Professor Rice truly wanted to be an engaging and interesting lecturer, and I almost feel bad complaining about the workload given the grades I and most of the class received, however, the readings he assigned were dense, dull, and extensive, and his lectures lacked clarity and seemingly any connection at all to what we had been learning in the first half of the quarter in my opinion. Professor Rice tried to draw connection between economic and political philosophy and sustainability but ultimately I feel that this was poorly suited to the course as there was not enough time or detail to sufficiently tie it all together. Additionally, for the material taught, the final Professor Rice wrote had vague questions, and was far more difficult than one would expect from the course. To say one good thing, Professor Rice did an excellent job generating student interaction with his in class surveys, and he often had fun activities. He seems like a cool person, but he was for sure not my favorite Professor.

He made the class unnecessarily difficult. For the film project, his standards of grading the videos were as if he expected the videos to have been made by film majors, not freshmen taking a environmental studies cluster. His lectures and slides were confusing and did not tie in well with the rest of the cluster. Worst professor of the cluster by far.

Ok. Here's my tip for you freshmen. Take the first quarter of this cluster and just drop the cluster after that. The first quarter is not only easy but also informative and will actually make you think twice about your actions. Although Professer D'Auria is a REALLY good lecturer (and super helpful also), Professor (honestly, how is he a professor) Rice is terrible. The first half of this cluster was taught by D'Auria, and although the midterm was challenging, I actually learned stuff. With Rice, we learn about philosophy then are required to make a film as our final project??? Does he not realize we are not in a film class??? NEWS FLASH we are in an environment and sustainability class, not a film class. So that being said, don't grade us as if we are freaking film majors. Everyone was super confused about the guidelines about this video project and even the TAs looked a bit flustered when asked questions by students. Just type in GE CLST M1B on youtube and you'll find a bunch of videos that are well made but probably got a 10-11/15. He's super vague about his grading rubric and specifically said that he would grade super tough on the video. If you're a film major, great! If you're not, well then get ready to be shafted. I legit had friends whose videos were pretty impressive but they had to redo their videos again because he said that they weren't "creative" enough. I don't mean to sound all whiny, because I might end up with an okay grade, but man the crap he made us go through with that video was so unnecessary and trivial. The lecture material he presented was crap and trivial; the guest lecturers that presented during his part of the cluster was eons better than all his lectures. I honestly feel sorry for whoever signed up for his seminar in the Spring, I really wish you the best of luck. As for my experience with Rice, an absolute disappointment and by far the worst professor in this cluster. If you're gonna grade harshly, judge us by fair standards! Is that so much to ask?

The winter quarter of this Cluster is the worst. Avoid at all costs. The tests have nothing to do with lectures.

I love Professor Rice! Although I would agree that sometimes his instructions aren't crystal clear, they are intentionally that way. He wants to give students more freedom in how to approach their assignments and if you have any questions, you can always go to his office hours where he'll kindly answer anything! I love how he is able to connect media/art to food. Such an interesting topic. His lectures are posted online the CCLE class page and you don't have to worry about not understanding the bullet points because he has "notes section" underneath each slide which gives you details on what he was specifically addressing. His class isn't always lecture lecture lecture, occasionally he has students participate in class in other ways.

Definitely Hands down, one of the best professors ever. I found his class very intriguing and engaging.