Jan Plaza - SUNY Plattsburgh

Professor: Jan Plaza

Department: Computer Science

College: SUNY Plattsburgh

Rating # 1

Overview:

• Course: CSC223
• Grade Received: A+
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

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

Comment:

Jan is both very friendly and a great professor who gets students to think on a much deeper level in Python and beyond. The lecture portion is very easy, and the lab portion can sometimes be difficult but manageable. The only negative Id say is that he can occasionally not understand questions you ask him, or misinterprets them.

Rating # 2

Overview:

• Course: CSC223
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

As long as you do the programming assignments you will do fine. There are about 6 programming assignments which aren't hard but require a lot of time to grind out. He allows you to bring notes and printouts of code to tests which means that if you wrote the programs the tests are really easy, but if you didn't you're going to fail.

Rating # 3

Overview:

• Course: CSC318
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

He is nice as a person but I don't like him as a teacher the way he taught our class was to either post slides or a video. We would then take notes on this and have an entrance quiz the next day before going over the material. I personally wish we went over the material and then had the quiz like most teachers.

Rating # 4

Overview:

• Course: CSC221
• Grade Received: C-
• Overall Rating: 1.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

He's horrible. Doesn't teach anything he just talks. So hard to keep up with him. Don't take him you won't do well. Literally you had to get the answers in lab, if you were ballsy enough to ask for the straight up answer. Every student had no clue what was going on.

Rating # 5

Overview:

• Course: CSC223
• Grade Received: A+
• Overall Rating: 5.0
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

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

Comment:

More in-class assignments and group work would be nice and more participation from students. Always available outside of class. Course could use more small projects to help the programming language stick.

Rating # 6

Overview:

• Course: CSC221
• Grade Received: A+
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

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

Comment:

I liked his class, they are long but if you are focused to get the stuff he helps a lot but you need to raise question to get points some time. you need to be advanced reader to get good grade in his class. and most important always helpful

Rating # 7

Overview:

• Course: CSC221
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

Good teacher but his lectures are boring because of lack of interaction.. He just keeps on speaking... and the lecture ends with a lot of yawns.

Rating # 8

Overview:

• Course: CSC223
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

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

Comment:

He's very intelligent and a great guy but he is not the best teacher. The classes are boring lectures on the code and it is hard to pay attention. For the homework, he gives you projects that you have to code in Python but if you have a question about it he will not answer your question but give you hints that aren't clear. Great guy bad teacher.

Rating # 9

Overview:

• Course: CSC223
• Grade Received: A+
• Overall Rating: 2.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

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

Comment:

Nice guy and will surely attempt to help you if you ask. However, during this course (data structures) he focused on very specific details of only a few data structures. He didn't even cover the basics of several structures that are fundamentally important to being a good programmer. Tests are easy if you study but quality of education is lacking

Rating # 10

Overview:

• Course: CSC221
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 1.5
• Course Difficulty: 5.0

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

Comment:

He is not a good teacher in a classroom setting. He has no idea how to teach with a lot of people or answer questions. In lab he will not help you with the program at all except giving you stupid hints (that is common knowledge). Doesn't really give partial credit on tests/quizzes. His accent isn't horrible but can get confusing at times

Rating # 11

Overview:

• Course: CSC221
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

Plaza is a very intelligent man. He is also very approachable and willing to do whatever it takes to help you succeed. As with the other profs in CS at SUNY Plattsburgh, you actually need to pay attention, go to class and - gasp - read the book. If you don't understand what he's presenting, let him know!! He's a great teacher.

Rating # 12

Overview:

• Course: CSC217
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

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

Comment:

He knows his stuff but my biggest problem is that his handwriting is really messy and I could not read his notes. He is pretty quite for a teacher also. He keeps you until the end of class unless it is a test. He wrote the book that he uses so you dont have to buy a book for this class.

Rating # 13

Overview:

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

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

Comment:

Dr. Plaza is the greatest teacher that ever mispronounced the word world.

Rating # 14

Overview:

• Course: SOMANY
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 2.5
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

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

Comment:

super weird dude who looks like a cartoon character

Rating # 15

Overview:

• Course: CSC318
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

Plaza is a very intelligent man. This tends to make him seem a bit scary and hard to approach. In order to do well in his class though you actually need to pay attention and go to the classes. Study about an hour before each class and it will help you tremendously. Only his book needs improvement.

Rating # 16

Overview:

• Course: CSC
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 4.0

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

Comment:

Knows his stuff, but has the most awkward and tehcnical way of saying things that would be simple to understand if he would lighten up just a little nad talk on a more 'student' level. He's also an extermly stiff grader due to his technical nature.

Rating # 17

Overview:

• Course: CSC
• Grade Received: F
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 2.0

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

Comment:

classes make you want to fall asleep, but he knows his stuff, but you just have to make it clear what you want answered or else you will find that your question will never get answered

Rating # 18

Overview:

• Course: CSI210LAB
• Grade Received: A
• Overall Rating: 3.0
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

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

Comment:

Harsh grader, if it dosen't work, its not good for credit. I liked Java, and wrote nice code, even to his pickey standards, but i didn't get some things perfect, and was harshly punished.

Rating # 19

Overview:

• Course: CSC319
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 4.0
• Course Difficulty: 1.0

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

Comment:

His teaching is okay, but he's the most HORRIBLE grader I have seen. He hardly cares how well-written your code is which I think is quite unfair. If you have a crapy program, that just WORKS he still will give you 100.

Rating # 20

Overview:

• Course: CSC319
• Grade Received: N/A
• Overall Rating: 3.5
• Course Difficulty: 3.0

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

Comment:

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