Andres Rubiano Acosta

This professor has taught: ENES220, ENES221, ENES232

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Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 06/05/2025	Bluntly put Dr. Rubiano might be too smart for a lot of students. If you miss something he says, you gotta ask or come to his office hours. Once you get that hang of the class you learn to love it. His practice problems are sometimes too intricate, but they are what prepares you for the more difficult exam problems. He makes a habit of reminding us to care about learning, and not worrying about grades. At times is hard to do that, but when you realize what you're in college for, it's easier to do. His lectures are clear and covers a lot in 50 minutes. His life lessons are priceless. I would take any class he offers. He is organized and responds to messages in less than an hour (don't send him emails, send him a class message through Elms). I think the only downside of the higher difficulty of his class is that you expect the exams to be impossible hard, and that can be anxiety inducing at times. But on the other hand, once you take the first exam you realize how easy they are because of how much you've learned. Maybe Rubiano is not for everyone, but surely for anyone who truly cares about learning. You'll learn a lot.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 06/03/2025	I only got an A because of professor Rubiano's office hours. I had Anderson for Thermo, but he only teaches you how to use equations. Rubiano finally made it click all for me. Any question I had for Anderson that he made up something for, Rubiano had a clear and concise answer for. I had Rubiano for ENES221, so I made an effort to go to his office hours. Just like in 221, Rubiano will explain anything you ask him in a way that just clicks. I wish I could've taken Thermo with him. At least I'm glad you can just look up his summary lectures on youtube to study for exams. They're a lifesaver when crunching for the final.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a C- Anonymous 06/03/2025	As a student who got a C- in this class, I can tell you Rubiano does not like slackers. And seeing his reviews here, slackers apparently don't like him either. That being said, Rubiano's class is as organized as they come. His thought process for problem solving is something I'll take with me forever, and I only wish I had noticed this sooner. Forget about his youtube, his classes are amazing. He does not dilly dally with the math but rather with the problem setup and how to approach any problem. He goes over many complex examples in each class. I think there's a learning curve to his teaching style, and if you're not there to see him teach and go through that curve yourself, you're just going to be frustrated. I know I was, but that was all my fault, not his. If you're here to get some sound advice, here it is: do NOT listen to what all these people that very obviously weren't expecting an A are complaining about. Lectures are a 10 out of 10, class examples will prepare you for the hardest problems, and he is on another level of smart. If you don't like rubiano as a professor, you probably didn't get to really know him.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 06/03/2025	Rubiano is really strict and he can be, cause he knows what he's talking about. The guy is really smart and conveys that knowledge with ease - pun intended. If you make it to class and participate, he'll be really helpful with absolutely anything you need. If you have never shown your face and intend to pass the class by watching what has always been intended to be a review, not an actual lecture, he's gonna be really harsh with you. You miss a quiz, you get a zero. You miss a deadline, you don't get a second chance. You ask for points back, he'll demonstrate how wrong you are and prove that you actually deserved fewer points. IMO he cares very much about the students that put it the work, and will give hell to those that want to get an A for doing very little or expect a curve. Also, you don't need the textbook at all. He covers a lot more than the textbook does in class.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 06/02/2025	He just doesn't teach. I had him for ENES220 last semester and, while we were still expected to watch his videos sometimes, he still tried to teach course material in class. This semester, he switched over entirely to his stupid lecture videos. I gave them a genuine try, but they are too general and spend way too much time on practice problems. Attending class felt like a complete waste of time because he would spend the entire class half-completing practice problems and harping on the most pointless details (spending 15 minutes teaching us how to look up values in tables during three different classes). While the 'flipped classroom' style teaching just isn't for me in general, I felt like he did a particularly bad job executing it. He would also forgot to post things on gradescope (homework assignments, exam grades). He had to delay the homework due date multiple different times because he did not remember to open up the assignment until hours before it was due. He says he only curves people who 'deserve it,' but my final percentage grade is 3% higher than the one calculated from my scores. Unless he felt like someone who was visibly never paying attention in class despite sitting in the front row (me) deserved to go from an A to an A+ (which is not an important grade distinction), I'm pretty sure he curves everyone's final grades. There was also a ~3% curve for ENES220 when he taught it, too, so I think that might apply to all of his classes.