Gerald Borgia

This professor has taught: BIOL708B, BIOL708D, BSCI329, BSCI338R, BSCI339O, BSCI360, BSCI370, BSCI465

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Gerald Borgia BSCI360 Expecting a B- Anonymous 11/07/2022	The class is horrendous. The classwork itself isnt the worst, they give a reasonable amount of work. The discussions are pointless, all you do is read an article for the week and talk about it during the discussion period. OH YEAH, pop quizzes during discussion as well, so you never know when you get one. First class I have seen give pop quizzes throughout my 4 years at umd. The exams are the worst part. 41 true/false (doesn't sound bad right?) and 8 short answers in 55 MINUTES!!!!!!! There is almost no time to run through the exam in its entirety, and the wording of his exams are so confusing. He also barely curves the exams, so if someone does exceptionally well then its wraps for your grade. TAs are super strict for no reason. It's almost like they're purposefully trying to make your life worse. If you are taking this class for an upper level class, and it is not specifically required for your major, I beg you to choose another class. This one is not worth it.
Gerald Borgia BSCI360 Expecting a B- Anonymous 12/04/2019	TL;DR Don't take this class unless you want to really work for your grade. This is a 3 credit class but feels more like a 4 credit class Fun class, but a terrible teacher. The exams are T/F and short answers and its almost impossible to finish in time. He expects you to understand his typoed notes and how his rambling stories are relevant to the lecture. The discussions are pretty bad especially when he expects you to lead at least 2 discussions on scientific papers that are written for experts in the field. He grades kinda fairly just make sure you are on good terms with the TA though, my TA was a harsh grader so it made the class even more stressful
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a C+ Raikou-Neko 12/14/2011	Borgia is rather boring, I will admit, but that's not what makes his class kill you. His exams and quizzes are mostly true and false questions where he only changes one or two words in the definition to make it false. Sometimes, he'll have a question on the exam from a quiz, but the answer is different. His questions purposely try to trick the student - they aren't designed to test for actual knowledge at all. He also makes a LOT of errors, both in his powerpoint slides and on exams. It shows he could really care less about the class he teaches. He also only curves by the highest test score. One person gets a 96 and he curves by 4 points, despite the class average being a 66. I agree with what someone else said - if you ask a question during lecture, he will answer quite brutally, almost rudely. There was one gentleman that obviously didn't quite believe in evolution and Borgia insulted his intelligence several times over. The lab isn't too bad. I had Dilip, who actually seems to care about how well you're doing and whether or not you understand the material. ---Edit--- I was furious with my grade. After checking and checking, apparently I ended up with a C. Out of 800 points, I was 1.5 points away from a B. I asked if it was possible to be bumped and the TA I was corresponding with (not Dilip) said Borgia didn't do that.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a B Anonymous 06/01/2011	This class was super boring but with almost no effort I got a B. If you're a bio major I would take this class with someone else where you'll probably learn more. There are quizzes every other lecture or so that really help your grade. He's a pretty okay guy, he does try to make jokes in lecture... Anyway if you have a good TA then your experience will be better. I had Katie and she was really great. Lab is where you learn most things but you do have to go to the forest which is by Lot 6 behind the Public Health Building. Also the last lab is at the stream which is by the View near Route 1. I have absolutely no interest in bio so this class was good for me because there was no book and by simply glancing over my notes I got C's on the test. The good thing about Borgia is he rounds from the highest grade to a 100 so my final exam grades were always Bs. I'm sure with a little more effort I could've gotten an A but what's done is done. The TA's are really helpful and there's opportunity for extra credit, through quizzez and the like, but it's only a few points so it won't make a big difference but if you're on the edge it will. Overall not a bad prof. but class is boring and it's not one you want to go to. He also pot notes and slides online and sometimes reuses exam questions. His tests are mostly true/false with one minor difference being false, there are fill in the blank, short answer, and matching.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting an A lmc33092 05/20/2011	Do not ever take him. His true and fa1se questions in pop quizzes and tests are SOOOOOO hard and tricky. His lectures are so boring that half of the people comes to lecture. Also his lecture slides do not make sense because there are so much grammatical error.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a B Anonymous 05/18/2011	Do not take him. You will learn nothing from his lectures and you'll end up teaching yourself the whole course. Not only is he rude, but he is extremely unhelpful. He doesn't care at ALL how much the students are learning or how the students do.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a B Genius 05/13/2011	AVOID HIM AT ALL COSTS. He is by far the most boring professor I've ever had. His lectures are awful, boring, mono-tone and just confusing. He barely explains anything as he reads from his lecture notes through the whole class. His lecture notes that he puts up on elms have so many different errors. Just to sum it up, save yourself a huge dissapointment and many many headaches... DON'T TAKE HIM
