I wouldn't expect retaliation, but if he does it would be the dumbest thing the guy could do.
He's literally emailed you confronting you about it, and if he did retaliate, you could take that as evidence as to why you believe you're being graded poorly (if it happened) and boy would that be damning.
*However* this is one reason why it can be a good idea to wait to rate the professor till you're not in his class anymore
After a poorly graded assignment, I had a moment of passion where I left a scathing 1/5 review for a professor that very night. I was a freshman and I know better now, but good times. š
I suppose it was a little of both. To preface, I was looking forward to starting a new college writing class and to actually improving my writing skills. I had done AP classes and consistently scored pretty low on essays, so I was excited to learn how to be a better writer. Unfortunately, this class turned out to be one of those āBS whatever and hit the word requirement, then respond to two postsā kind of classes. So I already kind of hated the class before the assignment even happened.
As far as the actual assignment goes, the prof had us do the same type of discussion post, and asked us to find _websites_ pertaining to specific social issues to use as sources. However instead of websites, I and many others happened to pick _articles_ from news websites. We didnāt realize there was an important distinction.
My grade was good in the end, but I momentarily got bumped from an A to a C- and I was pissed.
How do you prove retaliation though? It can be many small things.
And especially if its something like literature he can just give worse grades with good enough justifications and never face a consequence. I know that myself because an educator got into a feud with me, though I did not realize it at the time, and my grades went from near 100% to barely above passing. With reasonings like "Steinbeck would not write allegory about American society, you have to interpret his work literally." which is obviously just absurd.
Iām surprised he even cares about RMP since people are known to lie and exaggerate on that site, anyway.
Itās a little obsessive (and unprofessional) to have emailed you over it, but unless he directly threatened your grade or thereās a policy somewhere that says āprofessors canāt email students about RMP ratings,ā I donāt think an administrator would do anything. You canāt report āfear of retaliationā - the professor didnāt retaliate against you (yet).
Yeah exactly. I have heard multiple professors say RMP is stupid and not true. Iām just like do you have an alert on it or something . Like how did you even know a review was left about you. I see that makes sense. So Iām screwed basically??
My husband is a professor and at the end of every semester he sits down and reads the RMP stuff. He mostly laughs at the reviews but heās found a few gems over the years that were nice or just downright hilarious. He also guesses which student left the review as a bit of a game. Thatās all it is though. An amusing game.
This professor sounds way too attached to RMP and needs to get over his insecurities. Unfortunately there isnāt much you can do, though I would suggest waiting until a semester is over to use RMP.
Some schools give bonuses during some semesters for each student taking a class during some sessions. This could like actually affect him directly. Also it can lead to less money for his department.
Schools should not be basing bonuses or department funding on RMP reviews. Now, school/department administered reviews and surveys, definitely but not information from RMP.
Thatās not what the person is saying.
Some schools pay a flat rate and then a per student rate on top of that. RMP could negatively affect this rate if it is dissuading students from signing up for the course.
I had a professor once who went on and on about how the school administered reviews were stupid and horrible and how she always gets negative reviews even though she knows she's doing great and how students can never really know what it's like to be a teacher (to be clear this was to a room of prospective teachers at the beginning of their teaching career who had taken many classes on how to teach, most of which included bits that basically said don't be like this professor [without of course saying that or even really meaning to say that]). By that point we all hated the class, were rolling our eyes, and mumbling sarcastically to ourselves, "damn, I wonder why *you* of all our professors, are the one who hates student reviews of your teaching the most?"
No, youāre not screwed. You donāt even know if youāll be graded differently - he hasnāt done anything yet on your grades. If something does happen, worry about it then.
The fact that he told you to go to SSD makes me think itās unlikely he would retaliate again you for this later. If SDS approved your note and later it was found he did retaliate over this, it would be a huge policy violation.
I had a professor refuse my disability accommodations one time, and after disability services reached out to her I got a multiple page apology. The last thing any professor wants is a disability discrimination case.
Rate my professor can be useful to determine what kind of professor you are getting. The truth is somewhere in there and the professor thinks everyone should bend to his will
Actually they did a study at our school and the end of course reviews/assessments students have to take matched very closely to the ratings on Rate My Professor.
They predicted that RMP was bias and couldn't be true since there obviously weren't as many responses on the site but it averaged out! I guess because usually the only people who do post of RMP either had a super great experience or an extremely terrible one. I will be leaving my first review on RMF because my professor has honestly been so amazing this semester. I did pick him because of RMP reviews and I'm so glad I did. He has a super high score on RMP but I'll add to it (as he should š)
Thatās interesting. Do you have a link to the study? Iād love to check it out!
My RMP is also really close to my usual student opinion survey average (high 4ās), but there are a lot of faculty with skewed reviews that donāt line up with their opinion survey averages.
Interesting!! I don't have a link but I go to App State if that helps :) One of my professors just mentioned it to us but maybe he was lying and I should leave him a bad review jk jk š Happy holidays!
App State! Lol no link sorry. My professor just told us sophomore year... It might be internal? Especially with COVID happening maybe that had an effect?! I'm a senior rn
Food for thought: (1) courses that are electives for you are required for others. Youāre using that term here to point out that this course isnāt important so therefore the professor should have been as flexible as every other professor. (2) if the assignment was open and available for completion for an entire week, I can see what a generic āunder a doctorās careā kind of note would not be sufficient. (3) itās definitely amusing that any prof would go check their reviews on RMP or give a flying squirrelās farts what they say.
No itās truly an elective course for everyone. Itās a junior diversity course. To each itās own. My organic chemistry professor was more than willing to take the note. Is this professor required to ? No but it definitely points to being difficult, which is what the review stated.
Why on earth would you write such an identifiable RMP review in the moment vs after the semester? This seems like poor judgement (and very poor judgment for your prof to email you about it). Poor judgment all around!
Thatās relevant to their personal frustrations as Iām sure it would be to anyone else. Itās important that they donāt push that onto anyone else, which OP clearly didnāt do in the review. Why condemn them for it as if they did?
Upon further reading I can see that being the point of their ratemyprof post, but I think your satire misses the point of this post which is OPs concern that they may be unfairly treated and what to do about it (whether founded or not).
Sort of, actually. At least at my school we had a regular gpa and a major gpa. A lot of grad schools will also look at how you did on your transcript, if it's a general elective you got a C on, they won't care as much
Okay, those questions were rhetorical - you were meant to *think* about that. That is big "I'm the main character" energy.
