Students can see what others have to say about many Nicholls professors on RateMyProfessors.com, a website that allows people to rate a professor on the basis of helpfulness, clarity, easiness and, more recently, sexiness. According to RateMyProfessors.com, it is a free website which offers an anonymous public review, and sometimes a “public flogging,” of university professors from across the United States and Canada; the website has been online since 1999 and now contains over 200,000 ratings for professors from 1,700 schools.

“It’s good that (the site) is anonymous because there’s always that fear that teachers are going to go after certain students and flunk them because of hurt feelings,” Tamara Caillouet, a freshman from Natchitoches, said. “Whereas with the anonymity, you can say, ‘Okay, maybe this is something I should consider changing or improving because my students will benefit from it.’ “

According to Larry Howell, interim vice president for academic affairs, until the number of submissions increase, the website should not be taken seriously.

“It doesn’t have the numbers or protection to make it really valid,” Howell said.

Glenn Antizzo, associate professor of history and social studies, said he enjoys reading the comments students write about him, but is somewhat disappointed that there are not more comments. He said all of his comments thus far are good, and he even reads them to his parents.
“One major negative is that students can use it as a weapon of retribution,” Antizzo said.

Howell said: “The information is probably very few people’s opinions. That’s what concerns me.”

Howell said he thinks word of mouth is more reliable for determining the general opinion on a professor’s performance and students need not visit the website but simply ask others who have had a particular professor.

“I think RateMyProfessors.com would be a very good tool for students to use,” Jeremy Knight, computer informations systems senior from Raceland, said. “I would definitely (use) it because the one piece of advice I got before I came to college was ‘Know who you’re taking before you take them,’ and ‘If you get a teacher that you hear is bad, drop them as soon as possible and take (the class) next semester.'”

Michelle Blanchard, history major from Prairieville, said:
“RateMyProfessors.com is a good idea for new students who are entering college who have no idea what college life is like. I think it’s a bad idea if certain students have a bias against teachers because that means they’re going to fill the website with all sorts of bad things about the teacher when the teacher may not actually be so bad. (The professor) may be an awesome teacher.”

As of April 27, the website has over a million and a half total ratings, over 360,000 total professors listed and nearly 4,000 total schools listed. For the Nicholls section on the website, 126 professors are currently listed.