Best Duke Professors?

<p>I am particularly interested in Professors in the Trinity College of Arts and Sciences. I might major in mathematics or some sort of science. Any amazing professors?</p>

<p>Aww... but there are some really good Engineering proffessor! (Dr. G comes to mind there)</p>

<p>In trinity I've had Gopen (english) who was really good and Grinwald (bio) who was also really good. (is there something about proffessors with the letter G starting their names or something?)</p>

<p>Unfortunatly for you I never had a math professor I really liked. (that could just be my back luck and hatred of the math department as a whole though)</p>

<p>Oh, I also had a rather good physics professor but I can't remember his name.</p>

<p>Biology
Alex Motten- Didn't take it, but I've heard great things about Bio 26A.
Emily Bernhardt- Had her for the ecology part of Bio 116. Pretty good.
Jonathan Shaw- I haven't had him as a professor, but I worked for him. A pretty good professor if you like plants.
Kathleen Smith- Great professor!
Rick Searles- Awesome professor, but I think he retired.</p>

<p>BAA
Christine Drea and Leslie Digby are both great. Joanna Lambert was also good, but I don't know if she's still at Duke.</p>

<p>EOS
Emily Klein- Great professor. Clear and detailed lectures.
Paul Baker- Scatterbrained but fairly good lecturer.
Alan Boudreau- Good if you <em>really</em> like rocks. Better outside of class like on the volcanology trip.
Bruce Corliss- Had him for EOS 12 and 107L. Good lecturer.
Susan Lozier- By far one of the best professors I've had. Clear lecturer and extremely helpful.
Lincoln Pratson- Meh. He skipped class too often, but he was good when he was there.</p>

<p>Thanks for the replies sirgecko and warblersrule86!</p>

<p>sirgecko---why do you not like the math department? is it just the subject or are the professors you've had really that bad?</p>

<p>warblersrule86---Are you a majoring in Biology or EOS? I'm considering both as majors, although I am hugely undecided at this point.</p>

<p>Any other takers? Great professors?</p>

<p>Double major in Classics and EOS. I started out as a biology major, but EOS ended up fitting my interests better.</p>

<p>loveduke22 is a chem major, I think, so she should have some input on good chem professors. Try a PM.</p>

<p>Orgo Profs
Chris Roy
Holly Sebahar
Dewey McCafferty - not so easy to understand, very generous curve.</p>

<p>Seconded on Sebahar. (she isn't easy but she is a good teacher)</p>

<p>Oh and the reasons I don't like the math department could just have to do with me being an Engineer and the classes I've had to take as a result. I hate the fact that they do blocked finals. I went into my Math 107 final having done pretty well throughout the year but when I started the test everything was in a foreign language. (I exaggerate here obviously) I feel I had a rather firm grasp on the material but having a certain professor for the entire semester conditions you to expect questions the way they have been worded in class. In theory the entire group of people teaching the class get together and write the final but in practice it is usually rather dominated by one professor's voice. I have never been fortunate enough to have that professor. (expect for Math 103 where I was in the one section to have an unblocked final, oh how glorious that was) The professors I had for 107 and 108 were not exactly easy to understand as well but I'd say my main beef with the math department is the blocked finals. (can't get mad at the whole department over a couple of professors who didn't communicate very well)</p>

<p>The sad part is until I got to Duke I really liked math. (don't hate it now, still got to use it in engineering but not going to take another class) In contrast I am not such a fan of chemistry as a subject (prefer biology and physics) but I absolutely love the chemistry department. (even if I don't like all the people that teach chemistry and I don't always do real well the department is still really well run in my opinion)</p>

<p>Second on the blocked finals. Not only are they always scheduled at the end of the finals week but you never know what to expect unless you've looked at the exams of all the professors teaching that particular course.</p>

<p>sorry if this is a dumb questions, but what are blocked finals?</p>

<p>A block final is when all the sections of a course (such as Math 103) taught by different professors take the final at the same time, with the exact same exam. The exam contains questions from each professor.</p>

<p>I agree with all of the suggestions for Chem professors.</p>

<p>I had Holly Sebahar and Don Coltart for Orgo. Dr. Sebahar is PHENOMENAL...she really wants students to know and understand the material. Dr. Coltart is very intelligent but his tests are graded, well, harsh. In terms of Orgo, I would say Dr. Sebahar and Dr. Roy are two of the best. Dr. Richard MacPhail is also a FANTASTIC professor (he teaches PChem and occasionally Gen Chem). He's an entertaining lecturer, tests are fair, and if you go to his office hours he explains things in an incredibly tangible way. Anyway, in my opinion it's hard to go wrong with the Chemistry department...the professors and graduate students are great people.</p>