My goodness everyone needs to stop bitching--

Bruinsma was a great professor. Everyone was shocked to get less than 50 on the second midterm. I find these people absolutely ridiculous. If they took a real physics class (with Corbin for instance, where the averages are in the 30s), then you would cry, literally.

So stop complaining when you had the easy physics with the easy professor.

By the way, I got an A- without any high school physics, so clearly I could do it.

Professor Bruinsma is easily the most unfair professor I've had at UCLA. At the beginning of the class, I found his teaching style very effective and he seemed to enjoy teaching the material. The first midterm was fine--very doable and similar in difficulty to the the practice midterm. However, sometime in between the first and second midterm, Prof. Bruinsma must have had some kind of crippling midlife crisis or developed bipolar disorder or something. The second midterm was ridiculously impossible. Even the TA admitted that it was very unfair (the discussion when he handed them back, i thought the class was going to stage a revolt or something--everyone was so upset). Bruinsma tested us on a concept we hadn't yet learned (a thirty point question on an eighty point test), and when the TA addressed the professor about this, he said he "just wanted to see how far we could get" and knew full well that the question was beyond what we had learned. Bruinsma really seemed to enjoy making us nervous--he even cackled after addressing the class about the second midterm, even though he knew that everyone was upset about their performance. When asked if he would be fair on the final, he replied "I'll try, but no guarantees." He didn't. The final left me appalled at Bruinsma's smug and conniving attitude--a major departure from the vibrant and approachable persona he projected initially.

The real final was A LOT more challenging than the practice final (which was composed of the most basic examples from the book). He asked us to use our "physical intuition" on questions that seemed completely unrelated to what we learned. This seemed like a thinly veiled justification for giving us a test beyond the scope of the class. Hard tests are supposed to separate the people who really know the concepts from the others, but his final was so difficult no one had any idea what they were doing--it was basically a crapshoot. He also forbade us from asking questions during part of the final, even though it was riddled with mistakes and his wording was muddled. I ended up getting a B+ in the class, even though I'm an A/A- student. Physics 6A with Bruinsma was a very frustrating and traumatic experience.

Bruinsma made physics 6A a traumatic experience for me. Having said that, I must be fair (unlike he was) and say that he was a great lecturer and made his lectures very entertaining and enjoyable. However, his tests were NOT reflective of the material presented in class. I was astounded at how difficult the second midterm and the final were. I am generally an A student, but there were many times when I thought that I was going to have to drop his class! I ended up with a B (thank goodness there was a curve), but was disappointed because I worked extremely hard and would have gotten an A in any other physics class. His tests are disheartening and discouraging.

My roommate and I took this class together. She undertook the task of researching this professor, and we were both very optimistic about his class. In the end, both my roommate and I found these reviews very misleading.

Bruinsma is an interesting professor with a good sense of humor. His first midterm was very manageable and straightforward, leaving me with the feeling that I could be successful in his class. However, he completely switched up his style after the first midterm, and I walked out of the second midterm in near tears. I seriously took one look at that midterm and wondered if I had shown up to the wrong class. After talking to some of my classmates, it was clear that I was not the only one who felt that way. After scoring a safe 84% on the first midterm, I scored around a 50% on the second midterm. The final ended up being pretty bad also and I ended up with a B- in the class, whereas I am typically a A-/B+ student. I would not have been so upset with my final grade had I felt the class were fair. The test questions were unlike anything we had done on our homework sets, and the practice tests were completely misleading.

If I had to describe Professor Bruinsma with one phrase I would go with "spawn of the devil." He's terrible.

Bruinsma is EVIL! Although he is a very effective lecturer, his tests were filled with tricky questions. And his grading system is pretty awful too, with very little partial credits given. For example, if you got everything right except for the last step, he will take off 4 points in a 10 points question which I thought it was ridiculous. If you had AP physics, you will love him. If you don't have any previous foundation in physics (or a very weak one like I did), you will like him during lecture, but hate him during his tests and hate yourself when you get your grades back for choosing him!

Professor Bruinsma is easily one of the most effective professors I've had, particularly for physics. His lectures usually beging with background information and are followed by detailed, concrete examples. He doesn't include useless information and is very good at incorporating different concepts into a single example. His passion for physics makes learning much more enjoyable and he is funny without ever trying to be. He gets so carried away and excited during his explanations that he often has to pause and collect himself. He encourages questions and really wants students to understand the material. His midterms and final are a fair balance between class and discussion examples and homework problems, and he is not the kind of professory who likes to trick students. Both lectures and discussions are extremely helpful. Even his demos are quite good at incorporating what is learned in class. He is not an easy grader, but is definitely fair and I would definitely recommend him to everyone.

Last quarter I took Phsyics 6A with Bruinsma. He explains things really well and goes through the material very slowly. He is super sweet and funny and is always making little jokes. The questions on his exams were not necessarily things you would expect but weren't difficult.

I took 6A with Professor Bruinsma in Fall 2008. This was my first Physics class in my life and I felt that Bruinsma explained concepts thoroughly and he was more than happy to re-explain things that students didn't understand. Professor Bruinsma went much slower in terms of material then the other Physics professor, Maio. Midterms and Final were fairly easy, and there was even a bonus question on the second midterm. I would definitely recommend Bruinsma for those first time Physics students that want to really learn the material and do well.