Students will have a new tool to assist with academic planning when they sign up for classes next fall.

A Web site created by a computer engineering student, with the help of the Government of the Student Body, will allow students to rate and review ISU professors and their teaching methods.

The original evaluation page was developed about one year ago by Greg Hogan, sophomore in computer engineering. Hogan said he designed the site to educate students about the different teaching techniques of professors at Iowa State and to allow students to make informed decisions when they sign up for classes.

T.J. Schneider, GSB Director of Academic Affairs, and Hogan have worked together to revamp the current teacher evaluation system this year and to provide students with more information for their academic planning.

“The main objective is to match students up with teachers who work best with their individual learning style,” Hogan said.

The site allows students to rate professors on a five-star system in areas such as work-load, accessibility, communication and teaching styles. It also provides an overall rating of the professors and the number of students who have evaluated them.

Hogan said there are currently 1,051 ratings compiled that are available to students on the evaluation site.

Schneider said the current Web site will be used as an interim system until a new university-wide teaching evaluation system is available in roughly a week. The evaluation site will eventually get a new address that is easier to remember and will be linked to the GSB Web site.

The new teaching evaluation was taken with students’ interests in mind, he said.

“This system is for student use, to see other students’ ratings,” Schneider said. “This way, students can rate teachers, review them and see their results.”

Under the current system, students are able to complete teacher evaluation forms at the end of the semester, but never see any feedback from them, Schneider said.

“Students have the right to have that information accessible to them,” he said.

Hogan said there will be certain precautions within the evaluation system to prevent a student with ill will from evaluating a professor more than once.

Schneider and Hogan hope students will use the evaluation site responsibly for academic planning and provide feedback to make it more beneficial in the future.

“The more people that use the site, the more useful it will become,” Hogan said. “The database of information will keep getting bigger and bigger.”