Here at My Colleges and Careers, we don’t pretend to be above silly rankings like Rate My Professor’s Top 50 Hottest Professors list. We embrace and accept people who embrace and accept entertaining things. While a professor’s ability to teach and inspire will always be 
the the bread and butter that our educational system survives on, sometimes a little dessert is ok.
We now present to you (with a cherry on top) an up close and personal interview with one of the country’s hottest educators: Professor Dacia Charlesworth, Associate Professor in the Department of Communications at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne.
My Colleges and Careers: What was your initial reaction upon learning you were ranked as one of the nation’s “Hottest Professors?”
Professor Charlesworth: I laughed. I joke that since I was 1st runner-up for homecoming queen this title has replaced all the feeling of inadequacy I once had. Seriously though, I support RMP and encourage my students to leave their comments. Some faculty don’t like RMP and feel that since there’s no way to actually verify if students have completed one of your classes the site is invalid. I note that there are measures faculty can take if they think a comment is unfair or submitted by someone who clearly wasn’t a student (e.g., one of my friends flagged a rude comment by a student who’d written that he’d taken her for a class the university didn’t even offer; RMP removed the comment). RMP is one way for students to learn about professor’s teaching styles; I always ask my students to be very clear about rating and referencing my expectations and grading standards since I’m very rigorous and want potential students to know what to expect in my classes.
My Colleges and Careers: Do you think this sort of category is frivolous and silly or fun and interesting?
Professor Charlesworth: It’s both. I do know some students who’ve told me they marked certain professors as “hot” as a joke. As a communication scholar, I know that an individual’s ethos, or credibility, is dependent upon one’s attractiveness, dynamism, and trustworthiness. Thus, the measure of “hotness” could mean different things to different students (e.g., students might consider one’s personality “hot”). As a feminist rhetorical critic, I’ve analyzed the site, focusing specifically on the “hotness” factor, and have been surprised to find that both men and women are discussed equally in terms of hotness. I thought I’d discover that the female professors who were ranked as being hot would have comments that focused only on their physicality rather than their intellect. Of course, I haven’t conducted an official analysis of the site-just a quick once over.
My Colleges and Careers: Has anyone ever told you that you resemble a celebrity? If so, who?
Professor Charlesworth: I’m usually told that I look like Rachel Ray or Rachel McAdams. I used to love Ray; however, she’s overexposed and her voice annoys the heck out of me now. I’m a huge McAdams fan and whenever The Notebook or The Wedding Crashers air on TV I know that within the next few days someone is likely to tell me I remind them of McAdams.
My Colleges and Careers: What do you love about being a professor?
Professor Charlesworth: I know it’s cliche, but I love the students. I’ve always been extremely lucky in that I’ve been able to find students who rise to my expectations and amaze me. I also love being able to teach students to see things they wouldn’t have been before. As I’ve noted, I’m a feminist rhetorical critic and my research involves examining the roles of everyday life. When I teach a course like Persuasion or Communication & Gender I’m very satisfied when students tell me: “You’ve ruined my life! I can’t watch TV, go to the movies, or read a magazine without analyzing everything I see!”
My Colleges and Careers: Are you going to leverage this title for a salary increase?
Professor Charlesworth: I’d thought about that but now my husband is my boss’s boss’s boss, so that would just be considered nepotism!
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