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Zambrano, Eduardo

Cumulative GPA: 2.74/4.00 with 27 evaluations
Presents Material Clearly: 2.41
Recognizes Student Difficulties: 2.44

Economics Department, Cal Poly, SLO
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ECON 311 Junior Grade Earned: A Elective 1:14 pm, Apr 6, 2013 Report Evaluation		Zambrano is a cool enough guy but not when it comes to teaching. He does a very poor job at presenting the material which is sad since he is clearly so knowledgeable. He thinks like a computer explaining everything with equations or calculus even when you ask him a conceptual question. His first test was really hard and probably more than half the class failed it. Be prepared for hours upon hours of studying if you wish to pass this class. I actually thought i was going to fail for most the quarter but studied for consecutive 12-14 hour days before the tests. Take another teacher for this subject if you can, because it should be pretty easy material but it is presented very poorly and the book is HORRIBLE!!!

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 10:05 pm, Mar 19, 2013 Report Evaluation		Zambrano I'd have to say is one of the most knowledgeable professors I've had. This is a class where you have to commit at least 8-10 hours a week to study for and requires a lot of work. His tests are really hard but going to his office hours got me a B in this class. I highly recommend this class to anyone who is an Econ major or trying to do an Econ minor, otherwise you might want to choose a different professor. If you like Econ and you're good at math, definitely take this class. I would consider Zambrano the "Gorman" of Econ so it's a huge personal commitment taking 311 with him.

ECON 312 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 4:06 am, Mar 19, 2013 Report Evaluation		Arguably the worst professor at Cal Poly, and definitely the worst in the Econ Department. Hard to understand, terribly unorganized lectures, barely understands the material himself, and when he's asked to clarify he blames the students. I will do everything I can to avoid having to take another class with him.

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 7:11 pm, Jan 7, 2013 Report Evaluation		This is the professor you want to take. By far the best one I have had so far in my economics courses. He is fair and really wants to help and answer questions.

ECON 312 Senior Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 12:43 pm, Jun 1, 2012 Report Evaluation		If you are enraged that a teacher asked more of you than to just sit in class like a mindless drone, then why are you in college anyway? Zambrano is extremely intelligent, just listening to his digressions can send one into deep thought about the wider meaning of economics, philosophy, and the world as a whole. Yes, his classes are taught at a high level. Yes, you need be an active learner and participant in your own education. He loves nothing more than a question from a puzzled student, which he interprets as a need to go back over the material at any length. I wish more teachers were like Zambrano, as I would have learned exponentially more in college. And I wish there were less students who believed his deterrents to laziness warrant the bashing I've read below. Take Zambrano for every class you can, you will not regret it.

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: C Required (Major) 7:41 pm, May 21, 2011 Report Evaluation		Hands down the worst professor ive had at Cal Poly. Administered extremely difficult tests without teaching anything. It is possible to get a good grade in the course but it is necessary (or essential) that you teach yourself. It is a better use of your time if you dont go to class and just read the book for the two hours and go over practice problems. Oh yea, he also took his midterm from a random site online...Ooohhhh no wonder it was nothing like the practice test he handed out to the class. fuckin joke

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: N/A Required (Major) 7:03 pm, May 21, 2011 Report Evaluation		Zambrano is definitely a really smart guy. But that does not mean he can teach. His class is ridiculous. The only people who do remotely well either spend over 20 hours a weeks reading and teaching themselves or are part of the 15% of the class that is retaking due to failing it previously. He has no idea how to teach the material he knows. No idea. He frequently sent e-mails out telling us to read more and more chapters (either from our book or the other one he provides online). What sucks is I know i need to understand this crap to do well in econ. However, this guy just cant teach for shit. When this is combined with his Venezuelan accent and his 3 days of class he skipped, you start to get pissed off at him. Not to mention he schedules his midterms out of class time which is a pain in the ass. He is unbelievably unhelpful when asking questions in class. In my opinion he should stop trying to show off what he knows and start teaching others something. I literally learned nothing in his class at all. Nothing. It's not an overly challenging class-its a poorly taught class...



ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 2:25 pm, May 11, 2011 Report Evaluation		fantastic professor! very knowledgeable and knows how to lecture a class. he really cares about his students and you can tell right away after being in his class. yes he does go a bit fast, but if you don't hesitate and ask him questions, he'll answer your questions before moving on. attend his office hours and always do the reading beforehand. i went into this class hating it but ended up loving it, i recommend taking him

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 10:40 am, Mar 28, 2011 Report Evaluation		It seems as though people either really liked or disliked Zambrano. I'll admit he seemed to sometimes make things more difficult than they really were, but I understood most of the material so it didn't bother me too much. He's organized though, which helps. There are pre-class assignments which get you accustomed to the material, which he then lectures about in a well-planned order. There are also post-class materials which are more difficult but not to bad, and we only had about 5. The hardest part about the class is definitely the exams. The averages for the midterms were about 55 and 65 each, and 55 for the final. They require a lot of studying, and they look a lot different than any problems you work on in or outside of class. You really have to understand the material, and not just know how to do it by memorization and habit. There's definitely a lot of stuff to learn, but I think it was worth it. He's a pretty funny and cool guy, and he really tries to help you. I also noticed the class got easier as you went along. I recommend him and the class, but be warned it is not easy and you have to put time into it.

ECON 311 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 6:45 pm, Feb 28, 2011 Report Evaluation		the class consisted of 2 midterms, final, pre/post-class assignments, and book review. this class actually doesn't move that fast as people say... it just feels like it because Professor Zambrano procrastinated a lot. he always posted last minute assignments which got in the way of my schedule all the time. he always says he will post this or that by some day and not do it until 5 days later (which would be due in like 2 days). i understand that teachers have lives too, but teaching is a job that you have to perform and make sacrifices in. im sure he would be frustrated if the school always told him he'd get his paycheck by a certain date and be 1-2 weeks late on it every time. i also remember him constantly holding his head during lecture going "ummmmmm" trying to figure out what he's supposed to say next. honestly, Professor Zambrano is a smart individual. if he was more on top of things and was more organized, he'd be a great teacher. but as of now, i feel as though he would be better off being in the field of research rather than teaching.

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: B Required (Support) 8:54 pm, Feb 26, 2011 Report Evaluation		Many people say Zambrano is a great professor, because he pushes you as a student. Though I agree with the motive of where that statement comes from, I can't really say that this applies to Zambrano. He's a smart man, and a cool guy to talk to (type of person you can have a long conversation over a cup of coffee for hours). However, his ability as a professor is definitely questionable. The material of ECON 311 is not THAT difficult. What got me from getting an A was the basic teaching ethics he lacked: basic organizational skills, general student interactions, among other things. He wasn't very prompt in returning and grading assignments before tests (especially the post assignments which mattered the most) or posting study materials (posting materials 2 days before a midterm is not that effective). It also looks really unprofessional when a teacher frequently wastes lecture time flipping through his teaching notes when the students paid thousands of dollars to be there. Even worse, I was enrolled in his early class, but I've attended a few of his other sections later in the day if I didn't quite get the material down. I noticed that this guy forgets quite a bit of major steps or points for his earlier lectures; so if you're taking him, make sure to enroll in the latest sections. As far as helping students out, he's okay. What's ironic is when he belittles someone for not understanding/forgetting basic concepts. One of my classmates was asking a question during his office hours, and he basically shot her down before giving her an indirect answer because "[she] should know this stuff." Obviously, she still didn't get it and just went "Okay" after his explanation, because she actually went, "Ohhhh now I understand" and solved a relevant problem when I helped her out afterward. He talks about the philosophies of economics and how it applies to the rest of the world (which is great), but doesn't he realize that a student from a high school in South Central could have not gotten the same education as a private high school such as De La Salle? Therefore, the Calculus teacher of the previous student probably did not teach as well. Is that her fault? I understand his sentiment of "if you can't even do that, you shouldn't be here." But at the same time, what if that basic concept was the only thing she needed to easily understand the rest of the damn chapter (which was the case for the previous student I mentioned by the way)? Just because a student didn't get as good of an education as another student beforehand doesn't mean the previous student's potential is worse than the latter student. I thought this was Microeconomics; how does it even make sense that he can apply it to various places around the world if he can't even apply it to simpler real world applications such as the previous example? Anyways, I basically taught myself everything that were actually on the tests due to him not returning any post-assignments on time (which are the ones you really need to study for the exams). Others have listed the course structure itself (2 midterms, final, homework, etc.), so I just wanted to point out some things people really haven't mentioned.

