Professors Who Suck
- Thread starter ISUCubswin
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My stats professor was terrible. Since it was a department-wide requirement, Stats was tough to get into, but at least (we thought) the requirements were the same no matter who was teaching. Prof was having none of that - he was writing his own stats book and decided he was going to teach from that. Of course he didn't tell us that until it was too late to return books for the semester.
He did a lot of other crappy things to us too, like give us quiz grades of "Good", "OK", and "No" and not really having a conversion system from those grades to actual letter grades. After much wailing and gnashing of teeth, the department laid down the law to him. So our entire grade was the final exam, which was the department final, which was nothing we had studied.
Barf.
He did a lot of other crappy things to us too, like give us quiz grades of "Good", "OK", and "No" and not really having a conversion system from those grades to actual letter grades. After much wailing and gnashing of teeth, the department laid down the law to him. So our entire grade was the final exam, which was the department final, which was nothing we had studied.
Barf.
The worst person I dealt with was my adviser. I had to report them to the chair of the department multiple times. I didn't know if I was graduating until dead week of my final semester because I guess it takes ~3 years to see if certain credits transfer over from a previous school. I had to track down a syllabus from a professor that didn't even teach full time at my prior school, over 3 years removed from the class because my adviser lost it.
I couldn't even take interviews or anything because I didn't want to back out after the fact if I still had to take more classes.
I couldn't even take interviews or anything because I didn't want to back out after the fact if I still had to take more classes.
Anyone have Julie Summers? Mostly everyone didn't like her and I didn't think she was a very nice person but I learned a lot in her class
I had an overall good experience with professors. Two things pop into my head:
As mentioned before, I wasn't a big fan of McEllroy for the management class. Grading wise, he took that class way too serious for general business course. I think I remember one of our tests the class average being like 67% (this was a massive class, probably 300 people).
For English 150, or whatever the required english class was, I was given a D on a paper I wrote about Ronald Reagan's Brandenburg Gate speech. I had literally never had lower than a B on any sort of English paper in my life. To me the grading was clearly politically motivated. I thought about going to the department head, but ended up just forgetting it.
As mentioned before, I wasn't a big fan of McEllroy for the management class. Grading wise, he took that class way too serious for general business course. I think I remember one of our tests the class average being like 67% (this was a massive class, probably 300 people).
For English 150, or whatever the required english class was, I was given a D on a paper I wrote about Ronald Reagan's Brandenburg Gate speech. I had literally never had lower than a B on any sort of English paper in my life. To me the grading was clearly politically motivated. I thought about going to the department head, but ended up just forgetting it.
I had pretty good luck, but did run into a dooshy architecture TA. I wasn't an architecture major, but decided for some dumb reason to take a fairly challenging arch class. After a test or quiz or something, I did really poorly but thought my answers were correct. I scheduled some time with the TA to talk about the exam. We went through every answer, and he really couldn't tell me how to make my answers better, but threw me a bone by giving me an extra point or two here and there. But yet, couldn't tell me what I was missing. Still angers me to this day. It's why I hate architects. Sorry CF architects. He was super dooshy. Black turtleneck and everything. Pretty sure he hated me because I wasn't an arch major.
L
LincolnWay187
Guest
You beat me to the punch on this guy. I had Econ 101 and I feel he made it harder than a 101 class should have been. Much easier with other professors. I also saw him walking around friley with a young girl when I lived there...daughter or someone earning that a perhaps?Let's play "Name That Crappy Professor"
Son had an Aerospace prof with a brain tumor. I don’t think he was bad other than not remembering names and that you were even in his class.
I hated McElroy until i met with him a few times individually, and he was a lot more personable than would have ever expected - but certainly did give off that vibe to a lecture hall.
The only one i actually despised in school was Jon Perkins in accounting - seemed to make it a goal to make sure people would fail.
Don't forget about Cabbage Patch Dolls and data backups on VHS tapes!
I also had him for macro-economics in the mid-90s, where your comment was my main take-away from him. His lecture hall attendance and assigned seating was the strangest thing I experienced for a lecture.
Maybe not a bad one for me, since it's actually funny now. In the mid 90s, I had a professor for Thermodynamics. He was a hard-ass, however I learned a lot from him. He had rules like no food/gum/drinks in class and no wearing hats, since he wanted it professional. He also wanted homework done on the day it was assigned, so if one struggled, they'd know what to ask him in class.
One day he was in a mood and started asking a few people questions on material. He'd often ask questions to people in class, however seemed to focus on a few who were probably "not up to speed" as the others. On this day he focused on them and got no answers. Frustrated, he asked for people to turn in the homework problem assigned that day and the previous class day, where in a class of 25-30, one person submitted one of the two homework problems. The look on his face was priceless and he stated, "If you're not going to do the work, neither am I." He collected his things and walked out at that point, probably ten minutes into class. The rest of us waited there for a few minutes, then left at that point, too.
One day he was in a mood and started asking a few people questions on material. He'd often ask questions to people in class, however seemed to focus on a few who were probably "not up to speed" as the others. On this day he focused on them and got no answers. Frustrated, he asked for people to turn in the homework problem assigned that day and the previous class day, where in a class of 25-30, one person submitted one of the two homework problems. The look on his face was priceless and he stated, "If you're not going to do the work, neither am I." He collected his things and walked out at that point, probably ten minutes into class. The rest of us waited there for a few minutes, then left at that point, too.
My worst was my adviser. Knew him really well as I had him for classes all 4 years, including an 8 person class in my final spring semester. I had my required internship during the summer after my senior year, about which spoke to him many times during that spring. Once we hit summer, I would send him my required bi-weekly updates, but never got any responses from him. It wasn't until the end of the summer when I reached out to another person in the department that I found out he decided to retire at the beginning of the summer.
