High-tech help for choosing the right course

Busy students looking for that last course next semester know that the Student Course Guide can provide a useful, if anecdotal, review of a class and its professor.

But it may be surprising to learn that similar sites are a growing business nationwide, and that they may be changing how professors teach undergraduates.

PickAProf.com was founded in 2000 by two former University of Texas at Austin students who were trying to help friends choose their courses, said Karen Bragg, also a graduate of UT and now the company's director of university relations.

"Within a couple of semesters we had 80 percent of the campus using the site," Bragg said, and since then it has expanded to 54 campuses nationwide, primarily public universities.

The company makes use of free access to public school documents to post professors' grading tendencies on the site, Bragg said.

For example, students registered with the site can learn that Ruth Rosen, a professor at the University of California at Davis, has awarded about 31 percent of her students in History 072B grades in the A range, 61 percent in the B range and 8 percent a C or below.

Similar grading data is not available for schools such as Princeton because they are private, Bragg said, but the company has brought its professor-rating service to some private schools.

Bragg said many professors are upset over the site until they find out about features intended for them, such as an option for professors to review their own courses and to post surveys for their students.

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However, a Chronicle of Higher Education article reported that some faculty members felt the sites simply allowed students to search for the professors giving the highest grades.

The USG's Student Course Guide does not post grade information because it is not made public, said Thais Melo '04, who provides technical support for the site.

Instead, the course guide relies on student reviews and the course review sheets handed out at the end of the semester.

A "Cool Course" as defined by the guide is any class without prerequisites that received an overall rating of 4.8 out of 5 or higher, Melo said.

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The SCG's reviews are edited for appropriateness and usefulness, but only to an extent, Melo said. "We try not to judge them, [just] make sure they're coherent," she said.

PickAProf also edits reviews and ranks them by usefulness, Bragg said.

PickAProf makes money by charging student governments for access to the site for their students, Bragg said. According to the Chronicle, student governments generally pay several thousand dollars per year for the site.

USG academics chair Amy Saltzman '05 said in an email the USG had not been contacted by any private services offering to administer the course guide.

Another company started in a similar fashion at San Jose State University. RateMyProfessor.com now has about 800,000 ratings at nearly 3,000 schools, said John Swapceinski, the company's founder, in an email.

The site does not provide grade information but instead asks users to review the professor and to post short comments.

Several Princeton professors had been reviewed on the site, including economics professor Alan Blinder and psychology professor Ron Comer.

RateMyProfessor does not edit the students' reviews for accuracy before posting them on the Internet.

That might explain the eight reviews of "Professor" John Nash GS '50. Most of the comments made reference to either Russell Crowe or "A Beautiful Mind." However, almost all gave Nash a positive review.

Swapceinski said that while most students who respond to the site approve of it, about two thirds of professors do not. "We get about one email per week threatening legal action," he said.

Most University professors questioned said they felt the Student Course Guide does provide a limited benefit in choosing a class or a professor.

English Professor John Fleming said the course guide is useful, but it may overlook smaller classes that do not receive reviews.

"I think the guide is useful for students, but also prone to sell the same large courses over and over again. After all, most Princeton courses are good. Some of the best may have only six or eight students," Fleming said in an email.

Professors generally read their own reviews, Bragg said. "A lot of them are using it and making changes in their classroom," she said. She added that since the reviews can be posted while the course is being taught, it encourages professors to actively review their methods.

Melo said faculty respond to the reviews on the Student Course Guide. In fact, the site was changed so as to allow access only to Princeton students after faculty members complained about unfavorable reviews being available on the Internet, she said.

Economics Professor Elizabeth Bogan said in an email that she reads the reviews on the site every time she teaches a new course. "Some professors, especially new ones, read it. But many professors do not," she said.

James Gould, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, said in an email that he takes the white review sheets filled out in class more seriously than the online reviews.

As for the possibility of posting a professor's grading habits online, Saltzman said she felt it was a "great idea," although she said she was waiting for the review of grading practices to be completed by the departments before suggesting any changes.

Bragg said some schools favored such transparency as a means to fight grade inflation.

Professors Gould, Fleming and Sociology Professor Patricia Fernandez-Kelly agreed that posting such information is useful.

"If we are going to have course guides, formal or informal, there ought to be as much sunshine as possible," Fleming said.

However, Bogan disagreed. "It tends to push in the direction that all [the Student Course Guide] is for is to find easy courses," she said.

Gould said when choosing classes, students should look for topics "from across the spectrum." Also, he recommended students take EEB 311: Animal Behavior, which he teaches.