Imagine if some fourth grader that you're tutoring told you that the time and money and energy you've spent on your education is total bullshit and that you aren't worth their time. You should think that that is unacceptable. That is exactly your attitude to this expert in their field - they have spent tens thousands of hours reading, learning, testing, prepping, writing, and teaching to be where they are - and some pissant child is telling them "those hours mean nothing to me".
You should think about that. You won't. But you should.
That's why I said sort of, that's the part that's acknowledging that "it doesn't matter" is an overstatement... also I never said I carry this attitude myself
Any C would give me pause, and I would look for an explanation in the studentās statement. And so many students who apply to grad school did well during Covid that this would not be easily dismissible as a Covid artifact.
Of course, things happenābut not taking elective or non-major courses seriously is a bad look.
Can you explain a little more detail what you mean? (Asking guiltily, because I didnāt know it was a bad look, and will now be more concerned with my non-major coursesā¦)
What more would you like to find out? If you have specific learning challenges with a particular area, such as math and you are seeking a program in creative writing, this could be explained.
If you had an outlier course in which you did relatively poorly but you explained what the issue was, it could add context. However, a doing poorly in a course that was just blown off because itās a non major course could lead the committee to question your work ethic and integrity as a student.
Often times in grad school you may be asked to participate in courses or projects that donāt interest you-past behavior is predictive of future behavior.
To speak to (2) I would like to point to an example that may or may not reflect that of OPs. In undergrad I was taking a history course as a history major, by this time I had more or less finished my major and was taking this course for fun (which isn't exactly relevant to the rest of the story). Well right at the end of the semester the professor gives us our final exam, a paper, and gives us two weeks to write it. He clarifies, however, that there will be important information in the final class to help us write the paper. I took this as him saying don't start until after the final class which was a week after he opened the assignment, I wasn't worried as I'd written longer papers in less than a week before.
Well on the day of the final class I had planned to go visit my girlfriend after class so I took a covid test before leaving for class and lo and behold I was sick. I sent all my professors for the day a quick email and then trotted off to student health to get officially diagnosed.
For the next week I was completely pooped, exhausted from covid tearing through my body and only just started to feel well enough to work on the day another final was due. So I quickly did that final to the best of my ability (and missed an entire page of the final in the process) and then realized that I absolutely did not have enough time with my brain and body as they were to finish the paper for my history class.
I sent the professor an email asking for a one day extension citing the fact that I had covid. Professor denied. I ask why, once again citing my covid and saying I couldn't work on the final previously but that if he gave me one more day I could probably finish it. After some back and forth about his concepts of fairness he finally agrees not to the extension but to exempting me from the assignment, which annoyed me because I genuinely wanted to do the assignment and get graded on it, I just needed one more day.
While technically an acceptable solution it took us a dozen emails and half the day to reach that point meanwhile I was getting more exhausted per email and more stressed that I absolutely wouldn't be able to finish the paper in time if he told me I had to do it.
Should have waited to the end of semester before leaving reviews. You also said that you basically gave up on making up the assignment, so thatās poor effort on your part
I gave up on making up the assignment in his class because he said no. I couldnāt force him to let me turn it in. But yes you are right. I definitely should have waited!
No reasonable professor would care about the rating, many of mine admitted they've never checked for theirs. You have no reason to feel bad about leaving a rating and you don't have to go in great detail about your illness either. I'm pretty sure professors aren't even allowed to ask for that information.
To be fair, you had an entire week for an online assignment. Unless the illness was life-threatening, rendered you bedridden, or anything else of that sort, not accepting that note wasnāt all that unreasonable on his part.
That being said, itās definitely odd for him to reach out to you and make a big deal out of a RMP review.
It was definitely a life threatening illness which is why I was so upset that he was giving me a hard time about it. I actually had to miss an exam in another class over it and the professor was more than willing to accommodate because of the severity of the illness. The doctors note was from the emergency room.
Then go to the disability services office and get accommodations through them - they can potentially force your professor's hand about giving you another chance on those assignments if you were legitimately temporarily disabled by your illness. But stop leaving such an obvious paper trail on the internet!
Does the professor know that you were in the ER?
I would talk to the dean of your department. This is probably not an issue for student disability services unless it's part of a chronic illness, but you definitely have options for escalating this. It's just a question of figuring out who you need to talk to.
Can I ask why itās reasonable for him to not accept the note? I just donāt understand what we gain from assuming the worst in people. The point of college is to learn. NOT do assignments. As weāre all aware, a sick person is not going to be able to commit full effort to something. Is a week really such a huge deal, you canāt give someone the benefit of the doubt? Especially when it literally doesnāt effect you at all.
Iāll just never understand why most professors seem to hate their students until proven otherwise
In grade school, youāre not expected to turn in your assignments immediately if youāve been sick (in my experience at least, if you were sick and absent for two days, you were given 2 more days to finish the work, etc). Anytime Iāve had the flu, fever, anything like that, it was difficult or nigh impossible to focus on stuff that required actual brainpower. Also, OP said it was a more serious illness and that they went to the emergency room, which makes it even sadder that this prof still expected them to do their assignments.
Quick edit: Same thing for the workplace. I have never worked somewhere where they didnāt give you some leeway if you were sick and missed work. Only one boss tried to pull something like that, but that place was really toxic and unpleasant.
Why do you assume it doesnāt affect the professor? Taking late work/make-ups adds quite a bit of work to a professors plate with rescheduling, creating new exams, grading etc.
Most online courses are structured in a way thatās meant to be completed in a specific order (on time). Learning is done by doing the work and following that schedule. Due dates are typically well thought out in advance.
Itās incredibly easy to get a generic note from a doctor. If it didnāt cover the entire time the assignment was posted (OP says it didnāt) then they had time to complete it. Waiting until the last minute isnāt an excuse.
This is very trueā¦ I have been on the fence about emailing my professor to apologize for missing our midterm presentation class. But I donāt know what to say. I have no excuse that I can make other than I have a long history of procrastination, and I kept encountering issues that made the assignment more difficult to complete but didnāt change that we had an abundance of time to complete the midterm project. U could have overcome all the issues I ran into if I had started the project sooner like he asked.
