Tag: classroom and curriculum

[41-51] Then what was after that? So then biomaterials, which is a pretty hard class. The teachers, he tries really hard. I do think that he’s a good professor, except the only problem is, he expects us to know a ridiculous amount of information basically. And I do put a lot of time and effort into the class, and it’s still really hard. And I mean, he also acknowledges that, and he also does notice the effort that you put in something that says that he’s going to factor that into your grade at the end, which is good. But either way, that exam itself, I studied a lot for it, and it was still really difficult. It was literally basically all open-ended, and then there’s a couple of graphs that we had to analyze basically. And he’s also strict on, he’s not really going to accept any type of BS answer, it’s got to be basically almost exactly correct to get credit. And I knew that going into it. And then, obviously it was a little bit difficult.

[171-177] Yeah. So, biomaterials, like I said, it’s pretty hard class. The teacher goes very hard. He does care a lot and he’s a good teacher but […] So, the way he sets up his class is, he calls it a flip lecture. In my opinion it’s not, because I took a flip lecture class earlier last spring, and the way that she did it is […] So, the idea is to watch lectures outside of class and then basically do the problems in class. And then, because your lecture was having an idea about the material, then you’re going to try and do it and then the teacher can actually help you apply it, which in theory, doesn’t sound like a bad idea.

[178-185] Except, it also means that I have to watch, 45-minute lectures out of class, on top of, still being in class. Not to mention the fact that the way that he does it is, you watch the lectures, and then he bases his lecture on the lectures that you had to watch. So, he literally had the same exact PowerPoint, he’ll take out some of the slides or change some of the data or delete some stuff, but it would literally be the same exact picture, same exact information. And he’ll just post it and he’ll just go through it in class and he will […] And he has a thing on his phone where he’ll randomly call on you and then ask you questions about the PowerPoints.

[186-194] So, what I don’t understand is how are we going to call it a flip lecture when literally it’s just him, wanting us to watch it, almost memorized it, but also, more so understand so that way you can answer his questions. Because they’re also not […] He’s also not just being like, “Okay, well, what does it say on slide two or what does it say right here?” He actually wants you to get a little bit in depth. But along with that, he also mix questions with his 45 minutes lecture, and I even take notes on it. I still can’t answer his question sometime, which is, very frustrating and it happens, literally to everyone. So, again, in the grand scheme of things, it’s fine, but it still is frustrating.

[246-255] So, occasionally, because you also have the option to raise your hand like a normal classroom, except, no one wants to volunteer. Because, if you volunteer, you’re basically forcing yourself to have this in-depth debate with him of which, he’s probably going to end up inevitably asking you a question that you won’t understand. So, therefore, it discourages a little bit. If I know 100% that I know the answer, someone else is struggling, maybe I’ll help them. But I also know that if I do that, he’s going to hit me with another question right after, and I don’t know what that question is going to be. So, but, yeah. It really doesn’t encourage I guess, group discussion to be honest. I mean, he obviously does get a lot of us individually because we have talked to him because he calls on us. But, yeah.

[608-627] I mean biomaterials obviously, like I said, it was all open ended. I didn’t feel overly confident going into it because I knew it was going really hard even though I did study. But then afterwards, yet with all the open ended, I wasn’t feeling […] I mean, to be honest I felt I did okay. I actually ended up doing worse than I thought, which is also why it made me dip a little bit lower. But, yeah. In terms of dealing with that, I don’t know. I mean, for me personally at least, it definitely was a low, but it also was more so a low for that type of day, I guess. Because I also don’t to try and dwell on things because, obviously it’s not beneficial. Especially one that I […] Okay. So, I took the exam, I don’t know what I actually got. Could I get a 100, sure there’s still a shot. Did I? No. But […] So, my point is, I definitely did get upset about it and I wasn’t happy. But I’m, be able to get over that type of stuff relatively quickly. And just move on. And, like I said, especially when I got the grade back, but even prior to that, I was like, “Okay, well … Like I said, he bases his grading more so on effort so I got to make sure that I put up this effort. I got to make sure I email him a bunch of times and stuff. So, he actually sees that I’m putting forth the effort because I am putting forth ever. I’m watching lectures and taking all these notes, but he’s not watching me, watch his lectures or looking at my notes that I’m taking, he’s just basically going off, if you email him, which he keeps stressing, he wants people to email him. However, I really just haven’t had that many questions or reasons to email him.

[291-302] I think that he does care. I do personally think that I like the way that he teaches. Because, I think that, basically he just throws an example. So, he’ll go in-depth explaining a little bit why do think that it’s needed? He uses examples that I think are applicable. For instance, for probability example, he uses Sixers players, 76ers players, which, I personally found interesting. I don’t know about everyone else in the class. And then he also specifically tries to, for most of the problems, because that Sixers don’t, he’ll mostly find a random one. For most part, he does it, like involving biomedical stuff. So, I don’t know.  Whether it’d be, devices, probably it’d be getting cancer, any little thing that involves it, he does try to throw it in there, which I also think is good. Because obviously that’s why it’s called biomedical statistics or whatever. But I think because, especially with statistics class, because there’s nothing super specific for biomedical.

