ANTH266 | PlanetTerp

Information	Review
Salvador Valdez-Ono ANTH266 Expecting an A Anonymous 10/03/2024	Sal is a great teacher and a very kind and understanding person. He doesn't give late work penalties for minor assignments and if you explain your situation to him when you have to miss class or turn in a big assignment late he is an open ear and flexible with his students. There is nothing bad I could possibly say about this teacher. I wish more of my professors were like him. Sometimes the lectures can be a little bit dry, but I don't think you can help it when the content is about the theory of thought... inevitably, its a little bit convoluted, Sal makes it bearable and is great at talking about all of his subjects. He is very good at connecting the topic to you even if you have never taken anything anthropology related and totally know nothing about the subject. He provides ample office hours and is plenty responsive over email as well. In my experience, he always provides you personal feedback on your work. I highly recommend his class, it's super easy. You don't have to buy any textbook, each week you just read one article and right a brief response to it. There is no exam, you just write a paper or do a final project of some kind, which you work on the entire semester. The great thing is you can essentially write/talk about anything you want for the project, it's extremely malleable, you just have to ask Sal if it's something out of the ordinary and he will probably approve it. The class material is not at all challenging, it's a super easy A and you will pretty much never ever stress about this class unless you're an idiot and procrastinate on your paper until the last day to do it. A few people might find this class/lectures boring or somehow struggle with the material (which I think is unrealistic because of how plain easy it is) but even if you do there is absolutely no chance you have problems with this class unless you're just incredibly lazy and skip all the lectures and do absolutely nothing. In which case, it's your fault. Otherwise, you have no trouble getting an A.
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 06/17/2024	Very passionate and knowledgeable. Her grading is designed for students to succeed. As long as you understand the material, which Proffesor Kopelentova Rehak makes very easy to digest, you should not worry about your grade.
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/21/2024	Great professor! No exams at all, just attend the class because there are a lot of in class activities you would have to do throughout the whole semester even though she does drop 2 lowest grade from both group work and individual work. With there being no exams, there are about five major projects you would have to do but they’re not that bad! I’m not an anthropology major or anything bc just took the class since it takes out 3 gen eds. I would recommend this class!
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/02/2024	Great professor! No exams at all just attend the class because there are a lot of in class activities you would have to do throughout the whole semester even though she does drop 2 lowest grade from both group work and individual work. With there being no exams, there are about five major projects you would have to do but they’re not that bad! I’m not an anthropology major or anything bc just took the class since it takes out 3 gen eds. Would recommend this class!
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/19/2023	Shaffer is a great professor! Her lectures are engaging and relevant. She understood that a lot of her students were taking the class as a GenEd and made a conscious effort to keep the courseload reasonable. There were five "large" assignments (all take-home) and participation grades.
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting a B- Anonymous 12/19/2023	Nice person but grades the essays ridiculously harsh. Or maybe i'm just blind to the fact that my essays suck, take this review as you will, my intention isn't to knock her.
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/14/2023	If you need a easy Gen-ed, I'd highly recommend this class with Professor Shaffer. Mandatory attendance but you learn some pretty cool stuff and you don't have to go to 2-4 of the classes. Assignments aren't hard, just a little time consuming.
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/29/2023	- Kind professor, very passionate about her field. - The readings and videos we were expected to read/watch for homework essays were kind of long, as were the essays. But they weren’t graded too harshly.
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 01/11/2023	Super nice professor. Just write one essay per week and the class is super chill. Professor Rehak is super knowledgable and I highly recommend her.
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/14/2022	Easy lenient grader on papers. Straight forward prompts, no need to be creative or anything. She's really nice too and her passion makes the topic really interesting too
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Anonymous 05/12/2022	This class was just comprised of weekly readings and an essay, and you only had to show up to the online lecture and discussion to get credit. The discussions and lectures were interesting, and despite them being online, were engaging. My biggest complaint was the lack of clarity of what we had to do for the essays and the grading inconsistency. Also, the readings felt like they went on for a long time, but they were mostly interesting
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 01/07/2022	I really liked this class, surprisingly. The writing prompts are fairly easy, and you can quickly write them (within an hour) by just reading the conclusions and talking about your opinions of the topics discussed. English isn't her first language, which honestly helps with the writing prompts as you don't have to put as much work into making sure you have a great line of thought or transitions. Class was always interesting, and she grades really leniently. Highly recommend her for this class, easy gen ed!
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 08/31/2020	I just finished a semester with Dr. Shaffer and honestly she was one of the nicest professors that I have had at umd. Her class weighs heavily on discussions which for a subject such as climate change, it should have more of a discussion based lecture. She is very passionate about her work and is very welcoming when going to office hours. As long as you put in effort in her class you should get a good grade.
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Anonymous 05/01/2019	She's passionate about the material that she teaches, I love that. No final exam... just a large project. In class participation is a large portion of your grade so attendance is required. Loved this class!
Jana Kopelentova Rehak ANTH266 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/13/2019	English isn't her first language so she can be hard to understand sometimes, but she cares about the subject. Also because of that, everyone who turned in the writing assignments basically got 100s, so hooray, GPA boost.
L Jen Shaffer ANTH266 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 04/18/2018	She is a really fun professor. Talks about the material and loves when students come to office hours just to talk. Easy class if you follow the rubric for papers, and no exams!

