Professor
David Saltzberg
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Most Helpful Review
I cannot say Professor Saltzberg is one of the greatest professors at Physics Department but I cannot say he is a bad professor either. I would say he is an average professor overall. I definitely can tell that he did the best he can to give an excellent education in physics from his efforts both in lectures and outside lectures. Every teacher has strengths and weaknesses. His strengths are he definitely cares about students learning especially for those who also care about learning the beauty of Physics (you know some of us only care about getting good grades without really learning the materials) Go to his office hours and ask questions if you don't understand his lectures. He would be more than willing to guide you step by step until you really understand. In terms of his tests, they are very straightforward. Just do his homeworks and you will do fine in his midterms and final. His weaknesses are lectures often are not clear and always confusing to me, but some students may think he explains well, so it really is relative. But comparing to Prof. Whitten, he is much better!! At least not boring because of his demonstrations. Those who had Prof. Whitten should know this. Overall, I would recommend him for Physics 1B. Remember, go to his office hours if you don't understand. He would explain to you much better than in lectures!
I cannot say Professor Saltzberg is one of the greatest professors at Physics Department but I cannot say he is a bad professor either. I would say he is an average professor overall. I definitely can tell that he did the best he can to give an excellent education in physics from his efforts both in lectures and outside lectures. Every teacher has strengths and weaknesses. His strengths are he definitely cares about students learning especially for those who also care about learning the beauty of Physics (you know some of us only care about getting good grades without really learning the materials) Go to his office hours and ask questions if you don't understand his lectures. He would be more than willing to guide you step by step until you really understand. In terms of his tests, they are very straightforward. Just do his homeworks and you will do fine in his midterms and final. His weaknesses are lectures often are not clear and always confusing to me, but some students may think he explains well, so it really is relative. But comparing to Prof. Whitten, he is much better!! At least not boring because of his demonstrations. Those who had Prof. Whitten should know this. Overall, I would recommend him for Physics 1B. Remember, go to his office hours if you don't understand. He would explain to you much better than in lectures!
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Most Helpful Review
Winter 2016 - Overall, Saltzberg is a good professor. His lectures are pretty interesting, and he cares about teaching the material to students. However, his lectures can be a bit difficult to follow sometimes because of the sheer amount of calculus he does on the board, and on top of that he often gets his negative signs mixed up. The TA for this class, Michael, was fantastic, and going to his office hours was very helpful for the weekly homework and understanding the material better. This class can be a bit difficult, especially for those who haven't had prior experience to E&M. However, the curve is made generous so that students focus on learning the material rather than stressing about grades.
Winter 2016 - Overall, Saltzberg is a good professor. His lectures are pretty interesting, and he cares about teaching the material to students. However, his lectures can be a bit difficult to follow sometimes because of the sheer amount of calculus he does on the board, and on top of that he often gets his negative signs mixed up. The TA for this class, Michael, was fantastic, and going to his office hours was very helpful for the weekly homework and understanding the material better. This class can be a bit difficult, especially for those who haven't had prior experience to E&M. However, the curve is made generous so that students focus on learning the material rather than stressing about grades.
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2023 - I genuinely thought this was a very interesting class. Professor Saltzberg always appeared happy to teach the course and really was motivated during every class. I think he really wants to see his students succeed. The workload was very manageable, besides the exams there was barely any outside of class work besides homework assignments and finishing labs which I appreciated. My TA for my labs was also super nice and was always happy to help during office hours. I'm not a STEM person and not really a math/science person in general (I took this as a GE) so the exams were pretty difficult for me. They require A LOT of studying after the first midterm. If you're looking for an easy GE and you're not a STEM major, I wouldn't consider this as an easy course at all. They teach it well, but it's just a lot of material and concepts to wrap your head around so it requires a bit more effort than most classes. I really found it interesting though, and I think it was a course very well taught. He also released practice exams before every exam which was really helpful, and it gave you a good idea of the types of questions that would be on there. But if you're not good at math or understanding scientific concepts, I'm going to be real and say that this will be a challenging class.
Fall 2023 - I genuinely thought this was a very interesting class. Professor Saltzberg always appeared happy to teach the course and really was motivated during every class. I think he really wants to see his students succeed. The workload was very manageable, besides the exams there was barely any outside of class work besides homework assignments and finishing labs which I appreciated. My TA for my labs was also super nice and was always happy to help during office hours. I'm not a STEM person and not really a math/science person in general (I took this as a GE) so the exams were pretty difficult for me. They require A LOT of studying after the first midterm. If you're looking for an easy GE and you're not a STEM major, I wouldn't consider this as an easy course at all. They teach it well, but it's just a lot of material and concepts to wrap your head around so it requires a bit more effort than most classes. I really found it interesting though, and I think it was a course very well taught. He also released practice exams before every exam which was really helpful, and it gave you a good idea of the types of questions that would be on there. But if you're not good at math or understanding scientific concepts, I'm going to be real and say that this will be a challenging class.
Most Helpful Review
He's an aight professor, you get used to him or to sleeping in lecture BUT I love The Big Bang Theory and he is the technical producer of the show, which means he provides them with scientific dialogue and all the equations on the board on the show sooooooo that made him like **********0x cooler to me. Or like a **********0x more tolerable. I was too afraid to ask him for any hook-ups to the show cause it's sort of inappropriate but hey who knows, had I gone to office hours more or gotten to know the dude, maybe I could've worked up the courage. Who knows a degree from Princeton in physics could help you end up in the show biz !
He's an aight professor, you get used to him or to sleeping in lecture BUT I love The Big Bang Theory and he is the technical producer of the show, which means he provides them with scientific dialogue and all the equations on the board on the show sooooooo that made him like **********0x cooler to me. Or like a **********0x more tolerable. I was too afraid to ask him for any hook-ups to the show cause it's sort of inappropriate but hey who knows, had I gone to office hours more or gotten to know the dude, maybe I could've worked up the courage. Who knows a degree from Princeton in physics could help you end up in the show biz !
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