CS 3330

Venkat probably isn't meant to be a professor. He knows his material, but it doesn't sound like it in lecture. He is attempting to single-handedly change the course to include information he deems more relevant. Spoiler alert, it's not. Most of us aren't trying to go into computer architecture, and the things he's trying to teach us would better fit into an advanced computer architecture class.
My biggest complaint with him is that he asks his students to know material that he barely teaches in class. We teach ourselves in Piazza and in office hours and lab. Unfortunately for us, the TAs are learning the material right along with us (as well as being loaded with more work than they should be doing, particularly the graduate TAs). This means everyone is trying to learn the material and the professor doesn't have the temperament or the ability to explain material to us in an understandable way. His problem sets are deathly as they far exceed the weekly suggested time you are supposed to spend on homework. I don't know a single student in the class who has completed a problem set in under 5 hours, much less the 2.5 they suggest. He's also trying to write an entirely new midterm exam, and simply tells us that the problem sets (which take much, much longer than an exam block) and the in-class exercises (which are just like the problem sets) are representative of the problems we'll face on the exam. I don't know if he realizes that he is setting his students up for failure, but everything he does is detrimental.

Everything was fine when they had Reiss teach the first half of the semester—who decides it's a good idea to switch the professor (and also the teaching style) in the middle of the semester? I've considered dropping my CS major because of this guy, and I have wanted to study CS since I was in middle school. Ultimately decided to keep it, but man, if you can avoid this guy, avoid taking his classes. Take it a different semester, beg your advisor to teach it instead, anything.

F

Highly not recommended w/ Venkat. Reiss taught the first part of the course and Venkat took over afterwards. Reiss's portion was very well organized and well thought out. Venkat's portion has been a mess so far. Mistakes everywhere in the slides, teaching, and problem set solutions. TAs do NOT know the material (Venkat introduced a ton of new topics this semester) and can't help. Venkat repeatedly said that the exam would be like problem sets and in class activities. However, we never went over the problem sets in class and a 3rd problem set was released 2 days before the exam with exam material on it (and no solutions to check your understanding were provided). Terrible.

Save yourself and DO NOT take ANY class with Venkat. I don't know how this dude got hired to teach this class in the first place. Ever since he came in in the second half of the course, everyone's lives have been going downhill and it's just miserable. He assigns problem sets that are literally impossible - TA's won't be able to help you with them because 1) According to Venkat, going to TA's for help is cheating 2) They don't know how to solve the problem sets, either 3) Venkat previously gave them the wrong answer key and now won't provide them any answer keys at all in the first place. He refused to give us enough information about the format of the exam and kept repeating "it's the same as the problem sets and the in-class examples." Well, I took the second exam today and can tell you for sure that problem sets and in-class examples did not help at all for the exam and the difficulty was outrageous. He assigned a problem set 2 days before the exam informing us that the content in the new problem set (when there is absolutely no access to any kind of help guiding us how to solve the problems) will be on the second exam. However, no one knew how to solve those problems because we are now not allowed to ask any of the TA's for help or talk about the problems even conceptually with other students because that is "cheating." Venkat teaching this course has been the worst thing that has happened to me since getting into UVA and I am sure other students feel the exact same. If his goal is to guide his students to failure, he's doing a great job.

I miss Reiss </3.

It’s the night after the second midterm, and I’ve been sitting here writing and rewriting this review for hours because nothing is accurately encapsulating and conveying how absolutely frustrating this class is. The further the semester progresses, the more I’m convinced that this class has to be someone’s twisted idea of a joke. Nowhere else have I seen a professor accuse their students of cheating off the TAs on a problem set—solely because the answers that a lot of students turned in reflected the same exact mistakes that were in the answer key provided to the TAs. And I’m beside myself that his *very logical* solution to solving this nonexistent cheating scandal was to not provide TAs with the answers to the next problem set. I’ve also never met a professor who assigns another problem set right before a midterm, decides to put material from that problem set onto said midterm, but then doesn’t provide any resources for students to verify that they’re doing the problems correctly before taking the exam. Honestly, I’m just waiting for the day where the cameramen pop out of nowhere during lecture and someone announces that this whole semester has just been one giant prank.

