Midterm and final are insane. And TAs are useless because they assume you know all the materials. You'd better to read the books and pay attention to classes otherwise exams will destroy your GPA.

Professor Surro is a really caring and knowledgeable professor. His exams are extremely doable as long as you go to the lectures, but theTA sections are not helpful unless you don't get the materials he went over in class. Overall, I would highly recommend taking this class with him.

Hands down best professor I've had in the econ department, his lectures are very clear and his tests are fair. The class is hard but if you put in the work you can get the grade you want. His homework also serves as extra credit so it not only helps you better understand the coursework but it gives extra credit points. Would take any other class with Chris again.

My FAVORITE class ever!!! If you can, please choose Chris at all cost. He is the best! I really love his teaching philosophy, that it is more important for student to understand the class materials than simply getting an easy A. Sometimes it is really tempting to choose some 'easy classes' but I feel like I did not learning anything at the end of the day. For this class, yes it is not that easy, but I did feel I learn a LOT and fall into deeper love with Economics.

A few tips for this class(I hope they are useful):
1. Do all the problem sets and quizzes, even if they are not required. The quizzes are super easy, but the problem sets may be a bit more challenging, and more on the intuition side of the problem. But since the midterm and final have a bunch of questions that requires us to understand those intuition, it would be better just to do all the problem sets.
2. Go to office hours!! Chris is super helpful and approachable, and he can explain everything in a logical manner.

In short, I really really really recommend taking Econ 11 with Chris!!! You will learn more than you expected. : )

surro my GOAT. great lecturer and has a real learning system if you put in the work. technically nothing except the final was mandatory but obvs there was a midterm and practice work that only boosted your grade. full page cheat sheet was allowed on both exams and he gave us his past final to study from which was nice. me personally i pulled all nighters before each exam bc i didn't put in the work but i think if you understand the concepts, the math isn't hard and you'll be fine. i think he curved at the end too.

Surro is the goat. Great lecturer, tests are very unpredictable you will need to study all the practice materials he emails in order to do really well. I was suffering from crammy salmonella during the final exam defintely could have scored in B range if it wasn't for that because I did a lot better on other finals later in the week and felt better physically. So disregard my shitty grade anyways he was extremely helpful wish I had taken the time to go to office hours. I was annoying as hell probably should belched less oh well. His practice midterm/final were really similar. Class get curved massive time so if you're freaking out just chill you will likely pass. He doesn't want anyone to fail--but you will need to lock in more for 101 cuz Silveria is not as chill about that.

I didn't pay attention in class. I was annoying as hell during lecture. I didn't attend a single office hour. I had salmonella during the final. I somehow ended up with an A-. Surro is truly the GOAT. I was lucky enough to secure a spot with this dude again for econ 102 fall 2025.
Quick note that his handwriting is sometimes illegible and tends to emphasize the first three letters of "assume"...the "Ass Tally" exceeded 20 by the end of the quarter.

I absolutely loved econ 11 and prof surro! i was so nervous going into this class bc i heard it was super difficult etc etc but i swear its not.

surro's lectures are always structured (30 mins doing the practice problems he posted for last lecture's content + 45 mins teaching new content), he provides practice problems, exam style problems, and his typed notes for every lecture/topic, quizzes for each lecture due before the next (only based on completion), and problem sets every week (based on effort but you'll get full credit if you even attempted most). he'll also post more exam style problems for the midterm and final. everything except the final is extra credit unless you do better on the midterm. attendance is also mandatory for extra credit and you can miss up to 5 and still get full attendance credit.

he literally gives you a step-by-step on how to do well in his class, advising you to read thru the types notes before class, do the practice problems right after class, and the exam style ones when you feel confident w the topic, then obviously the practice midterm/final lastly. i did not read the notes or do the pratice problems, but did do everything else.

math in this class was not at all hard, only basic calc. cheat sheets were allowed for midterm and final. i really do not think the content was that hard, either. midterm was extremely easy to me but the final was definitely more challenging. even so, i ended w an A.

i cannot reiterate this enough- if you put in decent effort for this class, you WILL do well. the class is interesting and easy to follow & Surro is amazing. do not fear this class ...

If you have a class with Surro in it, take it. He gives so many opportunities to supplement the material and makes it very clear exactly what he expects and how to achieve it. If you follow all the study guidelines he gives at the beginning, you will get a good grade. This guy is amazing. 10/10 would recommend. Also he's so sweet and always cheering you on.

People glaze this man way too much. Yes he’s a decent prof who articulates the content well and seems to really care about his students but I wouldn’t say that he was a particularly engaging lecturer. His tests are actually evil, questions can be very unpredictable bc he really tries to test your intuition so you will see some questions on the test that are formatted like none of the questions you did in psets/other practice material. Imo midterm was worse than the final (midterm is def more of a time crunch than final) but I also put in more than 50 hrs of studying for the final. For reference the median on the midterm was a 66 and for the final was an 82. All the test questions are free response style but they are graded pretty harshly. One good thing though is your midterm grade gets dropped if you do better on the final. Overall this class will require a lot of effort and may make you question your major.