The faculty at Louisiana Tech has distinguished itself in the eyes of its most important and valued constituents: its students. RateMyProfessors.com, a student-generated Web site that rates college and university professors, ranks Tech at No. 2 in its 2008 Top University Faculty List.

Louisiana Tech is one of only two institutions in the state to be ranked in the top 10. Southeastern Louisiana University, ranked No. 4, was the other. The University of South Alabama received the list’s highest ranking.

“Louisiana Tech has long enjoyed an outstanding teaching reputation,” says Dr. Kenneth Rea, vice president for academic affairs at Tech. “Quality teaching is critical to the academic success of students, and the university is committed to promoting teaching excellence. That reputation is certainly borne out by the students who expressed their opinions on RateMyProfessors.com.”

RateMyProfessors.com uses a five-point Likert scale as well as a binary scoring system for students to rate professors. Selecting only schools with a minimum of at least 30 rated professors, the Web site computed the average professor rating for each school (only professors with 30 ratings or higher). Schools were then ranked from high to low according to their average rating.

“It’s important for us to shine a light on professors around the country who are doing great work at every institutional level,” said Carlo DiMarco, vice president of university relations for mtvU, which owns and operates RateMyProfessors.com. “These rankings mirror the voices of students sitting in classes and listening to professors’ lectures.”

Other institutions to make the top 10 include the University of Houston, Kennesaw State University, Florida International University, Brigham Young University, Northern Kentucky University, Stony Brook University (SUNY) and Virginia Commonwealth University.

“Tech’s professors and teachers make lifelong impressions on their students,” says Pamela Ford, dean of enrollment management for Tech. “If I were just beginning my college search, I would certainly feel confident about choosing a school whose very own students rate their teachers as high as the students did at Louisiana Tech University.”

RateMyProfessors.com is the Internet’s largest listing of collegiate professor ratings, with more than 8 million student-generated ratings of over 1 million professors at more than 6,500 schools across the United States, Canada and Great Britain.

Visit RateMyProfessors.com at http://www.ratemyprofessors.com for a complete list of the rankings.

Written by Dave Guerin