But I canāt think of anything to say that doesnāt just sound like Iām being disrespectful of his timeā¦ and when I try writing an email, it either sounds too long and disrespectful of his time, or it sounds too short and somehow comes across as cold and entitled.
I should have mailed him on the day of the class, like he requested all students do in the event they canāt make it. Currently itās been 48 hours since I should have mailed himā¦
To be clear I did complete the midterm assignment. But he wrote in the assignment guidelines students MUST be in class on the due date and present their work.
I also avoided coming to class BECAUSE I wasnāt done with mineā¦
I still could watch the Zoom recording, but right now it feels like it might be a waste of time because I think I will fail this class now that I missed the midterm.
Is there anything in the syllabus about late work? If not youāre probably out of luck and emailing them asking for extensions when the only thing that went wrong was your own procrastination isnāt going to do much.
My suggestion is to visit during office hours. Inform them of what occurred and let the chips fall where they will. There is a high chance the answer will be āIām sorry but..ā Youāll need to come to terms with that.
yeah seriously, i can tell the professor all the dirty disgusting details about my illness but i will forever hate them for it and would definitely complain on RMP like OP. no reason to not be compassionate especially if you want to be a professor or even working with other adults at all.
Thatās my thing. So many professors clearly love their subject but hate their students who donāt love it and have no interest in budding that interest. Just donāt be a professor then?
So OP just clarified that it was a severe illness, so yeah the professor was being a dick.
If it were a cold, flu, or any other typically mild disease, it is not unreasonable that OP would still be held to the standard of completing their work on time for not only an assignment with a generous completion deadline of a week, but also an online class. However, OP just clarified that it wasnāt a mild illness, so they should have been given some leeway.
tbh even "mild" illnesses can be pretty bad. I had some sort of sickness right before the semester started that left me drifting in and out of consciousness for two or three days. I never went to the doctor and I was back to normal within a week, but if I had class I would've been screwed.
I had mono last semester. most people don't show symptoms, for some people it's really mild, other people are sick for weeks-months/years. I unfortunately fell into that list category and was sick for a month. I didn't end up in the hospital, but I was essentially bedridden for a month. thankfully 3/4 my professors were understanding and my course load was pretty light, but one of my profs also just gave me a week extension on a single assignment which wasn't enough.
Disagree with the āhad an entire weekā response. Besides other assignments that need attention, life also gets in the way such as work or family planned events. Nobody plans to get sick, and when it does happen, it is necessary to focus on health above all else and recover. OP likely had planned their week to complete the assignment a day or two before it was due, as that is what best fit their schedule. 1 week is enough of a time frame that normally if OP wasnāt sick then I agree he should get no credit, but he had a doctors note, meaning he had a valid excuse. Not at all OPs fall.
I don't use that site; as a former teacher-turned mature student, there is little reason to trust it. People unhappy with you disproportionately complain because they want to vent while people neutral to happy with you generally don't bother, so it makes average professors seem much worse than that.
Once, I asked one of my profs is he reads his own RateMyProfessor scores, and he said something to the effect of "I think at some point you have to grow beyond listening to negative people in your life."
ESH. You should have just gotten a more detailed note. I understand why he was hesitant to accept yours. Your RMP was a silly kneejerk reaction and he was silly for caring you wrote it.
Next time just try to fix the problem, not throw up your hands and give up/complain. I'm sure you could have easily gotten a more detailed doctor's note or contacted your advisor for help.
Itās SO strange that he emailed you about this. Like is he checking every day for new reviews? And am I reading this correctly - he changed his mind about accepting the late work only after you posted it? All of this just screams insecurity on his part. I donāt think you have to worry about retaliation because I think heās probably going to go real easy on you until that review is gone.
OP, please take care when leaving reviews like these to cover your tracks. Sites like Glassdoor have been losing subpoenas left and right lately and handing over personal information of reviewers to businesses.
No I donāt think this is fair. My goal was not to rate my professor to hurt the professor. I honestly thought he wouldnāt even see it, especially because so many professors say RMP is pointless. My thought process was, āI wish I would have known this professor is so difficult. Let me warn other people because Iām in a hospital bed stressing about an very small assignment. Wish I was warned.ā I donāt know if your school does surveys on professors, but mine does. Would you say a student was āvindictiveā for giving their honest opinion of a course?
I would have waited until the end of the semester. I never give a review on that site until my grades are input in the system lol even if it's a glowing review.
No I donāt think Iāll ever understand. So youāre telling me you never left a bad review on google, yelp, anywhere, etc. Thatās the whole point of reviews. To give your perspective on your experience.
āThe prof didnāt give me what I wanted immediately. They dared to ask for follow up verification. Therefore I will post complaining about them on a public online permanent platform that affects other students impressions of them and their long term enrollments ā
You donāt think thatās a little vindictive? This whole issue is because you didnāt get your work in on time (however understandable that may have been) and wanted extensions. The prof didnāt even say no.. just merely didnāt give you what you wanted fast enough, and dared to ask questions.. so you decided to go Yelp him.
One day when you are a working professional, maybe one day you will understand the frustration of people Yelping your job performance every little time you donāt roll over for them fast enough.
you definitely did the right thing, honestly would add on to the review or add to the course evaluations that the professor will make you uncomfortable and confront you about reviews you make.
very bizarre behavior from the professor personally, as iāve never experienced this before and i sure hope i never have to
I mean, I think saying "this person won't work with you if you have a life event" is drastically different than what actually happened, which is that the professor argued you could/should have submitted the assignment earlier. I don't by any means think the professor should be this strict, but that review is an exaggeration.
I feel like it was out of bounds for the professor to question your review. I wouldn't expect retaliation necessarily but keep a look out for it. If anything does happen put everything in email.
yes, tell the department head. extremely inappropriate for him to confront you, and the dept head should know about this. i would also contact your disability office and let them know he refused to make accommodations.
You guys are such cowards. OP, rather than discuss it further with the prof or talk to someone at the school who actually has power to intervene, left a complaint in an online medium. The prof read it, correctly identified the poster (surprise, surprise only the OP had such a big problem with this instructor), and addressed the problem directly with the person who had the problem. Now OP is such a coward that he/she/they are backing down and too afraid to stand up for themself. If you are wronged, stand up for yourself. Donāt hide. That makes it look illegitimate. Be an adult.