ECON 311 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 8:32 pm, Jan 26, 2011 Report Evaluation		Zambrano is a great professor. He goes incredibly quickly through the lectures but if you can keep up it is very clear. He goes on tons of tangents but usually they are entertaining and break up the class. The homework isn't bad, just reading.

ECON 311 Senior Grade Earned: C Required (Major) 1:31 pm, Dec 8, 2010 Report Evaluation		To Whom it may concern, Doctor Zambrano is a champion. I took him last spring so I am on here to give some ratings by an economics student before I graduate. So here is my opinion: Zambrano is a very smart and interesting man. He is very curious and has a desire to have and to share knowledge. For some reason he has always seemed rather commanding to me (word choice?). I believe it might just be his Venezuelan accent and maybe his overwhelming confidence with academics (which is warranted no doubt), or maybe he just doesn\'t fuck around with that thing we call life; he has found, it seems, what he loves and tries very hard to present that subject to students in a clear manner. It is difficult to capture the essence of Zambrano in words, but I would say he has an anomalous character about him and because of this it seems only a select few are able to make a strong relational connection with him. I think he wants to make connections with more students, just seems so intellectually unattainable. Maybe he simply never had a chance to learn or succumb to American slang, which probably would make us more comfortable, being the slacker Californians we are. Anywho, that is a rant of me making unfounded judgments on one of our brightest faculty. 311 is tough, you had better start learning calculus because guess what, economics students use a good amount of it (relative to business students, if you know calc well, this may be a breeze). Zambrano presents the material incredibly well (I dont want to say better than Hamilton but i think i just did- side note, if Hamilton were an animal he would be giddy but smart, like an Australian Shepherd; if Zambrano were an animal, he would be cool and enjoy salsa dancing, like a mountain lion from Latin America), you will most likely fail the tests, but no worries because in his words, we live in a decadent society, so he institutes a large curve and it is unlikely that you will not pass the course or not have a good understanding of micro when you are finished- provided you attend and god-forbid have the balls (or ovaries) to speak up once in a while and ask \"stupid\" questions. Cmon we all need that one person to ask stupid questions so we dont have to. Step up and be a class full of those people, engaging in conversation about economics- chances are you will graduate with more human capital as a result.



ECON 311 Freshman Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 7:32 pm, Jun 9, 2010 Report Evaluation		First of all, this class is difficult, but not impossibly hard or anything, its just a class where you\'ll have to know your stuff to get a B. For me, that meant studying the materials 4-5 hours a week. But that 4-5 hours a week includes doing his post-class assignments, which take awhile. Throughout the quarter I felt that I was lacking in the math department. I passed out of calculus in high school with a 3 on the AP test, and I took this class Spring quarter, so I hadn\'t seen calculus in about a year. I would suggest, if you take this class, to be up-to-date in calculus. That being said, I did pretty well on his tests, despite the math, because I knew the concepts of economics and could put stuff together on the test to show him that I knew what the problem was asking. As for Zambrano himself I really thought he was an excellent teacher. Very sarcastic and witty. In my opinion, he knew how to explain concepts well, but others will disagree with me on that point. Another plus to him was that he took evaluations about midway through the quarter and I think he really valued what the students had to say. A criticism of him was that he took forever to get tests back. But ya, overall, learned a lot, not nearly as bad I thought it was going to be, and really good teacher.