I was set to graduate in 4.5 years. I took his mgmt 370 (I think) course during my last semester. I passed every class and was set to graduate, I ended up getting a C- in his class and needed a C to pass. I went to talk to him to see if there was anything I could do to bump it up. He said no. So I couldn’t graduate.
He also said before the final on the short answer questions if he thinks you are just BSing your answer he will give you negative points, so just leave it blank if you didn’t know the answer.
In the end it actually wasn’t too bad. Taking 3 credits in a class I already took and working a few hours/week was a great way to end my college career. Got an A the second time in the class and did my fair share of having fun.
My Calc 1 prof (2001) said he thought it was stupid that the semester started before Labor Day. So we basically screwed off the first week. Halfway through week 2 the dude has a heart attack. Luckily he's okay but out for 2 months.
Math Dept sends in whatever TA or prof has a free morning, which is different every week. Each one was surprised how behind we were, week after week.
Dude come back after Thanksgiving, and basically "re-teaches" us Calc 1 in the remaining weeks. Was a intense time, but ended up learning a fair amount. Calc 2 and Diff EQ were fairly easy thanks to him.
Math Dept sends in whatever TA or prof has a free morning, which is different every week. Each one was surprised how behind we were, week after week.
Dude come back after Thanksgiving, and basically "re-teaches" us Calc 1 in the remaining weeks. Was a intense time, but ended up learning a fair amount. Calc 2 and Diff EQ were fairly easy thanks to him.
I knew you were old, but damn.
My crappy professor story isn't really about the professor but how hard he made his class. It was a history class too.
He only gave two tests, the midterm and the final and that's all you had to get a grade from. Midterm counted one-third, final counted two-thirds so if you blew one, you were screwed.
His tests were interminably long. The tests themselves were probably at least 30-plus pages long. The final had 142 questions and was longer. His questions were just as long. Whole paragraphs with multiple sentences. Some of the multiple choice possible answers were just as long, a couple of sentences at least. So it took a long time to take the test.
In the final, which was allotted 2 1/2 hours to complete, I finished up with 10 minutes to spare and went back through some of the questions I was uncertain about, before handing in my test. As I was walking out the door, I heard the prof say, "time's up." At that point, I was the only one who had turned in a test. This was in a class of about 80 people.
He had three text books. One was a series of essays by right-leaning authors and one was a series of essays by left-leaning authors. These essays were all about one particular point in history told from the two different philosophies. We had to remember the historic context, the names of the two authors who expounded on that point in history and what point each made. And repeat that about 30 times because that's how many history points were discussed in these two texts, all by different authors. Then he had a regular history text too.
I was told by a guy in my house that he had taken this same course the year before and only got a C in it. He was a pre-med guy and thought he was really smart and couldn't believe he got a C. He was really bitter about it because it didn't do his GPA any favors. I think he needed to maintain a 3.5 to get into med school. He told me he learned after the fact that that particular professor hadn't given out an A in 5 years. That's what he said, but he may have just been making up excuses for getting a C.
Well, I got a B on my midterm and aced the final (I had the second highest score in the class, but I only got 110 questions out of 142 right) and got an A for a final grade. I told the pre-med guy my final grade and he didn't believe me. I didn't have my report card to show him yet. And since it was the end of the school year, I couldn't show it to him until next year. So next year rolls around and I show the guy the report card and he still doesn't believe me. He says I must have had a different professor. I tell him the professor's name and he just walks away mad.
He only gave two tests, the midterm and the final and that's all you had to get a grade from. Midterm counted one-third, final counted two-thirds so if you blew one, you were screwed.
His tests were interminably long. The tests themselves were probably at least 30-plus pages long. The final had 142 questions and was longer. His questions were just as long. Whole paragraphs with multiple sentences. Some of the multiple choice possible answers were just as long, a couple of sentences at least. So it took a long time to take the test.
In the final, which was allotted 2 1/2 hours to complete, I finished up with 10 minutes to spare and went back through some of the questions I was uncertain about, before handing in my test. As I was walking out the door, I heard the prof say, "time's up." At that point, I was the only one who had turned in a test. This was in a class of about 80 people.
He had three text books. One was a series of essays by right-leaning authors and one was a series of essays by left-leaning authors. These essays were all about one particular point in history told from the two different philosophies. We had to remember the historic context, the names of the two authors who expounded on that point in history and what point each made. And repeat that about 30 times because that's how many history points were discussed in these two texts, all by different authors. Then he had a regular history text too.
I was told by a guy in my house that he had taken this same course the year before and only got a C in it. He was a pre-med guy and thought he was really smart and couldn't believe he got a C. He was really bitter about it because it didn't do his GPA any favors. I think he needed to maintain a 3.5 to get into med school. He told me he learned after the fact that that particular professor hadn't given out an A in 5 years. That's what he said, but he may have just been making up excuses for getting a C.
Well, I got a B on my midterm and aced the final (I had the second highest score in the class, but I only got 110 questions out of 142 right) and got an A for a final grade. I told the pre-med guy my final grade and he didn't believe me. I didn't have my report card to show him yet. And since it was the end of the school year, I couldn't show it to him until next year. So next year rolls around and I show the guy the report card and he still doesn't believe me. He says I must have had a different professor. I tell him the professor's name and he just walks away mad.
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I had a prof in grad school in a class of about 8 people. During dead week, he said he could give us a final if we wanted one (though he hadn't written it yet) or we could all go out for breakfast and he would pay. In the moment, it was amazing because I had 3 other finals to worry about. Now, I think "wow, I paid $1000 for that."