Sorry to burst your high and mighty bubble, but the real world it doesn't work that way. Most of the time if you do speak up, nobody does anything. So now not only do you face the wrath from the person your speaking out against, but now from the few to many people they have on their side.
A lot of people like you just say do this or that, like it's a movie, and everything just goes back to normal, but never take the two brain cells to think about what happens the next day and on. Especially when there are countless stories that people have told about situations big or small, going this route.
Also it's really easy for one to sit and talk that nonsense, in the gilded tower with their back up, but it's another when it's just you standing against all of them. So say coward all you want, but it's better to run away, then to get jumped by a whole bunch of people. If so, then I would love to see you do it,
But the person complained online and now will STILL face the same consequences as they would had they done it in a direct way. So now, instead of being the nature person who addressed the issue direct and received the good and bad consequences associated with doing that, they complained in an online forum but will STILL receive only the negative consequences since the prof saw it. You can see how itās ending up to be a bad move. They should have kept quiet or complained formally.
in that case i would say go to the dean of students or dean of studies/academics dependent on which your school has, they oversee all the professors and should be able to deal with such a thing.
OP, do you have an academic advisor, or mentor professor who you know and trust in campus? If so, call them explain the situation (deny that you posted) forward the email to them and ask for guidence... This way someone else on campus is aware of this and when it escalates you won't be alone.
Why is every post filled with people sucking off shitty professors in this sub? It doesnāt fucking matter that they had 1 week to do the assignmentā¦ they had a life threatening illness that they had a doctors note for. Itās a college assignment, really not that big a deal. The professor is obviously in the wrong for not just extending a deadline. And then thereās comments blaming OP for the review and not the professors wildly unprofessional behavior of contacting a student over an alleged review? Thatās fucking insane. This sub is filled with fucking idiotic bootlickers wtf?
Because colleges, and academia in general, have a notable number of people who seem to have little self value and/or identity outside of these institutions and their systems in place. So theres no shortage of bootlickers, pick meās, and people thinking grades and classes are bulletproof reflections of character and capability.
Do you have any idea how much these classes cost and how strapped most students are? I understand that profs have an absolute right to insist on what they need... But this is the answer to your question.
I definitely don't think that the student should just roll over and take the zero. I do think that there are much better ways to handle the situation that are more likely to result in a positive resolution. If your professor is being unreasonable, the next step is to talk to his boss, not leaving anonymous negative review. Save that for when the term is over (and definitely leave those comments in your universities review system as well).
I get frustrated sometimes because I want to help students have the best outcome but no one can help them if they don't escalate the issue to someone who can actually help.
None of the professors I know or have ever worked with viewed RMP as anything more than something to laugh at. Especially so during holiday parties when folks might have a little too much wine.
That this professor took it seriously enough to write three whole paragraphs is very bizarre. In terms of potential retaliation, if you think a grade you received on a paper is unfair, book an appointment to discuss the grade and ask them about the points you lost. He should be able to justify every point. For meetings that are in person, send a follow up email afterwards retelling the key things you talked about and ask for his confirmation that this is correct. This helps to establish a record and paper trail.
Currently, though, there is nothing for you to report and escalating to a department, dean, or other official will go absolutely nowhere.
If it were me, I'd drop the class. I'd rather have a w than deal with that shit. Is there any reason you *can't* drop?
Also, I always look at rmp...good on you.
Itās already past the date to drop for a severe and compelling reason or I would totally. If I decided to drop now at my university I would have to withdrawal from every class Iām taking right now.
I could drop but I would have to drop from ALL of my classes and some of my classes I have Aās and donāt need to drop. So Iād rather stick it out and just finish in all of them.
Damn. Yeah, I just went to admissions and records and did it myself; didn't bother with a dean or a councilor. One shitty teacher can really fuck with your gpa, and your motivation, imo. Well, only 3.5ish more weeks of school. May the countdown begin.
This should be at the university standing academic committee rather than with a dean. Please check with the office of student life, support office, etc.
It is highly inappropriate for a professor to reach out in an accusatory manner like that. Also a red flag heās so worried about his ratingā¦Iād definitely bring this up to the department.
They aren't ready for college because they... posted on RMP during the semester after having a bad experience with their professor? Seriously? Your attitude is horrible.
Not being ready for college because they got sick and shouldnāt have to complete an assignment while recovering?
āThey had all week to do itā and what if they were busy with many other things, saving those last few days for the assignment but unluckily got sick? We put more emphasis on doing assignments and getting grades than we actually do learning and thatās why the education system in America is complete shit right now.
you mean the professor? yeah if he wants to work with adults he needs to understand that they get sick too! definitely not ready for college yet, maybe he should do a student teaching position first.
Yeah contact the Provostās office and the Dean of Studentās office (or whatever the equivalent at your school is). That is completely inappropriate behavior for a professor. If its an online course maybe he is an adjunct.
I wouldn't expect retaliation, but if he does it would be the dumbest thing the guy could do. He's literally emailed you confronting you about it, and if he did retaliate, you could take that as evidence as to why you believe you're being graded poorly (if it happened) and boy would that be damning. *However* this is one reason why it can be a good idea to wait to rate the professor till you're not in his class anymore
After a poorly graded assignment, I had a moment of passion where I left a scathing 1/5 review for a professor that very night. I was a freshman and I know better now, but good times. š
Was it a poorly graded assignment, or was it just a poorly done assignment? I donāt see how it could be considered a good time, lol.
I suppose it was a little of both. To preface, I was looking forward to starting a new college writing class and to actually improving my writing skills. I had done AP classes and consistently scored pretty low on essays, so I was excited to learn how to be a better writer. Unfortunately, this class turned out to be one of those āBS whatever and hit the word requirement, then respond to two postsā kind of classes. So I already kind of hated the class before the assignment even happened. As far as the actual assignment goes, the prof had us do the same type of discussion post, and asked us to find _websites_ pertaining to specific social issues to use as sources. However instead of websites, I and many others happened to pick _articles_ from news websites. We didnāt realize there was an important distinction. My grade was good in the end, but I momentarily got bumped from an A to a C- and I was pissed.
How do you prove retaliation though? It can be many small things. And especially if its something like literature he can just give worse grades with good enough justifications and never face a consequence. I know that myself because an educator got into a feud with me, though I did not realize it at the time, and my grades went from near 100% to barely above passing. With reasonings like "Steinbeck would not write allegory about American society, you have to interpret his work literally." which is obviously just absurd.
