Castilla, Guillermo  

This class was a joke. He is a really nice guy and means well, but doesn't actually TEACH very well. I don't know if it's because he's inexperienced in this course or what, but concepts weren't presented well and he never had any idea what he was doing. There's no real textbook, only a workbook and you can use any notes on the tests which is cool, but I don't recommend taking this guy for PSC 101.

right now i am studying for the 2nd exam for this class and im completely lost. all we do in class is go over example after example without ever really establishing foundation for what we are learning. Class avg for the first exam = 65. if you know physics well and are good at teaching it to yourself you'll be fine. if you're like me and dont know a thing about physics (and want to learn physics) i suggest a different professor. nice guy tho.

In short, awesome teacher. I'm in his class right now and I'm responding to the 65 avg on the midterm. Now practically everyone who got lower on the 65 I've talked to said that they barely opened up the book and just relied on what he posted on black board. One thing I've noticed is that Castilla bases his tests mainly out of the book. He's probably one of the most humorous and caring teachers Ive had so far here in poly. Everytime I go to his office hours, it seems like he wants to be there and he has a fun time teaching you. He wouldn't let me leave until I knew what I was having a problem with. I short, I recommend Castilla for any body, the class is good and he goes the extra step in helping you understand.

A good teacher who is always available and will sit and talk to you for hours if you don't understand a concept. He keeps class interesting with experiments and his accent. Dr. Castilla offers study guides for all tests and quizes, there are also homework problems if you so desire(they are not graded). Expressing your views during class and office hours will help you and your classmates.

Guillermo was a great teacher and a nice man. He was difficult at first beacuse he covers a lot of information, but after the first quiz you realize you arent responsible for a lot of the stuff he talked about in class. He was a fair grader and more than generous when it came to practice quizzes, tests, and finals. Plus, he was just so sweet and nice. Sometimes his experiements would go worng in class, but he always laughs it off, and you can help but feel for him. Hes fair, and wants you to do well. If he is gonna miss class, he gets another teacher to sub for him so that you still get the info instead of just assigning reading. Definitely take him.

I only have him for lab, but I feel he is a very good instructor. His speech is accented, but it is clear enough. He communicates extremely well on the board, so the lab very straight forward and simple. He makes an effort to finish early everyday and does. He is certainly competent. I think he would be acceptable for lecture as well.

Castilla cannot teach physics. During the lecture he would do examples on the board using variables. He doesn't explain the whole problem before he starts. Halfway through the problem he would give another piece of information needed to solve it. He would rarely give the equations needed to do the online homework. I think he expected us to learn the material mainly on our own because he would never give a direct answer when I asked a question. He would always lead me in the direction of the right answer. He knows physics, but he cant teach.

Castilla is a wierd guy, very quiet and slow as hell. He spends all of every lecture class working out sample problems but he is so slow that he only gets one or two examples done a day. He does most of the example in his head so it often left the class puzzled what he was doing. What was really funny whas that after almost every example he would say "But this is too dificult for you, id never expect you to do this on a test." i cant help but think THEN WHY THE HELL DID YOU SPEND THE WHOLE HOUR DOING IT. The thing with Castilla is that he knows Physics really well but hasnt a clue how to teach it. Just dont take him.

When taking Castilla for physics, you must first realize that he is new to the whole teaching scene. That being said, he is a real good guy. His lectures seem to be MUCH more devoted to the theory behind particular physics equations rather than the applications of them. He spends a large amount of time deriving and integrating one formulas, showing in tedious detail where everything comes from. This is offset by the last part of class being used to go through one or two long and complicated sample problems. He also uses the mastering physics online homework which, in case you don't already know, is a TERRIBLE SYSTEM. It actually discourages you from doing the assigned homework. Where Castilla really shines is office hours. Not many students take advantage of this time, but this is where I found him to be most helpful. He takes the time to try and understand the concepts you are having a hard time grasping and attempts to reduce them to the simplest terms possible. In addition, the fact that you care enough to seek extra help really impresses him. His tests aren't really too bad if you know the material, although the final was pretty nasty. Overall, he's a great guy, he just needs a few more years of experience under his belt before he becomes a good teacher.

ok first off this guy cant teach worth shit. He assigns about 3 hrs of hw a night on the stupid excuse for a program mastering physics than gives virtually no help on it. In class he is very boring and messes up about twenty times before finishing a problem he started an hour ago, not to mention the fact that he never even tells u what you are looking for till the end of the problem. one bit of advice-DONT TAKE THIS LITTLE ARGENTINIAN COMMUNIST!!!!!(and that was the edited version of what i really feel about him)

Guillermo is very very bad at teaching physics. He is a nice guy, but he just derives equations all lecture and fails to explain to you what is going on as he writes variables all over the board. he also uses this online homeowrk crap which takes forever and ever and ever to do, doesn't really give you much help on it, but he is easy to change the due dates for the homework if you need to. Take him if you know physics backwards and forwards already. he'll be your best friend. if you are in the class to Learn physics, don't expect anything from this guy.

i thought guillermo was great! he is a little hard to understand but he is more than willing to stay after class and help you with anything you need. The online hw kinda sucked but other than that i thought he was good. My advice is to take advantage of his office hours...it really helps!

Dr castilla is one of the toughest professors at CalPoly.The disadvantages of taking class from him is that you will work like a dog, doing lots of homework, thinking about those hard problems that he likes so much, and realizing that taking AP physics is, for all practical purposes, meaningless. The exams are pretty TOUGH. Yet, you learn the stuff and taking the class shows you what a real college level class is. Now, I find all the classes at CalPoly easy in comparison. A big plus is that he is always willing to help you. The bottom line is: if you want to get a B without too much effort, take some one else; if you want a real college level class and do not mind the work, he is a good choice.

