Cooper, Mary  

She was only my lab instructor and not my lecture instructor, but I didn't like her very much. Maybe it's because the format of the labs in 134 sucks, but I was never interested in the stuff we did because of her. She seemed really rude. Besides, I've heard Thorncroft is better anyway. Don't avoid her, but she isn't wonderful...

Had her for ME151 lecture too...Dont take her if you can...Very boring and dry. Made everything kind of confusing. Nice lady, but her gold tooth was the only thing interesting enough to pay attention to.

She gives out daily quizes that are quite unless you studied the chapters assigned in and out everyday. The homework is kind of heavy for an intro class and she doesn't explain how to do it very well, so be prepared to spend more time figuring out were to start then actual time on the homework. The test is the same as the homework. She is a boring lady, and will never teach what is on the homework, so you will learn on your own. All I can say is that she is not a good teacher.

Very good teacher. just dont fall behind in her class

She is a very nice lady and easy to talk to, but she has no idea how to teach a class. Here lectures have little or nothing to do with the homework assigned, so expect to spend hours figuring out the homework. Her midterms are not that hard and her final is even easier. So basically to do good in her class study the assigned chapters for the quizes she gives and do the homework. From there on everything will be easy. If you know how to do the homework you will ace the tests. Good luck!

Mary Cooper is a not the greatest lecturor. She doesnt present the material clearly, and often discusses tangents while leaving out pertinent information reguarding the actual topic. Also, the format of the lecture can be frustrating. She gives quizes to check if youve read. These are useless so dont worry if you fail every one of them. Tests are difficult, and I feel we were inadiquately prepared for them. I was worried about my grade, and she insisted that she diddnt curve the class, but I feel she did because my final grade was much better than I expected. Not the worst teacher, just frustrating.

The biggest thing that stangs out in my mind about her class are those stupid quizzes. About once a week we are quizzed on topics that we skimmed over or were expected to read from the book. Afterwards, she lectures about what we were just quizzed on, kinda backwards if you ask me. Overall, i would say cooper is an averge lecturer, not bad, no great...

She is a descent teacher. She is very helpful during office hours. Her big downfall is her grading system. It is so hard to do well in her class. She also presented way too much material for just one quarter. I probably learned more from her than I would have another teacher, but it was just too hard too get a full understanding of all the material presented. If you want a challenge, than take her class.

awesome teacher for lab. i had friends that had the same lab w/ a different professor, and from what they told me, none seemed as prepared as Prof. Cooper. Pretty much ever week we had a small quiz, but as long as you read the lab the night before it was cake. so basically, as long as you read the lab before hand (takes minimal time) and show up for all the labs, its fun and a breeze. highly recommended

A very easy-to-understand and caring prof! Instead of ignoring the people with difficulties, she gives personal help to make sure everyone is up to speed. She's very easy going and also friendly. A sure bet, get Cooper!

cooper gives 5-6 lecture quizes throughout the quarter. they come straight from the reading and her notes. she assigns weekly homework which are moderate in difficulty level, but fairly time consuming. during lab she goes rather quickly and you are expected to do the same to complete the assignments due at the end of the lab period. speed in completing the lab is more important than the quality of the drawings you turn in. her grader does not mark off points for line quality or neatness as much as for the drawing being complete and correct. she can be approachable during office hours, depending on her mood. she can be very nice and helpful at times, but rather short and rude at other times. her lecture final is worth 25% of your grade and consists of40 multiple choice questions and a few short answer problems and a drawing. the material is easy, but her wording can be somewhat ambiguous on the multiple choice questions. her lab final is worth 25% of your grade also. the final is fairly difficult because you are required to complete 5-6 drawings and you have no time to get stuck on any of them. because the two finals encompass 50% of your grade it is easy to drop an entire letter grade or two if you do poorly. i would take cooper again for this class, but i would take a different professor if i possible.

if you like high school, then take cooper. i thought she sucked. yeah the class is pretty easy so you should do well, but it is full of busy work. homeworks take a while to do. labs are long and boring. if i had the choice id choose another teacher.

Cooper isn't great. She is occasionally friendly, but really doesn't give a rats ass about you. If you fall behind, prepare to get yourself out, because she will not help.