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a B Anonymous 06/02/2025	Half his morning classroom was always empty. I think the hate comes from thinking you can sporadically come to class because you can watch his lectures later. You miss out and are going to be lost when you do come to class if you rely on supplementary resources and call that his class. Rubiano is by far the best professor I've had. He is extremely organized and his lecture videos are very clear. He assigns an enormous amount of work in terms of keeping up with recorded lectures and practice problems, but if you do keep up, and A is very easy to get. I personally skipped class a lot at first because I knew his lectures were online, but after I dedicated more time a lot more time to this class, everything was clear as water. He does not curve but I did get a small bump in my grade as I performed substantially better with every exam there was, which he says he does. 5/5
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/28/2025	Rubiano is not a terrible professor. His class is structured where you have to watch a video before class to learn and take notes, then in class he goes over example problems. The videos are 8-12 minutes and can all be seen on his youtube channel less boring lectures. If you want to learn anything from them you will have to take 30-45 minutes of taking notes per video because they are extremely fast paced and require lots of stopping and writing down. Most of what he says in class was "if you watched the videos this concept should be obvious" or "if you are unsure about this concept make sure to rewatch the video". The examples he goes over in class are not the most helpful with him often setting up a problem very quickly with variables then saying that it should make sense and moving on. If you missed a video or don't feel you understand don't go to that class it will be hard to get anything from it, Most of the class stopped going to lecture after the first week and only came for Friday studios. He started to say he was going to give quizzes during class time(which the syllabus specifically says wouldn't happen) to try to get people to attend class. The quizzes did end up getting dropped and didn't hurt your grade at the end of the semester. The exams are pretty fair and if you show improvement he gives a healthy curve even though he says all semester he won't curve. Another important thing to note is that he assigns random group for the project which is a little annoying but not the worst. Overall he is a nice guy and if you are willing to learn mostly from videos and on your own he's a fine professor to take.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Anonymous 05/28/2025	DO NOT TAKE RUBIANO unless you are confident in your ability to teach yourself the material for an entire course. Yes its does help to go to lecture and discussion and to watch his youtube videos (which are the only source of material you get) but with that being said, I did all of this and still almost didn't pass the class. Reasons I would avoid Rubiano at ALL COSTS: 1) He doesn't teach. He assigns you youtube videos from his channel to watch before every lecture which could be helpful except for the fact that the videos cover material as if you've taken the course before or have a background in thermo or the concepts covered in the class which is not the case for most people who take this class. This fact makes the videos a little more useful when studying for the final but I was not to go back and rewatch every video while trying to study for 4 other finals. The videos are not helpful and caused me to be so lost from the start and had to try to play catchup the rest of the semester. He also just has wrong equations in his videos 2) He "teaches" to the test and the homework. He is not interested in actually having you know the material from start to finish, he just wants you to have the exact amount info he feels you need to be able to complete the HW. He also told our class that a specific topic wouldn't be covered on an exam and then there was an entire question on that topic so you can't trust what he says 3) HE DOESNT CURVE. He claims that his sections had the highest averages on the exams but I dont see how that is possible since he doesn't teach and often cant finish examples in class or gets them wrong. He doesn't curve the class but i will say he does curve at the end on an individual basis which I really appreciated. 4) (less of a reason but thought I'd share) He just wants to be liked. I couldn't tell you the amount of time he spent in lecture complaining to us that he graded his exam question the day after the exam and is really upset that this one other guy hasn't graded his yet and he would grade the whole exam if he could blah blah blah. 5) He doesn't respond to emails or canvas messages unless he is literally in the classroom which can be very frustrating. TLDR: He doesn't teach, you have to watch his videos which are too fast and not good for learning thermo for the first time, he doesn't curve, and honestly I don't know if Rubiano would have been able to pass our final