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 9:35 am, Feb 22, 2010 Report Evaluation		Zambrano is hands down one of the best professors in the Econ department. The reason for the negative reviews (I assume) is that he is a very difficult professor who really wants you to push yourself and learn the material. He\'s the Gorman of Econ. Great class & highly recommended professor. I will take him again for anything else that he teaches during my time at Poly.

ECON 409 5th Year Senior Grade Earned: B Elective 1:42 am, Jun 17, 2009 Report Evaluation		I had Eduardo for the experimental class, Econ X409-Probability Models for Economic Decisions, my last quarter at Poly. It was extremely hard I was afraid I wouldn't graduate, but at the same time I felt that the material was interesting and useful in real life. I was suffering from a severe case of Senioritis and was very worried. He always gave extensions for homework assignments, the class project, and the take-home final(which was one of the hardest tests I've ever taken in my life). In the end, Eduardo gave me a much better grade than I thought I deserved, and I thank him for that. You will learn a lot if you pay attention and put in the effort. Overall, an great teacher who wants his students to learn and recognizes student difficulties very well. Thanks Eduardo for letting me graduate!

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 1:05 pm, Jun 3, 2009 Report Evaluation		I am disappointed to see all the negative reviews. In my opinion, Zambrano is by far the best econ professor I've had at Cal Poly. Yes, it was a difficult class, but after a week or two, I got used to it and ended up doing quite well. The class averages on tests are fairly low, but he has a generous curve. If you are going to take this class, you better know your calculus. And if you skated through not knowing anything, you might need to retake it. Overall, he is a great teacher, a funny guy, and you should not be afraid to take his class

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: N/A Required (Support) 4:11 pm, May 19, 2009 Report Evaluation		I have 2 words for this teacher FUCK YOU!!!

ECON 311 Sophomore Grade Earned: N/A Required (Support) 1:13 pm, May 14, 2009 Report Evaluation		Worst teacher I have ever had. The guy should be fired! He has no idea whats in the book and whats on aplia. He teaches out of his ass making up stuff as he goes. This guy needs a new job.



ECON 311 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 5:46 pm, Feb 20, 2009 Report Evaluation		He is not the best at explaining the material the first time around because he moves fast, but if you work hard you will learn a lot. Don't hesitate to take this professor if you’re willing to put the work in.

ECON 311 Senior Grade Earned: B Elective 11:25 am, Dec 16, 2008 Report Evaluation		Zambrano is an intelligent man but sometimes he goes too fast. This is a pretty hefty course with lots of material and if no one asks him questions he burns through the material and leaves examples half complete or skips major steps. The book wasn't too much help either. Basically he gives you the theoretical derivations and you have to apply them to problems that don't look like it. His exams are very tricky because he tries to fool you and gets excited about this. He also likes when the class average is really low, 60 for the first exam, 67 for the 2nd. He gives a pretty nice curve on the course though. He likes to cold call sometimes too, he has fun with this as well. post class hw, pre-class hw, 2 mids, and final were the overall grade, 20% for each. I think he has potential to be a great prof but hes not there yet... He is pretty funny at least.