If there ever was a teacher who was bitter about being just a "lecturer" and not a faculty member it is Cooper. She really doesn't seem to care to teach you anything. She hands out a quiz almost every class just to babysit you and make sure you did the reading and pulls some bullshit definition out of the chapter so unless you went over the material carefully you will fail the quizzes. Then instead of lecturing she reads the slides that you read the night before and has almost nothing relavent to say. She is simply a bad teacher who doesn't really care about teaching students. I now know why freshman change majors from ME after having a teacher like Cooper for an intro course.

Mary Cooper's class was hell. She doesn't give a rat's ass if you get the material or not. Her lectures are just notes on the slides from the previous week's assignment. She doesn't explain how to do the homework until after you turn it in. I would take priority just to get away from Mary. She grades extremely hard on both homework and labs. For a 2 unit class, the homework amount is rediculous. Thank god for the quarter system, one more day with Mary may attempt me to drop out.

Cooper is a very nice person, it was the grading that was bad. The homework, labwork, and quizes were held to strict guidlines, so if one line was missing on a drawing, much grade ended up missing as well. However, the final is 50% of the total grade and it is by no means as hard as the homework. The final is the time to make up the bad homework scores.

All that she does is go over the cd rom that came with our textbook. It is always the exact same material that was in our homework, so it is extra boring. That also means that all of the teaching in this class comes from a cd-rom. If you are like me and have a hard time learning by watching a computer screen, you should not take her class.

Mary Cooper teaches a bland, uninteresting, useless lecture. The format is this: You are required to read about a subject, you are quizzed on it, then she lectures on it. ME151 with Cooper is a lesson to freshmen to read before class. If you take it as an upper-classman, it's infuriating. The class is easy enough, but I didn't take it seriously enough for an A.

She was pretty good, she took very few points off homework, sometimes even for huge errors. i wish i had been in her lab.

I difinitely have mixed feeling about Prof Cooper. She is an overall decent teacher that knows the material well. But her grading system is horrible. She always gives these stupid quizzes on material that we have not yet learned because she wants us to read before hand. She'll also nail you for little mistakes. I wouldn't avoid her nor would i try to have her again.

Cooper laid out the quarter so you could expect what was coming, but the class did not require a professor to teach it. Cooper assigns homework and gives quizes almost every lecture and lab. She expects you to know how to do it. Not just have a basic understanding from what you read before class. After your homework was turned in then she would explain it. In lab she is actually helpful, but any student that has already taken the class could have taught it just as well.

She was a decent teacher, just make sure you pay attention during lecture and really work hard in lab. It's important because the lab final is quite difficult.

Well Professor Cooper A.K.A. Goldie was helpful and wasn't a bad instructor until I received my grade at the end of the quarter. I turned in all the homework, attended all of the labs, and believed that I had an "A" going into the final. Now I'm not trying to rip on her because I got a C but this was an easy freshmen-level class. The whole point to the class was to learn how to use AutoCAD and before even taking the class I had on-the-job experience with CAD. My point to all of this - I DID NOT DESERVE A "C"!!! I am bitter but even worse was that three other friends that did well in the class also received C's. What the heck were her expectations for us? None of us deserved a C and there is now a fatty C on my Major GPA.

Seriously, having Cooper for 152 was a joke. She doesn't even know how to use Solidworks. The only answer I ever received in class was, "I don't really know how to do that, I don't actually teach this class." The grading for the class was ridiculous to say the least. I have prior experience with both autocad and solidworks, yet I received a C in this class. I did every single assignment too. If you want a lame teacher, go with Cooper.

Cooper is well-organized with her lectures. She has a packet full of examples, summaries from the book, equations, and easy to read and learn. She introduces new topics for each lecture and then does problems or give hints on how to do the homework. Her tests are about 3 or 4 problems for each, very straigth forward, no problems. Homework really helps, so get perfect on them. I think she curves, but I'm not sure, depends on whether I aced the final or not. Extremely helpful in office hours, go to them if you have any questions. Early clarifications to your questions increases your understanding of future topics.

Mary Cooper ROCKS! Her lectures were clear, organized, and she made statics pretty damn interesting. She is excellent about answer questions and is easy to approach. Homework is assigned each time you meet (if you always do your homework, you will do fine in this class). There are quizes about once a week (fair and straight foward, usually over the material just discussed in class). There are two midterms (again these are fair and straight forward. She usually gives you a pretty good idea of what's going to be on these two tests). The only thing I didn't like about this class was that the final was a common test taken by all the secitions at the same time. In short, Mary is an excellent teacher. She teaches a fair class with no tricks.

