More exposure to subject reviews

[Oilerian]

The current subject reviews thread is superb I say. I just hope that more students are aware of it. I don't know if it's possible to publish it in one dedicated website but currently it seems that only those who are active enough in forum or internet know this kind of review exist. Imagine the far reaching impact of it if it can reach wider audience, both students and staff alike.

Currently as it stands, you have to know the forum first but many may not necessarily know this kind of media is there. (Would be good also to have one backup in case something goes wrong.)

Any thoughts?

[keltingmeith]

I dunno - I have friends who don't even know what an ATAR is, or that AN has a forum, and yet know about the reviews.

[simpak]

Definitely a bad idea, from PERSONAL EXPERIENCE.

[Chazef]

I don't think many subject reviewers want to be held accountable for what they say when they're given the opportunity to anonymously give feedback to the unit coordinator. Like I don't want anybody in the IT faculty to know if I give one of their units a bad score and kinda humiliate them to some extent; it's more for students to have a heads up for what they're entering into by taking a unit

this assumes that currently they're not looking at reviews here and that higher publicity would make them look at the reviews

[Oilerian]

I don't think many subject reviewers want to be held accountable for what they say when they're given the opportunity to anonymously give feedback to the unit coordinator. Like I don't want anybody in the IT faculty to know if I give one of their units a bad score and kinda humiliate them to some extent; it's more for students to have a heads up for what they're entering into by taking a unit

this assumes that currently they're not looking at reviews here and that higher publicity would make them look at the reviews

I have no doubt in the subject of anonymity, that is they should be as anonymous as possible. Anything less is out of question. They shouldn't be held accountable as well in any form at all. (Assuming the reviews are within reason of course i.e no insult, personal attack etc) 

But knowing that the review is already visible to even unregistered members (first result in Google) I don't see the harm of promoting it further e.g in uni publication or magazine. Might as well improve the quality of the subjects in the long run if they know that there exist open anonymous review.

[Chazef]

anonymity is hard because if you want to give a thorough review it may require you to give away details that allow the uni staff to identify you for example I think saying the score you received is important because if a person gets a 95 HD and gives the unit a 1/5 then obviously they're not biased by finding the content too hard and actually have issues with how the unit is run. But then that person may have been the only student to get a 95 HD meaning the uni knows who they are and that's not good for them. If people feel that their review is going to be majorly public they're less likely to give one or maybe they'll give one and leave out those details which I think are important. This might be offset by the increased number of students who discover the thread due to higher publicity but I still feel that too much publicity is going to erode the whole thing

[cameronp]

I think the subject reviews are an invaluable resource. I'm not sure they need to be moved anywhere and they already have a fair amount of Google-juice, but I'm sure there are plenty of places it would be worth mentioning or linking to the reviews here. A mention in a Student Union magazine might also encourage a bit more diversity in the subjects being reviewed, which are pretty heavily weighted towards to science and engineering at the moment.

Anonymity on forums is another kettle of worms entirely. If you don't put a lot of effort into hiding your identity, sooner or later people will be able to figure out who you are. Especially if you're reviewing 3rd year or postgraduate subjects and posting the percentages you got in your subjects. I've got a pretty identifying username, but even if I didn't, postgrad maths students are a pretty small cohort and even the list of subjects I've reviewed would be enough to uniquely identify me. Is that enough to have a chilling effect on what I write? I don't know, because I haven't taken a subject that deserves a really scathing review yet, and obviously I wouldn't write anything abusive.

I haven't heard the simpak saga, though...

[simpak]

I PM'd Oilerian directly and I can c/p what I sent him if you wanna hear it haha.
It's basically what your post and the one above alluded to though.

[alondouek]

All the reasons mentioned above are extremely good ones not to do anything differently as is done now (and those who recall what happened to simpak will further understand why).

Also, it's hard enough to index the ~20-40ish reviews that get made after each batch of exams, so I'm pretty happy with the amount of exposure these threads get at the moment haha. Would be nice to see some from unis other than UoM and Monash though; the La Trobe/Deakin/RMIT etc. ones are quite sparse (though this is likely more a demographics issue than anything else).

Keep up the good work everyone!

[Renaissance]

From my experience, most of the reviews were very accurate, at least for the subjects I did.
I think having more reviews would be awesome. If the reviews can be taken more seriously by the university, that would be great.

Regarding anonymity, I don't think anyone has to be anonymous if they are saying the truth. If the university is doing a bad job, then it is their problem.

[Russ]

Regarding anonymity, I don't think anyone has to be anonymous if they are saying the truth. If the university is doing a bad job, then it is their problem.

There's a difference between telling the truth and being obnoxious. I've messaged people in the past telling them to refine their post. You're free to give negative criticism but not to be outright rude or personally offensive.