And these report cards are electronic and very public.

The ratings are posted on Web sites such as www.ratemyprofessors.com, www.myprofessorsucks.com and www.PickAProf.com. Ratemyprofessors, one of the easiest to navigate, includes ratings for about 33 Aiken and Augusta professors.

At ratemyprofessors.com, students anonymously grade instructors on easiness, helpfulness and clarity. For fun, they can include a rating for sexiness. These ratings are then posted online.

There is even a section for comments; some get downright dirty.

"He will destroy you like an academic ninja," one entry reads. "Emotional scarring may fade away, but that big fat F on your transcript won't," reads another.

At ratemyprofessors.com, students can grade teachers numerically 1.0 through 5.0, with 5.0 being the best score. An overall rating is the average of the helpfulness and clarity scores.

The Web site was founded in 1999 by John Swapceinski, who graduated that same year from San Jose State University.

"I got the idea for the site in December of 1998 after taking a class with a particularly dastardly professor who routinely left students in tears and genuinely seemed to enjoy it," he said.

Many local professors find it entertaining, but not very reliable.

Bob Botsch, a political science professor at the University of South Carolina Aiken, said that, out of curiosity, he looked up the site a couple of weeks ago and found he had the highest possible rating.

"At the time, I was rated by one student. So even though the rating was positive, it is meaningless given that incredibly small sample. Even if there were 40-50 ratings, it would mean nothing because it is a self-selected sample."

While it may not be the most scientific method, Mr. Swapceinski said the site still provides some valuable information for students registering for classes.

"The site is a listing of opinions, some of which are fair and some are probably unfair. However, as a teacher gets more and more ratings, the effect of the unfair comments tends to diminish and the truth starts to come out," he said.

The students should have something that is all their own, said Doug Joiner, a communications instructor at Augusta State University, admitting that it isn't very scientific.

Screenshot of ratemyprofessors.com ANDREW DAVIS TUCKER/STAFF

But it shouldn't be, the school already has scientific evaluations. This is something just for students, he said.

David Jaspers, senior instructor in the USC Aiken Department of Mathematical Sciences, said the site could potentially provide a legitimate service to students, but there is room for improvement.

"I think in concept it's a good idea. What I worry about is that it might be used to slander somebody - to rip somebody up unjustifiably," he said. (Mr. Jaspers received an overall rating of 4.2.)

Mr. Swapceinski has people who screen comments to prevent that from happening, although that doesn't appease everyone.

"If someone reads a comment that seems libelous or inappropriate, they can 'red flag' it, which sends it back to our screeners for further review," he said. "Sometimes we'll leave the comment alone and sometimes we'll delete it, depending on its content."

But there is no filter that screens personal, and less objective, comments.

"We've always had a rumor mill. And that rumor mill is subject to the same problems as these Web sites," said ASU psychology professor Steve Hobbs, who received a perfect 5.0. "Somebody could be mad at their husband or wife, and rate them ..."

ASU psychology professor Deborah Richardson, who received a 4.5 rating, said if the sites could monitor who is doing the ratings, it might be more useful.

"This is different than word of mouth. People take this to be meaningful because it's a number and its online. And they don't realize the limited validity. If I dislike a professor and I go to you and tell you 15 times, you know it's me telling you 15 times and it's just my point of view," she said.

"It could be useful as a supplement for required classes. It could be very useful information, it's just that these data are not reliable," Dr. Richardson said.

Students at most universities, including ASU and USC Aiken, fill out teacher evaluations at the end of each semester. They consist of two sections: a series of questions in which the student answers on a rating system and a series of open-ended questions where a student can offer comments.

After grading, the evaluations circulate to departments and the professors. The comment section is sent to the professors only.

M. Edward Pettit, associate dean of Arts and Sciences at Augusta State University, said that because the school receives federal funding, these evaluations technically are covered by the Freedom of Information Act, at least in part. But they are not made available to students on a regular basis.

"They are public records but they are typically part of a personnel file," Mr. Pettit said.

But even if they were available, the information is not very reader friendly. The final forms are pages of numbers from the rating scale. It would take a lot of time to decipher the information, Ms. Richardson said.

Now a full-time software engineer and designer, Mr. Swapceinski said he wished a faculty-rating site existed when he was in college.

"I definitely would have used it. In fact, that's why I decided to make my own site. I was looking for one to use but couldn't find one that already existed," he said.

www.ratemyprofessors.com. Here are a few others: