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Medina, Elsa

Cumulative GPA: 3.16/4.00 with 31 evaluations
Presents Material Clearly: 3.26
Recognizes Student Difficulties: 3.16

Mathematics Department, Cal Poly, SLO
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MATH 227 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 1:11 am, Dec 1, 2012 Report Evaluation		Medina is probably the best professor I've had at Poly, and hands down the best math teacher I've had. She smiles all the time because she truly loves math, and she calls it "just beautiful" when we understand concepts. Concepts that you learn in elementary school (such as why a negative times a negative is positive) were things I just accepted, but never really understood. This class gave me a way to REALLY understand the basics, which is a lot more difficult than you might imagine. Her tests weren't hard, but there wasn't enough time to take them! I'm usually the last 10% to finish taking a test, so when I completed 67% of the test, I got a 67% on it. LAME.

MATH 142 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 5:59 pm, Mar 26, 2012 Report Evaluation		She isn't terrible, but isn't a great teacher either. I don't think her teaching style was that great. She would often "answer homework questions" for us, but would end up just setting up the problems (which was the easy part) and not working it through to get to what we needed help on. Also, I went to office hours a few times and she wasn't really helpful for that either. She must have curved the final grades though, which is one good thing about her. I know I would have definitely gotten a C in this course if I didn't have such a great study session leader. If you have a chance to pick a better teacher, do it.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: F Required (Major) 6:01 pm, Mar 8, 2012 Report Evaluation		Medina is a reallybad teacher. Like, REALLY bad. First of all, she screws up basic algebra all the time. Second, she switches between Englsih and Spanish. And third, she doesnt present the material clearly at all. She gives good definitions but when she goes through examples,she doesnt explain how she got there. Try to get a different teacher. I failed her class and then I took it again the next quarter and got a 95%.

MATH 423 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 12:45 am, Feb 10, 2012 Report Evaluation		Medina challenged me in such a good way. I love the student support she gives. You can tell when a teacher cares about you and she does. One warning: Her grading is hard, so don't think because she is a nice person that she will be an easy grader. She will challenge you. But she will also care about your success in her class.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: C Required (Support) 10:12 am, Jan 17, 2012 Report Evaluation		Professor Medina is a great lecturer. She taught the concepts of the class very well. She was very nice and did homework questions in class. However, THE TWO MIDTERMS AND THE FINAL EXAM WERE IMPOSSIBLE. These were significantly harder than just about every other MATH 141 section out there and I could have easily gotten an A- with any other teacher. The average on the midterms was around a 60%. DONT' TAKE HER IF YOU CAN AVOID IT.

MATH 143 Junior Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 1:42 pm, Nov 12, 2010 Report Evaluation		Medina is the only math teacher I have ever had take a personal interest in my education. She really cares about her students and notices when you are truly trying to make an effort. I highly recommend you go to office hours- she is not one of those teachers who will just stare at you and not answer your questions. Ask her anything, as dumb as you may think it is, and she will walk you through it. The quizzes are not tricky- do the homework, ask about it in office hours, and you will get high grades on them. The midterms take more time to study for but they aren\'t meant to confuse you. Other math teachers on campus like to put extremely difficult problems on the exam which you will not even complete. Take Medina if you can, she is amazing.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 10:42 am, Jan 29, 2010 Report Evaluation		Dr. Medina is good professor (and a really nice person). Her office hours are REALLY beneficial. GO TO THEM. Her tests are pretty straight forward. No tricks or anything like that. She collects hmwk once a week and there are weekly quizzes. Just do the homework and you should be all good for this class.



MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 8:03 pm, Dec 30, 2009 Report Evaluation		Dr. Medina is a very friendly, helpful professor who always was inclined to help students when they asked for help. There was homework due once a week, which was helpful, but could become a tad tedious/long at times. Be prepared to spend a lot of time studying for this class (which I\'m sure is the same for all MATH 141 courses), because it is fairly challenging, and was not an easy A.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: F Required (Support) 3:18 am, Dec 17, 2009 Report Evaluation		I\'ll say that she is a REALLY nice teacher. Very kind and even made an office hour special when I couldn\'t attend any other. I really like her as a person, but not so much as a teacher. The thing with polyratings is that people confuse good as a person with good as a teacher. I\'d say that Medina is an average teacher. She doesn\'t do any of the learn by doing and doesn\'t have much sympathy. Homework is 20+ problems assigned every day due on Tue, homework quiz every Fri. Attendance is not mandatory, calculators not permitted and 2 midterms and a final. She does not allow any retakes, makeups, or excuses and her midterms are VERY hard. And no practice tests, which would have really helped. The class average was a D on one midterm but there was no curve nor any sympathy on her part. Final was difficult as well but I (think) I aced it but STILL got an F in the class because my 2 other midterms were ~35/100 F\'s which are terrible. I only hoped that since I did good on the final I would still pass the class, but Medina shows us the cruelty of simple math when she calculates the averages, which are 15%HW (which she actually grades each problem) 30%quizzes and midterms and final.

MATH 206 Sophomore Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 1:25 pm, Mar 17, 2009 Report Evaluation		Awesome teacher. I felt I never got confused because she presented everything needed to do the homework and tests clearly without extra stuff. And when your phone went off in class she made you buy cookies. It was awesome. I got a 75% on the first midterm then I studied harder for the second one and was able to get a 97%. She's a nice lady and she is really really intelligent. take this class

MATH 206 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 3:58 pm, Mar 12, 2009 Report Evaluation		Awesome professor. Presents material clearly. Quizzes every week that were basically strait out of the homework. Homework was collected every week. Tests were more than fair. Basically go to lecture and do the homework and you'll do fine. Definitely recommend this professor.

MATH 143 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Support) 8:13 pm, Apr 3, 2008 Report Evaluation		IF YOU HAVE A CHANCE TO TAKE HER DO IT, IT WILL BE ONE OF YOUR BEST MATH DECISIONS. She is an amazing professor. She presents the material well, is very aware of how the class is progressing in terms of how hard the tests are, and she gets along well with the class. I would take her for every math class if I could. She does have a slight accent but nothing that you wont be able to understand.

MATH 143 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 12:01 am, Mar 26, 2008 Report Evaluation		Professor Medina likes to teach and loves math. Listening to her was easy, even though she has a slight accent. Her tests are reasonable, and she even let me take a quiz during her office hours because I had to miss class. Calc 2 was much easier than this class. I recommend you take Medina or Kato for Calc 3. They're both awesome.



MATH 143 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 12:54 pm, Mar 18, 2008 Report Evaluation		Dr. Medina is one of the best math professors I have ever had. Her accent is VERY easy to get used to, and her English is very good (there are a few words/phrases that she mixes up, but any native English speaker can understand what she means). She is VERY helpful in office hours. I have gone to her office with 5 minutes left in office hours, and she'll sit there until I understand the material, even if that means staying 30 minutes past the end of office hours (that is, if she doesn't have a class to get to, of course). Dr. Medina wants all of her students to learn and succeed, and is very patient. She has no problem explaining a concept multiple times or with multiple approaches, and never gets frustrated. She is happy to review test/quiz problems that students did not understand. Honestly, Dr. Medina is a HUGE asset to Cal Poly's math department. She is also a very pleasant person with a great sense of humor and understands that students have multiple classes/social lives and cannot spend 168 hours per week on math. I VERY HIGHLY RECOMMEND HER.

MATH 328 Sophomore Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 10:41 pm, Dec 16, 2007 Report Evaluation		Professor Medina is a really sweet person. She talks to her students as if they were her friends, usually starting off the day with a small story about her personal life. She gives a quiz a week which are all really easy as long as you go to class and understand the material. The thing I didn't enjoy about this course was the exams. I know that a lot of students got As on all the quizzes but when it came to the tests their grades just dropped. I think it's because she's very strict on partial credit. Most of her questions are worth around 10 points and even if you basically understood the question but just couldn't express your answer well, she only gave you like 4 points. However, she knows her material well and teaches it in a good manner with examples and student interaction (like worksheets, going to the board and writing your answer, etc.) She also gives homework but doesn't collect it. I think overall she's a good professor but maybe she should understand that if students are aceing the quizzes and failing the tests then maybe she should make the questions worth less or give more partial credit.

