Rating Portland State

To rant about a professor who bored you to sleep, compliment a teacher who made University Studies enjoyable or get an insider’s view on the Spanish department teachers, you might find yourself on www.ratemyprofessors.com.

The Web site is a nationwide online tool for students at over 6,000 schools around the country. Using the site, students are able to research professors at their university before registering for classes.

Portland State students can browse rankings of the university’s 1,120 listed professors, or they can search for specific professors by last name.

It is students who create the ratings by grading professors on the following criteria: easiness, helpfulness, clarity, the student’s interest level prior to attending class, textbook use, the grade the student achieved in the class, attendance policy and personal appearance.

“It is really helpful,” said sophomore Kelsey Robertson. “I always go to the site before I register for classes. But [first], I prefer to check with people I know who have had that professor before.”

Robertson cites the anonymity granted to those giving ratings as a reason to check with other students.
However, professors are not defenseless on www.ratemyprofessors.com.

Teachers have the opportunity to sign up for an account on the Web site. Once their status as a professor is verified, they can monitor what comments are made about them and, if needed, e-mail a moderator to have any inappropriate comment removed. Professors are also able to use the site to rate themselves and adjust their scores in any of the above categories.

Some teachers who may not want to fight back are Harry Anastasiou, Sandra Freels, Patricia Sylvester, Jane Mercer and Melissa Miller. These five are the highest-ranked Portland State professors on www.ratemyprofessors.com.

Anastasiou, the No. 1-ranked Portland State professor, teaches a wide variety of courses in the International Studies and Conflict Resolution programs.

“This is what we need to do instead of the feedback forms we use because this is online and continuous,” Anastasiou said. “All feedback is helpful. Part of teaching is learning from the students and growing through them. The more open we, as teachers, are to being taught, the better we’ll be at teaching.”