Professor
Janelle DeWitt
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2019 - The class is extremely straightforward. There are only two papers, a final exam that is about 40 questions MC, two short essays, and then your points from discussion section. Topics revolve around the different readings that Professor Dewitt puts on CCLE in PDFs (Aristotle, Kant, Aquinas, etc). You're suppose to do these readings and then Professor Dewitt goes over all of the important topics in lecture. Lectures are pretty interesting because she makes all of the ideas understandable given that they were made over a century ago. She also goes off topic fairly often to talk about her sister, mother, or some other experience she had. I remember one time she couldn't talk for the first 5 minutes of lecture because of a joke she wanted to tell us. She is a very sweet midwestern professor and I would definitely take the class again for the fair workload and interesting lectures. Professor Dewitt is definitely the type of person you would want to grab a cup of coffee and exchange stories with.
Fall 2019 - The class is extremely straightforward. There are only two papers, a final exam that is about 40 questions MC, two short essays, and then your points from discussion section. Topics revolve around the different readings that Professor Dewitt puts on CCLE in PDFs (Aristotle, Kant, Aquinas, etc). You're suppose to do these readings and then Professor Dewitt goes over all of the important topics in lecture. Lectures are pretty interesting because she makes all of the ideas understandable given that they were made over a century ago. She also goes off topic fairly often to talk about her sister, mother, or some other experience she had. I remember one time she couldn't talk for the first 5 minutes of lecture because of a joke she wanted to tell us. She is a very sweet midwestern professor and I would definitely take the class again for the fair workload and interesting lectures. Professor Dewitt is definitely the type of person you would want to grab a cup of coffee and exchange stories with.
Most Helpful Review
Fall 2021 - This class was a super easy GE and fairly interesting. For someone who has no back round in philosophy, this class was pretty interesting. She gives screen shares which are super important to study for the tests and the TAs are super helpful too. Id def rec going to the TAs office hours and conversing about essay structure and clarification on topic comprehension. I believe this class is super TA dependent. I would rec this class.
Fall 2021 - This class was a super easy GE and fairly interesting. For someone who has no back round in philosophy, this class was pretty interesting. She gives screen shares which are super important to study for the tests and the TAs are super helpful too. Id def rec going to the TAs office hours and conversing about essay structure and clarification on topic comprehension. I believe this class is super TA dependent. I would rec this class.
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2020 - As a transfer who has taken a lot of philosophy classes, this was one of the most painful I have taken. There were 3 essays (3-4 pages), and for all of them, I got no useful feedback. Part of it was the pacing; we had two of the three essays due in the last few weeks. The other part might have been just because of my T.A. Colleen, but for the last two essays I only received 5 comments in total that said either "good" or "nice" at different parts. I ended up getting a B+ on every essay. Yes I know, a B+ is not bad, but it is annoying because you can't improve on what you did wrong when you never receive comments about what you are doing wrong. The main gripe I had with the professor was that half the lecture was spent answering long unrelated questions that students should have asked during office hours and the other half of the lecture was the prof. reading almost word for word out of a text document. If you are looking for an easy intro philosophy class, this is not it.
Fall 2020 - As a transfer who has taken a lot of philosophy classes, this was one of the most painful I have taken. There were 3 essays (3-4 pages), and for all of them, I got no useful feedback. Part of it was the pacing; we had two of the three essays due in the last few weeks. The other part might have been just because of my T.A. Colleen, but for the last two essays I only received 5 comments in total that said either "good" or "nice" at different parts. I ended up getting a B+ on every essay. Yes I know, a B+ is not bad, but it is annoying because you can't improve on what you did wrong when you never receive comments about what you are doing wrong. The main gripe I had with the professor was that half the lecture was spent answering long unrelated questions that students should have asked during office hours and the other half of the lecture was the prof. reading almost word for word out of a text document. If you are looking for an easy intro philosophy class, this is not it.
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2021 - Dewitt relishes in making her course harder than they need to be. I am a fourth year philosophy major and have never experienced someone as obnoxious in their delight of making their students struggle. She had issues in her personal life, which I was completely sympathetic of. However, it resulted in a horribly unorganized quarter. Although we were expected to be understanding of her circumstances she was in no way considerate of student time or lives. She made up deadlines and was unwavering in her idiotic scheduling of things. You would think that since she was effectively screwing us with posting lectures late, or not at all at time, that she would reflect that with flexibilities with deadlines but instead we had to assume the consequences of her failures. This class should not have been difficult but she lost control very early on and made it exponentially worse. In addition, she within her lectures I often found myself cringing at her lack of compassion or awareness on many social issues. I am not sensitive or overly politically correct but she was on the verge of spewing overtly racist nonsense daily. Overall would say to just avoid her if possible, not a caring teacher nor an efficient lecturer.