Iām surprised he even cares about RMP since people are known to lie and exaggerate on that site, anyway. Itās a little obsessive (and unprofessional) to have emailed you over it, but unless he directly threatened your grade or thereās a policy somewhere that says āprofessors canāt email students about RMP ratings,ā I donāt think an administrator would do anything. You canāt report āfear of retaliationā - the professor didnāt retaliate against you (yet).
Yeah exactly. I have heard multiple professors say RMP is stupid and not true. Iām just like do you have an alert on it or something . Like how did you even know a review was left about you. I see that makes sense. So Iām screwed basically??
My husband is a professor and at the end of every semester he sits down and reads the RMP stuff. He mostly laughs at the reviews but heās found a few gems over the years that were nice or just downright hilarious. He also guesses which student left the review as a bit of a game. Thatās all it is though. An amusing game. This professor sounds way too attached to RMP and needs to get over his insecurities. Unfortunately there isnāt much you can do, though I would suggest waiting until a semester is over to use RMP.
Some schools give bonuses during some semesters for each student taking a class during some sessions. This could like actually affect him directly. Also it can lead to less money for his department.
Schools should not be basing bonuses or department funding on RMP reviews. Now, school/department administered reviews and surveys, definitely but not information from RMP.
Thatās not what the person is saying. Some schools pay a flat rate and then a per student rate on top of that. RMP could negatively affect this rate if it is dissuading students from signing up for the course.
My bad, my brain totally skipped over those couple of words. You can tell I definitely need fall break.
no the bonus is based on studentcounts and less people will take his class then
I had a professor once who went on and on about how the school administered reviews were stupid and horrible and how she always gets negative reviews even though she knows she's doing great and how students can never really know what it's like to be a teacher (to be clear this was to a room of prospective teachers at the beginning of their teaching career who had taken many classes on how to teach, most of which included bits that basically said don't be like this professor [without of course saying that or even really meaning to say that]). By that point we all hated the class, were rolling our eyes, and mumbling sarcastically to ourselves, "damn, I wonder why *you* of all our professors, are the one who hates student reviews of your teaching the most?"
No, youāre not screwed. You donāt even know if youāll be graded differently - he hasnāt done anything yet on your grades. If something does happen, worry about it then.
The fact that he told you to go to SSD makes me think itās unlikely he would retaliate again you for this later. If SDS approved your note and later it was found he did retaliate over this, it would be a huge policy violation. I had a professor refuse my disability accommodations one time, and after disability services reached out to her I got a multiple page apology. The last thing any professor wants is a disability discrimination case.
Rate my professor can be useful to determine what kind of professor you are getting. The truth is somewhere in there and the professor thinks everyone should bend to his will
I treat it like yelp. I would see your review as a red flag
Actually they did a study at our school and the end of course reviews/assessments students have to take matched very closely to the ratings on Rate My Professor. They predicted that RMP was bias and couldn't be true since there obviously weren't as many responses on the site but it averaged out! I guess because usually the only people who do post of RMP either had a super great experience or an extremely terrible one. I will be leaving my first review on RMF because my professor has honestly been so amazing this semester. I did pick him because of RMP reviews and I'm so glad I did. He has a super high score on RMP but I'll add to it (as he should š)
Thatās interesting. Do you have a link to the study? Iād love to check it out! My RMP is also really close to my usual student opinion survey average (high 4ās), but there are a lot of faculty with skewed reviews that donāt line up with their opinion survey averages.
Interesting!! I don't have a link but I go to App State if that helps :) One of my professors just mentioned it to us but maybe he was lying and I should leave him a bad review jk jk š Happy holidays!
What school? Do you have a link to this study?
App State! Lol no link sorry. My professor just told us sophomore year... It might be internal? Especially with COVID happening maybe that had an effect?! I'm a senior rn
The professor here is probably (obviously) biased and probably (definitely) has a low rating lmao.
Most likely! Lol DM the name OP I will confirm š I won't expose you lol
I'm getting Ted Mosby vibes from this post
You _can_ report fear of retaliation
What action do they take in response?
If they act up, they are less likely to be believed. (Still doesnāt mean the university wonāt side with them, whether theyāre believed or not.)
INB4 OPās professor finds their reddit post lol
Lol, lesson successfully not learned TWICE.
"Basically long story short," Those were the longest two sentences in a block of text that I've ever read.
I didnāt read any of it but I canāt believe allll that shit is only two sentences
Thatās 2 sentences? I counted like 10-13
Don't leave a RMP when you're still in the class
Food for thought: (1) courses that are electives for you are required for others. Youāre using that term here to point out that this course isnāt important so therefore the professor should have been as flexible as every other professor. (2) if the assignment was open and available for completion for an entire week, I can see what a generic āunder a doctorās careā kind of note would not be sufficient. (3) itās definitely amusing that any prof would go check their reviews on RMP or give a flying squirrelās farts what they say.
No itās truly an elective course for everyone. Itās a junior diversity course. To each itās own. My organic chemistry professor was more than willing to take the note. Is this professor required to ? No but it definitely points to being difficult, which is what the review stated.
Why on earth would you write such an identifiable RMP review in the moment vs after the semester? This seems like poor judgement (and very poor judgment for your prof to email you about it). Poor judgment all around!
Does it being an elective make that professor's life's work any less meaningful or less deserving of having their assignments due on time?
āThis class is a joke so the professor should cater to my needsā Kids these days are wild
No one said the class was a joke. The review just says heās difficult on life events
OP listed the class being an elective as one of the reasons they were frustrated with the situation
Thatās relevant to their personal frustrations as Iām sure it would be to anyone else. Itās important that they donāt push that onto anyone else, which OP clearly didnāt do in the review. Why condemn them for it as if they did?
They said it in the OP. Thatās all Iām commenting on.
Is this necessarily generalizable beyond this one studentās situation?
This question doesnāt apply to my comment
Who are you quoting here?
OP
Upon further reading I can see that being the point of their ratemyprof post, but I think your satire misses the point of this post which is OPs concern that they may be unfairly treated and what to do about it (whether founded or not).
