Professor
Tommaso Treu
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Most Helpful Review
Winter 2023 - Average on first midterm was a 65 and on the second was a 71, and all he could say was that it was surprisingly low and he did not understand why we didn't get it. Granted I spent hours studying just to get both averages. This is supposed to be a science GE, and as an english major I was not expecting to have to know all of physics to be able to complete this course. The labs have nothing to do with the course, the textbook is useless and has actual crash course youtube videos embedded. Professor rips through the lectures so quickly good luck trying to understand anything.
Winter 2023 - Average on first midterm was a 65 and on the second was a 71, and all he could say was that it was surprisingly low and he did not understand why we didn't get it. Granted I spent hours studying just to get both averages. This is supposed to be a science GE, and as an english major I was not expecting to have to know all of physics to be able to complete this course. The labs have nothing to do with the course, the textbook is useless and has actual crash course youtube videos embedded. Professor rips through the lectures so quickly good luck trying to understand anything.
Most Helpful Review
Fall 2019 - As a GE, it's a perfectly fine, easy class, but I was not a fan, mostly because I wasn't interested. Treu is a cute prof, in that old guy passionate-about-astronomy type of way. However, he has the tendency to be really wishy-washy during lecture, so it's a little hard to stay engaged, particularly if you aren't already into the material. His slides were pretty disorganized and it's hard to really know what's the most important stuff to know for exams. He is very passionate about the material and open to student questions, so if you're really into astronomy, unlike me, he's a fun prof to have. Exams are open note and therefore, weren't too bad in terms of difficulty. The questions were sometimes confusingly worded and it wasn't always clear what they were asking. Final was actually trickier than anticipated because the questions weren't clear and I ended up using the entire 3 hours LOL. The most helpful materials were definitely worksheets that were done during TA discussions that covered much of the mathematical computations that would be on the exams. As long as you have some prior understanding of the topics (especially the math!) and where everything is at in your notes, you'll be fine. I will say, however, that I HATED Kudu, the online textbook we were required to pay for. If you're familiar with the LS7 series and Launchpad, it's pretty much a budget version of it. Super buggy, often changes answers to your quizzes, and a lot of the texts and videos are available for free online so I wasn't sure why I was required to pay 50 dollars just to watch Crashcourse Astronomy and have my quizzes graded wrong because the program changed my responses post submission. It was easy to get your credit back, though, by emailing the Kudu administrators to get it corrected. But still, if you're paying for a service, you'd think that it would work properly. Most people didn't go to lecture from what I saw, so that's up to you, but I do recommend attending discussions! He also had an extra credit opportunity that was fairly easy and only took like two hours of my time. Overall, fairly easy GE if you don't totally drop the ball on it.
Fall 2019 - As a GE, it's a perfectly fine, easy class, but I was not a fan, mostly because I wasn't interested. Treu is a cute prof, in that old guy passionate-about-astronomy type of way. However, he has the tendency to be really wishy-washy during lecture, so it's a little hard to stay engaged, particularly if you aren't already into the material. His slides were pretty disorganized and it's hard to really know what's the most important stuff to know for exams. He is very passionate about the material and open to student questions, so if you're really into astronomy, unlike me, he's a fun prof to have. Exams are open note and therefore, weren't too bad in terms of difficulty. The questions were sometimes confusingly worded and it wasn't always clear what they were asking. Final was actually trickier than anticipated because the questions weren't clear and I ended up using the entire 3 hours LOL. The most helpful materials were definitely worksheets that were done during TA discussions that covered much of the mathematical computations that would be on the exams. As long as you have some prior understanding of the topics (especially the math!) and where everything is at in your notes, you'll be fine. I will say, however, that I HATED Kudu, the online textbook we were required to pay for. If you're familiar with the LS7 series and Launchpad, it's pretty much a budget version of it. Super buggy, often changes answers to your quizzes, and a lot of the texts and videos are available for free online so I wasn't sure why I was required to pay 50 dollars just to watch Crashcourse Astronomy and have my quizzes graded wrong because the program changed my responses post submission. It was easy to get your credit back, though, by emailing the Kudu administrators to get it corrected. But still, if you're paying for a service, you'd think that it would work properly. Most people didn't go to lecture from what I saw, so that's up to you, but I do recommend attending discussions! He also had an extra credit opportunity that was fairly easy and only took like two hours of my time. Overall, fairly easy GE if you don't totally drop the ball on it.
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