COMM 2020

WOW. What an absolute waste of time.It only took me 2 lectures to realize how much I hated this teacher and the way in which the class was taught. Her lack of teaching skill, approachability and ability to adapt to the needs of the class are unbelievable. She is an embarrassment to UVA and the Comm school. All one needs to do is look at the reviews to understand how terrible Middleton really is, I don't think I've ever seen this many negative ones for one teacher. Congrats Mary, you've successfully managed to disappoint all of your students for the past 2 semesters in a row. When will it stop? SOMEONE NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING!

THOT

This class is relatively difficult. Ms. Middleton understands accounting very well, but she can go on long tangents in class, unrelated to material. The tests are also rather difficult. There is no reason to take this class unless you are Pre-comm or try to get a CPA.

Prof. Middleton is an absolute joke of a teacher, and McIntire needs to seriously look at replacing her. She is embarrassingly unable to communicate even the most basic concepts of managerial accounting, and just about every student ends up teaching themselves the material. These are techniques and knowledge that not only matter for a career in accounting but also for finance and consulting interviews, and from what I can tell from speaking to older students who took this class with Wilke, we are all grossly unprepared for next fall.

The main reason she was a terrible teacher is that her hour and fifteen-minute lectures were almost completely worthless. I would break down her lectures as follows:
50% - lecturing us about things that have nothing to do with accounting. Examples: one time she spent a solid 10 minutes describing how to choose a carpet for our apartments, and concluded that we should never buy silk carpets especially if we have pets. Synthetic carpets, while less luxurious, are much safer purchases. Another class she spent 20 minutes describing her dietary techniques and why we should follow them. I wish I was making this up.
10% - waiting for someone to ask a question or yelling at us for not coming to a 200-person class prepared to ask questions. I don't think she understood that is what office hours are for. This is a lecture - you are supposed to teach us the material. The most ironic thing was she spent a ton of time telling us how we were wasting our money by not asking her questions. Her class was the single biggest waste of money I've ever experienced.
40% - going over the one or two questions that someone asked. Which, for everyone else who wasn't confused by that particular point, was completely worthless.

The textbook was decent - I would have been screwed otherwise. After the first midterm, I started skipping lectures (after turning in HW and picking up the answers) and going to the library to read the chapter and start the homework. My grade on the second midterm was much better than the first because of this.

If possible, do not take this class with Prof. Middleton.

So everyone below me has it pretty damn well summed up: she's an absolutely awful teacher. The lectures, her obsession with homework problems, and her extremeness are all not exaggerated by everyone.

What I want to add is how she's completely the kind of professor who wants to see students do poorly. I remember after the second midterm, which a lot of people did poorly on enough to have it curved like 10 points, she had this huge smirk on her face and blamed the lack of class attendance instead of taking an OUNCE of blame for herself. She thinks she's perfect and has discovered the ideal way to teach. Not the case at all.

The only resources she gives you to prepare for the exam are those fucking homework problems and then that workbook with the multiple choice problems. She seems to think this is enough and they correspond with her exams. No. I would get all the homework problems and workbook problems correct, which would mean I didn't have questions to ask in lectures (which she lectures about us needing to do more than the actual material) and then BAM exam time, oh what are these questions that are nothing like the problems she gives us??? Seriously, as a deferred student from the COMM school, if doing poorly in her class takes that away from me I will be more than displeased.

You may read the reviews on this page and think that people have come here merely to complain due to getting a bad grade. In all honesty, bad grade or not, these reviews are accurate. I got a 100 on the first midterm. and a 98 on the second one, yet still feel obliged to come here and make students aware of the poor learning environment they will be subject to should they take this class with Middleton.

Professor Middleton is completely oblivious to the reality of her classroom. She firmly believes in her teaching style being the best, and can never lay blame on anyone besides the students. She once asked us for feedback and then shot down every request or suggestion that was aired.

Rather than teach, she will assign homework, go over homework, and then discuss a non-related topic.

Take this only if you have to, and be prepared to teach yourself.

This professor does not know how to teach and purposely make this class a pain. Exams do not match up closely with the materials taught in class nor do they match the materials in the book. Spends the entire class period going over problems from the book but tests on an entirely different set of questions.

Spends and wastes class time ranting about subjects not related to managerial accounting. Dean Z needs to consider a possible replacement for this poor excuse of a professor. I don't pay 5k a year in additional money to McIntire to have taken a worthless and painful experience that I have taken with Middleton.

This class could have been good, if Middleton...
1) Taught concepts, not just walked through homework problems in a confusing and disorganized manner.
2) Didn't assign a ton of borderline-useless homework.
3) Bitched out students less.
4) Was less of a diva.

I adored Financial Accounting with Erickson - her lectures were great. Managerial, however, was a time-sucking nightmare.

Mary Middleton's class was absolutely worthless.

If you want to literally teach yourself managerial accounting then TAKE THIS CLASS. Mary Middleton does't explain anything and is almost always off topic.

She doesn't care about her students performance, and it seems like she enjoys when we fail. I would recommend taking this class with anyone but Mary Middleton because she will ruin your experience.

The most ridiculous class I've taken at UVa. I have NEVER hated a class so much. Sure financial accounting was one of the harder classes here, but at least it was FAIR and Erickson actually taught us. I heard that managerial was easier than financial, but that is definitley not the case for anyone who took 2020 with middleton.

Middleton DID NOT TEACH. I literally taught myself managerial accounting through the textbook, and despite attending class every day, doing every single homework probelm, and going over the study guide multiple multiple times, I still did poorly on her unfair exams. Her tests were more about whether or not you could rush through and finish the questions in time. Exams were ridiculous. I have never felt so prepared for an exam and still done so poorly. I know the material, which I've taught myself via the textbook, but her exams are NOT A FAIR REFLECTION of how well you know accounting. As shown through the fact that almost nobody could finish the midterms in time.

On top of that she patronized me in office hours, and when I asked her to explain why one of the answer to a "Which is NOT true" correction was correct, all she did was highlight the correct answer and refuse to explain why the other options didn't work. Despite her yelling at us that we needed to ask questions, she made me feel uncomfortable and talked down to me when I tried to ask for help.

I am considering finance and accounting for my concentrations, I like the subject, but Middleton has been the worst professor I've ever had at UVa and this class has put unneccessary emotional stress on me all semester.