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/27/2025	He makes thermo pretty easy to get an A or A- in. If you go to every lecture, do the homeworks, and do the studios, you should be guaranteed a good grade depending on how you do in exams. He has a really helpful YouTube channel that he always plugs during class, you usually have to watch the assigned video before lecture and he talks about that video during lecture, they are only like 5-10 minutes long. His lectures are a little bit boring, however, and he talks in the really monotone voice that can be hard to listen to. Interestingly, his exam averages are higher than the exam averages in other sections, im guessing he just provides us better resources than the other 232 instructors. He adds a few extra points to the end of your course grade if he feels like you are trying (doing all your assignments and showing improvements on exams), he pushed my 88 to a 92. Even if you do terrible on one exam, he will let it slide if you show improvement.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/20/2025	Top Dawg on that youtube grind. He spends a lot of time making those youtube videos, they are very very good for teaching thermo.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/19/2025	He doesn't deserve the hate. He's a great guy who cares about his students. I brought up errors in my exam grading, and he immediately fixed them. His YouTube lectures are good, but I did wish he lectured a little more. He gave great examples, and our class always had the highest averages for exams. He gave quizzes, but they ended up not counting towards finals. Do a great review before exams. I recommend him greatly, made me interested in the subject.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Anonymous 05/19/2025	Everyone else is hating, I've had him two semesters in a row and have gone to class every day. He tells you to watch a 10/15-minute video before each class, in class briefly summarizes it, and does 1-2 complex problems applying it. He explains things conceptually very well (very helpful in office hours), and does good reviews before exams. Watching the videos can be boring, but his averages for exams are significantly higher than other sections. There is no reason to avoid taking him.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/10/2025	He just doesn't really teach. As others have said, he assigns videos before every lecture to watch, but these aren't proper lectures - they're Organic Chem Tutor-style reviews of the material that are 10 minutes long. (Even if they were full lectures, I hate the flipped learning model). Rubiano says we should be taking ~30 mins to watch them and write notes, but that's absurdly frustrating and hard to learn from. Then, in lectures, he'll do a problem or two, but I rarely felt like it elevated my understanding. Most of my actual 'learning' happened during Friday studios and homeworks when I actually had to solve problems myself. Also says he won't curve our class, except if he thinks you individually deserve a higher grade. But I always go to Anderson for office hours (he's great) so how would he know how much effort I've put in? He's an okay guy I guess, makes the classroom feel a bit stifled but he's not, like, actively harmful to the learning environment. Just a very frustrating professor to learn from.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/10/2025	Hes a good professor when he actually decides to teach but that's about half the time, he expects that everyone has watched the youtube videos that he made several years ago, admitadly they are good but not good enough that I want to be introduced to topics, also never believe a promise this guy makes I don't think a single one has been true the entire semester
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Anonymous 05/08/2025	Teaching from YouTube videos the whole year should not be allowed at UMD. I would understand if it was supplemental like some other teachers do, but this is ridiculous.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/07/2025	Wow we have hit a new low. I can't say I've had a professor like him. His other thermo reviews are extremely accurate, in that he definitely does not teach well, if at all. His class time is him spending the time plugging his youtube channel. Mid-semester, he switched from calling it youtube videos to "online lectures". The channel's name "Less Boring Lectures" is definitely false info. He also started giving out more quizzes because he was depressed no one showed up to his class. I learned from reverse teaching myself from the homeworks. I can't wait to be done with this class. I almost feel sorry.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/06/2025	Professor Rubiano does not teach. Instead of giving real lectures, he assigns YouTube videos and reads through confusing or incorrect examples in class, rarely finishing them or explaining clearly. His lectures are disorganized, often inaccurate, and not aligned with assignments. Students are left to rely on textbooks, online videos, and their own efforts to learn the material. Despite seeming nice, he’s petty and disingenuous. His approach makes learning harder, not easier. He shouldn’t be teaching at UMD if all he does is shove his online materials down the throat.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES232 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/05/2025	Horrible Professor. He does not teach during lectures, and instead has assigned YouTube videos to watch to learn content. His lectures instead consist of working partially through example problems which he does not fully answer or explain. He also decides to randomly have in-class quizzes, which are against the course-wide syllabus. Watching the video lectures for content is not enough to do well in the class, as reading the textbook is a necessity for this professor. Do not take this professor if you can.
Andres Rubiano Acosta Anonymous 03/04/2025	Read the textbook, but he will help you out with individual curves. Good guy!
