CS 1110

This will be a long review/rant. The first paragraph is about Morrison, the rest is about CS 1110 in general (i.e., things Morrison has no power over).

Morrison is a very sweet person, is always open to questions, loves to teach, and is a generally effective professor. This is her first time teaching python, so she doesn't always explain things the best way. But she still has years of experience coding in python and she has years of experience teaching other languages, so it's not like she doesn't have any idea what she's doing. (So if you want to take a class with her that doesn’t involve python she’ll probably be a great instructor). This is also her first semester at UVA so I think she’s still adjusting.

Grade breakdown: Programming assignments (PAs) are 35% (weekly assignments, open note, drop lowest score), labs are 10% (graded on effort, drop lowest), quizzes are 10% (timed, weekly, open note, drop lowest 2), final project is 10% (create a game with a partner), exams are 35% (timed, closed note, exam 1 and 2 are each 10%, final exam is 35%). I did terribly on the exams and the main thing that saved me (and got me a B+ as my final grade) was that most assignments were open note. A lot of other people thought the exams were hard and the mean and median exam grades were around B-/C+, so I highly encourage you to practice with the previous exams that are uploaded to Collab.

The Piazza discussion board was helpful for asking questions. The other professors recorded their lectures so eventually I stopped going to class in person and just watched the recordings and read the powerpoint slides.

This is my least favorite class I’ve ever taken at UVA. I was confused most of the time and I feel like I didn’t learn anything (I’m not sure how much of that is Morrison’s fault and how much is just me having no interest in python). I would have dropped this class if I didn’t need it for my major. I went to the TAs for homework help a few times, and while they were always nice and supportive, they usually gave me wrong answers so I stopped going to office hours.

With all that being said, if you think you might be interested in programming, sign up for this class! Everyone I’ve talked to who has taken this class in the past loved it, and I only met one other person who disliked the class. Plus, this is an e-school class so you have at least a month to decide on if you want to drop the class (versus arts and sciences where you have 2 weeks to decide). This class is also designed for people with no coding experience, so don’t worry if you’ve never coded before (I actually have prior coding experience but the languages I learned are very different from python so it didn’t help me. So any prior coding experience you have probably won’t help you unless it is with python.) Python is also one of the easiest languages to learn.

tl;dr Morrison is kind and supportive, but you’d probably be better off with one of the other professors. This class is manageable if you put in the work.