Very smart teacher!! Knows her shit and very helpful at office hours. One of the best teachers Ive ever had!!

This is an excellent professor. She is very down to earth and very student friendly. She knows the material very well and knows how to convey difficult topics to her students.

She explains concepts well, but can be anal about details on tests such as vector notation, declaring axes and rotational direction, etc.

Cooper is an excellent teacher. She presents the material so clearly that it is incredibly easy to understand. Statics was supposed to be a hard class, but taking it with Cooper make it really not hard at all.

well, the class is just hard! but Dr cooper gave many examples in class and went over homework problems. I got a C- because she is cool i think....study study study

I really enjoyed how the class was taught. Not only can professor Cooper explain things really well she also goes over hw in class. There were no midterms but quizes every week. They were pretty hard at first, but I ended up pulling my grade up by getting A's on the last four. I wish that I could take dynamics from her. She always tries to show the easiest way or fastest way to do a problem, other teachers will force you to do everything the long way and then your screwed on the final.

COOPER IS GREAT!!! I honestly couldn't have asked for a better teacher for Statics. She is super organized. Each time a new concept was introduced she gave us handouts which gave easy steps to recognizing and solving that type of problem. At the beginning of each lecture she would go over any questions from the homework due that day. I especially liked how she would work out entire problems to the answer, unlike other teachers who only want to get you started. Homework was due every class, usually four problems. There were seven quizzes, no midterms. I liked this because the material was always fresh in my mind. The final is common, so the teachers collaborate to make it fair, then each teacher will grade one problem for all sections, to make sure scoring is fair too. Homework was worth only 10%, but don't think that means you shouldn't do it. Solving the problems is what prepares you for the quizzes and final. Quizzes were 60%, final was 30%. Go to office hours if you get stuck on homework. She'll search through your work to find your mistake, even if it's just a sign error. A really nice lady too.

Dr. Cooper did present the material clearly, however she did a poor job of prepairing us for the common final, which is pointless. A quiz every week and she spends the least amount of time on the hard stuff, and way too much time on the easy stuff. Also, she was useless in her office hours.

ehh............... an okay teacher, not as all hot as people said she was. When I saw that there was an opening for her on POWER I was really happy because I thought I was going in and getting a good teacher for a change because of so many praises. Well........ I don't want to say she's a bad teacher, she's just overrated, personally. I'm not here to bash her in any way, i just want to say, that don't go in there expecting a whole lot because she doesn't teach much, just kind of goes over the HW for the lecture

I don't know who these other people took. Professor Cooper is a perfect teacher. She explains statics well enough that even non-engineers could understand it. She helps us through every problem and evaluates us fairly on the material we learned. Thats right, her tests are fair! Tough but not hard and she gives solid partial credit if you had the right equations and just made numerical mistakes. She is always available, like I emailed her over thanksgiving break and she emailed me back like six hours later with the answer to my question. Thats right, she was able to help me over the frieking internet through e-mail!!!! You're crazy if you don't wanna get her as a prof, I would die to have her for dynamics too. so take her if your not a retard and if you are a retard _______TAKE COOPER_______

Mary Cooper and her gold tooth kick ass; including yours if you act like little girly man. Do the homework and you will have nothing to bitch about. wah wah!

One of the few truly outstanding professors I have had thus far. Admittedly, the material itself was easy for me to understand, but Professor Cooper is just a great teacher all-around. I actually went to her office hour once, which is rare for me, and she was incredibly helpful and patient. Each class session she assigns homework that is due the next time, but it's never too much. You drop it on her desk when you come to class and then, if you had difficulties but you couldn't make it to her office hours, you can ask about a problem and she'll go through it before she gets to new material. There is a quiz each week except when there's a midterm (or two?), and of course the final, which is very straightforward. Your grade is based on all of these plus homework, which is helpful. Cooper even made a video lecture one time because she was going to be gone; that's how much she wants her students to learn. I would highly recommend her for any class.

Pr. Cooper seems to be hit or miss- some like her, some don't. I was on the liking side. She is a good teacher. Explains everything, even if it is after the fact, it forces you to learn the material. Instead of having midterms we had a quiz every week which forces you to keep up with the class. Her office hours are very good if you're having trouble. I would take her again.