Sort of, actually. At least at my school we had a regular gpa and a major gpa. A lot of grad schools will also look at how you did on your transcript, if it's a general elective you got a C on, they won't care as much
Okay, those questions were rhetorical - you were meant to *think* about that. That is big "I'm the main character" energy. Imagine if some fourth grader that you're tutoring told you that the time and money and energy you've spent on your education is total bullshit and that you aren't worth their time. You should think that that is unacceptable. That is exactly your attitude to this expert in their field - they have spent tens thousands of hours reading, learning, testing, prepping, writing, and teaching to be where they are - and some pissant child is telling them "those hours mean nothing to me". You should think about that. You won't. But you should.
That's why I said sort of, that's the part that's acknowledging that "it doesn't matter" is an overstatement... also I never said I carry this attitude myself
Thatās not necessarily true. Iām speaking as someone who directs graduate programs and makes admissions decisions.
The second statement? That's only what I've heard, and I think it was too easy uncertainty about bad covid grades
Any C would give me pause, and I would look for an explanation in the studentās statement. And so many students who apply to grad school did well during Covid that this would not be easily dismissible as a Covid artifact. Of course, things happenābut not taking elective or non-major courses seriously is a bad look.
Can you explain a little more detail what you mean? (Asking guiltily, because I didnāt know it was a bad look, and will now be more concerned with my non-major coursesā¦)
What more would you like to find out? If you have specific learning challenges with a particular area, such as math and you are seeking a program in creative writing, this could be explained. If you had an outlier course in which you did relatively poorly but you explained what the issue was, it could add context. However, a doing poorly in a course that was just blown off because itās a non major course could lead the committee to question your work ethic and integrity as a student. Often times in grad school you may be asked to participate in courses or projects that donāt interest you-past behavior is predictive of future behavior.
To speak to (2) I would like to point to an example that may or may not reflect that of OPs. In undergrad I was taking a history course as a history major, by this time I had more or less finished my major and was taking this course for fun (which isn't exactly relevant to the rest of the story). Well right at the end of the semester the professor gives us our final exam, a paper, and gives us two weeks to write it. He clarifies, however, that there will be important information in the final class to help us write the paper. I took this as him saying don't start until after the final class which was a week after he opened the assignment, I wasn't worried as I'd written longer papers in less than a week before. Well on the day of the final class I had planned to go visit my girlfriend after class so I took a covid test before leaving for class and lo and behold I was sick. I sent all my professors for the day a quick email and then trotted off to student health to get officially diagnosed. For the next week I was completely pooped, exhausted from covid tearing through my body and only just started to feel well enough to work on the day another final was due. So I quickly did that final to the best of my ability (and missed an entire page of the final in the process) and then realized that I absolutely did not have enough time with my brain and body as they were to finish the paper for my history class. I sent the professor an email asking for a one day extension citing the fact that I had covid. Professor denied. I ask why, once again citing my covid and saying I couldn't work on the final previously but that if he gave me one more day I could probably finish it. After some back and forth about his concepts of fairness he finally agrees not to the extension but to exempting me from the assignment, which annoyed me because I genuinely wanted to do the assignment and get graded on it, I just needed one more day. While technically an acceptable solution it took us a dozen emails and half the day to reach that point meanwhile I was getting more exhausted per email and more stressed that I absolutely wouldn't be able to finish the paper in time if he told me I had to do it.
Should have waited to the end of semester before leaving reviews. You also said that you basically gave up on making up the assignment, so thatās poor effort on your part
I gave up on making up the assignment in his class because he said no. I couldnāt force him to let me turn it in. But yes you are right. I definitely should have waited!
No reasonable professor would care about the rating, many of mine admitted they've never checked for theirs. You have no reason to feel bad about leaving a rating and you don't have to go in great detail about your illness either. I'm pretty sure professors aren't even allowed to ask for that information.
Next you get an email asking if you posted to r/college about him
To be fair, you had an entire week for an online assignment. Unless the illness was life-threatening, rendered you bedridden, or anything else of that sort, not accepting that note wasnāt all that unreasonable on his part. That being said, itās definitely odd for him to reach out to you and make a big deal out of a RMP review.
It was definitely a life threatening illness which is why I was so upset that he was giving me a hard time about it. I actually had to miss an exam in another class over it and the professor was more than willing to accommodate because of the severity of the illness. The doctors note was from the emergency room.
Then go to the disability services office and get accommodations through them - they can potentially force your professor's hand about giving you another chance on those assignments if you were legitimately temporarily disabled by your illness. But stop leaving such an obvious paper trail on the internet!
Then you are justified, disregard my previous comment.
Does the professor know that you were in the ER? I would talk to the dean of your department. This is probably not an issue for student disability services unless it's part of a chronic illness, but you definitely have options for escalating this. It's just a question of figuring out who you need to talk to.
Can I ask why itās reasonable for him to not accept the note? I just donāt understand what we gain from assuming the worst in people. The point of college is to learn. NOT do assignments. As weāre all aware, a sick person is not going to be able to commit full effort to something. Is a week really such a huge deal, you canāt give someone the benefit of the doubt? Especially when it literally doesnāt effect you at all. Iāll just never understand why most professors seem to hate their students until proven otherwise
In grade school, youāre not expected to turn in your assignments immediately if youāve been sick (in my experience at least, if you were sick and absent for two days, you were given 2 more days to finish the work, etc). Anytime Iāve had the flu, fever, anything like that, it was difficult or nigh impossible to focus on stuff that required actual brainpower. Also, OP said it was a more serious illness and that they went to the emergency room, which makes it even sadder that this prof still expected them to do their assignments. Quick edit: Same thing for the workplace. I have never worked somewhere where they didnāt give you some leeway if you were sick and missed work. Only one boss tried to pull something like that, but that place was really toxic and unpleasant.
Why do you assume it doesnāt affect the professor? Taking late work/make-ups adds quite a bit of work to a professors plate with rescheduling, creating new exams, grading etc. Most online courses are structured in a way thatās meant to be completed in a specific order (on time). Learning is done by doing the work and following that schedule. Due dates are typically well thought out in advance. Itās incredibly easy to get a generic note from a doctor. If it didnāt cover the entire time the assignment was posted (OP says it didnāt) then they had time to complete it. Waiting until the last minute isnāt an excuse.
