How to Choose Good Professors When Scheduling Your Classes

Making a good schedule can make or break your next semester. If you don't do your research, you could end up with horrible teachers and be miserable for the next three months.

Sometimes classes sound really fun and easy in their description, but a really hard or mean teacher can really screw up a subject you would otherwise love. Luckily, you have all sorts of resources at your disposal to be able to pick the professor that will make the class as painless as possible.

One of the most common websites is ratemyprofessors.com. Here, students go and rate professors from everything like easiness, helpfulness and even hotness. The great thing about this site is that in addition to number ratings, you can leave a comment and these can be very helpful in deciding whether or not to take a class. Raters often comment not only about the professor but will also give you tips on how to succeed in the class.

Another similar website is called pickaprof.com. This website requires registration but it's free and worth it. Here you can see a chart with the average grades of students registered for that professor's class from previous semesters. Usually good teachers have a lot of students who got A's and B's. Using both of these sites can be used together to determine your chances of succeeding as well as getting random tips like whether or not you should buy the book or go to class.

Another resource that people don't think about are teacher evaluations. Most colleges give out teacher evaluation forms at the end of every semester. The great thing about this is that you'll get more students evaluating the course than you would on sites like ratemyprofessors and pickaprof. These evaluations appear as current as the next semester on your schools website. You can see the average ratings students gave the professor in classes dating back to when the professor started teaching.

Another good idea is to check your potential professors' websites. Most professors have one and a lot of them have the syllabus for their course, which for most teachers tends to rarely change. This won't help you determine how hard the tests are but you can see what composes your grades. If you don't like presentations or pop quizzes, this can help you rule out some professors.

Using all these resources combined, you can make a good decision about what classes to schedule for the upcoming semester. If you know what to expect, you will be more prepared and will probably do better in the class.