Rachel Schine

This professor has taught: AASP498U, ARAB398M, ARAB499J, HIST120, HIST319D, HIST319Y, HIST429F, RELS120, RELS271, RELS319E, WGSS379E

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Rachel Schine RELS271 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/11/2024	As long as you're interested in religion, take this class!!! Dr. Schine is an AMAZING person and an even better teacher. She clearly loves what she does, and it will be impossible to find another person nearly as knowledgeable about religious studies as she is. The class is a smaller setting, and has somewhat of an unusual structure, but it works. Mondays are lectures, and on Wednesdays she introduces the topic with a lecture and then has small groups present the readings of the week, followed by a class discussion. The main assignments are participation, 2 or 3 reviews that are 3-4 pages long, and the final project. Two things you should know: 1) the readings can be very long and time-consuming, so its best that you have an interest in religion, and 2) the final project is an 8-10 page paper so be ready for that. But Dr. Schine is very inclusive of any topic you might want to do as long as it holds some relevance. I truly enjoyed this class!
Rachel Schine HIST120 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 01/30/2024	I absolutely adored Professor Schine's teaching style. I went into HIST120 not entirely sure what to expect (it was my second choice for a gen ed) and found that I had accidentally struck gold. If you're interested in history, even if you know nothing about the Islamic world, I can almost guarantee you will enjoy this class. Lectures are a solid 50 minutes of Professor Schine enthusiastically teaching you about that day's topic. She often had so much to say that we wouldn't finish the slides, but that was totally fine, because none of the assignments or exams relied on you being able to know every bit of information, and it never seemed like she was rushing any of the core aspects of the course. I personally loved just absorbing as much information as possible, especially when she would go on small tangents and give you fun facts. She is clearly passionate about teaching and enjoys lecturing, and is super friendly and approachable. Assignments and exams were never too hard (although they did involve some studying to be confident on), and the only part of the course I actively disliked was the term paper. Even that, though, was interesting in its own right, as I got to do research on a topic of my choice. Overall 10/10, will be looking to take a class with her in the future.
Rachel Schine HIST120 Expecting an A frankMiller 12/21/2023	(Please approve this review, I am trying to share documents that will be useful to future students so they can make informed decisions like syllabuses I have no interest in spreading computer viruses) I took HIST120 : Islamic Civilization with Dr Rachel Schine and TA Tobin Johnson over Fall 2023. SYLLABUS: Here is our class syllabus: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-NNgcVjCKmoeWvMdaGQWs8NrriOUxtRE/view?usp=sharing This was a good class and I would take it again. It was pretty interesting, Dr Schine was an excellent professor and Tobin Johnson was also an excellent TA. I took this class for the history minor because there is a requirement to take a course from at least two different geographic fields. But it also gives some gen-ed requirements so you might want to look into that as well. Here is the history minor form: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eptoRdAroUeR9dU3eAq3K2OKxhA5o7_a/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=115474565583495284649&rtpof=true&sd=true Here is also the list of all the different "fields of study" / how History courses at UMD get divided up into different courses and all that: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rP2kWy1TuT8xZepXuHr3SHD0G38pjSlb/view?usp=sharing So Islamic History is vastly different from the usual American History that I would take, so I took Islamic instead. Originally I was going to take HIST111: The Medieval World with Christopher Halsted. I tried both classes and liked the subject matter, the TA, Dr Schine, the assignments, smaller class size more (the map quiz etc seemed easier than that class) so I took this class instead. Initially I was concerned about the workload before I added this class, but the workload was minimal and very easy. Here was the entire real workload: Map Exercise: 10% ID Quiz: 10% Midterm: 25% Term Paper: 35% Participation: 20%* *BONUS READING: For extra credit (good for +5 points on any other assignment), at any point in the semester, read and write a 1-2 page reflection on Kevin van Bladel’s article, “A Brief History of Islamic Civilization from Its Genesis in the Late Nineteenth Century to Its Institutional Entrenchment” (https://www.middleeastmedievalists.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/UW-28-Van-Bladel.pdf) as it relates to our class. Attendance to lecture did not factor into participation, only attendance to discussion did. So I stopped going to lecture, and only went to discussion. (Most other people also stopped going to lecture and did fine, Schine actually had to send out a message asking people to start coming to lecture again because attendance was so low). Basically for most of the semester this class only took up 50 minutes of my time every week, which was great. All expectations of the class were highly reasonable (show up to Discussion and participate, submit things on time). The TA Tobin Johnson was excellent and one of the best TAs I've had across all departments at UMD. Extremely knowledgeable, responded fast to emails, accommodating. Dr Schine was basically so qualified and knowledgeable to teach this class, she was basically over-qualified. She is fluent in Arabic so listening to her you will get all sorts of extra material because of her pronouncing things in the actual Arabic way. The composition of this class as a whole was also great and beneficial, since it was Islamic history it attracted a lot of practising Muslims but also others who were just interested in ancient history and the history of religion. Laptops / technology was allowed in lecture and discussion.
Rachel Schine HIST120 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/18/2023	Dr. Schine speaks very quickly which makes the lectures a bit difficult to follow. She also assigns an impossible amount of reading for a 100 level history course. However, you don't really have to do the reading to do well in the class. Also, she does not take attendance at lectures.
Rachel Schine HIST120 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/09/2023	This class is EASY AS HELL if ur Muslim. Took the class and only went to lecture like 5 times and still got an A+. Prof is super chill and supports Palestine too <3
Rachel Schine HIST120 Expecting an A Anonymous 10/02/2023	Genuinely very nice but does not know how to teach students. Her slides have way too much information and literally looks like abstract art with pictures and long paragraphs in tiny font. She just talks for the full 50 minutes and expects us to be able to follow what's going on the whole time. If you're gonna lecture the whole time, at least have slides that summarize main ideas. Assignments are easy enough to get a good grade, but anything I ever learned from this class I taught myself or learned in discussion with the TA (who is very knowledgeable and great in general).
Rachel Schine HIST120 Anonymous 10/02/2023	She is a nice teacher and a nice human. She is super understanding regarding assignments but I needed that understanding because the structure of the class is not great. Lectures feel just like the teacher is talking at you and provided slides are super hard to follow and badly formatted. Many times I feel like I am behind in the class and truly just have to self study the material. Also, the structure of the class is weird and I am always confused on information such as structure of exams. Only interesting if you already have an understanding of Islamic history, otherwise it is hard to follow.
Rachel Schine AASP498U Expecting an A Anonymous 05/11/2023	She's amazing. She's so understanding about literally everything and her lectures are so interesting. She makes you want to know what else she has to say. Also, she is very accurate in her teachings and makes sure that the people she is teaching are all heard and understood. The poets, authors, artists, etc. There are times when it is hard to understand certain assignments, but all you have to do is ask and she will help you. If you need an extension, she'll give it to you. You just have to talk to her. Attendance isn't mandatory but I recommend you go. Please take her!!
Rachel Schine HIST120 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/07/2023	Dr. Schine was a great professor, and the class itself wasn't too difficult either. All of the assignments (which included a map quiz, definition quiz, midterm, and final paper) were graded fairly and related directly to the course material. As long as you put effort into the assignments, an A is definitely achievable. Dr. Schine's lectures were very easy to follow and contained a lot of interesting information. Attendance in lectures isn't crucial as she posts the slides to ELMS, but I would recommend attending still as she's a great lecturer, and attendance is taken for discussion. Dr. Schine is also very sweet and understanding, and very knowledgable about Islamic history, so I would definitely recommend taking her for this course.