EDIT: Now that it's the end of the semester, I feel strongly compelled to give this an update. A single class has never made me feel so unbelievably stupid like this one has--and it's not from a lack of trying on my end. I've spent more time on this class than all my other classes combined this semester, and I still understand absolutely none of the material. He doesn't listen to suggestions from anyone (students, TAs, other professors), and he says to go to office hours if we need help, but his office hours are some of the most unhelpful things I've ever been to. Venkat's singlehandedly been responsible for many mental breakdowns and a serious deterioration of my mental health so for that I'm so very grateful :)))))))

I don't know who the heck gave him high ratings, but I found it more accurate when it was at a 1.15. You have to be extraordinarily shitty at your job to make Reiss look like this much of a godsend.

Sad the lowest rating we could give is a 1.

What I always tell people about this course is that although the material is difficult to make interesting, exciting, etc. for many students, it was always evident that Professor Reiss did the best he could with the course. Now, that being said, let's get into Venkat...

When I took this class, Reiss stopped teaching after the first exam to allow Venkat to take over. In his first lecture, he claimed he would be changing the course somewhat by introducing problem sets, in addition to the labs and homeworks already assigned by Reiss' schedule. He also claimed he would provide a bigger incentive to go to lecture by doing problems which would have similar variants on future problem sets and the exam.

----- With regards to Venkat's "incentives," here is what I gathered: a) he quickly runs through problems without explaining the steps he is using to get there or the methodology behind those steps; b) the problems are complete jokes compared to the ones which appeared on the second exam and in problem sets he has assigned; c) knowing how to the problems in lecture is no bearing on how well you will do on the exam or problem sets.

----- With regards to the problem sets: they are difficult, but not impossible. They often require several hours of looking back through the material which Venkat "covered" during lecture, however this typically provides little benefit since his so-called annotations on the slides are illegible (and in the event you do spend 10 minutes to decipher something he write, they aren't usually helpful). Also, need I mention the cheating accusations? It's almost like Venkat is paid based on the number of students which he is able to accuse of cheating. Don't even bother going to TAs for help on the problem sets because a) they usually can't do the problems at all because Venkat has introduced new material without explaining it to his teaching assistants; b) if a TA gives up and just tells you the answer, you have to either unhear it or face the penalty of cheating (according to Venkat, from lecture).

----- With regards to the exam: prior to the exam, a student asked Venkat if he would be producing a practice exam with solutions, as Reiss had available for the first exam (Reiss actually makes all previous exams available, with the answer keys as well). Venkat abruptly said no, you have had enough practice. At this time in the course, we had been assigned 2 problem sets of <5 questions each, and Venkat had been teaching for a few weeks. Normally I wouldn't find this annoying, but Venkat actually said that he would be using a brand new test format closely aligned with the problem sets he assigns, rendering all of Reiss' previous exam resources unhelpful. I'll just go on the record here and say that 2 questions on the test resembled problem set questions, and the rest were totally new. He also had a true false section, which he did not discuss prior to the exam (and his problem sets do not have T/F on them), which contained an acronym he had never discussed in lecture. The day before the exam I looked through every slide and I have no reccolection of him ever discussing it.

---- Don't take this class with Venkat. Don't take this class if you have heard there is even a CHANCE Venkat may show up to teach a lecture. That said, I don't think future students have much to worry about because at this rate I doubt Venkat will be at the university in his current capacity for much longer.

i'm gonna keep it so real with you guys, never have i ever hated a class more than this. i genuinely do not think i'm gonna pass and that is a 100% because of venkat and the cs department as a whole for deciding that it was a good idea to switch professors in the middle of a course.
let's start with my mans venkat. as other reviews have mentioned, we had a super fun cheating scandal! i love when professors threaten you with honor code violations that you didn't commit :) <3 he literally teaches us nothing in lecture and assigns some wack problem sets to do (bring back the reading quizzes plz). i put in a lot of effort trying to get the hw done and honestly i'm running out energy and tolerance for this class. his slides are essentially useless and the practice problems we do, don't even help with problem sets.
i've had many ragrets in my time as a uva student, but none of them are as big as taking comp arch this semester and having venkat as a professor.
@ the cs dept pls never again switch up a course halfway through the semester. I enrolled specifically in the 11 am lecture to have reiss as my professor because that is who was listed on sis. i didn't take this class to have a new and condescending professor. stick with what works.

TL;DR: save your soul and don't take a class with him lol

Easiest final ever. Assuming we're tryna get a 0