I had Mary Cooper for ME 211 Lecture, and I thought she did a great job. Statics has a reputation for being a pain in the ass, and while the course material is demanding, Cooper was a great teacher for the subject. She collected homework everyday and gave a quiz once a week, which forced you to keep up. No midterms, just quizzes, homework, and final. She expects you to learn the material, but she's very reasonable about it. She's great in office hours, and has no problem answering questions in class. She always explained things in a way that made sense and gave lots of examples. I would definitely take her class again.

Professor Cooper is a warm-hearted, reasonable teacher. Her ability to present material clearly, though, is a little lacking. Just ask questions and you'll be fine. She's a nice professor, and I'd take class from her again.

Cooper is just ok. Her ability to present new material is kind of lacking. Her grading system is nice though. 8 quizzes, homework and a final. The quizzes make sure you're up to pace. The homework is easy, make sure you do it and don't just use a solutions manual/cd. The common final was brutal, but i think it was like that for most people so they just curved it a ton. Nice and approachable professor. Not too helpful in office hours based on the one time i went in there. Statics is one of those classes that you either get or you don't, so good luck

Ms. Cooper is nice and approachable. She does a lot of examples in class which I really liked. The grading was very fair on both homeworks and quizzes. The material was pretty difficult for me so I went to quite a few office hours and that really helped. Surprisingly I found the common final to be a lot easier than expected. Maybe it was because I studied a bunch for it and stressed too much about it. I'd recommend her for statics.

Cooper is one of the best professors in the ME department. The material is rough, but its going to be with anybody. She explains things very clear and is very helpful in office hours. If you have to take statics, I would definately recommend her.

Terrible teacher. I repeatedly went to her office hours only to have her blow me off like 3 out of 4 times. I mean seriously, you have to be there for the students when they need you, especially during your listed office hours. Just a terrible teacher, take someone else if you can.

so this was my second time taking statics and i actually got it. she gives handouts with all the lectures which are really helpful. there are no midterms just 5 quizzes which are fairly easy. the only negative is occasional popquizes that count toward hw points, but i suggeest going to that class anyways. overall i would say take her she will make statics more enjoyable and understandable (if thats possible)

Average instructor. Quizzes every other week, no midterms. Homework collected daily. The quizzes were relatively simple (and WAY easyier thaan the final), but her grading is extremely harsh. Example: I wrote down that the sum of forces in the x direction equals zero. I meant to write 'y', did the math for 'y,' got the problem correct... but got only 3 out of the 5 points for the problem! Additionally, even if you have the proper methods you can expect major point markdowns for minor algebraic mistakes. Homework is collected daily, which is a good thing. People say avoid the solutions manual, but the proper thing is to avoid directly copying the problems. It can be a great way to start you off or see where you went wrong if you are stuck. A final note: she says she does not curve the class, but she does.

Cooper was very straight forward in her teaching. she was willing to help during office hours and always went over questions in class. She gives out handouts for each new topic and goes over many examples. She prepared me very well for the common final and her grading is very fair. Instead of having midterms that cover a lot of material, she has 5 quizzes that cover less material. Take Cher if you can!!

This was my second time taking this class. The first time I had Jane Kennedy and I did bad in her class because she expected us to learn on our own in groups which defeats the purpose of a teacher. Mary Cooper had lots of examples/worksheets that she would show how to solve in class and take us through them step-by-step. Her quizzes are better than midterms because they give you more time to do the problems and let you focus on fewer topics. The quiz grades combined with better learning through all her examples helped me do better in her class.

Even though I did ok in her class I had a really hard time relating to Dr Cooper. the only time I went to her office hour she made me feel like a total moron and beleive me I have tough skin! Everybody thinks, she is the best but I happen to feel differently. Well, i will never have to take her again and I'm so happy about it. I just want students to know that she might not be the greast instructor that Cal Poly has...... Good Luck

Aside from the fact that weekly quizes are 55% of the final grade (there are no midterms), Mary Cooper is an excellent professor. She is very helpful in office hours and always has handouts or worksheets prepared for new subjects. Be prepared for the common final though, it is very difficult and the quizes (in my opinion) do not prepare the students well enough for it.

Mary Cooper was an awesome professor. Her tests were average difficulty and the class was very hard. But dynamics is a hard class material-wise, and she did her best to teach the students. She was extremely helpful in office hours. She really cares how her students perform. Mary is a proficient professor and I whole-heartedly recommend her!

