Catherine Byrne

This professor has taught: ENGL391

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Catherine Byrne ENGL391 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 11/08/2024	While I can't speak on her ENGL101 teaching as all of the previous comments discuss, I will talk about my experience in her Professional Writing course. I was intimidated by the other reviews about her being a harsh grader, but upon taking ENGL391 with Byrne, I believe she is a relatively fair grader. You do have to follow the rubric to know what she is looking for, but as long as you adhere to that, you should be fine. Effort is required. I also recommend attending office hours or talking to her after class to clarify certain feedback comments or to ask for recommended changes to your work. She is always open to helping you out. Grading for ENGL101 may have seemed harder because the class has more underclassmen that have less writing experience compared to majority upperclassmen in ENGL391 who have had a few more semesters of college writing. Again, just follow the rubrics she gives and read through all of her instructions, and you should be fine.
Catherine Byrne ENGL101 Expecting an A- Anonymous 07/01/2024	Easy to talk to, but grades insanely hard on both rough drafts and final drafts. Be careful and attend all her office hours and writing center hours if you take Prof Byrne to maximize your grade.
Catherine Byrne ENGL101 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/08/2024	She seems like a nice person but her grading is absolutely brutal. She doesn't reveal what the grade cut offs are for each letter grade until the end of the semester and even then she keeps saying that we will be fine (spoiler alert: we were not fine). She also says that she'll take note of whether you implemented her comments or not and grade your writing accordingly, but even if you do, you're still screwed for essays because she'll absolutely tear it apart and give you a low grade (around a low B on average). Also, she grades rough drafts pretty harshly (it's a rough draft, which isn't supposed to be perfect!) and it will bring down your grade. The weighting for each category is also very weird - a rough draft for one of the papers is far more weighted than the final paper of another unit in the course. A notable moment was when a lot of us got around a 75-80% on a rough draft and it brought down our grades significantly (we're talking around 5% on average). The only reason that it is not completely terrible because of the TA, who's very generous with the assignments they're given to grade. Also, the professor is absolutely terrible at responding to emails on time. Try to avoid this professor if you can - she's nice, but she will wreck your GPA.
Catherine Byrne ENGL101 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/08/2024	She is nice in person but her grading is AWFUL!! If you try to talk to her about your grade she doesn't care. For some perspective, the class average for one of the essays was a D+, and I read all the essays and they were GOOD. Makes no sense.
Catherine Byrne ENGL101 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/03/2024	This class, at times was really frustrating. Whether it be "completion grading" that was not graded as such or disorganization and confusion within different tasks. It was exceedingly frustrating too, after completing my essay to the best of. my ability, to then be told that we HAD to make changes and chose different wording in class in order to get a good grade on the assignment. By this I mean, when I write papers I particularly chose my wording and then going into class and being forced to change, highlight and bold new words because the professor wanted to see specific words was hard since I already put my time and effort into the words and wording I thoughtful chose. In all honesty this class was a struggle. I understand different professors have different grading styles but I would have appreciated some consistency throughout the grading because I found the grades I received to not reflect what was put into following the guidelines and effort that was put into the assignments. I found it exceedingly unhelpful, and I want to emphasis this, that when I already completed my paper, and HAD to go back and highlight all over like paint splatters over my paragraphs all these meaningless highlights just for her to prove a point. I found not a second of this style of teaching helpful, in fact I felt as if I were in elementary school highlighting words and coloring in the lines. If I could go back I would wish to take a different instructor because I did not find this Professors teaching style or class to be very beneficial and that is really hard for me to say. I really enjoy school and learning and being pushed to think differently, but this class did not seem to exemplify that which pushes me, shapes my skills, and improves my overall position as a student. If you are taking Engl101, I advise you to take a different professor that is actually consistent and organized, I would avoid this professor at all costs if possible.