I have arrived!
by Alex
W00t! After semesters of teaching I am now finally an official professor: I have “a rating at ratemyprofessor.com”:http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/ShowRatings.jsp?tid=753498! Apparently I am a good teacher, although exactly why is still a little unclear. Indeed, sometimes the comments verge on the enigmatic, such as the line “one of the books he has chosen for the class is very different from other books.”
I rate a 4.8 out of 5, which is pretty good. In fact, it is higher than most of the other professors in my department. But don’t get too excited, though — I am also one of the few in my department who has not earned the coveted chili pepper before their name to indicate that they are ‘hot.’ Transference: it’s complicated.
I know some professors harbor considerable resentment to sites like Rate My Professor for one reason or another, but I’m just happy that someone cared enough about my course to register an opinion one way or the other. I’m even more delighted that the opinion was a good one. However I also found out today that one section of my intro anthro course is full and I haven’t even finished teaching the ones for this semester. Perhaps I should try to be scarier so I can get smaller class sizes where a discussion-based format would work better?
Congratulations! Welcome to the academe.
I too lack the approbation of the chili pepper (though I did have that honor at Toronto). It’s a little embarrassing how much that annoys me. (The fact that only 50% of my students can spell the word “weird” is a little irritating too.)
I had a chili pepper, but lost it. My elbow patches must have slipped out of fashion between semesters.
Also, my carefully planned readings and assignments, designed to connect across the semester in intricate ways, are apparently “random.” But at least random is usually spelled correctly!
I went to that professor website to see your review. Ended up writing a review for my kick ass screenwriting professor from Emerson, Susan Woll.
Oddly enough, no review for SEB. Hmm…
However, found reviews for Marty, Emily, Bayliss, and Angela. All my college instructor friends got great marks. Obviously my influence.
Commander Plaza: your influence is clearly everywhere. “EVERYWHERE”:http://ratemyprofessor.com/ShowRatings.jsp?tid=775918
UMFK in the house!
I just love that we all read it and I think it is hilarious.
For more good student generated fun try taking a look at
http://culpa.info/
for some evaluations of very well known Columbia U faculty.
I deserve that fucking chili pepper. Nothing for nothing, but have you seen my colleagues at UMFK? They all look like a mix between a homunculus and nothing.