Students looking to snag a choice professor, or avoid a rotten one, have turned to the Arts and Science Student Union (ASSU) Anti-Calendar since 1981. The Anti-Calendar has, for the last 23 years, been tabulating student evaluation surveys into an averaged reflection of the course and its professor. And as the last day to drop courses for a full refund approaches on September 21, knowing whether you’ve got a winner or a dud becomes crucial.
Despite its rebellious-sounding name, the calendar is actually encouraged by the faculties and read by professors. ASSU says that the Anti-Calendar’s purpose is to act as a “valuable resource for students who may be unsure of the courses in which they are registering and for instructors to review their teaching abilities.” It also has online archives dating back to 1998.
While the calendar now reviews about 1700 courses and instructors, many courses are still missing-notably non-Arts and Science programs like Engineering. Further, professors have the option of refusing to release their evaluations; ASSU’s website has a page naming those professors, which in the 2003-2004 edition number 236. These factors contribute to the considerable gap of missing and/or un-compiled courses.
In 1999, another option was created: RateMyProfessors.com. It allows students to anonymously rate professors on their helpfulness, clarity, difficulty, and physical attractiveness.
“I got the idea for the site after taking a class with a particularly dastardly professor who often left students in tears and genuinely seemed to enjoy it,” said its creator, John Swapceinski, a graduate of San José State University. After five years of exponential growth, the site now has over four million ratings and 40,000 instructors in its database.
The site, as a forum for some bruising criticism of many university professors, is itself criticized by instructors.
One professor likens the idea to book reviews on Amazon.com: anonymous, unmediated, highly subjective. Other than the removal of libellous comments, virtually anything goes. There’s also no way of knowing who posted each rating, which means that professors can even rate themselves.
Mireille Broucke, a professor of Engineering at U of T, notes that while she has taught over 1500 students, only 14 have given her ratings on the site.
Professor Parham Aarabi, U of T’s “sexiest prof” with 58 “hot” votes, agrees that the site is not definitive.
“It’s a very noisy snapshot of what’s going on,” Aarabi said. But, he added, he does strongly support the idea of student feedback and ratings. In addition to the in-course evaluations, he administers his own set of evaluations throughout the term.
Despite criticisms, with 17,810 ratings and 2,341 University of Toronto professors, RateMyProfessors.com has a lot to offer. For first year students who may not know any upper year students to go to for advice, it can be a good starting point. Even the professors agree that students should have access to the information-but caution that they should be wary of its credibility.
Fred Wilson, a U of T philosophy professor, stressed that all evaluations will have some flaws, regardless of whether they are official or not. A widely-circulated urban myth tells of a professor who brought in wine to manipulate the outcome of his in-course evaluations.
“These types of ratings,” said Wilson, “Are often biased towards choosing popular professors and are unfair towards those who are very good at inspiring a certain group of students that have a particular style.”