Salvador Valdez-Ono
ANTH266

Expecting an A
Anonymous
10/03/2024

Sal is a great teacher and a very kind and understanding person. He doesn't give late work penalties for minor assignments and if you explain your situation to him when you have to miss class or turn in a big assignment late he is an open ear and flexible with his students. There is nothing bad I could possibly say about this teacher. I wish more of my professors were like him. Sometimes the lectures can be a little bit dry, but I don't think you can help it when the content is about the theory of thought... inevitably, its a little bit convoluted, Sal makes it bearable and is great at talking about all of his subjects. He is very good at connecting the topic to you even if you have never taken anything anthropology related and totally know nothing about the subject. He provides ample office hours and is plenty responsive over email as well. In my experience, he always provides you personal feedback on your work. I highly recommend his class, it's super easy. You don't have to buy any textbook, each week you just read one article and right a brief response to it. There is no exam, you just write a paper or do a final project of some kind, which you work on the entire semester. The great thing is you can essentially write/talk about anything you want for the project, it's extremely malleable, you just have to ask Sal if it's something out of the ordinary and he will probably approve it. The class material is not at all challenging, it's a super easy A and you will pretty much never ever stress about this class unless you're an idiot and procrastinate on your paper until the last day to do it. A few people might find this class/lectures boring or somehow struggle with the material (which I think is unrealistic because of how plain easy it is) but even if you do there is absolutely no chance you have problems with this class unless you're just incredibly lazy and skip all the lectures and do absolutely nothing. In which case, it's your fault. Otherwise, you have no trouble getting an A.

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
06/17/2024

Very passionate and knowledgeable. Her grading is designed for students to succeed. As long as you understand the material, which Proffesor Kopelentova Rehak makes very easy to digest, you should not worry about your grade.

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting an A
Anonymous
01/21/2024

Great professor! No exams at all, just attend the class because there are a lot of in class activities you would have to do throughout the whole semester even though she does drop 2 lowest grade from both group work and individual work. With there being no exams, there are about five major projects you would have to do but they’re not that bad! I’m not an anthropology major or anything bc just took the class since it takes out 3 gen eds. I would recommend this class!

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting an A
Anonymous
01/02/2024

Great professor! No exams at all just attend the class because there are a lot of in class activities you would have to do throughout the whole semester even though she does drop 2 lowest grade from both group work and individual work. With there being no exams, there are about five major projects you would have to do but they’re not that bad! I’m not an anthropology major or anything bc just took the class since it takes out 3 gen eds. Would recommend this class!

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
12/19/2023

Shaffer is a great professor! Her lectures are engaging and relevant. She understood that a lot of her students were taking the class as a GenEd and made a conscious effort to keep the courseload reasonable. There were five "large" assignments (all take-home) and participation grades.

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting a B-
Anonymous
12/19/2023

Nice person but grades the essays ridiculously harsh. Or maybe i'm just blind to the fact that my essays suck, take this review as you will, my intention isn't to knock her.

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
12/14/2023

If you need a easy Gen-ed, I'd highly recommend this class with Professor Shaffer. Mandatory attendance but you learn some pretty cool stuff and you don't have to go to 2-4 of the classes. Assignments aren't hard, just a little time consuming.

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Expecting an A
Anonymous
04/29/2023

- Kind professor, very passionate about her field. - The readings and videos we were expected to read/watch for homework essays were kind of long, as were the essays. But they weren’t graded too harshly.

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
01/11/2023

Super nice professor. Just write one essay per week and the class is super chill. Professor Rehak is super knowledgable and I highly recommend her.

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Expecting an A
Anonymous
11/14/2022

Easy lenient grader on papers. Straight forward prompts, no need to be creative or anything. She's really nice too and her passion makes the topic really interesting too

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Anonymous
05/12/2022

This class was just comprised of weekly readings and an essay, and you only had to show up to the online lecture and discussion to get credit. The discussions and lectures were interesting, and despite them being online, were engaging. My biggest complaint was the lack of clarity of what we had to do for the essays and the grading inconsistency. Also, the readings felt like they went on for a long time, but they were mostly interesting

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
01/07/2022

I really liked this class, surprisingly. The writing prompts are fairly easy, and you can quickly write them (within an hour) by just reading the conclusions and talking about your opinions of the topics discussed. English isn't her first language, which honestly helps with the writing prompts as you don't have to put as much work into making sure you have a great line of thought or transitions. Class was always interesting, and she grades really leniently. Highly recommend her for this class, easy gen ed!

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
08/31/2020

I just finished a semester with Dr. Shaffer and honestly she was one of the nicest professors that I have had at umd. Her class weighs heavily on discussions which for a subject such as climate change, it should have more of a discussion based lecture. She is very passionate about her work and is very welcoming when going to office hours. As long as you put in effort in her class you should get a good grade.

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Anonymous
05/01/2019

She's passionate about the material that she teaches, I love that. No final exam... just a large project. In class participation is a large portion of your grade so attendance is required. Loved this class!

Jana Kopelentova Rehak
ANTH266

Expecting an A
Anonymous
01/13/2019

English isn't her first language so she can be hard to understand sometimes, but she cares about the subject. Also because of that, everyone who turned in the writing assignments basically got 100s, so hooray, GPA boost.

L Jen Shaffer
ANTH266

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
04/18/2018

She is a really fun professor. Talks about the material and loves when students come to office hours just to talk. Easy class if you follow the rubric for papers, and no exams!

Reviews for ANTH266