ENGL 3001

I really enjoyed Clare Kinney's lectures. I was not too thrilled to be taking this course since it's a requirement for my major, but I ended up really enjoying a lot of the readings partly due to how funny CK was as she taught them. Her sense of humor is refreshing and she doesn't take her or her content too seriously, which I appreciate. I honestly found the tests pretty easy, you get a 1-page cheat sheet and attending her Zoom review sessions set you up to do pretty well. Someone before me complained about the quote ID questions, but she makes them pretty obvious if you just pay attention to which authors use iambic pentameter, heroic couplets, etc. (hint: this is what I used the bulk of my cheat sheet to keep track of!)

Before you take this course, know that this is a very reading intensive course. Though, you're not held accountable and penalized for not reading or showing up to the lecture classes, it *will* catch up to you on the midterm and final exam, which account for a good portion of your grade. The midterm isn't difficult if you do all the reading, attend most every lecture, and take notes straight off the PowerPoints. Another hint to help with the midterm and final exam is to **ATTEND THE ZOOM REVIEWS** (live, if you can). I *cannot* stress that enough, as Kinney often gives big, obvious hints to what will be and not be on the midterm and final exam and how to do well on them.

Professor Kinney is a good lecturer and is clearly knowledgeable in her craft. I also recommend having the TA Shalmi Barman as she leads very insightful discussions and gives great feedback on your essay drafts if you take them to her during her office hours.

Clare Kinney is a great lecturer, she is funny and dives deeply into each text. Also, the workload was typically reasonable, and we had no assignments other than papers or exams. The papers were fairly easy because Professor Kinney gave many ideas for paper prompts, including some creative writing options.
However, the exams for this class were utterly soul-crushing and difficult. I don't see how anyone without a photographic memory could complete the ID section, which required identifying a work and its author based on a small passage. Furthermore, extra credit options were fun (making playlists and memes) but competitive and therefore a waste of time in a class with some 300 students.

I loved the content of this course and how wide-ranging the syllabus was! The responses took a while to write but they were good incentives to really think deeply about the texts and any interesting connections between them. Be sure to read CAREFULLY throughout the course (I mean meditate on each page), because the midterm and final were really tough and demanded your use of very specific details from the text in a short amount of time.

Prof. Kinney was ok. She uploads her slides and sample lecture outlines, but they arent helpful unless you actually watch the asynchronous lectures bc of how cryptic they are. She also packs A LOT into each lecture, and even puts in extra credit opportunities through contests she'll announce during lecture. The contests would be about random history facts, or even about writing poems that mimic class readings. Grades were based on 6-7 short responses to the readings, a midterm, final, and discussion participation. I def recommend Shalmi as a TA - she was super insightful and always gave us extra resources to prepare for the exams/to understand the readings and lectures. Shalmi was also very chill and approachable and her grading was fair. The midterm & final were brutal, bc it was 3 hours to do an ID section and 2 essays.

#tCF2020