ECON 311 Senior Grade Earned: C Required (Major) 9:11 pm, Oct 23, 2008 Report Evaluation		MY EXPERIENCE: After being at Cuesta, exiled from Poly for 2 years, I had Zambrano my first quarter back. TOTALLY not prepared for it, not only because the pace was fast, but also because it required you to really LEARN the material in order to pass the class (as he puts it, "learn how to formulate a decision problem like an economist would"). Honestly, because if this Zambrano has re-energized my interest in Econ and he is actually the inspiration for my senior project. CHARACTERIZATION:He cares about his students a lot, truly he does, but don't think for a moment he'll be a softy if you don't keep up with the material. He is one of the smartest professors, but not arrogant (like Marlow or Fisher) and challenges you and pushes you. CLASS STRUCTURE: There are 2 midterms and a cumulative final. They are "designed to test your UNDERSTANDING of the material" and "will appear to have no connection to what was taught unless you understood it well." This is completely true and you need to know the magnitude of that early on. There are pre-class homeworks that are graded and are easy compared to the post-class homeworks, which TAKE TIME. The 2 midterms, the final and the lot of pre and post-class homeworks are worth 20% each. THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO DO TO PASS: Recognize the importance of the post-class homeworks because if you understand how to do them, you will be able to tackle the tests. Don't underestimate the time it takes to do them, however, and give yourself time to ask him to clarify parts of it during office hours if you can because he's good at explaining concepts in simple terms one-on-one (when in lecture not all of us really got what he was trying to explain, part language barrier, part not being able to word what he was thinking at the moment). LASTLY: Attendance is voluntary but you're seriously screwing yourself if you don't go. Sleeping in that extra 2 hours is NOT worth the 4 you have to spend teaching the material yourself, it doesn't even work that way at all for his class. Hope this helps.

ECON 313 Junior Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 7:02 pm, Aug 9, 2008 Report Evaluation		hard class. lots of work and difficult tests. great teacher though. very involved and is there to explain, but be prepared to put in the work.

ECON 311 Junior Grade Earned: A Required (Major) 9:00 am, Mar 31, 2008 Report Evaluation		This Professor does not dumb down the lecture material or exams for this class. The material is tough, but he does a pretty good job at presenting it clearly. If something is not clear you HAVE to stop him and ask questions, otherwise he will continue on at his typically rapid pace. Start working on postclass homeworks and exam studying early because you will almost definitely need extra help in office hours. There is a pretty massive curve on grades depending on how well the class does and he gives an excel spreadsheet to help see where you stand with the curve implemented. Grades include pre and post class assignments, 2 midterms, and the final, each worth 20%. Overall, I learned a lot and appreciate the difficulty level of teaching and learning this material.

ECON 311 Senior Grade Earned: C Required (Support) 9:56 am, Mar 22, 2008 Report Evaluation		This class is EXTREMELY difficult. He goes very quickly through seemingly simple material, only to be given complex real world applications on exams. Bridging the gap between lecture material and exam questions is very hard to do. He will go as fast as he can over material and will only be stopped to go over everything if asked specific questions. ASK QUESTIONS, and be prepared to be belittled and degraded when you ask them. Dont be suprised if you are compared to his 6 year old daughter (We feel sorry for her...)If you dont already hold a masters in Economics, good luck. I would suggest you find someone with old exams and homeworks, or somehow coerce him to post old homeworks so you can at least have an idea how the material is going to be applied before exam time. Expect a 10 point curve on your overall grade.



ECON 311 Senior Grade Earned: B Required (Major) 1:28 pm, Feb 10, 2008 Report Evaluation		Zambrano is very smart. The class is fast paced because the of the amount of material involved. This is the hardest class I've ever taken, but don't let that discourage you. I worked my ass off for this class, but I learned a TON. Zambrano is concerned about his students; he wants everyone to be learning. Yea, the class is difficult, but it pays off. Zambrano is also very fair with grades. He pushes you on homework and tests, but he grades nicely. Ultimately this guy wants you to learn. If you're a slacker DO NOT take this class; you'll probably fail. If you genuinely want to get the most out of your college experience then take him. Excellent Professor. For the first weeks in class you'll probably feel lost. Ask questions. Follow along in his lectures. You WILL understand the material if you're paying attention. Oh yeah, don't miss class!

ECON 311 5th Year Senior Grade Earned: C Required (Support) 3:28 pm, Jan 10, 2008 Report Evaluation		This professor truly wants the student to learn and walk away from the class gaining an unforgettable learning experience. I have never worked so hard in any of my Cal Poly classes to just earn a C+, however I have also never learned so much. If your looking for a professor that challenges you take him!

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