One of the worst professors at UCLA

This guy is terrible. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

PS 111A Winter 2014

Here's how the past two weeks have been:
After module 1/2 exams, felt pretty confident of passing course.
Took the final on Tuesday 8-11AM of finals week
Cried myself to sleep because THAT WAS THE WORSE FINAL EVER. AND IT'S WORTH 160 POINTS?!??!?!
Constantly checked for grades on MyUCLA to make sure I passed, so I can continue onto PS 111B
GRADES WERE NOT UPDATED UNTIL THE SUNDAY NIGHT BEFORE SPRING QUARTER AT 11PM!!? ?!?!??!?

This professor, although a nice person, is the worse professor I've ever had. He is the worse thing you will encounter about the PS major... so good luck, and make sure you score as many points as you can from exams 1/2 because you will need it as padding.

This man is the cruelest, worst professor at UCLA. Not only is he a horrible professor that cannot teach, he teaches the hardest part of this class. My review of him for teacher evals for the PhySci department follows:

"Dr. Simmons is quite possibly the single worst professor I've had while at UCLA. Let me correct that, the single worst teacher I have ever had, period. Not only is the man completely unorganized, he is clueless to the commonplace feelings of scorn and disdain that all of his students have for him. He routinely contradicts himself and laughs it off, as if it is nothing, while we as his students remain lost. His notes make no sense, leaving us at the mercy of a textbook that is difficult to understand and remain engaged. Please, for the sake of the reputation of the physiological science major, do not allow this man to continue teaching as a part of this teaching team. Narrins and Tidball were amazing, making it even more sad that this great class is being closed by such a horrible teacher."

He has bad flow. He needs to
(1) state what he is going to cover then go into it...
(2) make a claim
(3) support the claim/ explain the shit
(4) make a conclusion that makes us go (ahhhhh I get it)

What he does:
(1) lists everything he will go over in the beginning (wtf how are we going to keep track?)
(2) goes back and forth.
(3) wtf is up with the presentation/ white board shit? (do one or the other)

His section is the hardest part for physci 111a because of his topic. He also shouldn't teach from Purves. Fucking Purves is retarded...we're undergrads not fucking neuroscientists...the terminology makes shit confusing...for example...say interneuron instead of fucking local circuit neurons...also the book is organized terribly and is dense as shit... Probably why Simmons has a hard time teaching.. It is the books fault not simmons.

As a person, Simmons is a homie G. IDK about his exams yet...

This class was challenging but personally I did not think Simmons was the worst section. He presented a lot of material but I found it interesting. I studied really hard for his final and ended up doing really well on it. But if you do get behind on the material his final would be really difficult because there is so much information and his questions require you to really understand the material. Simmons is also very nice, he is not the best lecturer but he is very eager to help his students learn.

Simmons reminds me a lot of Gustavo Fring from Breaking Bad....he appears quiet and innocent upon the first impression...but behind those glasses is something diabolical .

He taught modules 3 and 4 of 111A (motor systems and sensory systems), which are by far and large make up the hardest portion of the course. Module 1 (Electrophysiology) was taught by Roberts, and Module 2 (Muscle Physiology) was taught by Tidball. Their exams were worth 100 points each, and Simmons exam was worth 160 points.

My point breakdown for the course was as follows:

Midterm 1 (Module 1):
Average - 64/100
My score - 72/100

Midterm 2 (Module 2):
Average - 86/100
My score - 91/100

Final (Modules 3 & 4):
Average - he never released the distribution
My score - 138 / 160

Final grade: B+

Personally, I feel a little cheated with my final grade and the curve seemed strict, but everyone in PhySci111A really wants to be there and succeed. With regards to his teaching style, he is very all over the place. He switches between power points and the white board with no clear order or flow. He tries to map out the concepts on the board and tie them together in diagrams. He mumbles through an insane amount of material but doesn't seem to make any precise claims about what is going on. I disliked the book because the book was just too detailed and even used words that were used differently in lecture.

I recorded all of his lectures because they weren't podcast, and I LABORIOUSLY wrote down every detail from every lecture. Upon doing this, I realized that many concepts and ideas he discussed skipped around and were disorganized. He would often reiterate the same concepts in different parts of the lecture but in a slightly different way, cut himself off during a stream of thought to discuss something else/an anecdote , and constantly correct himself after he had written stuff down on the board. To account for these things, I organized what I had written all down to establish a better flow of the concepts, and I then consolidated these notes into one form and studied them over...and over...and over...and over... and over again for the final. The final exam was excruciatingly long. Parts of the exam were reasonable and required you to regurgitate concepts, but other parts of the final were grossly excessive.

In summary, his section for the course was the bane of my existence and required a ludicrous amount of time. We covered full lecture of new material up until Friday of 10th week, and the final exam was less than a week away. Although Simmons tried to be pleasant and funny, he needs a little bit of an attitude adjustment when it comes to some of the biting things he would say. He sarcastically chuckled and told us that class evaluations "have no income on his salary no matter what we say." He also made remarks about how much he loves throwing cats to test their reflexes and how everyone continue should damage their hearing from loud headphones in order to keep funding his research about hearing loss. Thanks, Dwayne.