posted on: Aug 30th, 2010

After This Long, Hot Summer, How to Avoid A Wallet of Discontent

Welcome back, one and all!

We at Professor Performance hope you had a fantastic summer vacation and that not too many of your ‘memories’ ended up going viral on YouTube. Alas, now it’s time to get back to reality.

Getting ready for the new college year is always a stressful experience, not least because of the cost involved. But now, for the first time, Professor Performance can help financially as well as academically. That’s because we are rolling out a new ‘Textbook Exchange’ whereby students deal with each other. Books are listed – for free – in the right-hand column of the Professor Evaluation pages and potential buyers then arrange to meet up with the seller. It’s a great new system, and brings with it two major advantages:-

Firstly, the deals are done locally and face-to-face. That way, you’ll know for sure that the textbook you buy is the correct one, even if the school has a custom edition. No finding at the last minute that the online seller has shipped the wrong edition. Or the wrong subject!

Secondly, and most important of all, this will end the tyranny of school bookstores. Our website offers this completely free service so that students will not have to spend a fortune buying textbooks. They will also no longer have to accept a pittance when selling them back to the college equivalent of a pawnbroker. This could potentially free up hundreds of dollars for the other essentials of student life.

Like beer!

posted on: June 20th, 2010

Welcome to the New ProfessorPerformance.com!

Welcome to the all new and improved (we hope) ProfessorPerformance website. We've worked really hard on this upgrade to make the experience more intuitive and, above all, enjoyable. Before jumping straight in, though, please take a moment to see what has changed.

TEACHERS: We are not against you! Anyone who spends thousands on a vacation without researching it first, arguably deserves the inevitable explosive diarrhea. The same holds true for students selecting an expensive course, and we offer the opportunity for them to avoid visiting the college equivalent of Mexico (no offense!)

The first change you will notice is the addition of two more Grade Categories: Knowledge and Ability. Students can grade a professor’s grasp of a subject and, more importantly, how easily he teaches it to others. We understand that some professors may have concerns about being graded themselves, and have therefore put in place certain safeguards. The system grants higher influence to verified students, thereby reducing the impact from those who normally spend their lives posting on Fox News as ‘Anon’. Furthermore, in order to prevent the occasional personality clash from having a disproportionate effect on the Overall grade, several good evaluations will outweigh one bad one.

Of course, you should know that –  after all, it’s simple math, and you are the teacher! 

STUDENTS: For you guys, the main change is that all posts will now be verified by human administrators. Most of them can spot a ‘!’ pretending to be an ‘I’, and are experienced in the use of the ‘*’. Having said that, as long as the post isn’t abusive, hey, be creative.

And don’t feel left out, either. You too can flag a post as suspicious if you believe it may have come from the teacher. One example might be an evaluation that described a purely hypothetical Prof. G.W. Bush as an “intelligent, well-spoken, handsome lover of peace”. Unless we receive an affidavit, proving this dude is an 83-year-old, African-American from Boston, that post is likely to be removed! On the flip side, you can reduce the risk of this happening to one of your own posts by registering with a school email and becoming one of our Verified students. Basically, as we know you are an actual student, your opinions will carry a lot more weight. While you’re at it, why not upload to the new Notes/Syllabus module? Your generosity will help interested students to better understand the course they’re applying for, and people can use the notes to supplement their studies. 

Finally, both professors and students can now respond to evaluations, or leave comments rating the quality of the post. Alternatively, those in a hurry can rate the evaluation with a simple click on the new ‘Funny’ button. Couple this with a more user-friendly evaluation form and the result is a better experience all around.

We have redesigned this ProfessorPerformance website from the ground up, and these are just a few of many improvements. Don’t take our word for it, though, just jump in and start digging. If you have time, ask Ross a question and we guarantee to make you laugh with a response. If we have done our job properly, we will have succeeded where the banking industry spectacularly failed – you might just get more out than you put in!