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Pilkington, Wayne

Cumulative GPA: 3.52/4.00 with 25 evaluations
Presents Material Clearly: 3.64
Recognizes Student Difficulties: 3.40

Electrical Engineering Department, Cal Poly, SLO
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CPE 129 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 1:03 pm, Jun 27, 2012 Report Evaluation		Gives out alot of handouts which is nice. You should try your best to fill in all the blanks and if you are unable to attend class there are outline videos. He is a good teacher, I feel like exams are pretty hard. He doesn't always seem to be there for office hours, it might be because he is real busy. Overall I would say always take pilkington for any class, if he is teaching it.

EE 419 Senior Grade Earned: A Elective 9:43 am, Mar 18, 2012 Report Evaluation		Pilkington is just the best. He tries harder than any other professor out there. Sure, DSP is a lot of work, but you actually learn the material from doing the lengthy homework, and don't really have to study for the exams. Beware! DSP never sleeps, and neither does Dr. Pilkington! If I could take him over and over again, I would.

EE 419 Graduate Student Grade Earned: A Elective 4:15 pm, Mar 9, 2012 Report Evaluation		One of the best professors I've ever had. I'm not sure if the material is just not that difficult or he does a good job teaching but I learned a lot from this class. The homeworks and labs match up with the lecture and the exams are fair. Like a lot of teachers, the tests are hard to complete in 50 minutes so practice!

EE 328 Senior Grade Earned: C Required (Major) 6:44 pm, Dec 5, 2011 Report Evaluation		Dr P is really something else... I have to respectfully disagree with what other reviewers wrote. The HW problems that he assigned were really easy. So easy that one would leave it the last thing to do, but when exam time arrives you are dead. The exam questions were no where near the magnitude of the homework assigned. It's already the last week of lecture, and he has yet to return one graded homework nor post grade updates on BB. He gave two exams and a final, 7 HW assignments, no quiz, and lots of handouts to read with. Emailed him four times asking whether he would post the exam solutions as study material, but with no response. Also, the horrible book assigned to this class by a person who think he could unified everything about analog and digital within one book but carelessly forgot to include answers to the chapter problems in the back leaving the student stranded without a source to check his or her work with. If I knew it would be like this, I would rather take Saghri instead!

EE 151 Freshman Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 12:33 am, Nov 30, 2011 Report Evaluation		Okay, so here's the thing. The lab was a very confusing, almost pointless class. Not only do you spend the entire weekly lab doing the most dry things every (wiring circuits, learning about ohms, etc.), but Dr. P really didn't help the process go along easier. It's IMPOSSIBLE to get his attention...he's basically in his own world. Then he hardly helps you and looks at you like you should know the answer. I want to scream "I'M COMING TO COLLEGE BECAUSE I DON'T KNOW THIS INFORMATION." Extremely lengthy pre-labs to read with essential information, I'll admit. He has like one quiz the entire quarter and a few pre-lab assignments...which he makes worth 100 points EACH?? Made no sense to me. Be sure to record all information in your lab notebooks if you end up with Dr. P...he requires it to be turned in at the end of the quarter. And the annoying "Robot Egg Transporter" project....we never work on it in class. All of the work is outside of class. Try not to let this class stress you out too much. Oh, by the way, the final is IMPOSSIBLE.

CPE 129 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 1:12 am, Jul 24, 2011 Report Evaluation		Dr. Pilkington is a very good CPE/EE professor. The first midterm we took covered logic design and the second covered programming in a HDL. When everyone did bad on the final, he curved it so everyone could get a decent grade. If we you want to learn the material well and want it presented to you in an interesting way, take this class with Dr. Pilkington.

EE 129 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 9:26 am, May 17, 2011 Report Evaluation		Best EE professor so far. There is a lot of content covered in ee129 but Dr. P organized very well. He made digital logic easy to understand and fun. He even had a conmencement by the end of quarter. HW and lab was not hard but very time consuming, and final was ridiculously over 20 pages long.



EE 419 Graduate Student Grade Earned: B Elective 9:23 am, Mar 31, 2011 Report Evaluation		One of the best, if not the best, instructors I've ever had. The class is time consuming, but everything you do is worth while. Highly recommended for anybody slightly interested in DSP.

EE 419 Senior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 8:05 pm, Mar 28, 2011 Report Evaluation		Best EE professor I have had in my 4 years at poly. Pilkington makes digital signal processing fun and interesting with his exciting lectures. He does a great job of tying everything together that you learned in 228 and 328 and even clarifies certain things that were vaguely covered in those classes. With Pilkington I found myself saying "why didnt someone tell me this before" so many times. 2 midterms and a final plus HW, all very straight forward and do able.

EE 151 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 1:15 pm, Jan 14, 2011 Report Evaluation		The only downside of this class: the final is impossible. The class is fun, but he expects you to know way too much on the final, especially for an introductory course. He gives a 30 minute summary of the concepts in the lab right at the start. He's very clear in presenting concepts. Be aware if the lab documents say if there might be a quiz or if there is a prelab assignment. Every prelab/quiz/lab write up is 100 points. Also, do a good job on your lab notebook as the quarter progresses. Again, it was a fun class.

EE 151 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 1:21 am, Mar 3, 2010 Report Evaluation		A good teacher for a fun course. A funny guy overall. Hes pretty nice and understanding. It might be hard to learn because theres no real lecture connected to the class. i didnt work too hard in the class and i did well, its a lot of work but thats how the class is. Good teacher, fun class, lots of work per unit

CPE 129 Freshman Grade Earned: C Required (Major) 12:07 am, Jun 6, 2009 Report Evaluation		Great teacher. Really nice, and approachable, and really great at teaching. I feel like i learned more in this class than any other class ive taken. Dr. P is where its at if youre an EE or CPE. But beware. Be prepared for LONNNGGG Testsss.

