While shopping period has already come to an end, it’s still never too early to take a look at the course evaluations from last semester and start planning for the fall (okay, perhaps it’s a bit too early). Luckily, if you were basing your class decisions on our post from last year, not much has changed with the latest batch of course evaluations.
The Highest Rated Department:
East Asian Studies once again, garnering an average score of 4.55 for the quality of its courses.
Lowest Rated Departments:
Physics (3.33) has now dropped below Economics (3.46) to take the spot of lowest rated department in terms of average course quality. Also joining them in the bottom three is Civil and Environmental Engineering (3.46).
Student Happiness by Department:
Humanities students are still the happiest, with most humanities departments garnering scores over 4.00, resulting in an overall average of 4.18. On the other hand, only one natural science department (Molecular Biology) had above a 4.00. But B.S.E. students seem to be happier than a few years ago, with the department coming in second for the quality of their courses at 3.82.
Some classes to avoid?
CHM 305: The Quantum World (rated a dismal 1.82)
EGR 191: Integrated Introduction to EMP: Math (2.16)
PHY 101: Introductory Physics (2.72)
On the other hand, small seminar classes fared well, most notably:
HIS 448: History: An Introduction to the Discipline (a perfect 5.0)
CLA 336 / LIN 336: Introduction to Indo-European (4.85).
DAN 209: Introduction to Movement and Dance (4.93)
CWR 201: Creative Writing Poetry (4.73).
As one enthusiastic student wrote about CWR 201, “Absolutely take it. The world will open up and speak to you, and you’ll learn how to tell others about it. Poetry is life.”
