<p>Just like Spark Notes, it’s a tool you have to use with caution. Some people rate professors based on a personal issue with them instead of what should matter which includes teaching style, number of exams, workload, energy, etc. </p>
<p>It’s best to take some time and read through most of the reviews for the professor and notice a trend (prof. is boring, rants alot, gives no exams, gives too many exams, late a lot, fair grader, etc.). You can count on a trend being the general consensus and expect to see it in the classroom if you choose to take a course with that professor. If there are too few reviews, I usually steer away because I can’t form an opinion off of what one person thinks. </p>
<p>I really do use it religiously, though. I can’t register for a course without using it most of the time. But again, like I said, I only use it as a supplementary aid in my course decisions so I certainly wouldn’t use it as a primary tool.</p>
<p>I like it but hate it at the same time. Because of my schedule, I’m frequently stuck selecting classes based on what time they are instead of what professor they have. So, I often end up having to take a bad one even though I know better. On the bright side, I usually know what kind of bad I’m dealing with, whether it’s a teacher who mumbles so much you end up having to teach yourself or a teacher who has horrible time management skills and drags out the first few chapters of material only to not have enough time to cover the last ones. That happened in my Spanish II class this summer, teacher dragged her way through the first couple chapters and then didn’t even have time to lecture on the last two chapters that the final test was on. But, since I knew in advance that she would still hold responsible even though she didn’t get around to teaching it, I knew to teach it to myself.
Makes me positively nauseous about this semester though, apparently every professor I have this fall absolutely sucks and there’s nothing I can do about it. Even weeding out the incoherent reviews of people who probably deserved the miserable grade they got, they still have terrible reviews.
Sometimes for that reason it’s not all that helpful, you’re still stuck with that professor it just can cause a lot of anxiety about a situation you can’t change.</p>
<p>Hey my post in this topic got edited out. Let me repeat what I posted:</p>
<p>Almost everybody on that web site is a huge whiner. I wouldn’t pay much attention to the reviews on the site.</p>
<p>I think it’s worth checking out. Fwiw, every professor I’ve had on there has had reviews that were spot on for that professor. There isn’t always much selection at my little school professor wise, but you at least know what you are in for ahead of time!</p>
<p>I think it’s definitely helpful at times, if (and only if) there are a number of reviews that are all consistent. If there are conflicting reviews, then it’s definitely a task trying to weed out the whiners or the unrealistic.</p>
<p>Of course, Columbia has its own RMP of sorts, which I find to be much more comprehensive and helpful.</p>
<p>There are a lot of whiners on the site, I just look for the coherent posts that aren’t full of grammatical errors. There are some good reviews that tell you a lot about the class, like how much home work there is, if the instructor manages their time well and things like that.</p>
<p>It’s useful most of the time. If I see that a professor has 99% negative ratings, I’ll avoid that professor. For example, there’s a math professor at my community college who has negative ratings all across the board because reviewers say he is rude and refuses to help students understand math.</p>
<p>Like everyone else said, take it with a grain of salt. If you are at a larger university and there are a bunch of reviews, you can probably get a good representation of what you are dealing with. I ended up using this after I ended up with a terrible professor and had to drop the class because she wouldn’t accept my work when I was sick. I hadn’t looked at the ratings before getting in the class, but after I dropped it, one of my friends in the class told me to look and the reviews were dead on. I looked at previous professors just out of curiosity and found the same thing. Great for general classes, but there are none of the professors from the food science department except for the intro teacher whose class is a popular elective.</p>