Pick a prof, pick a grade

Posted by Kenneth Ronkowitz on


There are several of these "rate the teacher" sites out there. Few faculty like them, but students do. Students tell me that they use the reviews to help pick classes and professors. Usually they have very superficial comments ("she's tough but fair", "like watching paint that's already dry")

Now I see that Pick-A-Prof is trying to get universities to give them access to the grading histories & the distributions of their professors.

Amazingly, they are getting them.

The University of California agreed recently to hand over such records. Pickaprof.com will expand to Brown this fall. They will be the first Ivy League school that the service covers.

The site first started in April 2000 at Texas A&M University, expanded to the University of Texas at Austin. Since then, the site has expanded to 180 institutions across the nation, including all 33 schools in the University of California and California State University systems.

Those critical of the service argue that besides the "I-want-to-get-even" aspect that these sites offer, this new addition will ultimately increase grade inflation and hurt some course enrollments.

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