| Information | Review |
|---|---|
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 09/05/2024 |
I'm glad that the more recent reviews have had a better time in this class than I did, and I hope if you have to take it you will too. I had to take this course during Covid and it was painful. The course itself is obviously rough and covers a lot, but the way Dr. Singer taught was also rough. He seems like a good guy, funny, but also has an ego. People would ask questions during lecture and he would go on long tangents that wouldn't really answer the question, or he would berate them and ask them why they don't already know something. It definitely gave the lectures a weird vibe because by the middle of the semester only 2-3 people were ever brave enough to ask questions about the material. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI450 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/19/2023 |
Dr. Singer was my favorite professor I’ve had in college so far. Only about 25 of us in the class so he got to know us well and would joke around with everyone. Test averages were really high, and he would move through content very slowly so that you would understand it. Not sure why his reviews are so bad but I think he was a great prof that maybe is misunderstood if you don’t get to know him. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI450 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/13/2023 |
Gonna be fully honest. I saw the early reviews. Saw the RateMyProfessor. And I was worried. But wow, what an amazing class. Dr. Singer is really witty with his jokes but also takes the course very serious. He wants you to do well, and you can only do that by participating. I thought he was great at explaining and exams were extremely fair. I really do not know what caused people to tank his review but he was 11/10 this semester and I would recommend him to anyone. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI450 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/07/2023 |
I don't know why his reviews are so bad. This is one of the best classes I've taken at UMD. Singer is a great instructor and repeats himself a lot during lecture - doesn't talk super fast - really easy to follow. Grading is extremely fair, exam averages have been high. Exams are also super fair. I have learned so much in this class and he tells us a lot of cool fun facts about random things. He's funny. Definitely take this course with Singer he's the best. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI450 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/05/2023 |
Prof: He is funny and loves answering questions. Has very high expectations (he asked us to start reading the book the week before school!). Got to office hours, he's a nice guy outside of class. Class: BSCI450 is hard (comparable to bchm463). Remember, this is a physiology class, not an anatomy class. There is a lot of memorizing you need to do, but also a lot of problem solving. This class is much easier with a study group. Lectures: The first half of each unit is him talking about the book readings (which are very dense). He is not a good lecturer, so I learned the content from the homework. The second half of each unit is review questions. He is much better at explaining how to solve problems than teaching you things from the book. Exams: there are 10 questions, each worth 0/5/10 points. But you don't need a 100% correct answer to get full points. Despite what he says, he is looking for key words. Half of the questions are straight from the book. The other half includes questions he goes over in class during review. So go over the book problems and the review problems again and again and again. Curve: I wouldn't count on it. Averages are low but the upper quartile is pretty high. I guess some people catch on to the predictable exams. Verdict: He's not the best professor, but not the worst either. He gets the job done. Good luck. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI450 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/21/2022 |
I will say, he is a funny guy. I would've liked him outside of a classroom setting. He's brilliant and he knows his stuff for sure. Problem is, I think he teaches to show off his knowledge and not to actually teach us. He has no interest in students succeeding. The average in the class in 70ish. If you think a curve will carry you, it wont. Everyone drops the class and if you were 10% above average, you are now 1% above average. You slowly watch your grade suffer as more people drop the class. There are homework in the class but they are barely weighted so you better be a great test taker. I was told by many people to not take the class with Dr. Singer but I didn't listen (spoiler, that was a mistake). He has so much potential to be a great professor but I wish he listened to the feedback of the students. But he's definitely the type to think EVERYONE is the problem before he thinks that the common denominator is him. Not to mention, the waitlist for next semester is flooded because he's not teaching the class in comparison to him having 167 seats open. Don't take him unless you don't care about your GPA or your mental well being. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/19/2021 |
Don’t take this class w/ Singer unless you absolutely have to. He’s nice after class but his ego is pretty big at all other times. Don’t ask what your letter grade in the class is, you won’t know until after the final. The grade on ELMS was inaccurate as he didn’t weigh assignments correctly according to his own rubric, he just gave them an arbitrary point value. Exams are hard, but not bc the content itself is impossible. He’ll lecture about something for three classes but choose to ask a hard question about something he mentioned in passing for 2 minutes. Questions can be randomly specific or a mix from textbook chapter review questions. He said he assigns grades based off the median, and he uses the median after everyone drops the class. That means your grade “decays” weekly. As more people withdraw, the better performers stay in the class, raising the averages on the exams. Even the Chem profs don’t do that. So the only way to do good is to beat the curve, by A LOT, for the exams as they weigh the most on your overall letter grade. Exam averages trend from 60-70%. Check your exam points after you get your exam back. He has his younger daughter count your exam points for the total score you get. One time she miscounted mine and I had to get a regrade. He ended up taking more points away from my exam. Even regrades are risky to ask for. If you agitate him, it might not end well for you as he seems to grade depending on his mood. In summary, the class itself isn’t hard. Singer makes it harder for no reason. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Expecting a B Anonymous 03/22/2021 |
Alright so I took him last semester (Fall 2020) and he was definitely not as bad as people make him out to be. I think people thought that they were going to get away with a lot more bullshit since it was online and Dr. Singer really wasn't entertaining that. He made himself super accessible via Zoom and he held discussion-like twice a week in addition to about 3 longish lectures per unit. Overall there was a lot of material and a lot of detail but there were a lot of resources available to help us succeed- he even went through old exam questions with us that were pretty similar to the actual exams. This class was definitely not easy and he caught/reported roughly 20% of the class blatantly cheating on our exams so that wasn't fun but he wasn't being unreasonable or anything. I would say that this class definitely requires a full 12-15 hours a week of studying regardless of who you take it with (the other section was Speer and their averages were actually lower than ours). |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/13/2020 |
Open ended questions without much guidance, rough semester especially for neurodivergent students. Avoid if possible. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Expecting a B Anonymous 11/21/2020 |
If you have another option, take them instead. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Expecting a B- Anonymous 01/02/2018 |
Is a weedwhacker with a poor personality, not horrifying, but not recommended. Record lectures if you have him, and don't expect an easy semester. |
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Joshua Singer
BSCI440 Anonymous 12/14/2017 |
Terrible lectures, hard exams, shitty personality. Avoid like the plague |