Rate My Professors: Guidelines and Reliability

Rate My Professors is a review site started in May 1999 by John Swapceinski, a software developer from Menlo Park, California, that allows college and university students to rate teachers and campuses at universities in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. The original name of the site earlier was TeacherRatings.com which was changed to RateMyProfessors in 2001.

Patrick Nagle and William DeSantis bought RMP in 2005. RMP was later resold to Viacom’s MTVU, MTV’s College channel, by Nagle and DeSantis in 2007. For a decade, Viacom owned and ran RateMyProfessors.com. In 2018, Cheddar announced the purchase of RMP from Viacom. RMP is the most popular internet source for professor ratings. Over 8,000 colleges, 1.7 million instructors, and over 19 million ratings are available on the web.

Is Rate My Professor a Reliable Source?

It depends on who you ask, Rate My Professor has been welcomed by many students around the country. As a democratising tool that allows students to submit more accurate criticism about instructors. Proponents of the site believe that the reviews are unbiased. Whether positive or negative, it gives an accurate depiction of how academics are. Because the site is carefully vetted and regulated by an apparently unbiased personnel.

Experts claim that Rate My Professor is more of a popularity contest than a true assessment of their teaching abilities. In June 2018, the website was forced to delete the “hotness” score because many professors perceived it as a sexist and objectifying criterion for ratings. We’ve seen professors get low grades based on seemingly ridiculous reviews like “doesn’t have a triangle tattoo” or “picks his teeth during tests” in our own review of the site. While these are realistic depictions of a student’s personal experience, they are not necessarily representative of a teacher’s talents.

Both sides appear to have a solid case: on the one hand, if you’re a student, you want to discover more about the teacher you’ll have in college and whether or not you think you’ll learn anything from them. As an educator, on the other hand, it can be aggravating when pupils rate you based on your personality and popularity rather than your teaching abilities.

What are the guidelines to use Rate My Professors site?

The various guidelines re to be followed by the students and the professors too. Have a look on the guidelines before using the site.

For Students

• When writing reviews, be truthful. We ask that you contribute in the same spirit if you want to be able to trust these ratings while considering your course alternatives.
• It’s generally beneficial to offer both advantages and drawbacks when reviewing a class and/or lecturer. As a result, your peers will receive far more trustworthy and constructive criticism.
• The course and your learning experience should be the primary emphasis of reviews. Don’t make any remarks about a Professor’s appearance, attire, age, gender, or race.
• Don’t believe everything you hear. We’d like you to tell us about your personal experience with the course and what you learned from it. Encourage others to post their own reviews instead of speaking on their behalf.

For Professors

• Derogatory remarks about religion, ethnicity or race, gender, physical appearance, age, and mental and/or physical disabilities; profanity, name-calling, and/or vulgarity; profanity, name-calling, and/or vulgarity; profanity, name-calling, and/or vulgarity; derogatory remarks about religion, ethnicity or race, gender, physical appearance.
• Identifying information on a professor or student that could be used to contact them outside of their school.
• Sexual innuendos, as well as references to a professor’s or student’s family, personal life, and/or sex life.
• Claims that a professor is biassed in favour of or against a particular student or group of students.
• Claims concerning a professor’s work status, including prior employment; Claims that a professor or student is currently engaging in or has previously engaged in criminal actions;
• Direct referrals to previous comments that have already been made or that have been removed by our moderators;
• Accusations that the lecturer is giving himself or his colleagues a grade;
• There is a language that isn’t English. Comments must be written entirely in English. If you attend a French-
• Canadian school, you are permitted to speak French.
  URLs and/or hyperlinks.

Conclusion

Rate My Professors is the best site to check about the classes and for professors review. As it is also a reliable site because whether it has positive or negative review, it gives an accurate depiction of how academics are. Because the site is carefully look over and thus this site is truly trustworthy and reliable.

However, students and professors have to follow some guidelines to use this site. and then can give the reviews.