I do not think Cooper is a very good instructor. She is rather disorganized in her lecture, and tends to stray off topic a bit. I don't believe she completed a single problem in class, not one. She sometimes would start a problem, guess at what she might do to solve it, "maybe this would work" kind of approach. I heard a lot of "do this, and, Yada, yada, yada, you get the answer." She believed that if you weren't getting it, then you weren't trying hard enough and not reading the text. I spent hours sometimes trying to read the text and figure things out, and still ended up lost sometimes. I saw her once during office hours, and she seemed annoyed that I was there, and wanted me to "go work on it some more, and then come back." Man, I had already spent 3 hours on it before I went to her. This is the first time I have received a grade less than a B in my college career, so it's not like I'm a big dummy. I think Cooper failed me as an instructor, and I would not recommend her.

Prof. Cooper is a very fair grader, despite the horrible grading scheme for ME 212. Basically it was 50% Quizzes, 10% H/W and 40% Final. However, there was only 4 quizzes . . . so if you did poorly on one, you're messed over for the rest of the quarter. Additionally, it is quite likely that there will be no curve, since scores are genrally pretty high in her classes. Homework for dynamics (as everyone knows) stinks. It's overly long and mostly boring. If you happen to have a question on the homework, she'll go over it in class. Explanation of the course material is very clear. Overall, a good teacher, take her for dynamics if available.

I was nervous taking Cooper's class seeing her Polyratings but she was very fair. Her 5 quizzes were very related to the homework so as long as you fully understood that, then the quizzes were great. She doesn't waste your time doing outside projects and such and her handouts she gives you everyday are very helpful. Overall w/ no doubt. I would take Cooper again!

Awful lecturer. Granted, she makes handouts that are fairly helpful, but then she copies the handout verbatim on the board. It makes it absolutely pointless to go to class. When you ask a problem, she starts the first line of the problem and says "Yada Yada Yada, and you get the right answer." Avoid her if possible."

Probably just like everyone else, I stressed all winter quarter over dynamics with Cooper. She has no midterms and only quizzes. The 5-6 quizzes she gave, I averaged a low C- and was stressing over the final. Luckily, I found the final to be a lot easier than her quizzes and got a high B on the final and ended up with a B in the class. Coopers teaching method has positives and negatives. She gives hand outs for all new material and by the end of the quarter you end up with about 30 pages. I found the pages to help, but then again cooper didn't always teach the material and expected you to learn by the sheet. She was helpful in office hours, but don't ask dumb questions or else she will flip out on you. Overall, cooper really cares about the success of her students and I would take cooper again. Homework due everyday, just like every other dynamics class, thank god for chegg. however, if you understand all the little tricks in the homeworks, you will be fine in the class. Take cooper if you have the chance.

The best thing I can say about Cooper is she isn't the worst teacher at Cal Poly. Somehow I was able to pass the final and the class, but I have such a shaky grasp on the material that I doubt I would be able to explain any of the concepts of dynamics to a student now. Her handouts (which she gives nearly every day) are helpful for studying, but she gives next to no examples in class and those examples she did give she only set up and didn't finish. Learning and retaining the material was difficult, as I am someone who learns by watching and working through example problems. Homework is due everyday but is only worth ten percent of your grade. Her quizzes are confusing. She says they are similar to the homework, but in fact they are harder and more poorly written and I still don't understand how her partial credit grading works. After studying for hours and actually feeling confident about the material, I received an F on 3 out of 5 quizzes . This class is next to impossible unless you have a solid study group or can teach yourself Dynamics because attending lecture with Cooper really doesn't teach you much. Good luck!

I don't think that Professor Cooper prepares us to answer questions in an effective way. If you must take this class from her I recommend: "structurefree" youtube channel and "Yeow Siow" youtube channel

She is actually a good teacher, people need to stop complaining. If you actually do the homework and come to every class, it all makes sense. She does a ton of examples in class and her quizzes are fairly graded. The quizzes are worth 40% of your grade though so don't take them lightly, and there are only five of them so doing badly on one can really screw you over. Homework is due everyday.

Dynamics is an incredibly difficult course. I had Mary for three 50 minute periods a week, which in itself is not enough time to really learn Dynamics. Prof. Cooper is a fantastic person and a wonderfully chipper, warm, nurturing professor. Do not hesitate to take her, but please do not rely upon any professor to ensure you will pass this course. I failed the class due to my own lack of work. Do the homework thoroughly, do well on her quizzes, and study like hell for the final. Do not rely on the solutions manual, it will bite you in the butt.

