A new Facebook application called “CampusBuddy” now allows students to gain information about the classes they are taking, or are considering taking, including past semesters’ grade distributions.

“CampusBuddy” lets users view who have taken a class in the past and what percentage of past students achieved what grades.

In addition, students can also look at what the past students thought of each instructor, while connecting with other students in one’s particular area of interest. In sum, students have access to grades of classes and opinions of teachers from previous years.

Data for University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee are taken from the university’s open records, as is the case for all other schools and classes featured on the application. While data for many courses is available on CampusBuddy, it does not contain a complete listing of all courses the universities offer.

As great as it may seem to be able to have access to that information, students should keep in mind that they have no way of knowing who is writing the comments or how reliable their accounts are. Also, courses are often revamped from one school year to the next.

“Too many unaccounted variables exist,” said Michael Zimmer, a UWM assistant professor of Information Studies. “Has the course been redesigned? Has the instructor changed their grading procedures? Perhaps the quality of students has changed over time. Simply put, past grading behavior doesn’t predict future grading performance.”

“CampusBuddy” may encourage students to reach out and possibly meet with other people in similar classes. However, it becomes a problem when students depend on this as a source of which classes to take and which to avoid.

“I fear that students might rely too heavily on simply a chart of grading data to determine their curriculum,” Zimmer said. “A histogram of grades is not a good way to determine one’s academic future.”