Professor
Aaron Meyer
1 of 2
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2023 - This class at UCLA has been an extremely disappointing experience, ranking among the worst courses I have taken. Dr. Meyer and his head TA, Michael Bogumil, make for a disastrous combination. Firstly, Dr. Meyer's approach to teaching is lacking. Instead of lecturing, he relies on student presentations while only making class announcements. Inconsistencies arose, as attendance was initially disregarded but later enforced in week 8, without any mention in the syllabus. It felt as if Dr. Meyer was merely a placeholder, oblivious to the chaos unfolding in the lab sections due to the incompetence of his head TA. The lab sessions were consistently plagued with issues. Our cell cultures were never ready on time, resulting in incomplete experiments and confusion about the lab sequence. Michael's inability to seed the cells promptly meant our experiments suffered from inadequate cell densities. When I approached my TA about this, she acknowledged the negative impact but stated that it was expected at this point, leaving us to anticipate mistakes from our TAs, which is unacceptable. Changes to the protocols were frequently made without consulting us, leaving us feeling powerless. When I raised these concerns with Dr. Meyer, he seemed genuinely surprised by the last-minute changes. Furthermore, the grading of assignments and tests was abysmal. Reports lacked a clear rubric, and receiving feedback was a struggle, with minimal comments provided. Completing the reports was a time-consuming task, given the excessive number of questions and required observations. The exams were a nightmare, bearing little resemblance to the course material that was never properly taught by Dr. Meyer. The questions demanded specific answers that could only be known if one had seen the test beforehand. The grading process was the most frustrating aspect, as my initial score of 46/75 dramatically increased to 67/75 after pleading for a recount. Such discrepancies should not be tolerated. Dr. Meyer's lack of organization is evident, and it would benefit him to experience this class anonymously, gaining a firsthand understanding of the challenges we endure. Unfortunately, his head TA has yet to take responsibility, severely hindering the students' educational experience.
Spring 2023 - This class at UCLA has been an extremely disappointing experience, ranking among the worst courses I have taken. Dr. Meyer and his head TA, Michael Bogumil, make for a disastrous combination. Firstly, Dr. Meyer's approach to teaching is lacking. Instead of lecturing, he relies on student presentations while only making class announcements. Inconsistencies arose, as attendance was initially disregarded but later enforced in week 8, without any mention in the syllabus. It felt as if Dr. Meyer was merely a placeholder, oblivious to the chaos unfolding in the lab sections due to the incompetence of his head TA. The lab sessions were consistently plagued with issues. Our cell cultures were never ready on time, resulting in incomplete experiments and confusion about the lab sequence. Michael's inability to seed the cells promptly meant our experiments suffered from inadequate cell densities. When I approached my TA about this, she acknowledged the negative impact but stated that it was expected at this point, leaving us to anticipate mistakes from our TAs, which is unacceptable. Changes to the protocols were frequently made without consulting us, leaving us feeling powerless. When I raised these concerns with Dr. Meyer, he seemed genuinely surprised by the last-minute changes. Furthermore, the grading of assignments and tests was abysmal. Reports lacked a clear rubric, and receiving feedback was a struggle, with minimal comments provided. Completing the reports was a time-consuming task, given the excessive number of questions and required observations. The exams were a nightmare, bearing little resemblance to the course material that was never properly taught by Dr. Meyer. The questions demanded specific answers that could only be known if one had seen the test beforehand. The grading process was the most frustrating aspect, as my initial score of 46/75 dramatically increased to 67/75 after pleading for a recount. Such discrepancies should not be tolerated. Dr. Meyer's lack of organization is evident, and it would benefit him to experience this class anonymously, gaining a firsthand understanding of the challenges we endure. Unfortunately, his head TA has yet to take responsibility, severely hindering the students' educational experience.
AD
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2023 - Terrible class, and meyer was unfortunately very unclear and unhelpful. Seems like a nice enough guy, but just had no good structure or idea how to teach concepts effectively. The concepts were disjoint, random, and not useful to anything we have done or need to do later. Also why is it in python if we only have to learn C++, but we never learn how to do any of the code, he just gives us complex problems.
Winter 2023 - Terrible class, and meyer was unfortunately very unclear and unhelpful. Seems like a nice enough guy, but just had no good structure or idea how to teach concepts effectively. The concepts were disjoint, random, and not useful to anything we have done or need to do later. Also why is it in python if we only have to learn C++, but we never learn how to do any of the code, he just gives us complex problems.
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2024 - Logistics: About 10 quizzes (two attempts, takes the average) 6 Lab assignments 1 Midterm 1 final project (can be solo or in group) Participation grade This class is very interesting and also very useful however it is very poorly organized. Professor Meyer is very sweet and always tries to help you (especially via Slack) however this class is very confusing and the Labs/HWs are very disconnected from the lecture. He also doesn't provide the best examples for the topics covered and can't break down bigger concepts into smaller ones. I personally thought the TAs did a much better job at explaining and breaking down the concepts. It also helps a lot if you have taken a stat class before. Although this class isn't a coding class, coding in Python is a big part of this class and I struggled a lot with implementing different Machine Learning models just because I had never seen how to implement one, in addition the questions are very confusingly worded and you have no idea what the question wants you to do. Make sure to attend EVERY SINGLE OFFICE HOUR, every minute you go to the office hour is an hour you save being confused on the labs. The TAs and professor are very helpful in clarifying what the question wants and helping you with the coding aspect. Discussions are helpful but the TAs just don't have enough time to cover lecture material and help with Labs. It would have been much more beneficial if this class was broken into a lecture and a lab portion. The midterm isn't too bad as long as you do all the previous midterms and get used to his style of asking questions as he generally asks the same types of questions every year. Overall this class isn't difficult topic-wise but extremely time-consuming just because of how confusing everything is so make sure to leave enough time.
Winter 2024 - Logistics: About 10 quizzes (two attempts, takes the average) 6 Lab assignments 1 Midterm 1 final project (can be solo or in group) Participation grade This class is very interesting and also very useful however it is very poorly organized. Professor Meyer is very sweet and always tries to help you (especially via Slack) however this class is very confusing and the Labs/HWs are very disconnected from the lecture. He also doesn't provide the best examples for the topics covered and can't break down bigger concepts into smaller ones. I personally thought the TAs did a much better job at explaining and breaking down the concepts. It also helps a lot if you have taken a stat class before. Although this class isn't a coding class, coding in Python is a big part of this class and I struggled a lot with implementing different Machine Learning models just because I had never seen how to implement one, in addition the questions are very confusingly worded and you have no idea what the question wants you to do. Make sure to attend EVERY SINGLE OFFICE HOUR, every minute you go to the office hour is an hour you save being confused on the labs. The TAs and professor are very helpful in clarifying what the question wants and helping you with the coding aspect. Discussions are helpful but the TAs just don't have enough time to cover lecture material and help with Labs. It would have been much more beneficial if this class was broken into a lecture and a lab portion. The midterm isn't too bad as long as you do all the previous midterms and get used to his style of asking questions as he generally asks the same types of questions every year. Overall this class isn't difficult topic-wise but extremely time-consuming just because of how confusing everything is so make sure to leave enough time.
AD
1 of 2
