<p>Who are some of the best undergrad prof. at UVA’s College of Arts and Sciences? And what classes do they teach?</p>
<p>If anyone says Larry Sabato s/he is a huge tool.</p>
<p>Come on, now, Wahoom. Larry is phenomenal, well liked, and has tremendous pull when it comes to getting interesting guest speakers to come here. These are prospective students…no need to answer a simple question by saying something negative about a professor.</p>
<p>Russian, the responses you get will generally fall into three categories: nationally known professors (household names), professors known nationally in their specific field ([see</a> this article about the Creative Writing program, for example](<a href=“http://www.c-ville.com/index.php?cat=121304064644348&z_Issue_ID=11432807072651555&ShowArchiveArticle_ID=11103007073360279]see”>http://www.c-ville.com/index.php?cat=121304064644348&z_Issue_ID=11432807072651555&ShowArchiveArticle_ID=11103007073360279)), and professors that might not be known on the national scene, but who are beloved by students. </p>
<p>We just had a quick brainstorm in the office and here are some of the names that came up…</p>
<p>Nationally known:
Julian Bond - History
Rita Dove - English
Ken Elzinga - Econimics
Paul Freedman - Politics
Kathy Thorton - Science, Technology, and Society (Engineering)
Larry Sabato - Politics</p>
<p>Known in their field, not necessarily a household name:
Lou Bloomfield - Physics
John D’Earth - Music (jazz)
Herman (Hank) Shugurt - Environmental Sciences
Peter Waldman - Architecture</p>
<p>Beloved by their students:
Steve Cushman - English
Jim Demis - Chem
Karen Jansen - Finance (Commerce)
Michael Levenson - English
Wendy Marshall - Anthropology
John Mason - History
Gustavo Pellon - Spanish
John Portman - Religous Studies
Pete Spar - Music
Lisa Woolfork - Enlgish</p>
<p>**There are surly more to add and there will be some students who don’t agree with this list…this is literally the result of about 3 minutes of discussion with a few colleagues. **</p>
<p>When you get here, you will start to hear about the professors everyone likes to have at least once in their four years here. Some of their classes are harder to get into than others.</p>
<p>Lol some of the the profs on that list made me chuckle. </p>
<p>I’ve enjoyed classes with Maxim Engers, Ed Burton and Gerald Haines.</p>
<p>Dean J–you will agree with me that being “well known” and quoted every other day in CNN does not make a good professor. I took Intro American Govt with Sabato and it was the worst class I’ve ever taken at UVA. You don’t have to agree with me, just go look at [url=<a href=“http://www.ratemyprofessors.com%5DRateMyProfessors.com%5B/url”>http://www.ratemyprofessors.com]RateMyProfessors.com[/url</a>] or [url=<a href=“http://www.thecourseforum.com%5DtheCourseForum%5B/url”>http://www.thecourseforum.com]theCourseForum[/url</a>] and find out for yourself what a lot of his former students think. He’s unapproachable and extremely arrogant. And yes, I’m sorry for having answered the question in a negative way, but I was sure someone was going to mislead this poor first year.</p>
<p>Wahoomb, there’s room to be playful and sarcastic here, but preemptively calling someone who might like Sabato “a tool” might come off as the pot calling the kettle black.</p>
<p>wahoomb, it’s cool, nobody here is going to be misled, I just wanted to hear people’s opinions so that I could look into it some more, being a first year I just wanted to get some names of professors so I could learn more about them, I appreciate all opinions, positive or negative because I never approach a situation from one perspective</p>
<p>Dean J, it’s all good, wahoomb just stated his opinion, just because he didn’t like Prof. Sabato doesn’t mean that I’ll never take a class with Prof. Sabato, and I appreciate the names you gave me, I’ll learn more about those professors, it would be ignorant for me to make a decision based on other people’s opinions</p>
<p>If there’s anyone else who would like to put out any names of professors who they’ve enjoyed in the past it would be highly appreciated!</p>
<p>bump, anyone?</p>
<p>Dean Harman – Honors Chemistry. :D</p>
<p>Richard Handler - Anthropology
David C. Smith - Finance
Claire Kinney - English/Literature</p>
<p>David Haberly-Portuguese
Fernando Tejedo-Spanish
Milton Vickerman-Sociology
Tico Braun-Latin American History
Roquinaldo Ferreira-History
Manuela Achilles–History</p>
<p>Avoid: </p>
<p>Mirman–Economics
David Jordan–Politics</p>
<p>Kathy Thornton and her male counterpart, (don’t remember his first name) Prof Thornton are both phenomenal. I’ve heard great things about the Mrs, and she’s a former astronaut so she has great stories. I took an online physics course over the summer with Mr, and he was not only extremely helpful and nice, but he really enjoyed teaching his subject, but not to the point where he under-explained things or assumed we knew certain things right away.</p>
<p>thanks everyone for your input, if anyone else wants to throw out some names feel free to do so</p>
<p>i have a better suggestion for you:</p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://www.thecourseforum.com%5DtheCourseForum%5B/url”>http://www.thecourseforum.com]theCourseForum[/url</a>] :)</p>
<p>For the courseforum, I think you have to have a UVA email ID to register…</p>
<p>
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<p>Actually I was told Mirman >> Elzinga if you were really hardcore into economics.</p>
<p>Most people in Mirman’s class fail their midterm so if econ is not your forte, you’re failing the whole semester until you take the final and miraculously you end up with a decent grade. Mirman is not very friendly or approachable. I would take econ in a small section (30 students), if I was to do it again.</p>
<p>some of my favs.</p>
<p>Larry Sabato - PLAP
Lee Coppock - Econ
Allison Pugh - Sociology
Sheetal Sekhri - Econ (New, Enviro)
Michelle Kisliuk - Music
Timothy Wilson - Psych</p>
<p>also as far as who to avoid, my number one avoid that trumps any other bad experience i had is John James (Econ). I was actually telling an underclassman friend about him and a stranger walked up to her saying that what I was saying was some of the best advice she’s ever heard :P</p>
<p>so yeah, stay away. mirman is ok if you like dry sarcasm. elzinga is better by leaps and bounds for econ201. better lecturer, more enjoyable, more notable, more interested in his students (Mirman refuses to hold office hours)</p>
<p>Is there good reason to forfeit AP credit for ECON 201 just to take Elzinga’s class?</p>