Reviews for Radu Victor
Average Rating:| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: A- December 20, 2011, 8:53 am | You will learn a lot from this professor compared to the others. We even had someone from the other class go tot our lectures because his professor did not cover all the material as well. He does have an accent, but its not hard to decipher. His tests are very hard , but you get use to them eventually. They usually feature some type of hard integration we learned in calculus 2 , but the TA's were very lenient with grading. Hes a funny guy and not as bad as everyone's making him out to be you just have to put effort into the class.Overall I am happy I took him because I got a lot out of the class and I'm not sure if the other section can say the same. I ended up with a 89% but got an A as my final grade so he did curve a little as well. |
| bigbabby Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: December 19, 2011, 10:05 pm | Please, no. Balan speaks quietly and with an odd accent, and this combined with the lectures taken directly from the book makes class unbearable. Quizzes are very hard and often not able to be finished in the time alloted. Tons of MATLAB assignments and you get random partners, which is great because I got someone who does absolutely nothing. Exams are filled with tricks and graded harshly. Class is barely curved, I think it was around 5 percent A's. He only curves up the bottom end of students to decrease his fail percentage. You can do well above the average and get a B. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: December 15, 2011, 2:29 pm | He does some theory and good examples. Make sure to study up using his practice exams, he uses those and gives it a twist. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: December 10, 2011, 9:42 pm | He is the smartest professor I have ever seen. he definitely knows what he is teaching. If you only care about a good grade, then avoid him. He doesn't curve AT ALL. I like him because of the fact that he really tries to help you when you have questions. He would make extra office hours to answer your questions and he will explain it until you understand. His tests are REALLY HARD/long and he does NOT curve, that's the only two things I didn't like about him. But you will learn a lot at the end. If he teaches other courses, I would consider taking it with him. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: November 30, 2011, 7:37 pm | While I agree with many of the points made below, I disagree with the onslaught of low ratings. 246 in and of itself is not that difficult of a course, just a lot of memorization. I would argue that barring a heavy accent, god-awful handwriting or complete ineptitude in enunciation, it's "hard" to teach 246 poorly. But I digress. I will whole-heartedly agree that his exams are a world of butt-hurt. He likes to throw in complicated integrals that you haven't seen since 141, if ever. He also throws in MATLAB related question (e.g. "Here is some MATLAB code, how many steps of the Euler Method are being used?"). The in-lecture quizzes aren't terrible but he's a real stickler when it comes to time limit, so work fast. If you've already taken 240 and/or 241, DO NOT think these MATLABs will be remotely at simple. I highly suggest against waiting until the night before to start on them. Overall, he's mediocre but not terrible. You won't find much better in 246 professors (except Justin, of course). |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: B October 26, 2011, 6:56 pm | Professor Balan is a joke. he teaches directly from the book, and EXACTLY like the person who wrote the long review said, you can know the diff eq material but he will toss in a difficult integral or a trig identity that screws up your whole problem. I knew the diff eq material when i went to take the first test really well... I went to my TA for practice and did all the homeworks... but got stuck halfway through EVERY problem because of a trig identity i forgot or some other stupid trick. ended up with a 56% on the test. so im dropping the class and taking it with another teacher because EVERYONE who I have talked to had easier tests and higher averages than professor Balan's class. Oh and by the way he NEVER lets you make up anything... I was in the hospital one night and that wasnt a good excuse for missing a quiz... another kid missed it because of a JEWISH HOLIDAY! and nope... no make ups. hes a grade A jerk. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: B January 18, 2011, 3:23 pm | Whoever submitted that long review, a few posts below mine, nailed everything 100% about Balan. Avoid this douche at all costs. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: C January 1, 2011, 8:19 am | believe the other reviews that give him one star. This class was hard, and he did not care at all about the grade distribution, so about 70% of his class got a C. Great! If the other professor is better, GO FOR THEM. Oh yeah and if you do take his class, the matlab assignments are graded HARD. A couple of times on quizzes he would include stuff we hadn't learned and when we complained he didn't care. So, best of luck! |
| zhangsta Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: B December 17, 2010, 1:46 pm | He pretty much teaches straight out of the book, which is a poorly written book to begin with, and tends to talk to the board. His exams weren't too bad if you do a lot of practice and understood the material. If you can, switch out of his class as the other professor would probably be better than him. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: D December 16, 2010, 2:12 am | Terrible Experience. He makes one feel as though it is Prof vs. student. I truly believe that he wants his students to fail. One can learn the process of solving differential equations and not do well on his tests. He usually tests one's ability to utilize an out of class trick to solve. These tricks are something like an unusual trig identity or difficult integral. Although I completed all of the assigned homework problems prior to the test and knew how to do all of the differential equations tested, I had a 65% test average because of missed tricks that did not appear in any of the homework problems. TEACHING ABILITY He lectures straight from the book and hard to understand. If you ask for help on a problem, his response will not be helpful. I once made the mistake of asking him for help and he gave me a very long and confusing response that took up 4 chalkboards and 15 minutes. When I asked someone else for help, I learned that the problem required merely one additional step from what I did to solve. QUIZZES My TA was kind of a harsh grader, but even they admitted off the record that Balan's quizzes are typically too long for the time allotted. He does not always follow his syllabus for quiz material. I believe this is because he wants to punish those that skip his confusing and unhelpful lectures. GRADE FORMAT He gives 11 quizzes (1 drop), 6 Matlab assignments (1 drop), 3 exams, and the final. Below are the grade distributions for his exams, which I copied directly from his website. (http://www-users.math.umd.edu/~rvbalan/TEACHING/MATH246Fall2010/index.html) Exam 1: A 24, B 25, C 41, D 29, F 72, Exam 2: A 23, B 75, C 44, D 19, F 16 Exam 3: A 10, B 23, C 32, D 45, F 55. Although I don't know the average, the quiz grades were fairly low (approximately 60%) and the Matlab grades fairly high (approximately 90%). The final class grade curve resulted in approximately 8% As and >25% Ds and Fs for the fall '10 semester. CONCLUSION Overall, he is like most UMD math professors in that he lectures straight from the book. However, unlike them he cannot provide any help in explaining the material. As stated previously, his out of class tutelage is actually negative because a student will likely be more confused about the problem after seeing him. Dr. Balan most be an incredible researcher because his teaching ability is very subpar.If you were to equate his teaching ability to that of a major league hitter, he would clearly be batting below the Mendoza line. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: B December 15, 2010, 11:30 pm | Out of 168 students: 11 got As and 40 got Bs What kind of stupid bullshit arbitrary curve gives only 6.5% of the class an A and 20.5% a B? I well outperformed the class average and still got a C in the course. Also, his lectures are a complete waste of time as he just repeats examples in the book, neither of the TAs were any help, and his quizzes do not follow the syllabus or the posted homework at all. Worst professor ever. Take anyone else. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: December 15, 2010, 3:34 pm | This is the worst professor I've ever had. No exceptions. Switch out, now. |
| MooseNinja Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: C December 13, 2010, 3:45 pm | All that Balan does in class is write the examples from the book on the board. He seems to favor the conceptual stuff over material that actually appears on quizzes and tests. He does not follow the online syllabus at all. He gave a quiz that had material from the next weeks lectures, he gave a quiz that had a problem that could not be solved by the methods taught in math246. Numerically speaking, approximately 1/3 of the test grades given were F's. He gave a total of 57 A's on 3 tests (465 total scores). |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: A February 21, 2010, 9:15 am | He is defiantly not as bad as others say. The material is very straight forward and he presents them clearly. Some people just do not get the material no matter who teachers it. All his notes are online and he basically just copies them on the board in class, but don't skip lecture because his notes are online. MATLAB is one every two weeks and you get to do them with a partner so it isn't alot of work. MATLAB isn't very hard but some people just don't get MATLAB and end up doing very poorly. The best tip I can offer is attend all classes and do your homework and practice exams. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: B December 28, 2009, 6:36 pm | He is a decent professor. People complain that he does not "teach" them the material well. People, in math classes at UMD, I've learned that you basically should just teach yourself the material. Cant expect professors to spoon-feed you the material. Balan presents the material clearly enough in his hand-written notes he posts. Those notes (as PDFs) were decent and I learned from those outside of class, which I seldom attended except for the weekly Tuesday quiz, after which, I would just leave. In summary, I guess dont even bother to go to class, just download his notes, go through them...do the HW and MATLAB projects... If you do the HW problems he assigns, you will do well on the quizzes/tests, because they are exactly the same kinds of problems, sometimes verbatim. Balan is a friendly guy with a good sense of humor, and he is a fair professor. Not as bad as the other reviewers make him out to be. Sometimes students just need to learn to teach themselves the material. |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: December 7, 2009, 7:32 pm | Pretty bad, what the others said is definitely true. He was particularly not adept at teaching all the matrix and laplace stuff during the last third of the semester, so good luck trying to figure that stuff out on your own... |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: December 6, 2009, 12:43 pm | Horrible experience. He presents the course content but doesn't necessarily "teach". Basically repeats what the book says during lecture so you're probably better of just reading the book and skipping lecture. Quizzes are very similar to homework problems, if not the same. Matlab counts a good amount so do well on those, luckily i had a good TA. Overall, I'm sure he's a nice guy but I feel he is inexperienced teaching a large undergrad class, perhaps he should stick to grad students. The odds are on your side in choosing the other professor for 246 |
| Anonymous Course: MATH246 Grade Expected: B November 17, 2009, 6:52 pm | Not the worst but certainly not the best. His policy on making up quizzes and tests is rather unforgiving (especially if you're out for a good amount of time with, say, swine flu). He has an accent, but isn't that hard to understand. He doesn't always explain things in the most straightforward way, so hopefully you have a TA who will make things more clear. He gives a ton of quizzes and they are generally straight from the suggest homework. I think he's not quite used to teaching an undergrad class and that might account for some of his issues. He's probably a good grad prof... but if you're taking him for an undergrad course and there's another option, the other person will probably be a better bet. |