EE 151 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 3:43 pm, Mar 9, 2009 Report Evaluation		Fun Lab. Pilikington knows his stuff, and really wants you to know it too. Helpful guy and really nice. He does like to assign a whole lot of stuff to do, and we almost never finished a lab, but he grades on how much you get done. Also let us use our lab notes on final.



EE 151 Freshman Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 1:02 pm, Nov 6, 2008 Report Evaluation		K, here is the deal: Pilkington is a very nice and helpful guy, it's just didn't seem like the prepared enough for the lab exercises. What was really, really annoying is that he would post a lab on blackboard, I would do a prelab for it, and then he would change the lab 30 MINUTES BEFORE CLASS. NOT COOL. It was also almost impossible to finish the entire lab in the allotted 3 hours. This also shows some lack of planning. He is, however, very willing to help students if they have problems, and explains things in a way that makes sense. He also stays after the lab if you don't finish, which is very, very generous of him and I appreciate that.

EE 129 5th Year Senior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 1:14 pm, Sep 3, 2008 Report Evaluation		really organized and energetic, very helpful and entertaining in class with his slides. he practically gives you the notes for EE 129 and you fill in some of the blanks if you are paying attention. a really easy way to transition into college.

EE 129 Freshman Grade Earned: C Required (Major) 12:29 am, Aug 21, 2008 Report Evaluation		He is a really good guy, but his tests are WAY WAY WAYYY TOOO LONG. He teaches well, he is funny, awesome powerpoints but geeze his tests were killer. I got a C in the class and an A in lab, my partner did do work at all. I just used the skills he taught me. I think I deserved a B but who knows what happened. Would I take him again? Yes. Just realize your final WILL BE 3+ hours.

CPE 129 Freshman Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 3:11 pm, Jul 9, 2008 Report Evaluation		Pilkington is very experienced teaching CPE129. Since he has taught it for many years, he knows exactly where student difficulties arise. He explains the material well. However, you really need to do the homework. Without doing it, getting even a C will be a struggle. (Even though I got an A, I know this from fellow classmates).

CPE 129 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 7:40 pm, Mar 25, 2008 Report Evaluation		Pilks honestly tries very, VERY hard to keep his students interested and awake in his lectures, and for that, I applaud him. It's just that the lecture material for Digital Design 1 can get dry and boring at times...otherwise, most of the material was very interesting (especially since the VHDL learned in this class was applied in lab, with the Nexys boards) and the two midterms & final were very fair. There is homework due every day at the start of class, and if you don't do it, then you are almost guaranteed to not do well on the midterms and final. Pilkington also responds quickly to emails, and will answer any questions in lecture that may come up. He's a very approachable professor, and possesses a great sense of humor to boot. Definitely recommended!

CPE 129 Junior Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 7:04 pm, Mar 21, 2008 Report Evaluation		he is an extremely good teacher, the downside is that he is also a hardass on the midterms. he will include every single topic that he covered in lecture regardless if his tests end up being ridiculously long. the final was not a final it was more like a novel; it seems that he enjoys watching his students suffer for an entire three hours. if his midterms werent so hard i would probably say this is the best teacher ever.



EE 129 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 9:52 am, Jan 11, 2008 Report Evaluation		This was by far the best taught class I have attended at Cal Poly. Prof. Pilkington is the best lecturer I have had, all the material was presented in both visual form via slides and then his lecture complemented the slides with no tangents...ever. In addition, his tests are fair and are similar to the homework which he writes himself. Take him for CPE/EE 129.

CPE 129 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 1:16 am, Dec 13, 2007 Report Evaluation		I took it Fall 06 - Pilkington taught all of the 129 material through Powerpoint slides, and was always asking if we liked them or not. As interesting and simple as CPE 129 material was, his voice combined with slides made me sleepy all the time. He had several quizzes that were not too difficult. The exams weren't very difficult either as long as you did the homework.

EE 129 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 5:56 pm, Dec 11, 2007 Report Evaluation		Pilkington is awesome. A little quirky, but awesome. He knows what he is teaching very well and is able to present it in a very clear and straightforward way. He threatens you with quizzes throughout the quarter but there only ended up being 1 quiz, 2 midterms, and a final. As long as you keep up on the homework, this class is an easy B. If he is teaching any other classes in the future, I am definitely going to try and take him. You should too.

CPE 129 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 9:03 pm, Dec 6, 2007 Report Evaluation		Professor Pilkington is an incredibly good lecturer. He is very thorough, does not stray off topic while lecturing, and explains all of the material in a very easy-to-understand way. Also, he puts all of his notes in power point presentations and copies them to handouts, so you don't need to take your own notes in class. At first, I was disappointed that I didn't get to take Mealy for 129, but if I had to compare the two now (after taking Mealy for 229), I would say I prefer Pilkington.

CPE 129 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 4:13 pm, Dec 5, 2007 Report Evaluation		He loves using PowerPoints in lecture, but it's not what you are thinking. He does PowerPoints the way they should be done and combined with his lecture they are used as tools to help convey the topic. Simply put, the best lectures utilizing PowerPoints I have ever seen.

EE 328 Senior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 6:59 pm, Dec 12, 2005 Report Evaluation		This was Pilkington's first quarter teaching here, and he was excellent! He is focused on the students and always willing to accomodate. His lectures were both enjoyable and informative and I felt (unlike many other EE courses here) that I left with a solid understanding of the material. TAKE HIM IF YOU CAN!!!!

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