Students have to take into account several criteria

May 18, 2015 13:21 GMT  ·  By

Formerly called TeacherRatings.com, the now popular review site changed its name to RateMyProfessors.com allowing students to grade their lecturers and even throw in some productive criticism meant to help them improve their teaching skills.

Although there are students who use the site as a way to vent their anger at a teacher for receiving a small grade, the website is not entirely biased towards students as it also allows professors to dispute harsh criticism and try to restore their damaged reputation.

Students are given the opportunity to rate their professors based on several criteria. One of them is hotness, and it does indeed refer to the physical appeal of the academics which students can comment upon, all in good humor.

The online page even has a unique corner where professors get to read some of the comments that their students leave behind and dispute some of the claims if they feel aggrieved by any of them.

And surprisingly, most teachers are unperplexed by the reviews they get. On the contrary, many handle things pretty well and manage to see beyond the harshness of the comments.

The website has gained quite some popularity having amassed over 1 million ratings from students who want to give their teachers a taste of their own medicine.

Not everyone can take criticism in stride

What to some might be a means of entertainment or even a tool for improvement - there are teachers who take their students' feedback into consideration, there are people, professors mostly, who feel that the website is degrading for school representatives as it encourages students to speak ill of them.

The website has even been the target of in-depth analysis with researchers claiming that the ratings on the site show that students tend to give lower grades to foreign teachers on the basis that they are unable to fully comprehend the subject taught by the teacher in question due to language gaps or accents.

In the video below, there are some reactions from professors who agreed to read what they students had to object regarding their ways of teaching and grading.

Unexpectedly, they seem more fazed by the fact they had not received any chili peppers – which serve to denote the "hotness" - rather than by the less pleasant remarks.