Since Ratemyprofessors.com is unregulated, students can say whatever they want without censorship. Students looking to take a professor’s class might be misled. 

Although the website allows students to learn about potential instructors and assignments, students who plan to transfer to or are already at a four-year university will not have the luxury of choosing their classes based on the website.

In a community college, many professors often teach the same class. At the university level, however, instructors are assigned to a specific course. Students in any particular major must take a required course with the professor, regardless of a bad rating. 

This makes selecting professors based on RateMyProfessors.com useless and could even hamper a student’s success in a class by allowing the student to view professors by reviews instead of their actual teaching ability.

Another reason why RateMyProfessors.com can pose a problem for students is that opinions expressed on the website are biased.

 Imagine that a student in the class did not study for a test, thinking that it would be easy. The student then took the test and receives a D. 

The student might unfairly blame the professor on the website for making such a hard test, when it was really the student’s fault for not studying. A student wanting to take the class might decide against it, based on the poor review, and he or she may miss a good course.

Not surprisingly, students tend to shy away from professors they find are difficult and this can have a detrimental effect. Some of the best instructors are difficult. In high school, they were the ones who best prepared students for college. In community college, they could be the ones who best prepare a student for a four-year university. 

More importantly, a good but difficult instructor can also prepare a student for a job in the real world. Would you want to pass on an excellent professor just because you read on RateMyProfessors.com that he or she is difficult?

RateMyProfessors.com hurts more than helps students because students who write the reviews might lie about a professor, especially if they had a bad experience in the professor’s class. This might get a student in trouble in two ways. The student might refuse to take a good class altogether. Also, if the class is required for the student and a certain professor is the only one who teaches it, the student might hold the prior reviews against them. 

A student should not pick classes based on a RateMyProfessors.com rating. That professor, who may have had the reputation of hard tests and endless readings, might just be the one that a student learns from the most.