Worst Professor at Poly!

worst professor i have ever had at cal poly. she's the type of professor who wouldn't even be able to get an A on her own tests. after all these years of teaching the same course over and over again, you'd think she would have mastered the material by now... but she hasn't. and it shows-- badly. she cant fucking review a homework problem without looking at the solution every five seconds. and whenever someone asks her a question, she stutters and stares and says "i dont know" or "its magic." and honestly, it just makes me laugh. whenever she says something like that i just looked around the room and saw a bunch of disgusted faces. its unbelievable this lady has a job here.

Professor Cooper is not a great teacher. She gives handouts to the class at the beginning of the period, and then rewrites them on the board. The handouts are actually super helpful. Multiple times she had to have students explain the problems to her. Relatively decent in office hours.

Mary cooper is unhelpful. She doesn't have a good handle on what she is doing. And she is standoffish to those looking for help. Do not recommend at all, I would have skipped taking dynamics this quarter if I had known how subpar she is.

Ms. Cooper makes Statics easy to understand. I did not understand Physics at all last year, and the way she explains concepts like Moments and Couples makes me wonder if all those old tenured profs just forgot what they were! She gives helpful handouts and worksheets, and usually sets up a few homework problems for you. Her Wednesday Quizes are very straightforward; as long as you understand the homework it's easy. She's very helpful in office hours, and all the other classes had midterms when we didn't.

This was about as bad of a professor that I have had at Cal Poly yet. Cooper did not have a clear, thoughtout lecture for class. She would hand out a ditto with the formula, a couple of examples and that was it. Instead of writing out actual examples and showing how to do the problem, she would only set up our homework problems. I guess you had to be the conceptual type to appreciate her teaching style. In office hours, she explained problems really well and identified my difficulty areas. However, her office hours conflicted with almost every class I had. In summary, the lecture was virtually no help to anyone. The breakdown of the class was as follows: 15% hw, 15% quizzes, midterm 20%, final 50%. When the class average on the midterm was in the 40's it should have signaled to her that something wasn't right, but it didn't. She instead rambled about how she taught the class for 20 years and these were the worst scores that she had ever seen. So many people ended up go into the final wondering whether they were going to pass the class or not. Thank heavens she lightened up and gave our class a fairly straight forward final. Avoid her if you can. I'd even take the ME version of dynamics.

I don't think Mary Cooper is a very good instructor for AutoCad. She in fact learned AutoCad from and ARCE student who would have been a much better instructor than she is. The quizzes she gives are ridiculous both in format(racing against each other on timed quizzes) and since it seems she tries to trick you on written quizzes. I don't think you have musch of a choice of teacher's for this class so my best advice is to get really fast at AutoCad so you don't get penalized for not being as fast as your classmates.

Mary knows Autocad in and out. Her lecture is short and quick. Most of the in class assignments are pretty easy too. She did give homework, which was kind of pointless, but it did boost our grades. I still don't understand the reasoning behind timed quizzes, but they didn't count for much anyway. A very straight forward class. The written quizzes were extremely difficult and the written final was even worse. The whole class was scaled though. Pretty easy class, don't stress about it. You can use what you learn in this class for Arch 222 and Arch 231.

She thinks, she is the best but I would have to disagree. She is not really clear and going to her class was a nightmare. I would like to thanks our group study, it was a lot more useful than our instructor.

I hated every classes I had to spend with her. I got by in her class but not thanks to her.

Mary is a nice teacher and very easy to talk to but she is a absolute horrible teacher. For a class that is based on looking up values in tables she decided to get rid of the tables on the final! However she is a very easy grader and it is not that hard to get a passing grade but you do not learn anything.

Cooper is a good teacher. She gave us fair tests and short daily hw assignments. Towards the end of the quarter the class started getting repetitive with a daily review of basic equations, but it made them stick. Put a little effort into your hw and you'll be set

Cooper is great. Extremely helpful, handouts given every lecture were convienient, and the tests were very fair. The only complaint i have is that the lectures sometimes seemed not worthwhile because the rievew over what we had done so far in each class built up throughout the quarter became long and tedious. Time could have been better spent. But still a great class i would absolutely take her again. Thanks cooper!

cooper is an OK teacher. She hands out her lectures everyday so you don't have to take notes. Some pop quiz here and there (mostly in the beginning of quarter). Her midterms are basically like hw problems and final wasn't that much harder. If you just attempt to finish the daily hw, you'll be fine.