I could not stand Castilla AT ALL. He made many mistakes every day when giving us notes on the board. Plus going to his office hours are nearly usless because he will just explain that this is a very hard course. What he doesn't understand is that he is the one making it difficult. However, my biggest problem with him is the online homework he assigns. It is "dead week" for me right now (it's Thursday night) and I have three, yes THREE assignments to do between now and next Tuesday when the final is. I'm sure you have heard complaints about the online homework system, and how #$%&ing horrible it is. If you round differently than the webpage anticipated, you will get 0 POINTS. The online homework is the worst idea for assigning homework I have ever experienced. It is simply the homework that lazy teachers assign, since the website grades it for them, and records all student's scores for the teacher. This homework system is reason enough to avoid Castilla. He is the worst professor I have had so far at Cal Poly. AVOID HIM!

i managed to pull a decent grade in the class, but that's because i read the book. his lectures were basically useless, and i found it more usefull if i went to my lab professor for help than go into his office hours. i think that he does understand the material, but he just can't explain it to you. in class all he does is derive the equations given to you in the book, there are no examples done in class. i personally would not take him again.

Anyone who complains about castilla is a wimp. Pay attention in class. Do the online HW even if rounds different. Ask questions. Castilla is as good as anyother physics teacher. Just because he has an accent is a lame excuse. 132 is hard, deal with it.

Negatives: Fast-paced, too much homework, really hard exams, need to read in advance otherwise you are left behind pretty soon. Likely one of the toughest profs here. He expects you to work on your own a lot. Positives: Nice guy who is helpful in office hours. He will give you breaks in the homework. Plenty of partial credit in the exams. Lots of examples during the lectures but you need to have read the material in advance.

Professor Castilla's take home midterms are so hard it takes around 6 hours or more to finish. 2 weeks before the final, he calculates the number a hours a student have to study everyday to pass the final which is roughly an hour everyday including the holidays and weekends. He doesn't curve he midterms or finals, but he includes bonus questions which is like curve. The bonus questions are sometimes hard but he gives partial credit so it all works out. If you want an easy A, I don't recommend him b/c you are going to have to work you ass off in this class.

Nice guy but you need to work twice as much to get a decent grade. Calculus is a must. Exams are tough and long. You need to know what you are doing since the problems can be very tricky. Do the homework and try to work in full some of the "suggested" problems (you will see variations of them in the final).

I had him for phys 131 and phys 133. Expect to do a LOT of extra work outside of the class. The final (and some of the midterms) is incredible long and difficult (and carries a lot of weight). If you just want an easy A and miss High School do not take him. Going to the lecture and studying the notes will not be sufficient to pass the class with this guy. You need to study the book a lot, score high in the online homework and know inside out all the examples problems of the textbook (that is where the exam problems come from). This guy sticks verbatim to the philosophy of "learn by doing". If you are not willing to be on top of all the hard work, take him at your own risk.

He is funny and you can tell he really loves physics. His class is somewhat unstructured yet results in lots of work. The reason for this is he expects too much and it is hard to tell when he is serious or not. Take home midterms took 7+ hours but the final was not too bad. Expect to do tons of mastering physics, but not to improve your grade. It only helps to learn the material. He sometimes makes mistakes in lecture, but they are not critical to the concept. Just dont take his lecture notes as gospel, they should be cross referenced with the book. I wouldn't choose him again, but I wouldn't avoid him either. I am sure after he has been a lecturer for a few years he will be much better. He just needs to learn a few tricks.

Mr. Castilla is most definitely the worst teacher I have ever had or seen teach. His rating here on Poly Ratings is way higher than it should be. I practically aced two of the exams and did all of the homework and somehow I ended up with a C. The material for the class is NOT PRESENTED AT ALL. Castilla sits up there and tries to talk and be funny when he really just cannot convey any part of physics to the class. Castilla is definitely among the top ten worst teachers at Cal Poly. I did not learn physics. I was not happy (no one was). I wish I didn't take Castilla.

Castilla is an very bad teacher. He does not understand how to teacher. He gives out homework problems that he takes over 1/2 an hour to solve if you bring it to him at his study hours. I spent an average 15 hours a week on HW alone for this class. He did not curve in a class where no one recieved an A and the class average was a D-. The info is not hard learn by yourself if you put some effort into it, but I think any other teacher in the department would be more helpful in assisting you to learn the information needed to go on to future physics courses.

Not a class for wimps, that's for sure. Finals and midterms are difficult and really test your problem solving skills and understanding of the material. Some of the problems in the exams will go beyond of what you find in the textbook that we use at Cal Poly. It will be tough, but after all this is college. If you take him, set aside at least 10 hours a week for homework and study. Use his office hours, it will save you time since he is always willing to help you with the homework.

This guy does not understand time management. Given this is a college level course and it is not supposed to be easy, but assigning 20 problems on one website, then another 15 problems on mastering physics, each with a-e subsections, it gets rediculous really fast. I did so much physics homework I nearly did not have time for the rest of my classes. The wrost part about it was Castilla was horrible at teaching the subjects. He would try to do an example problem, make a mistake, then say screw it and let the class leave, but still expect us to solve the homework. If you are going to take Castilla, you had better have a love fo physics that rivals Newton.

Several of my friends had other teachers for 141, and they were in absolute hell. Castilla seems really absent-minded and will often stop for a little bit to think and recollect his thoughts. He always seemed really tired and not really interested in what he was showing us. Prepare for a lot more work than the other physics classes: he assigns from a workbook, the regular text, mastering physics, and another online site at utexas (I just skipped the utexas work, its only like 2% of the grade.) He wasn't great, but wasn't awful, and seemed like probably the best option of all the 141 teachers.

Taking this instructor is like being in a Twilight Zone episode. You just can