ECON 2010

Elzinga is the best. If you're taking Econ 201, take it with him. He is extremely knowledgeable and cares about getting to know his students and being accommodating (even though he teaches 800 students). However, if you don't have any interest in economics I feel that this wouldn't be a great option for an elective. The exams are difficult and require a lot of studying. Textbook reading is also extremely important, but I usually ended up waiting to do those until right before the exam. Discussions are also helpful for doing practice questions if you have a good TA.

Anything he says in lecture is worthless. Scored a D average on the midterms so I stopped going to lectures to self study; Thoroughly reading the textbook actually helped me understand econ and I got a B+ on the final for Dutch knockout. If you actually care about your grades, his teaching style and difficult exams are not worth the extra stress.

Took this class as a pre-req for some prospective majors and I have a meh opinion. Reading the textbook was much more helpful than the lectures (which were often rambling and covering things you weren't sure if you should take notes on or not). What really makes or breaks your experience is your TA: I had the head TA (Anderson Frailey) which helped out a lot since he was the closest to the Professor and thus could give us better advice and help regarding what would be on the exams. The midterms (there are two) are all short-answer and aren't too bad if you read the textbook and watch the Econ minutes. However, DO NOT bank on Dutch Knockout to boost your grade: the final is full of obscure concepts and was much harder than I was expecting. Overall, if you are not a big numbers person and would prefer a more qualitative econ class, then I would choose Elzinga. If you are not bothered by more quantitive analysis, then choose Santiguni.

I'll start off by saying that I had the pleasure to meet Elzinga in office hours and he really is the nicest man with really cool stories to tell! He is a pretty good lecturer, but I found his class to be really difficult. As someone who had never taken any sort of economics in high school, it was hard for me to absorb all the information so quickly. I also very much dislike the grading system. I'm personally not the best test taker, so hearing that the final would be worth 50% or possibly 100% (dutch knockout) of my grade was very unnerving.

Elzinga is a great man and a great teacher; however, there's no need to both read the textbook AND go to lecture. Yes, there is a lot that he doesn't go over in lectures that's covered in the textbook. But whatever he doesn't mention in lecture that's in the textbook can be found on Quizlet study guides made by previous students (which I recommend you look at while studying).

Both midterms will only feature material that's covered in the lecture, but the final might have 3-5 questions that could only be answered if you read the textbook (or looked at Quizlet).

I'd say you either do one or the other, both are overkill and a waste of time. For me, I went to the lectures cause Elzinga actually makes them really interesting and enjoyable to listen to. If you want to read the textbook, then there's no need to go to lecture at all.

All in all, Elzinga's class might be harder than other professors, but going to the lectures and hearing his jokes/examples are worth the struggle. However, if your priority is to get the best grade possible, enroll with a different professor.

Do not take this class with Elzinga. I've never studied so much for a class before and still ended up with a C in the class. I read the textbook and went to every lecture to still fail every exam, not worth it. My TA also sucked and did not explain anything well. Basically had to teach myself all the material the entire semester and obviously that didn't work out.

Kenneth Elzinga is a senile jerk who literally just wants to confuse people. You can know the material so well you can feel like you can teach the course, but NO, Elzinga makes his final exam epically impossible with the worst wording. He is NOT a legend. DO NOT TAKE CLASS WITH HIM!!!!

I loved this class. I would strongly recommend going to every lecture and actually reading the textbook and taking notes. The midterms will be more based on the lectures, but the final definitely had many concepts from the textbook that you needed to know to do well. Elzinga is a legend at UVA, and taught when my mom went here, that's how you know he's a great professor! I really enjoyed his lectures and liked the structure of the class. Grading is based on a 400 point scale accumulating clicker points, discussion section participation, and the exams, but a Dutch Knockout is used, so that if you do better on your final exam than your average, that grade will be taken as your final grade. The final grade is also curved, so I wouldn't sweat it if the first midterm doesn't go so well, because you could be looking at a good 7 point bump in the end. #tCFfall22

Elzinga is definitely one of the most caring and genuine professors I have had at UVA, however I think he started rambling too much in class and I could often tell during certain lectures that the class completely lost their train of thought on what he was saying. One aspect about this class was how dependent it is on your TA. The TA's basically make their own decisions when grading the mid terms, with mine not even following the rubric given half the time, so I would have to go to office hours with the Head TA to get it sorted out. I ended up getting an A-, not to the help of my poor midterm grades, which is the most common grade in the class. DO NOT listen to other reviews about the final. It is very easy to skim the textbook and pick up the facts needed to do well on the final. I think people are just upset because he asked 2 questions that maybe required more in depth reading, but even whilst skimming the textbook I was able to gather and answer to these questions. Take the course, with knowledge knowing that you could get screwed by your TA grading and that you are going to have to teach yourself some material that Elzinga glosses over. #tCFfall22

I don't know what people are on with their Elzinga reviews. Professor Elzinga is genuinely one of the most engaging professors you could get. For students who want to be spoon-fed names, terms, and graphs to memorize, the lectures might seem unhelpful. But for students who want to understand economics long-term, Elzinga wastes little time explaining key concepts in a memorable and easy to follow manner. As Elzinga says, the course is really just organized common sense. Use your brain and nothing will be a challenge.