HACS101 | PlanetTerp

Information	Review
Michel Cukier HACS101 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 09/03/2024	He doesn't teach, doesn't show up to class at all, and somehow gets paid more than anyone who does anything for the program he's supposed to be directing. Frankly, he's a disgrace to the CS department as a whole. Shout out to the HACS101 TAs, who are trying their best despite being the only people more confused than the students
Michel Cukier HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 08/14/2024	It takes a special sort of terrible to have a 1.26 rating on PlanetTerp, but Michel Cukier is certainly an especially unpleasant person and instructor. He was decidedly rude and uncompromisable when it comes to punctuality(yelled at students for being 2 minutes late to class on the first day due to walking conflicts) for a professor who showed up to class no more than 5 or 6 times during the semester. The entire class was left for the TAs to teach(TAs who were all, or at the very least close to all, sophomores, which is not a criticism on their ability to teach- frankly, they were better instructors than Professor Cukier could ever hope to be- but please consider the ramifications of having students not even halfway through their undergraduate studies teaching a course on their own), which raises the question of why Michel Cukier is listed as an instructor at all.
Michel Cukier HACS101 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 05/22/2024	If 1000 people hate Michel Cukier I'm one of them, if he only has 1 hater that's me, if he has 0 haters I'm dead.
Michel Cukier HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 02/28/2024	He doesnt even teach... I guess thats a blessing in disguise...
Michel Cukier HACS101 Anonymous 01/29/2024	Day 1 and I arrive to class from Iribe, I am 6 minutes late. These are his words to me and subsequent students that come from the same building. "Last time you are late next time do not come to class if you are late again, I don't care where you were change your schedule." Never have I ever met someone so unsympathetic and rude on the first day of classes and to someone he's never even met before! Unfortunately this professor is the only one that teaches this course and my schedule cant be changed to accommodate for his lack on leniency for students that have these slight conflicts. Will update review as semester goes on but he is already not starting off on the right foot with his students.
Zhi Xiang Lin HACS101 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 08/14/2023	Rude and dismissive to students. Very condescending. Expects students to figure out most of the class by themselves. Grades unpredictably.
Zhi Xiang Lin HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/03/2023	Toby is a really great professor and you can definitely tell that he wants you to succeed not only in his class, but also in the industry in general. His slides are so good! All the other professors are just a wall of text, but the slides in 101 are all diagrams and visuals which really helps with understanding the concepts. Quizzes are easy as long as you took notes in class or you can watch the recording too to get the answers. The homework assignments are straight forward and he provides a learning outcome statement for each assignment and how that relates to the future HACS200 class, some of them are harder than others, I think on the average they were a few hours each week. The midterm was really tough, but Toby gave a debrief afterwards and showed which slides he took the questions from and let us do exam corrections to get points back. I think that really shows that he really does want you to learn the material, but at the same time offering some grade protections for us. He also spends a lot of time focusing on the outside of classroom skills, like teaching us how to ask good questions for feedback, I really liked that because it helped me feel less anxious about asking others for feedback, having almost like a template of do's and don'ts. He answers questions really quickly on slack, sometimes even late at night. He's also super great to talk to about cybersecurity or compsci in general, he'll share a lot of his industry experiences with you. I asked him for suggestions on some material that was outside of the course material and he was able to provide a lot of advice to me. An important note is that Toby does not do any research as he's not a full time faculty, he said that because he has a full time industry job outside of ACES, he doesn't do research but was able to point me to professors that did do research. It was also really cool to learn about the company that he and another ACES student founded while they were at UMD. Overall, I really liked the class, helped me understand networking and containers a lot more, would definitely recommend having him for the class!
Toby Lin HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/27/2023	Rude and dismissive to students. Full of himself. Expects students to figure out most of the class by themselves. Grades unpredictably.
Toby Lin HACS101 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 04/26/2023	Manages to give a 4-credit class worth of work within a 2-credit class. Purposefully avoids directly answering questions, leading to miscommunication on expectations on assignments and projects. I understand he is trying to make learning topics more independent instead of relying on him for answers, but it gets to the point where he literally provides no guidance, acting as if we should already have complete confidence in the topic after just 1 week. The class overall isn't difficult, but his grading techniques can be questionable.
Toby Lin HACS101 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 04/24/2023	Absolutely useless teacher. Acts stuck up and like he is doing a really good job, but is actually overloading a 2 credit course with completely unnecessary technical work. This course would be excellent if they spread out the content over more time, and taught it in depth. However, Toby will give a 30 minute presentation on Mondays and expect you to know the topic as if you were a veteran expert in the field.
Toby Lin HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 03/27/2023	Super unclear with just about everything. His class is more about how much you understand the stuff that he's talking about rather than the stuff on the slides. If you're good at taking notes from a person talking then you should be fine.
Toby Lin HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 03/07/2023	Smart guy but kind of indirect.
Zhi Xiang Lin HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 09/17/2022	Toby is definitely super knowledgeable about cybersecurity. If there is anyone you would want to get information about cyber from, it's him. He has a lot of industry experience and even runs his own cybersecurity company, so he is really trustworthy and knows the latest trends from the industry. The homework assignments can be challenging (as well as the final) but you will learn a lot about Linux, networking, etc. from this class.
Zhi Xiang Lin HACS101 Expecting an A Anonymous 06/03/2022	Good professor, very receptive and helpful. He definitely wants you to succeed in the class. Weekly quizzes were easy as long as you paid attention during class, but weekly homework often took a long time. The final was rough and not completely based on what we did during the class (more focused on what we will do during HACS200), but he curved the final so it didn't negatively damage people's grades too much.