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a C Anonymous 05/11/2011	The content was impossible. I went to class and studied for an ABSURD amount of time for the exams, and I've only gotten a 65% and 55% on the midterms. The class average for the second exam was a D, which is absolutely ridiculous. I'm a mostly A, high B student. I have never once gotten a C in any class and I'm praying for a C in this class, which is ridiculous considering the amount of time I put into this class. The teacher is an idiot; he reads right off the slides. When I go back to his lecture slides to read the notes, he spells "cells" as "sells" and has so many grammatical errors that you cannot even understand the point he is trying to make. My TA wasn't even good. I emailed him 6 days before the exam to ask what we should study since there was no study guide given out and no specifications and he did not email me back until two days before the exam, only after I sent him a second email. He responded with "I have no idea how to answer your question." There was literally NOTHING enjoyable about this course and I wouldn't recommend my worst enemy to take it. I'll admit that I am much more of an English/History student, but I've never been a bad student whatsoever and I'm praying that I do not need to retake this class. His exams are 60 True/False questions. True and false does not test your knowledge, but your test taking skills. He is not curving the class, but he should when his average on a test is a D, and a friend of mine who got an A in BSCI105 is struggling and worried about his grade. I wanted to take this course to be a Psychology major, but I'm dropping the major. Dr. Borgia is way to old to be an effective teacher- he cannot even see when his students have questions. He snaps at certain people and his TA's do the same thing. Even my TA would start a class beginning, "If I don't make you fall asleep today, it has been a successful day." In the middle of class he would say to himself, "I love my job. I love my job." While everyone else has had their quizzes back for weeks, I'm still waiting for my grade and they obviously will not be returned by the end of the semester. This class is 100% the worst class I have ever taken and will ever take through my college career. I am possibly taking it to the department, but I'm not sure what they can do about it. Basically, DO. NOT. TAKE. THIS. CLASS.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 04/28/2011	The teaching style is abysmal. The powerpoints are fraught with typos, he lectures in a monotone, and even though he asks if there are questions, he never stops to actually see if there are any, and the TA has to intervene before he moves onto the next slide. He goes through the lecture slides incredibly fast-- he reads straight from the slides, which he posts online a few hours after the lecture. Going to class feels pointless, but he has 10 unannounced quizzes throughout the semester, so you need to go or else you'll most likely miss one. Exams are inordinately difficult: we have 2 midterms, both of which are half true/false, and remaining half consisting of fill in the blank, matching, and short answers. The exams don't focus on overall concepts, but rather nit-picky details hidden in his disorganized lecture slides, which makes it VERY difficult to get a grade that matches the level of effort you put into studying for the exam. He curves each test to the highest grade, which is nice since he isn't obliged to do that, but since there are only a few people with any A's at all, the majority of the class is still stuck in the C, low B range. Also, don't waste money on the textbook; he says in the beginning of the year that you can to have some background information, but his tests are completely lecture-based, and it is a complete waste of money to buy the expensive text listed on the syllabus. This class isn't the worst in the world; if you work your ass off, you can probably get a decent grade. That having been said, if you can take the course with a different professor, I highly suggest you do so.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Erik.Deaton 04/27/2011	This guy is an awful teacher. He can barely see and can't read his lecture slides to us without getting an inch from the screen. On top of that, his exams come straight from lectures, and are so poorly worded that almost nobody does well, yet one person will get a 95 and wreck the curve for everyone. Avoid Him.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a C Anonymous 04/19/2011	This professor is the worst one I have ever had. I tried to read the reviews on here and decided to take a chance and take this class with him. Biggest mistake ever. I highly suggest you find another professor. His tests are confusing and most people get c's and d's on them, but since one person gets a 95 or above he only curves the test by 2-3 points. Trust me, save your time/money and take it with a better professor.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting an A- waite 05/19/2010	Borgia sucks. He is an extremely boring lecturer, he's really rude, and if you raise your hand he won't call on you cause he's basically blind. The class is real easy though. You have to go to class because of the 5 question clicker quizzes each lecture. The exams are all true/false and most of the questions come from the clicker quizzes. Don't buy the textbook or anything for this class besides the response card, everything comes from lecture.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting a B Anonymous 05/11/2010	He is awful. rude, not very helpful, all he does is read the notes which you can do yourself. also you dont need the book at all. all the notes are available online. the TA's basically teach this class
Gerald Borgia BSCI106C Expecting a B maglist1 05/04/2010	Ok so Borgia was one of the most boring lectures I have ever been to see. He does these clicker questions that are eventually totaled up into an exam grade which sucked but the TAs in this class are amazing. Reimi was great and actually made lab pretty fun.
Gerald Borgia BSCI106 Expecting an A- Anonymous 04/30/2010	First off try and get JF Savard as your TA (he is more than a grad student i think he said he was here to work for Maryland on their projects in Australia over the summer or something like that. anyway he has TAed for BSCI106 like 7 times so he knows what he is doing) As for Borgia he is really an ok guy. There was one true/false midterm (but he changes the midterm type semester to semester i think) and a final. There were also 5 clicker question points each class and those added up to one test grade. A lot of points in this class come from the lab, so that is why you want Savard. Borgia's lectures were pretty useless, but you had to go for the clickers... He just reads off a powerpoint that has many misspelled words. He curves tests so that the highest grade gets bumped up to a 100 and everyone else gets bumped up the same amount of points.
Gerald Borgia BSCI338R terrapin 08/19/2008	Stubborn, even rude at times. Easier to talk to in his office than in class. Lecture for fifteen minutes, rest of the class is discussion lead by a different pair of students each week. If quiet or not very opinionated, class may seem dull and annoying as you try to find something to say each week. Participation is part of your grade. Turn in typed questions from the reading every week. One multiple-choice midterm, curved to highest grade. Based on lectures (he posts them). One paper presenting a novel idea relating to Darwinian Medicine, or presenting different sides of a related topic. Presentation on last day to class on a different topic than paper. Readings from "Why We Get Sick" by Nesse & Williams, papers or articles. Vary in length and difficulty. Would not recommend to friends.