MATH 328 Senior Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 3:34 pm, Jun 3, 2006 Report Evaluation		This class may have been slightly boring, but Medina was very friendly and helpful and gave students opportunities to be successful. Homework is assigned for practice, not for grades, but it's worth doing. There is a quiz every week, which sounds bad, but I think it was really helpful for the exams. There are 2 mid-terms and a cumulative final. My only complaint is when she had students share their answer with the class, knowing they got the wrong answer. She would then say, "Who can tell ______ what they did wrong?" She did this a couple times. I don't know if she realized how that can be embarrassing or hurtful. She spent a lot of time explaining that kids think differently, that you have to teach them multiple ways... but how about setting them up for failure? Anyway, she's really a sweet lady, and I would recommend her for this class.

MATH 142 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Support) 11:09 pm, Mar 17, 2006 Report Evaluation		It is like taking mathematics from your grandmother. She is supportive, helpful, understanding ...you know, grandmotherly..It would be very difficult to fail with this mature lady. Of course she does not like to grade your homework. JUst study the practice tests and quizzes and you will do fine.

MATH 143 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Support) 5:40 pm, Feb 25, 2006 Report Evaluation		She's a great professor. She explains the concepts clearly and provides useful examples. Homework is due on Tuesdays and Fridays along with a quiz at the end of the week. Her tests cover what was taught. Overall, great teacher!

MATH 143 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Support) 4:06 pm, Jan 19, 2006 Report Evaluation		She explains everything clearly, presents everything clearly, helps out a lot in office hours, everything you could hope from a teacher.



MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Support) 10:21 am, Jan 9, 2006 Report Evaluation		Professor Medina was awesome. If you have never taken calculus, take her. She teaches in well and her quizes and tests are easy. Just make sure you study.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 1:00 pm, Jan 5, 2006 Report Evaluation		A nice middle age lady. She is easy to understand and the exams are not too bad. The practice exams are for all practical purposes very similar to the real exams. She is supportive and helpful in office hours. I did not care for some one in the class grading my homework. She should have graded at least a few of our homeworks.What I did not care for at all was for the lack of applications of the material to real problems. She will explain you how to derive or integrate but she has NO CLUE how to use the concepts in science or engineering problems.

MATH 143 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Support) 3:01 pm, Jan 4, 2006 Report Evaluation		Medina is a great teacher. She is very sweet and understanding. She gives quizzes every week, two exams and the final, so it is a very straightforward class. The tests are a challenge, but I did well on them because this whole class was a review of BC Ap Calculus. Also, if your phone goes off in class, you have to bring in cookies, so everyone wins. Her lectures are fast, but she is very clear in explaining material. She multiplies in Spanish which is also kind of funny. GREAT TEACHER.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: C Required (Support) 1:14 pm, Dec 14, 2005 Report Evaluation		Dr. Medina is an excellent professor. Her lectures are very easy to understand and she's a very nice lady. I got a C because i failed my first midterm and didn't do so good on my second one, but the thing is, you don't have to give up because u can still pull your grades up. her grading system is pretty fair, 15% hmk, 15% quizzes, 20% for each of the exam (midterm) and 30% final. her tests are pretty hard and long sometimes, so make sure to study those A LOT (if u don't already know the material). final is a bit easier since it covers everything from the beginning.