[306-358] So, the biomedical devices and systems class is a mess. It’s his first […] So, the guy that’s teaching it, from what I’ve heard, he basically runs the ECE department, which is electrical engineering at my institution. And the ECE department is run really well. They have a hundred percent placement rating after graduating. Ridiculous. And he supposedly runs it. But now, he’s teaching this class for the first time, and I don’t know if he’s ever taught a class ever. And it just a whole ass mess because, for one, his homework policy is that, the homework’s not due until […] Well, he has a due date that, when you’re tentatively supposed to hand in, so you hand it in. So, it’s not due until he hands back people’s grades. He hasn’t handed back any homework the entire semester. I’ve only done the first two homework assignments. I think there’s been four or five because he hasn’t graded any of them yet. And I also heard that apparently one year, he literally just didn’t grade any whatsoever. Like at all. It was for a different class but […] And then, we tried to do a lab because we’re in an ECE lab setting where it has a bunch of, I don’t even know what the devices are called to be honest, but a bunch of, basically devices where … I know the one thing that we did was a wave simulator. So, we did Stein leaves and stuff. And, he basically tried to have this lab on one […] It was supposed to be a lab for one day, he just had to use it and then do this lab and his instructions were so bad. A lot of the devices were different, which he didn’t account for. He didn’t do a good job explaining the paper itself, the hand-out that he gave us wasn’t very clear. The only way that we were somehow able to get through it is because there were seniors in that class that were already ECEs. So, everything that we’re doing in the class was still pretty easy for them because they already had gone through it. Whereas also us as BMEs, we’re looking at this and like, “I really don’t know 100% what he’s talking about sometimes.” But, basically, they went around helping us with the lab. We still never even got real data from the lab. He mentioned I think once or twice about writing our lab report, there’s literally one line at the end of the document that said to write a lab report for it. Without that, no one has any data. Let’s see. He had an exam […] Oh, I forgot to include that exam because it was literally such a joke because it was a take home exam. And literally, everyone worked together on it basically. And it was a joke and also some even got a grade back on that. So, I was completely fried about that. That’s how much of a joke his class had been. Also, the school issued a mandated thing that, we’re supposed to hear from all our teachers by Wednesday, which was yesterday. Well, in terms of what they’re going to do for our class and stuff considering we are transitioning online. And I’ve also gotten emails from, I think all my other professors, besides him. Even before this, just at least saying something, he hasn’t emailed anything at all. So, I have no clue what this class is going to do. I have no clue what we’re doing now that this happened. And, this class, I really […] Yeah, I don’t know. I can’t really describe it much better than it’s an entire mess. And I think the whole idea like he tries to teach us during class. He’ll basically just go on rants about I think stuff that he finds interesting that is also probably semi relative to the curriculum. However, I still don’t even really know what the curriculum is supposed to be specifically for this. Because, he will go talk about, some systems and devices and he’ll also hand us out diagrams of complex ass circuitry stuff. And we’re like, “Yeah, well, we don’t know what the hell this is.” And he’s taught us some stuff, I know he’s talked about capacitors and types of filters and stuff along those lines, but for a majority of it, a lot of it goes over our head. And we try and ask them questions, but also, to be honest, I’m not even going to lie, the feeling that I get as a class is people are starting to give up on him, which obviously, it’s bad. And he’s also doesn’t seem like he’s putting that much effort in either. So, if no one is putting in effort and then nothing’s going to get done. And, in my opinion, that’s what I’ve seen happening. It’s pretty sad. I’m just being completely honest.

[363-385] So, he actually has this policy, but this is the one thing that I’ll give him credit for. He handed out a note cards and his idea is he wants you to have […] I don’t even know how it works, 100%, because I don’t personally do it and I don’t really know if anyone else utilize it at all. But, you write on the index part, I’m not sure we’re supposed to put it. But then you just ask him a question on the next card and in case you guys don’t want to ask him in class, basically. And then he’s going to address the next class, which I think is good idea. I think people utilize it maybe once or twice because he would say, “Okay, in this card I got asked, here’s the answer.” Because he would tell everyone, “Because obviously, if one person is thinking it, maybe multiple people are thinking it and the person just didn’t want to ask in class. Fine. I agree with that.” My point being no one utilizes it now. And some people ask questions in class and the number has just consistently dwindled and dwindled as the semester goes by. Not to mention the fact that, when you ask a question, he’ll try to explain it, but he also doesn’t necessarily explain in the best way. And I also think that, he isn’t acknowledging the lack of understanding in stuff that we’ve learned as biomedical engineers. Because obviously, there’s the senior who literally already know everything. But then, besides literally those four or five seniors, the rest of us are all junior biomedical engineering students. And I know everyone else in my class because I had all classes the last semester. So, I’m on the same boat as them because, the only other experience we really had in terms of circuitry and stuff, was our efounds, was our electrical foundation class the last semester, which, also wasn’t that good and did not prepare us very well at all. So, between that and then this guy also just not managing it well, it’s just been a very bad foundation.

[388-405] The guy for electrical foundations, he, I don’t know. Again, I’m going to say he wasn’t a good teacher. I mean, he’s helped with the ascent which I’m not going to fault him for, but it did make things a little bit harder. And then, not to mention the fact that, he would also basically just come in and just, write literally pretty big circuits on the board and then just go through the problems. Which again, I’m not going to say that that’s not the worst way to go do circuits basically it’s you just actually, go do them. But that’s basically all that he did for the most part. And also, we would literally spend a lot of time writing down the circuits and not be able to listen to them or not be able to follow what he’s doing. So, we’d be trailing behind him the whole time. And we told him this because he actually had a mid-semester evaluation. So, some guy came in, he left the room, he asks us these questions, whatever. We all spoke honestly, everyone ripped into him a little bit and then, he really didn’t change at all after that still, for the most part. He mentioned, I think, not even the class after that, but two class after that. He brought it up a little bit at the beginning of class, and then, he didn’t really change much of the structure though, which is a little frustrating.  But, yeah. That’s why I feel I don’t necessarily have as good of a basis in, I guess, circuitry as I could have.