Alison Pechenick - University of Vermont

Professor: Alison Pechenick

Department: Computer Science

College: University of Vermont

Rating # 1

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Took her CS class as it was mandatory for all engineers. I have never felt more lost, she is extremely nice but does a god awful job at teaching the subject. Her homework assignments seem to be built more as puzzles(that she demands you solve her way) then actual implementations of skill you will end up looking up most code you need to write.

Rating # 2

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: B
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Pechenick is one of the worst teachers I've ever had. Lectures consist of everybody figuring out how the people who know matlab answered each iClicker question while trying as hard as you can to stay awake. She is so bad at explaining anything. HW is hard if you procrastinate on it, but tests aren't too bad. Overall I learned little about matlab

Rating # 3

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: A
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: Yes
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Class time was pretty useless. We spent most hour +fifteen minute classes doing clicker quizzes that could easily only take 20 minutes. Most of the work I had to do for the class were the terribly ambiguous homework assignments. Show up to class and be anal about submitting each hw and get at least a B in the class.

Rating # 4

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

I took Computer Science 020-programming for engineers, meaning all students are engineering majors, and it was incredibly unenjoyable because of the lack of actual teaching and explanation. you are suppose to learn thru graded clicker quizzes and the TA office hours r the only way to get a good score on the homeworks. very smart, cant teach.

Rating # 5

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: B+
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

One of the worst professors I have ever had. She does not teach the material, and is not available for help. Instead, she bases her lectures on taking quizes which do not help with learning at all. Her homework consist of spending hours upon hours at help sessions, which are not as efficient as they could be. Overall rude and unhelpful professor.

Rating # 6

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: C
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

She does not teach her students directly through her lectures. She makes you learn material through the exhausting homework and the impossible quizzes first. After you sufficiently failed the weekly quizzes and homework she (or more likely her TA's) are more than happy to teach you the material.

Rating # 7

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: B
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

this is an intro class for computer programming for engineers, and as a freshmen who has little to no programming background, i find it very difficult to do well in this class. Not only do we only use our laptops once a week in class, but we are suppose to learn through pop quizzes that count towards our grade. She never actually teaches.

Rating # 8

Overview:

• Course: CS121
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: Yes
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

So I tried taking CS121 with professor Pechenick last year, and I ended up withdrawing. I must say that this semester things have been much better and more manageable. She gives you everything you need to know for exams and the homework assigned is reasonable. You can tell she has a passion for what she does and wants everyone to succeed.

Rating # 9

Overview:

• Course: CS121
• Grade Received: Not sure yet
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Professor Pechenick means well, and she's so nice and pleasant. I think she tries hard to teach, and she cares about her students, but she is just not able to convey information. We never know quite what we should be learning at any given moment, the lectures are unclear, and the textbook is horribly written and confusing as well.

Rating # 10

Overview:

• Course: CS121
• Grade Received: Not sure yet
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: No
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Doesnt know what she is teaching. Beware of her tests and quizzes since she gonna have some stuff that she did not even teach. Homeworks graded by Ta and she wanted you to go to Ta if you dont know why you got your stuff wrong. Mainly learnt thing by myself and she is still testing on stuff that she does not even teach. Would avoid her possibly.

Rating # 11

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: A+
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: Yes
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Prof. Pechenick is an excellent professor. She's an engineer, not a computer scientist, so she knows how to make CS accessible to students who haven't taken any CS courses before. I'm surprised to see that a number of students felt left behind, because she really is one of my nicest, most helpful professors.

Rating # 12

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.5
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Mandatory

Comment:

Skipping class means you won't pass not because you learn in it, but because half of the time you exist in the presence of this dang room you're answering questions with your iClicker that are arbitrary to actually learning CS.

Rating # 13

Overview:

• Course: CS121
• Grade Received: B-
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Not Mandatory

Comment:

Incredibly disorganized and confusing. Loves matlab, even though not related to this course at all. Nice lady, just struggles to get the information across. Tests are difficult, but she adds curves to help. Will avoid taking her again if I can. Shes obviously passionate about the subject. Apparently helpful at office hours.

Rating # 14

Overview:

• Course: CS20
• Grade Received: B-
• Overall Rating: 2.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: Yes
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

Extremely nice, knows here stuff, horrible teacher. She seems like great person but the class is horribly unorganized, the lectures are utterly useless. She makes it easy to get a good grade but you constantly get random assignments dumped in your lap that you will have no idea how to do unless you have prior CS knowledge. Pain in the ass. Avoid.

Rating # 15

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: A+
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Not Mandatory

Comment:

Very willing to help, very committed to the "ideal-of-learning" style of teaching. I got a decent amount out of the class (MATLAB), though I get the impression that if I didn't know as much about programming as I did when I came in I wouldn't have had as good a time. Just put in the effort and you should be fine.

Rating # 16

Overview:

• Course: CS14
• Grade Received: A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: Not Mandatory

Comment:

it was awesome class much learning

Rating # 17

Overview:

• Course: CS020
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 5.0
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

I took her over the summer and she was awesome she goes through everything step by step so you understand whats actually happening and everything you learn in class is on the hw/tests. Def plan on taking her again if possible

Rating # 18

Overview:

• Course: CS20
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

VERY disorganized. I couldn't stand her all over the place teaching style. Definitely knows her stuff and means well but is very difficult to learn from. The course itself is not very difficult but she doesn't give her TAs the homework assignments so they can't really help either. Never seems to have plan for class or homeworks till shes there.

Rating # 19

Overview:

• Course: CS20
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: No
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

She starts out easy, if you go to class and pay attention you'll pretty much get A's on the home work assignments, too bad they're not worth much. Then they will get extremely hard. The online quizzes have questions that you'll never need to know, and her tests have questions on things she'll never teach you (or barely cover).

Rating # 20

Overview:

• Course: CS14
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

• For Credit: N/A
• Textbook Used: Yes
• Would Take Again: N/A
• Attendance: N/A

Comment:

It's great that she's so helpful because you will definitely need help if you take her course! I cannot tell you how often we went off topic or how many times we didn't even do anything related to the current lesson. Take this class only if you have strong learning skills because most likely you will be teaching yourself!