MATH 328 Junior Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 4:17 pm, Jun 24, 2005 Report Evaluation		Dr. Medina did a great job explaining the material. She made sure we understood the concepts taught and allowed us to work together to discuss the material and try to work out any problems on our own. She is always available to answer questions and open to corrections from students. English is a second language to her so she does have difficulty with spelling sometimes, but nothing you can't understand. The only thing wrong with her class was that she missed lecture quite a few times.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: C Required (Support) 11:42 pm, Jan 11, 2005 Report Evaluation		Medina is a sweet teacher. She's really nice, funny, and super caring about the students. I got a C in the class because I never tried on my homework and just tried to cram before the night before the tests. It was in no way a reflection of her teaching. She is VERY VERY helpful at her office hours and is willing to help you and explain it in every way possible until you understand the material. She doesn't really curve the tests (for the most part), but sometimes will 2-3%. She has someone in the class grade your homework, so that means, if you have a class full of douchebags, you'll get bad grades on your homework, but on the other side, if you have a class full of cool kids that dont care and see it fit that every one gets A's and is happy, then you're stoked. Yes, I had the class of douchebags. So at any rate, she's a really caring, good teacher, and I would take her again. Just study for the tests earlier than the night before and utilize office hours. "C" you kids later...



MATH 327 Junior Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 8:33 pm, Jan 2, 2005 Report Evaluation		Ms. Medina is a very nice teacher. However, I think I took her first quarter of Math 327 and she really needed to work on a few things. First, she called the same two people up to class to explain answers so the rest of the class started to look at each other because this is an elementary math ed class. In an elementary situation you would have discouraged many many children. Also, she told me I should take the class again even though I had a high C. I just felt discouaged and thought she could have been less bias towards the A students. If you have a hard time in math try to take a different teacher. I won't take her again.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: N/A Required (Support) 11:14 pm, Nov 17, 2004 Report Evaluation		Medina is the best teacher. She actually teaches and helps you with your homework if you need it. Her grading system is generous and her office hours are really helpfull. Plus she is a really nice person. I actually failed her second midterm but that was my own fault, because I am slow at related rates problems. I would have taken her for 142 class too if I didn't have last priority. If you get the chance, I would take her class, especially from what I've heard of other proffs.

MATH 328 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 2:34 pm, Aug 1, 2004 Report Evaluation		Dr. Medina is the NICEST, friendliest lady!! She loves math and she loves kids and she has a lot of insight to share as far as putting the two together! Since I'm a math person and Dr. Medina's requirements are very stright-forward, this class was a breeze for me. I could have gone a lot less and still gotten a good grade, but I went almost every day because I really felt what I gained from her lectures was valuable! The only draw-back is that English is her second language and as a result I occasionally noticed she would say one thing, while meaning to say another, and people who didn't know math better would easily get confused. The class has simple weekly quizes (yes, every Friday), weekly POWS (usually easy, but if you got stuck she was always giving the class hints during class and in office hours), a midterm and final. Another thing that made the class enjoyable was that it was 16 girls and very interactive so we'd all help each other if anyone was getting left behind. TAKE MEDINA!!:-)

MATH 142 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 10:07 am, Mar 29, 2004 Report Evaluation		Medina is Awsome. Take her if you can. Her lectures are informative and the homework is easy. If you keep up with the homework then the weekly quizes will be simple and the midterms and final are basically large quizes. I used to be afraid of Calc but this class gave me a lot of confidence. Again she is just an Awsome calc teacher.

MATH 142 Freshman Grade Earned: D Required (Support) 9:28 pm, Mar 27, 2004 Report Evaluation		Medina is a really good teacher. My grade doesnt reflect it because i didnt keep up with the hw, but she really is a good teacher. HW is due two days from when it was assigned, which was kinda tough because she assigned the same amount of work as other teachers but other teachers gave their students a few more days to turn it in. the break down is...30% final, 20% for each of the two midterms and 15% for quizzes(given once a week on friday) and 15% for HW. Quizzes should be a cinch if u did you kept up with hw. Midterms and Finals were very reasonable. I lived off her partial credit which she is generous of. I had her for 141 and she rocked then...nothing has changed.

MATH 141 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 4:01 pm, Feb 19, 2004 Report Evaluation		medina is a good math teacher. she is friendly, presents the material clearly, and doesn't give a terrible amount of homework. there are quizes every friday but they are a good point boost and they aren't difficult if you have been keeping up with the material. i didn't put a ton of effort into this course and i got a b. i'm taking her again for 142 this quarter and she is still just as good as last quarter. she is a good professor and i would definitely recommend her.

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