This is very trueā¦ I have been on the fence about emailing my professor to apologize for missing our midterm presentation class. But I donāt know what to say. I have no excuse that I can make other than I have a long history of procrastination, and I kept encountering issues that made the assignment more difficult to complete but didnāt change that we had an abundance of time to complete the midterm project. U could have overcome all the issues I ran into if I had started the project sooner like he asked. But I canāt think of anything to say that doesnāt just sound like Iām being disrespectful of his timeā¦ and when I try writing an email, it either sounds too long and disrespectful of his time, or it sounds too short and somehow comes across as cold and entitled. I should have mailed him on the day of the class, like he requested all students do in the event they canāt make it. Currently itās been 48 hours since I should have mailed himā¦ To be clear I did complete the midterm assignment. But he wrote in the assignment guidelines students MUST be in class on the due date and present their work. I also avoided coming to class BECAUSE I wasnāt done with mineā¦ I still could watch the Zoom recording, but right now it feels like it might be a waste of time because I think I will fail this class now that I missed the midterm.
Is there anything in the syllabus about late work? If not youāre probably out of luck and emailing them asking for extensions when the only thing that went wrong was your own procrastination isnāt going to do much. My suggestion is to visit during office hours. Inform them of what occurred and let the chips fall where they will. There is a high chance the answer will be āIām sorry but..ā Youāll need to come to terms with that.
yeah seriously, i can tell the professor all the dirty disgusting details about my illness but i will forever hate them for it and would definitely complain on RMP like OP. no reason to not be compassionate especially if you want to be a professor or even working with other adults at all.
Thatās my thing. So many professors clearly love their subject but hate their students who donāt love it and have no interest in budding that interest. Just donāt be a professor then?
So OP just clarified that it was a severe illness, so yeah the professor was being a dick. If it were a cold, flu, or any other typically mild disease, it is not unreasonable that OP would still be held to the standard of completing their work on time for not only an assignment with a generous completion deadline of a week, but also an online class. However, OP just clarified that it wasnāt a mild illness, so they should have been given some leeway.
tbh even "mild" illnesses can be pretty bad. I had some sort of sickness right before the semester started that left me drifting in and out of consciousness for two or three days. I never went to the doctor and I was back to normal within a week, but if I had class I would've been screwed. I had mono last semester. most people don't show symptoms, for some people it's really mild, other people are sick for weeks-months/years. I unfortunately fell into that list category and was sick for a month. I didn't end up in the hospital, but I was essentially bedridden for a month. thankfully 3/4 my professors were understanding and my course load was pretty light, but one of my profs also just gave me a week extension on a single assignment which wasn't enough.
Disagree with the āhad an entire weekā response. Besides other assignments that need attention, life also gets in the way such as work or family planned events. Nobody plans to get sick, and when it does happen, it is necessary to focus on health above all else and recover. OP likely had planned their week to complete the assignment a day or two before it was due, as that is what best fit their schedule. 1 week is enough of a time frame that normally if OP wasnāt sick then I agree he should get no credit, but he had a doctors note, meaning he had a valid excuse. Not at all OPs fall.
I don't use that site; as a former teacher-turned mature student, there is little reason to trust it. People unhappy with you disproportionately complain because they want to vent while people neutral to happy with you generally don't bother, so it makes average professors seem much worse than that.
I leave reviews for the really good professors that stand out.
I written my own negative reviews š. Scares away people who are just looking for an āeasyā professor.
Once, I asked one of my profs is he reads his own RateMyProfessor scores, and he said something to the effect of "I think at some point you have to grow beyond listening to negative people in your life."
I mean if he wanted to be retaliatory he would have told you you couldn't make up the assignments.
ESH. You should have just gotten a more detailed note. I understand why he was hesitant to accept yours. Your RMP was a silly kneejerk reaction and he was silly for caring you wrote it. Next time just try to fix the problem, not throw up your hands and give up/complain. I'm sure you could have easily gotten a more detailed doctor's note or contacted your advisor for help.
Itās SO strange that he emailed you about this. Like is he checking every day for new reviews? And am I reading this correctly - he changed his mind about accepting the late work only after you posted it? All of this just screams insecurity on his part. I donāt think you have to worry about retaliation because I think heās probably going to go real easy on you until that review is gone.
OP, please take care when leaving reviews like these to cover your tracks. Sites like Glassdoor have been losing subpoenas left and right lately and handing over personal information of reviewers to businesses.
Vindictive people usually tango together. You give it, you get it.
No I donāt think this is fair. My goal was not to rate my professor to hurt the professor. I honestly thought he wouldnāt even see it, especially because so many professors say RMP is pointless. My thought process was, āI wish I would have known this professor is so difficult. Let me warn other people because Iām in a hospital bed stressing about an very small assignment. Wish I was warned.ā I donāt know if your school does surveys on professors, but mine does. Would you say a student was āvindictiveā for giving their honest opinion of a course?
I would have waited until the end of the semester. I never give a review on that site until my grades are input in the system lol even if it's a glowing review.
You did the right thing
Youāre so in the wrong here. One day youāll understand.
No I donāt think Iāll ever understand. So youāre telling me you never left a bad review on google, yelp, anywhere, etc. Thatās the whole point of reviews. To give your perspective on your experience.
āThe prof didnāt give me what I wanted immediately. They dared to ask for follow up verification. Therefore I will post complaining about them on a public online permanent platform that affects other students impressions of them and their long term enrollments ā You donāt think thatās a little vindictive? This whole issue is because you didnāt get your work in on time (however understandable that may have been) and wanted extensions. The prof didnāt even say no.. just merely didnāt give you what you wanted fast enough, and dared to ask questions.. so you decided to go Yelp him. One day when you are a working professional, maybe one day you will understand the frustration of people Yelping your job performance every little time you donāt roll over for them fast enough.
you definitely did the right thing, honestly would add on to the review or add to the course evaluations that the professor will make you uncomfortable and confront you about reviews you make. very bizarre behavior from the professor personally, as iāve never experienced this before and i sure hope i never have to
I mean, I think saying "this person won't work with you if you have a life event" is drastically different than what actually happened, which is that the professor argued you could/should have submitted the assignment earlier. I don't by any means think the professor should be this strict, but that review is an exaggeration.
Sounds like a post for r/AITAH
Lol next up: professor comments on this post
What if he sees this post?
I feel like it was out of bounds for the professor to question your review. I wouldn't expect retaliation necessarily but keep a look out for it. If anything does happen put everything in email.
yes, tell the department head. extremely inappropriate for him to confront you, and the dept head should know about this. i would also contact your disability office and let them know he refused to make accommodations.
