sweet websites, man

I'm working on some lesson plans that look at graffiti, and I came across this site that features Palestinian graffiti photographed in Gaza. Pretty moving, I think.


I find ratemyprofessor.com a little disturbing. It just invites all kinds of mean-spiritedness. I've never actually consulted it before registering for classes, but when I heard about it, I perused it to check out some of the ratings of profs I've had. Actually, most of them got great ratings and positive comments. Most, but not all. I'm all for constructive criticism, but there's something decidedly not-constructive about a forum wherein those being critiqued have no space for feedback or defense. There's no dialogue, just one-sided attack, which might be okay in other venues like movie reviews, concert reviews, etc., but to me, that's just not what education should be about.

"Way too difficult for a #00 level class, for the tests you have to memorize over 150 terms and only 15 are actualy on there. the lectures are really difficult to take notes on and he focuses on history rather than the texts themselves, they aren't letting him teach ### anymore, thank god, but now [another prof] is and shes a giant snob"

"STOP TEACHING NOW PLEASE"

"My third class with [prof's name], I used to dislike her but now I get her.She NEVER hands anything back and you won't get a grade till you're final one, but if you participate alot and keep up on the reading you should be okay in the end or maybe not as the class smarties got B's.Shes really loopy and we have a theory that she comes to class ****"

This kind of thing just makes me sad. I didn't find any "this prof is so hot"-type comments, which would have been even more depressing, but I know they're there because there's also Professors Strike Back on which many (mostly female) profs say thanks-but-no-thanks to their moron "complimenters." Ugh. Profs Strike Back is hosted by MTV and is just about as unproductive as its student counterpart. (But admittedly, a little funnier.)





Finally, this to-do list blog is pretty sweet.