Rate My Professors (RMP)  is an online forum that allows college students to review professors at their college anonymously. Here is what FAU professors and students think about the website.

Steve Mitton is a history department’s senior instructor, and 95% of raters said they would retake his class. Mitton says he checks his RMP score regularly as it provides valuable feedback and makes sure his lessons are beneficial.

“Rate My Professors is a valuable tool for students to get direct feedback from peers more readily […] and provides valuable feedback for teachers and students. It also gives students a platform to express their opinions,” Mitton said.

Mitton explained that you can usually spot a good professor if they have a high difficulty rating combined with a high RMP score. This indicates that the professor has a track record for giving students a healthy challenge and is skilled at getting students to understand complex concepts. Mitton also says to look for consistent improvement.

Danielle Banton graduated from FAU this past summer and said she held the site in high regard as a student.

“RMP is extremely accurate; never register for classes without using RMP. It’s like walking into a class blind, without RMP, my college experience would have been terrible,” she said.

Banton suggests that the scores you see are not as important as the comments from students who took the class.

“Don’t even look at the score. It’s irrelevant. Look at the comments… [look to see] if comments are consistently good or consistently bad,” Danielle said.

Stephen Engle is the university’s associate provost for Academic Personnel and a history professor. He tends to focus on comments, too.

“I look at the comments [on RMP] rather than the number because the comments tell me what’s working and what’s not […] We are always trying to do better to meet student demands,” he said.

Engle encourages students to have an open mind and meet professors halfway. “Looking for the easiest teacher will not set you up for success,” he said. 

“Some subjects are not as glamorous as others and harder to teach, such as math and chemistry. […] Some students might not appreciate a challenge,” he explained.

Kirk Orr is a contributing writer for the University Press. For more information on this article or others, you can reach him at [email protected].