The course guide may provide class descriptions, but when it comes to actually choosing classes most students turn to a far more trusted source.

Students use the CUE Guide to determine a class' difficulty or to get a preview of a professor's pizzazz, but the guide has another audience--Faculty members.

The CUE Guide ratings can encourage a professor to alter his teaching style or change the workload of her class, but the greatest implication of the CUE guide is its effect on the tenure and promotions of professors within the university, according to some Faculty members.

Winthrop Professor of History Stephan A. Thernstrom says he believes ratings for courses can affect professors who are worried about their future.

"In bureaucratic places, for people who don't have tenure, their grading is very much influenced," Thernstrom says. "If they don't have high enough ratings, they fear they are not going to get promoted."

Though Thernstrom did not attach his theories to Harvard's system, other professors are much more adamant about the CUE Guide's potential influence on tenure decisions.

The CUE Review

In academia, the presumption is that a good scholar is one who publishes often, not necessarily one who teaches well.