t necessarily know what they are supposed to look for.
“No one ever taught (students) how to do it,” she said. “How are you supposed to know?”
She said that while one student may have liked a professor, another may have not, and so the ratings may not be completely accurate.
“It might be the student and not the professor,” Schmitt said.
Senior Megan Dzik said she doesn’t think it is a good idea for universities to offer Web sites critiquing professors.
“I’d be intimidated by them,” she said. “I don’t trust those (sites) because I usually like the teachers who everyone hates.”
Senior Lila Moritsch said she uses RateMyProfessor.com every semester.
She said it was more help when she was an underclassman, when there were GEs to choose from.
“It’s therapeutic to put it out there,” Moritsch said.
She said that she can see both sides of the argument.
“Professors are working hard for the students anyway,” she said. “It could be biased.”
Moritsch offered an alternative and said that Eau Claire could look into following in the footsteps of Northwestern University and Williams College.
“It might be to the school’s advantage to go to that Web site, or come up with a Web site for only Eau Claire students,” she said.
RateMyProfessors.com’s Web site reports that over 5.1 million ratings have been posted about 720,459 professors from 5,590 universities.
More than 1,600 ratings had been added on Sunday alone.
While Dzik admitted that she has been on RateMy Professor.com once, she said that she believes that critiques should remain personal.
“If you put it online, teachers know that they’re hated,” she said. “It could lessen the education that students receive.”