Professor Ratings

Kevin Corley
Amber brought up an interesting topic in her post about the ratings of professors that are available on the internet. Statistics are made available by Georgia Tech to students here about the grades given by professors. Some professors give very few A’s while others give primarily A’s in the same course. According to the Ubyssey, www.ratemyprofessors.com only lists ratings about professors who give consent. Data about professors, however, is extremely important to both students and universities. It is helpful that Georgia Tech makes these statistics available on its own website. All colleges should require that these statistics be made available to students.

Ratings about professors raises an interesting issue as to the enormous spread in average grades given by professors. Some students are able to slide by easily in one professor’s class while others struggle to just barely get by in a different professor's class. This is not fair to students and it is evident of poorly educating all students at an equal level. If two students are are taking the same class, but with different professors, and one class averages a C while the other average an A the students are not being educated at the same level. Making data about professors available is helpful to students but it does not solve the problem.

While making data about professors available is important, something should be done about leveling the playing field. The data clearly shows that there is an issue with the way certain professors are grading or teaching. Some sort of standard should be put in place to ensure that professors are teaching properly. Professors should be evaluated upon the performance of their students and if their grade are sub-par, then some sort of action should be taken to facilitate a correction. While all the grades given by all professors may have a normal average, this is of little importance. If the grades are skewed based upon professors, there is a problem with certain professors' teachings. Each professor should be giving approximately the same number of A’s, B’s, C’s, D’s, and F’s as other professors and approximately the same GPA. This would help to ensure that students get the best education possible and that everyone has a fair opportunity to succeed in a class.