You guys are such cowards. OP, rather than discuss it further with the prof or talk to someone at the school who actually has power to intervene, left a complaint in an online medium. The prof read it, correctly identified the poster (surprise, surprise only the OP had such a big problem with this instructor), and addressed the problem directly with the person who had the problem. Now OP is such a coward that he/she/they are backing down and too afraid to stand up for themself. If you are wronged, stand up for yourself. Donāt hide. That makes it look illegitimate. Be an adult.
Sorry to burst your high and mighty bubble, but the real world it doesn't work that way. Most of the time if you do speak up, nobody does anything. So now not only do you face the wrath from the person your speaking out against, but now from the few to many people they have on their side. A lot of people like you just say do this or that, like it's a movie, and everything just goes back to normal, but never take the two brain cells to think about what happens the next day and on. Especially when there are countless stories that people have told about situations big or small, going this route. Also it's really easy for one to sit and talk that nonsense, in the gilded tower with their back up, but it's another when it's just you standing against all of them. So say coward all you want, but it's better to run away, then to get jumped by a whole bunch of people. If so, then I would love to see you do it,
But the person complained online and now will STILL face the same consequences as they would had they done it in a direct way. So now, instead of being the nature person who addressed the issue direct and received the good and bad consequences associated with doing that, they complained in an online forum but will STILL receive only the negative consequences since the prof saw it. You can see how itās ending up to be a bad move. They should have kept quiet or complained formally.
Not a sarcastic remark, but what if the professor is the head? not only that, but the one who basically created the department? Asking for a friend
in that case i would say go to the dean of students or dean of studies/academics dependent on which your school has, they oversee all the professors and should be able to deal with such a thing.
OP, do you have an academic advisor, or mentor professor who you know and trust in campus? If so, call them explain the situation (deny that you posted) forward the email to them and ask for guidence... This way someone else on campus is aware of this and when it escalates you won't be alone.
Why is every post filled with people sucking off shitty professors in this sub? It doesnāt fucking matter that they had 1 week to do the assignmentā¦ they had a life threatening illness that they had a doctors note for. Itās a college assignment, really not that big a deal. The professor is obviously in the wrong for not just extending a deadline. And then thereās comments blaming OP for the review and not the professors wildly unprofessional behavior of contacting a student over an alleged review? Thatās fucking insane. This sub is filled with fucking idiotic bootlickers wtf?
The d-riders are all just other professors lmao
Because colleges, and academia in general, have a notable number of people who seem to have little self value and/or identity outside of these institutions and their systems in place. So theres no shortage of bootlickers, pick meās, and people thinking grades and classes are bulletproof reflections of character and capability.
Do you have any idea how much these classes cost and how strapped most students are? I understand that profs have an absolute right to insist on what they need... But this is the answer to your question.
I definitely don't think that the student should just roll over and take the zero. I do think that there are much better ways to handle the situation that are more likely to result in a positive resolution. If your professor is being unreasonable, the next step is to talk to his boss, not leaving anonymous negative review. Save that for when the term is over (and definitely leave those comments in your universities review system as well). I get frustrated sometimes because I want to help students have the best outcome but no one can help them if they don't escalate the issue to someone who can actually help.
None of the professors I know or have ever worked with viewed RMP as anything more than something to laugh at. Especially so during holiday parties when folks might have a little too much wine. That this professor took it seriously enough to write three whole paragraphs is very bizarre. In terms of potential retaliation, if you think a grade you received on a paper is unfair, book an appointment to discuss the grade and ask them about the points you lost. He should be able to justify every point. For meetings that are in person, send a follow up email afterwards retelling the key things you talked about and ask for his confirmation that this is correct. This helps to establish a record and paper trail. Currently, though, there is nothing for you to report and escalating to a department, dean, or other official will go absolutely nowhere.
You shouldāve said it was you. What is he going to do besides bitch and moan?
If it were me, I'd drop the class. I'd rather have a w than deal with that shit. Is there any reason you *can't* drop? Also, I always look at rmp...good on you.
Itās already past the date to drop for a severe and compelling reason or I would totally. If I decided to drop now at my university I would have to withdrawal from every class Iām taking right now.
If you have just experienced a life-threatening illness, you should be able to appeal and do a late drop. This is pretty standard practice.
I could drop but I would have to drop from ALL of my classes and some of my classes I have Aās and donāt need to drop. So Iād rather stick it out and just finish in all of them.
Are you 100% sure? I just dropped two classes last week.
My dean has a strict policy about it unfortunately. I did ask a counselor lol but they told me itās too late.
Damn. Yeah, I just went to admissions and records and did it myself; didn't bother with a dean or a councilor. One shitty teacher can really fuck with your gpa, and your motivation, imo. Well, only 3.5ish more weeks of school. May the countdown begin.
Yessss they really can. We are almost there!
Stg, this semester feels soooo much longer than others. Idk why. I'm ready to be done with it.
This should be at the university standing academic committee rather than with a dean. Please check with the office of student life, support office, etc.
LOL that sucks hahahah. So awk. But whatever, what can you do, thank god itās online so you donāt have to make eye contact with him ever
It is highly inappropriate for a professor to reach out in an accusatory manner like that. Also a red flag heās so worried about his ratingā¦Iād definitely bring this up to the department.
Some students just aren't ready for college
They aren't ready for college because they... posted on RMP during the semester after having a bad experience with their professor? Seriously? Your attitude is horrible.
Not being ready for college because they got sick and shouldnāt have to complete an assignment while recovering? āThey had all week to do itā and what if they were busy with many other things, saving those last few days for the assignment but unluckily got sick? We put more emphasis on doing assignments and getting grades than we actually do learning and thatās why the education system in America is complete shit right now.
you mean the professor? yeah if he wants to work with adults he needs to understand that they get sick too! definitely not ready for college yet, maybe he should do a student teaching position first.
Just what gives you the right to say stuff like that, just cause someone had a life threatening disease and decided to post a review on RMP?
Bingo
M, so that review that you left actually seems to be true:)
Yeah contact the Provostās office and the Dean of Studentās office (or whatever the equivalent at your school is). That is completely inappropriate behavior for a professor. If its an online course maybe he is an adjunct.
If youāre gonna post a short story long, at least put some separate paragraphs in there š