Spring Session 2006 report:
CSCI213: Java Programming and Object Oriented Design
Associate Professor Neil Gray - bad
Others said he is awesome but my experience with him is the otherwise.
This dude is so up himself. His lecturing speed is ridiculously fast, and doesn't really explain much, covers too much in one subject. What really makes him bad is that I emailed 3 times on questions of assignment 2 - no reply. The next day I went to the lecture he said 'A student emailed me about the assignment, but I didn't bother to reply, the questions are too easy'. Those easy questions took me 12 hours and still couldn't solve it. Nevertheless I dropped the subject the week after.
CSCI213 is good if you knew how to program in Java already. Neil Gray has a serious attitude problem.
CSCI205: Development Methods and Tools
Aneesh Krishna - bad
OK a confession here: I didn't even go to one of his lecture. More details below.
However, as a subject coordinator, I had trouble with the group project therefore I went to him.
I worked in a group of 4. Throughout the project 2 other group members were very uncooperative. One of them went back to China 2 weeks prior the project was due because of family emergency. I said to him that's fine just do the work while you are over China, he could still use pen and paper right? He came back on the 2 days just before the project was due: nada and get this, he did nothing before he left, so it was a big zero from him.
Then the other guy went on hiking as a guide during stuvac for 10 days, again before he left, he did nothing. He came back 3 days before it was due.
As for the 3rd member, he was only slightly better than the other 2, I did the majority of the work.
I told Aneesh everything about the group and he assured me when they marked the assignment, our marks will reflect upon our contribution. When I got the assignment back, our marks were the SAME. I put down our workloads: 40%, 20%, 15%, 15%. Aneesh's reason: There is no evidence to support they did less work than me. What a load of shit! From this point onwards, I lost all my respect to SITACS staff. Shit department filled with shit staff.
Oh not to mention the useless exam revision lectures. What was in the revision notes was completely different to what was in the exam. Moron.
Aniruddha Dasgupta - bad
I had this guy in CSCI205 for the first 8 weeks. At the beginning 30 people went to his lecture. By the time I stopped going, only 15 left. All he did was just read straight off from the notes. The mid term was a joke, 25 multiple choice questions, the worst questions I've seen, they weren't hard, its just the wordings were bad. Negative marking applied initially, but at the end, Aneesh got rid of it, average was 10/20. In week 8, only 5 people went to his Thursday afternoon lecture (80 people were enrolled in the subject)
I also had him in CSCI222, same crap, I stopped going to the lectures in week 4.
CSCI222: Systems Developments
John Fulcher - bad
Again I didn't go any of his lecture. HOWEVER this subject was taught by 2 people. Our group had some questions on the lecture notes (Anirudda's part). Since Anirudda wasn't available that day, we went to Fulcher. His answer was: Oh that's not part of my course, I don't know anything about it, don't ask me, ask Anirudda." Mind you he is Professor and the subject coordinator.
Also what's with the announcements are made during lectures only but not on WebCT? Assignment 3 demonstration wasn't mentioned in the spec at all. But Fulcher decided it was on the week after in the lab. Even the tutor didn't know about it.
STAT131: Exploring variation and uncertainty in Data
Chandra Gulati - good
Like Jerome said his lectures were crap, very very boring, hopeless.
BUT he was excellent in replying emails. He answered all my questions and made sure I actually understood it. He pointed out where to look in the lab manual and sometimes even provided the answers! He really wants everyone to do well, the best lecturer I've met this year!
I agree with the quality of the tutor. I had Raed and his accent was difficult to understand and not helpful. Once we had Loai, he was worse. He talked in a very soft voice and the accent was also difficult to understand, not sure about Clive.
For the record I got 67 in CSCI205; 83 in CSCI222 and 80 in STAT131.