A case in points: Olivier Ratle¡¯s friends posted rave reviews to test website¡¯s rigour

The man behind the website, which encourages UK university students to publicly praise or censure their teachers, has defended the project against a glut of criticism from academics.

Michael Bulman, founder of the site, said he believed it would ¡°help to redress the balance¡± between teaching and research in the UK sector, adding that too many institutions held the latter in higher regard than the former ¨C to the detriment of student customers.

¡°When I was at uni, people were comparing and contrasting their courses and lecturers, and saying how some were better than others,¡± said Mr?Bulman, who graduated with a BA in history from Northumbria University last year.

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¡°I also spent a year in the US, where they already have the Rate My Professors site, and the idea came from there. I just thought I could do it better.¡±

His site ranks UK universities and lecturers on the basis of feedback from users, who give scores out of 10. It also contains a section where students can list teachers¡¯ pros and cons.

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One of those leading the protests against the site is Bill Cooke, head of the department of organisation, work and technology at Lancaster University Management School. on the issue ¨C declaring that lecturers are human beings, ¡°not dancing bears¡± ¨C has been accessed around 8,000 times.

¡°For people¡­early in their lecturing career, to be subject to that very public scrutiny is challenging and threatening,¡± he told Times Higher Education. ¡°There is anger and anxiety¡­about the debt people are incurring as students and what will happen to them afterwards. Coming out and saying which lecturers are good or bad is an expression of that.¡±

He also claimed that because the site was not registered as a data controller with the Information Commissioner¡¯s Office ¨C a requirement for firms that hold personal data ¨C it was in breach of data-protection rules. Mr Bulman said his company, Sterling Ideas, had not yet registered, attributing this to ¡°inexperience¡±, but added that he expected the oversight to be rectified shortly.

The University and College Union warned that seemingly innocent internet ¡°gossip¡± could lead to ¡°online and offline bullying¡±.

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¡°There is no way of determining if the individual posting comments has a real concern about the standard of their course, the university or the teaching, or just fancy lashing out after getting a poor mark,¡± said Michael MacNeil, head of higher education at the UCU.

Mr?Bulman said that although it was possible that ¡°one idiot will say something stupid¡±, comments were reviewed all the time and were ¡°usually¡­useful and well thought out¡±.

However, Olivier Ratle, senior lecturer in organisation studies at the University of the West of England, has already revealed potential flaws in the site.

¡°I thought, just for fun, let¡¯s see how rigorous the system is,¡± he said. ¡°My friends managed to register using different email addresses and fake names, and were successful in rating me very positively.¡±

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Dr Ratle was at the time of writing rated the fourth-best lecturer on the site thanks to his friends.

¡°He¡¯s just too handsome, can¡¯t really concentrate on what he¡¯s saying,¡± reads one of the comments.

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chris.parr@tsleducation.com