Reviews for Massimo Ricotti
Average Rating:| Anonymous Course: ASTR340 Grade Expected: A May 15, 2011, 1:38 pm | Pros: Knows what he's talking about, gives out copies of the lecture, very friendly and always willing to answer questions. Curve was set first day of class (100-85 A, 84-70 B, ...) and homework was 40% of the final grade. Cons: If you aren't super interested in some of the topics of the course, then some lectures can be pretty boring. The math involved in the homework gave some people problems, but overall it really was not that difficult if you could use the given equations and can convert units (high school level stuff). Overall: While I did enjoy the course a lot, it is "designed primarily for non-science majors" and therefore didn't go as in depth with physics as I personally would have liked. Regardless, I learned a lot and recommend both the course and the professor. |
| Anonymous Course: ASTR415 Grade Expected: A December 7, 2010, 1:44 pm | While I can't say Dr. Ricotti is a bad teacher, I can't say he's excellent either. As a person, he is excellent. Really, really nice and funny, and even brought us cookies and cake a couple of times. While his lectures are extremely dry, that may have been just because the material, computational astrophysics, can be pretty dull when you study the algorithms closely. He is an extremely fair grader, however. He is very willing to give extensions, and really tries very hard to give good grades. The homework was very difficult, but again, that was probably because the material is difficult. To summarize - if you are interested in the subject, take his class. Otherwise you may find lectures to be very boring. |