This is my first time taking coop for an upper division class, and it was great. She hints in lecture when she's going to be putting something tricky on the tests or quizzes, so just make sure you're staying on top of paying attention. Write down things like, "there could be a 10^-3 on the units" make sure you know how to deal with it, and watch for it on the test. She hands out a lot of notes, but you should still write everything else down just so you memorize those formulas. Overall, great prof!

Good!

I really didn't like her teaching style. She always had handwriten handouts and then would go over them quickly. After the midterm and final I was confident that I did well and I end up getting a D on them. I kindof felt that she left out a lot of material concerning the theoretical basis of the class. She would just write out an equations and expect us to gain a full understanding of the class from the equation that somehow came from here schematic... but at least i passed.

Cooper is the epitome of an engineer who is only able to insert numbers from a problem into equation with no concept of the underlying theory. As a result her homework this quarter has been extremely difficult not because the problems are hard, but rather because I do not know any of the underlying theory motivating the equations that we are supposed to just accept. All that I am able to do for most of the problems is write out the main equations and then move on. For the last 5 weeks of class, the first 45 minutes of every class have been verbatim the same lecture, which is nothing more than an overview of the main equations that we have used in the class. This same lecture could easily be accomplished by handing out an equation sheet at the beginning of the quarter. Any questions asked of Cooper that require explanation beyond pointing to an equation will cause her to nervously explain for a few seconds before simply skirting the question. Cooper\'s one saving grace is that her tests are fairly representative of her understanding of Thermodynamics and are therefore relatively easy if you put the time in to learn the concepts that she does not teach. If you are interested in truly advancing your knowledge and skills as an engineer I advise taking Lacasio.

Cooper is extremely underrated. It\'s true that she tends to race through new material at the end of class, but I didn\'t mind this so much because she reviews everything (and I mean \"the whole course\" everything) at the start of every lecture. These reviews worked well because it kept the entire course\'s material fresh in my mind (as did the daily homework) and provided a map on which additional equations we learned could be placed. Chapters of the textbook were summarized in note sheets she provided every lecture, meaning an easy reference during homework. If you\'re a student who learns best by reading textbooks, don\'t take Cooper. But if you\'re like me, and you\'d prefer to have compact notes with summaries of all the important information, she is definitely the way to go. I recommend her.

Cooper ? What a freaking JOKE ! DON'T EVEN BOTHER GOING TO HER OFFICE HOURS ! Talking about Teacher/Student confidentiality, Cooper got a F for FAILURE ! There is really no help both in class and in office. I usually don't hate teachers but for some reasons, I hate that woman with a passion! How could you suck so much and get away with it? Does the CE Dept care about what students have to say about her? I could not believe how unprofessional and unfair she interacted with me. STAY AWAY from here if you are a minority...

F A I L

FAILURE at its prime... Shame on the school for teachers like her ! Grrrr.....

If you like handouts, this is your teacher. she has her own hand written notes that she gives to class and they are somewhat helpful. she goes over equations repetitively and it gets kind of annoying. But when it comes to the test, she doesn't really prepare you because it's a lot on concepts and she does not go over that. she's mediocre at best, nothing special.

Holy balls, the first half of the class really is not that bad, it's just she kind of forgets that she's teaching a class after the sixth week rolls around. She literally has started every lecture the same way for the past 3-4 weeks repeatin the same set of 1st and 2nd law equations. we get it already! Please teach something! The homework does not reflect anything we do in class anymore

Awesome teacher! Thermo was mostly all the same material over and over. But her teaching skills were solid and I learned a lot

I came into this class expecting the worst, but she wasn't as bad as I thought she would be. Yeah, like everyone else has said, she goes through equations from the beginning of class to the current date for the first 15 minutes of class at least, and it gets redundant pretty fast.However, I found her teaching style to be decent. She gives out handouts with relevant information for each topic and has HW based on that topic due the next course meeting. The HW is tough, but if you can manage to find the solutions manual online and understand the problems, you shouldn't be getting out of this class with less than a B. The Tests are just like the HW, maybe a littler harder, but she helps you out by telling you what types of problems will be on the test. Just remember before taking her that you will need to put in the extra amount of work to understand concepts that she doesn't explain too well. The book does a pretty good job at explaining them. Overall, an OK teacher. She is very nice though.

