The free Rate My Professors website allows students to anonymously rate their university professors as well as view the ratings college teachers have received. The college professor rating site provides invaluable unfiltered feedback and opinions from students who have firsthand knowledge of teachers from whom they took a university course.
There are other sites that supply prof ratings, including RateAProf.com, StudentsReview.com, KnowYourProfessor.com, and RateYourProf.com, but none has as much information or is as well organized and easy to use as RateMyProfessors.com. The site’s tagline gives an indication of its scope: “Over 6,000 schools, 1 million professors, 10 million opinions.”
What is the Purpose of the Rate My Prof Site?
Trying to navigate the often-intimidating world of college can be difficult for undergraduates. College professors greatly influence a student’s college experience for good or bad. Some university teachers try to “weed out” students by making intro 101 class exceedingly difficult, while other teachers devote their careers to truly mentoring students into succeeding. Identifying which instructor is which is the trick.
According to the RateMyProfessors.com FAQs, "[The website] is built for college students, by college students. … The site does what students have been doing forever – checking in with each other … – to figure out who's a great professor and who's one you might want to avoid.”
What Information Does the Professor Rating Site Give?
The Rate My Prof website supplies rating information about colleges and universities as a whole as well as ratings for individual professors. Students can search for information by college/university or by teacher.
The website supplies two types of ratings – one focusing on the school itself and the other on individual professors. Ratings are given on a scale of 1 to 5, with a score of 5 being the highest.
For each college or university, an overall, or averaged, rating of all the scores the professors at the school received is supplied. Ratings for student experience at the school, which includes categories like campus location, school reputation, career opportunities, and so on, are also given.
For each instructor, an individual rating is supplied based on three criteria – helpfulness, clarity, and easiness. An overall score for the teacher is tabulated from these three scores. Raters are also asked to rate their interest in the class.
Finally, students have the option to leave a comment about their experience with the particular prof. The comments are actually the most helpful aspect of the rating system because students are able to provide their personal observations about a teacher’s style, course expectations, and grading policies.
Pick Your Professor
The Rate Your Prof website allows students to get the inside scoop on various university professors. The site turns the tables, allowing students to grade teachers and find out how good the classes from particular instructors actually are. Picking the best professor just got easier.
Aimee Larsen Stoddard - Aimee is a professional writer/editor. She has a BA in English and is currently completing an MS in Theology.
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