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES220 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 01/15/2025	He seemed like he really cared about the content he was teaching. However, there were multiple times in which he went out of his way to teach content differently than the other professors, which could make parts of the homework confusing. He also wasn't a very interesting lecturer: he would make us watch the videos with the actual content before class (some mechanics videos he had made for some youtube channel) which I thought was annoying, or he would just play one of those videos in class. He was kind of a harsh grader, but he also curved the class 4% in the end so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. He was fine. Not good or bad. There's no point in avoiding a class he's teaching, but no reason to prefer him.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES220 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/17/2024	Great professor. Definitely go to his office hours for extra help and if you don’t understand something speak up. His group works are good review for the midterms and exams and he and the TA will answer questions during group works so make sure to ask them if you don’t understand. He is not a harsh grader either
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES221 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/12/2024	Pros: Prof. Rubiano is a pretty nice guy. He started the semester very theory heavy but it balanced out into a good mix of theory and helpful examples after the first exam. He tried to teach understanding rather than pattern recognition for the content which I enjoyed. He's also a pretty nice/forgiving grader. Cons: There were often errors in the lecture examples and he did not ever post lecture notes. Lecture notes didn't matter to me but the errors in the examples were quite annoying. Personally, I did not use the textbook and solely relied on his lectures and office hours for understanding the material, but for some of my friends the textbook was helpful. Overall a pretty solid professor.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES221 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/10/2024	Pros: Goes over a lot of examples in class. That's pretty much where the pros end. Cons: The main issue is that very often, his solutions to the examples in class are incorrect. Either he writes key formulas down incorrectly, or he makes mistakes in his solution process that he doesn't bother checking. He also almost never fully solves the problems (partially due to his tendency to ramble), which made his lectures even less useful to me. A vast majority of my learning in this class has been from the textbook as well as watching videos on YouTube. Another gripe I had is that we were supposed to be given formula sheets during every exam and weekly quiz, but he never handed them out (he ironically said we "didn't really need them", despite writing the incorrect formulas half the time during lectures). If you're good at self-studying and like the feeling of having no idea what's going on during lecture, this professor is for you! Otherwise, I'd suggest you try to avoid him.
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES221 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/09/2024	Professor Rubiano is honestly a really nice guy, really wants students to succeed in this class. He understand situations students are going through and is very flexible with things like homework, quizzes, whatnot and even gives extra credit when he deems necessary. He also provides a lot of explanation to confusing material and goes very in depth with concepts. But his lectures don't help much when it comes to material since he doesn't have too much of a structure to these lectures. Sometimes he'll go over examples but he doesn't believe in giving students examples. If anything, he mostly goes over deriving equations which gets confusing and doesn't really help too much since it doesn't pertain to our assignments. He also doesn't post most in class material on ELMS so it makes content a little more confusing. All in all, his teaching style is confusing but overall a great guy when you seek help
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES221 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/04/2024	Pros: Rubiano is a really nice guy, generous with exam grading compared to other dynamics profs, sometimes will do helpful examples before a quiz. He tries to teach less memorization and more critical thinking. He is also understanding with makeup quiz opportunities, allowing you to double count a quiz if you have a valid reason for missing one. Cons: Spends most of lecture time doing proofs that you don't care about and don't need to know. He often times will give the class the wrong equations which just leads to more confusion. More often than not, he does examples wrong in lecture which just makes students more confused on the process. Towards the end of this semester he stopped with the proofs and began doing a lot of our HW problems in lecture, which seems helpful but like I said he usually does them wrong, so when you later go to do your HW you are already moving in the wrong direction. Conclusion: Not the best professor for dynamics, but certainly not the worst option. Don't bend over backwards to take his class but don't bend over backwards to avoid it either. Most of my learning in this class was from youtube, other profs office hours, and brute forcing through the homework. Overall dynamics is just PHYS 161 beefed up a little bit. Not a very hard class
Andres Rubiano Acosta ENES221 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 11/20/2024	Really chill guy and engages the class a lot, but his notes aren't structured like other ENES courses are and he'll often just go in random directions that are hard to follow but overall he's pretty good.