Spring 2021 - Dewitt relishes in making her course harder than they need to be. I am a fourth year philosophy major and have never experienced someone as obnoxious in their delight of making their students struggle. She had issues in her personal life, which I was completely sympathetic of. However, it resulted in a horribly unorganized quarter. Although we were expected to be understanding of her circumstances she was in no way considerate of student time or lives. She made up deadlines and was unwavering in her idiotic scheduling of things. You would think that since she was effectively screwing us with posting lectures late, or not at all at time, that she would reflect that with flexibilities with deadlines but instead we had to assume the consequences of her failures. This class should not have been difficult but she lost control very early on and made it exponentially worse. In addition, she within her lectures I often found myself cringing at her lack of compassion or awareness on many social issues. I am not sensitive or overly politically correct but she was on the verge of spewing overtly racist nonsense daily. Overall would say to just avoid her if possible, not a caring teacher nor an efficient lecturer.
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2022 - I'm genuinely shocked by the rating on this website about Professor DeWitt. I've taken three classes with her and my experience was beyond amazing. Professor DeWitt does not believe in easy As. If you want an A in her class, you need to put in the work. Although this feels annoying at first because we all love easy As, it has helped me improve my reading and writing dramatically. If you're willing to do all the readings and attend all the lectures, I guarantee that you will receive an A or at least an A-. She allows students to engage with her in lecture which makes it so much more fun to listen to. She's also great at helping you understand VERY hard concepts. Most importantly, she will go above and beyond to be there for her students, whether that be in their personal lives or academically. She is willing to stay 3+ hours over her office hour time to make sure that students understand the concepts. The only caveat is that you need to show her you care about learning and are not just there for an easy A. Most of these comments make me think that the students just didn't put in the work. Please take her class! She's truly the best Professor I have had the pleasure of working with. Grade distribution: This is standard for all of the upper div classes I've taken with her. 10% 5 reading responses submitted at your leisure throughout the quarter 40% midterm paper 4-6 pages 50% final paper 5-7 pages
Fall 2022 - I'm genuinely shocked by the rating on this website about Professor DeWitt. I've taken three classes with her and my experience was beyond amazing. Professor DeWitt does not believe in easy As. If you want an A in her class, you need to put in the work. Although this feels annoying at first because we all love easy As, it has helped me improve my reading and writing dramatically. If you're willing to do all the readings and attend all the lectures, I guarantee that you will receive an A or at least an A-. She allows students to engage with her in lecture which makes it so much more fun to listen to. She's also great at helping you understand VERY hard concepts. Most importantly, she will go above and beyond to be there for her students, whether that be in their personal lives or academically. She is willing to stay 3+ hours over her office hour time to make sure that students understand the concepts. The only caveat is that you need to show her you care about learning and are not just there for an easy A. Most of these comments make me think that the students just didn't put in the work. Please take her class! She's truly the best Professor I have had the pleasure of working with. Grade distribution: This is standard for all of the upper div classes I've taken with her. 10% 5 reading responses submitted at your leisure throughout the quarter 40% midterm paper 4-6 pages 50% final paper 5-7 pages
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2024 - Prof. DeWitt is very nice and I can feel her passion for Kantian Ethics from every lecture of her. She has tried her best to make things clear though there is still a bit of room for improvement (sometimes she makes things too clear, which can make it hard to track where the entire discussion is going -- but this wasn't too much a problem). Would recommend and take again.
Spring 2024 - Prof. DeWitt is very nice and I can feel her passion for Kantian Ethics from every lecture of her. She has tried her best to make things clear though there is still a bit of room for improvement (sometimes she makes things too clear, which can make it hard to track where the entire discussion is going -- but this wasn't too much a problem). Would recommend and take again.
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2020 - Professor Dewitt is not the most engaging professor and the lectures are super boring. There is no attendance req for this class, two papers each worth %40 and %10 of your grade is 5 reflection papers. The class heavily depends on how the TA grades the papers since the professor doesn't even bother discussing paper grades with you. The TA (Ayana) was one of toughest graders ever and her way of grading is due to most students not showing up to her sections (the sections are optional). I do not recommend taking this class at all if you want to keep a good GPA!!!
Winter 2020 - Professor Dewitt is not the most engaging professor and the lectures are super boring. There is no attendance req for this class, two papers each worth %40 and %10 of your grade is 5 reflection papers. The class heavily depends on how the TA grades the papers since the professor doesn't even bother discussing paper grades with you. The TA (Ayana) was one of toughest graders ever and her way of grading is due to most students not showing up to her sections (the sections are optional). I do not recommend taking this class at all if you want to keep a good GPA!!!
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