Michel Cukier
HACS101

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
09/03/2024

He doesn't teach, doesn't show up to class at all, and somehow gets paid more than anyone who does anything for the program he's supposed to be directing. Frankly, he's a disgrace to the CS department as a whole. Shout out to the HACS101 TAs, who are trying their best despite being the only people more confused than the students

Michel Cukier
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
08/14/2024

It takes a special sort of terrible to have a 1.26 rating on PlanetTerp, but Michel Cukier is certainly an especially unpleasant person and instructor. He was decidedly rude and uncompromisable when it comes to punctuality(yelled at students for being 2 minutes late to class on the first day due to walking conflicts) for a professor who showed up to class no more than 5 or 6 times during the semester. The entire class was left for the TAs to teach(TAs who were all, or at the very least close to all, sophomores, which is not a criticism on their ability to teach- frankly, they were better instructors than Professor Cukier could ever hope to be- but please consider the ramifications of having students not even halfway through their undergraduate studies teaching a course *on their own*), which raises the question of why Michel Cukier is listed as an instructor at all.

Michel Cukier
HACS101

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
05/22/2024

If 1000 people hate Michel Cukier I'm one of them, if he only has 1 hater that's me, if he has 0 haters I'm dead.

Michel Cukier
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
02/28/2024

He doesnt even teach... I guess thats a blessing in disguise...

Michel Cukier
HACS101

Anonymous
01/29/2024

Day 1 and I arrive to class from Iribe, I am 6 minutes late. These are his words to me and subsequent students that come from the same building. "Last time you are late next time do not come to class if you are late again, I don't care where you were change your schedule." Never have I ever met someone so unsympathetic and rude on the first day of classes and to someone he's never even met before! Unfortunately this professor is the only one that teaches this course and my schedule cant be changed to accommodate for his lack on leniency for students that have these slight conflicts. Will update review as semester goes on but he is already not starting off on the right foot with his students.

Zhi Xiang Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
08/14/2023

Rude and dismissive to students. Very condescending. Expects students to figure out most of the class by themselves. Grades unpredictably.

Zhi Xiang Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/03/2023

Toby is a really great professor and you can definitely tell that he wants you to succeed not only in his class, but also in the industry in general. His slides are so good! All the other professors are just a wall of text, but the slides in 101 are all diagrams and visuals which really helps with understanding the concepts. Quizzes are easy as long as you took notes in class or you can watch the recording too to get the answers. The homework assignments are straight forward and he provides a learning outcome statement for each assignment and how that relates to the future HACS200 class, some of them are harder than others, I think on the average they were a few hours each week. The midterm was really tough, but Toby gave a debrief afterwards and showed which slides he took the questions from and let us do exam corrections to get points back. I think that really shows that he really does want you to learn the material, but at the same time offering some grade protections for us. He also spends a lot of time focusing on the outside of classroom skills, like teaching us how to ask good questions for feedback, I really liked that because it helped me feel less anxious about asking others for feedback, having almost like a template of do's and don'ts. He answers questions really quickly on slack, sometimes even late at night. He's also super great to talk to about cybersecurity or compsci in general, he'll share a lot of his industry experiences with you. I asked him for suggestions on some material that was outside of the course material and he was able to provide a lot of advice to me. An important note is that Toby does not do any research as he's not a full time faculty, he said that because he has a full time industry job outside of ACES, he doesn't do research but was able to point me to professors that did do research. It was also really cool to learn about the company that he and another ACES student founded while they were at UMD. Overall, I really liked the class, helped me understand networking and containers a lot more, would definitely recommend having him for the class!

Toby Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
04/27/2023

Rude and dismissive to students. Full of himself. Expects students to figure out most of the class by themselves. Grades unpredictably.

Toby Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
04/26/2023

Manages to give a 4-credit class worth of work within a 2-credit class. Purposefully avoids directly answering questions, leading to miscommunication on expectations on assignments and projects. I understand he is trying to make learning topics more independent instead of relying on him for answers, but it gets to the point where he literally provides no guidance, acting as if we should already have complete confidence in the topic after just 1 week. The class overall isn't difficult, but his grading techniques can be questionable.

Toby Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
04/24/2023

Absolutely useless teacher. Acts stuck up and like he is doing a really good job, but is actually overloading a 2 credit course with completely unnecessary technical work. This course would be excellent if they spread out the content over more time, and taught it in depth. However, Toby will give a 30 minute presentation on Mondays and expect you to know the topic as if you were a veteran expert in the field.

Toby Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
03/27/2023

Super unclear with just about everything. His class is more about how much you understand the stuff that he's talking about rather than the stuff on the slides. If you're good at taking notes from a person talking then you should be fine.

Toby Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
03/07/2023

Smart guy but kind of indirect.

Zhi Xiang Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
09/17/2022

Toby is definitely super knowledgeable about cybersecurity. If there is anyone you would want to get information about cyber from, it's him. He has a lot of industry experience and even runs his own cybersecurity company, so he is really trustworthy and knows the latest trends from the industry. The homework assignments can be challenging (as well as the final) but you will learn a lot about Linux, networking, etc. from this class.

Zhi Xiang Lin
HACS101

Expecting an A
Anonymous
06/03/2022

Good professor, very receptive and helpful. He definitely wants you to succeed in the class. Weekly quizzes were easy as long as you paid attention during class, but weekly homework often took a long time. The final was rough and not completely based on what we did during the class (more focused on what we will do during HACS200), but he curved the final so it didn't negatively damage people's grades too much.

Reviews for HACS101