<p>hey everyone,</p>
<p>i am planning to take psyc 60 in the fall. both professor julian parris and timothy rickard are teaching the course. i heard that parris is really good but tricky exams and that rickard is a decent but boring lecturer. </p>
<p>any experiences with any of them?</p>
<p>thanks for any responses!</p>
<p>Rickard- he’s really straightforward, sticks to the syllabus, lecture material applies straight to the exam, no tricky stuff. </p>
<p>If you want more opinions check ratemyprof i’ve found it to be pretty reliable.</p>
<p>Parris really is a great teacher. He’s very clear, very thorough, has brilliant powerpoints that illustrate and match what he’s discussing at the moment. The averages on his exams are always low and I did find the tests much trickier than the hw, but I think he’s very generous with grades, curves, and extra credit. If it helps you decide in any way, his grade distribution for spr2011 was 3% experimetrix, 6% class participation, 16% hw, 15% midterm 1 and 25% midterm 2 (40% total), and 35% final.</p>
<p>I had Parris for PSYC 60 last spring and I thought he was AMAZING. He is easily one of the best lecturers I have had and his lecture slides are beyond legendary. I really enjoyed going to his class every day. I honestly didn’t think his tests were tricky. I thought he did a great job of preparing us for his tests but maybe that’s just me. I just think his tests were well written so the incorrect answers would come about from common mistakes. It’s pretty much just like taking a free response test in that case. I guess in a way that could be considered tricky. Another way I could perceive them as tricky is if you didn’t really study all that much because statistics is something you kind of have to wrap your head around to really get. Repetition is the key. Things like understanding all the conditions of the null hypothesis for example WOULD BE tricky if you only looked at it once and said “Yeah it’s about things being true or not”. That doesn’t really cut it, but it’s really not different than other classes either. If you don’t study much, things seem trickier because you haven’t seen them enough to understand the tricky parts. I’m NOT saying that anybody who found the class tricky is stupid and didn’t study enough. Maybe the wording was trickier for them and maybe in another class the tests would be trickier for me. That’s totally fine, I know everybody is different and I respect that. I’m not trying to be a know it all or a hater or anything like that. All I’m saying is don’t think it’s going to be a really easy class and then not study (that goes for every class, ha ha).</p>
<p>It’s important to say that just because I really liked him and the class, that doesn’t necessarily mean you will too. I’ve liked professors that other people didn’t and not liked professors that other people like. It’s just my opinion. I haven’t taken a class with Rickard so I can’t compare the two. Maybe I would find Rickard EVEN MORE AMAZING. But without first hand experience, I can’t know for sure. It’s just something to keep in mind when you read things on sites like ratemyprofessors. If EVERYBODY loves or hates a professor, then maybe there’s a lot of truth to it. But if you see a lot of conflicting posts, you really have to sit there and asses why these things might be the way they are and make a decision from there. I’ll admit that I really like ratemyprofessors, but take it for what it is. All in all though, I really liked Parris and would definitely recommend him.</p>
<p>Rickard. Get in, get out, get ahead. The man is completely straightforward and there is no reason for you not to do well unless you shoot yourself in the foot. I didnt think he was a boring lecturer either, and he actually got me to like stats. I wish I had a prof like him for all my classes, Id learn a lot and know what is exactly needed of me to do well. Great prof</p>
<p>@KingsElite ah, and from our last discussion of Parris I’ve made clear enough that my “studying” consisted of reading the book religiously two days before each test. XD I think there’s a lot of truth to what you’ve said. I didn’t study, so I fell victim to a lot of his common mistake choices on the MC, and thus the tests were verryyy tricky to me.</p>
<p>I’d like to add that for me personally, stats as a subject was hard for me to “get.” I really had to review, say when to use which hypothesis test, several times before really understanding the difference between each of them. That’s why I really liked Parris too, since he devoted the first and last 5-10min of each class to reviewing and connecting concepts together. He did a lot of the work for me 
A lot of profs just blaze through the material, but he really takes the time to make sure you understand everything for the hw and midterm.</p>
<p>^Yeah. And when I was saying things like “you”, I didn’t mean that to be necessarily directed to you momosky. It was just a general statement to somebody who might have found things tricky in this class or others. Trust me, I’ve had classes where I felt the tests questions were tricky. And also, just because I’m talking about all these fantastic study habits doesn’t mean I practice them all the time unfortunately. But I think they’re good to point out not only to others but to myself too. I’m really going to push hard this year to study better. I know what I should be doing but it’s just about forcing myself to do it. I think a lot of students have that problem so no worries. I would just really hate for you guys to think that I’m sitting up here on my high horse telling you guys what to do. I’m totally not like that. I just really like to help people and sometimes it’s good to just be reminded to study more periodically. I really don’t want to come over as rude or threatening in my posts and like I said, I wasn’t trying to direct anything to momosky, I was just making a general statement for things I have observed.</p>
<p>@KingsElite: I don’t think you come off as rude or arrogant or anything bad at all xD I think you made a really good comment that tests tend to be trickier when you haven’t prepared as well for them. And I agree, since I was a great example of that haha. After reading through these forums for my entire first year at SD your posts come off as really polite and mild and nice even when you’re disagreeing :)</p>
<p>OK, so I’ll add my 2 cents… I had Parris last quarter and thought he was super chill and a good lecturer. I did my homework, did not attend discussions, and crammed for the exams. I did find his exams tricky and thus got a C+ in the class (my worst grade so far at UCSD).</p>
<p>@momosky</p>
<p>Ok good. My only worry is that when I give my opinions and experiences I don’t want people to think that if they had different opinions and experiences that I think they are wrong and must be stupid. Something I always say is that we are all unique people with unique experiences and I respect that. I’ve liked professors that people I know didn’t like and didn’t like professors that people I know liked. As much as I try to be a really helpful person on this website, I am definitely not the end all and be all of help. I am only one person’s opinion and there is a lot I don’t know and haven’t experienced which I’m always honest about. I just really am not a pompous person who tries to look better than other people. I totally hate the thought of that and it would really make me feel uncomfortable if people thought that about me. So I’m just being careful, that’s all. But if you read my recent post in the College Life forum on fire drills and I seem to contradict my last statement, that guy just deserved some brutal honesty. Ha ha. I really am a nice person otherwise. :P</p>
<p>thanks for the information everyone!</p>
<p>@shinydrag: so who did you end up taking?</p>
<p>^i decided on rickard - even though he uses an old school projector to display his notes haha. hopefully all goes well.</p>