Teacher is a bitch. Straight up. I am level headed and haven't written a polyratings before but this teacher literally ran away from me when I tried to ask her a question about a midterm, among other incidences, and I thought I'd do my part in defaming her. I have an A understanding of thermodynamics but got a B in the class because she is retarded. Not a big deal, but you are probably gonna wanna bitch slap her by the end of the quarter.

Cooper was one of the better professors I've had at Cal Poly. Her lectures are very straight forward, and the only notes you would have to take are already done for you on sheets that she hands out every class. Do not bother taking any notes other than that. She spends usually about 30 minutes at the beginning of every class period doing a review of all the important equations you will use in the course. It can get boring at times, but if you pay attention to it, it gets ingrained in your memory and you will barely need the note sheet she allows you to have for each of her two midterms. If you can understand how to look things up on the thermodynamic tables you will do fine.

if you actually try, this class with her shouldn't be too hard. I relied on my first two midterm scores (100% and 80%) to carry me through the class. as you can see by the D it didn't work too well. do the HW and try, thats my advice

Awesome teacher - tests aren't too hard and the final is exactly what was taught in class. Very straightforward. Quizzes go into the homework category so your grade is basically the homework (free points), the two midterms, and then the final.

Cooper is a good lecturer, and you will probably learn thermodynamic calculations from her very well, as I did. However, I believe that what she expects of her students in order to earn a good grade is a bit odd. For instance, on the midterm you could lose a few points if you couldn't name an individual who proposed some important theory in thermodynamics -- like who gives a shit, is this history? Also, she will mark you down for not giving information in your problem answers, even when said information was not asked for in the problem statement. I thought I got 100% on the midterm, but got 69% instead because I didn't give information (that wasn't even asked for in the problem statement) that did not affect the final answer. She also doesn't curve, and does not negotiate grades. Good teacher, but will probably screw your GPA. Myself and all of my friends in the class (junior civil engineers) got Ds in this class. Would not recommend her if you care about your GPA.

Straightforward and knowledgeable. Loved the pirate gold tooth. Decent slides and easy exams... honestly, I let the class go. The material is pretty easy but I got bored out my mind with her lack of energy and dismissive approach to questions. Okay lecturer.

She seems to think she's a post-graduate english professor when she grades your labs. Be happy if you can manage 50% on any one lab. She isn't helpful, and gives vague instructions for labs. Also, her final consisted of some trick questions and was virtually impossible. Avoid her. The grade she gave me dragged my Vibes grade down to a C. I seriously doubt she's qualified to teach this course. She's a glorified Lab Tech!

Do not take her for a lab. Your grade will not be determined by what you know or how good your data/calculations were, but how well you read her mind about lab writing. She provides no examples of acceptable reports, just nails you after the fact. Following the example reports in the lab manuals is useless. Expect no higher than a D on a lab report. Anything you learned from Thorncroft in ME 236 about lab writing does not apply here. The class average before the final was low C, with the highest grade being a low B. There was no review for the lab final, and if you hadn't memorized the procedure for each piece of equipment (which you've used once in your life), you couldn't do the problems. It wasn't based on the concepts as much as it should have been. It seems as if she WANTS you to do poorly by witholding information that most teachers provide. Face it, vibes is hard enough as it is.

I had Cooper for 152 and thought she was nice, but pretty bad as a prof. She took a round-about way to present material and ultimately holds it against students for her own inadequacies as an instructor (espeically those who knew more about autoCAD than she did)... After taking 318 with her, this was emphatically re-emphasized. Whether she knows the material or not, she doesn't seem to convey it to the class; using uhms, uhs and feverishly flipping through notes or overheads to ward off questions (and then ends with "I hope that answered your question"). Expect fringe topics not covered in the book (which was rarely used) to be weighted as equally on tests as subjects which spanned many homework sets. She should stick to 211 or 212.

The gold toothed Mary Cooper might pass as Joe Pesci from Home Alone at first glance.....but I can assure you that she isn't even that cool. I think that for statics and dynamics she actually might be a better prof. Vibes, however, did not seem as much like her cup of tea. If fact, she tried to squeeze in dynamics to the mix whenever possible in vibes. Vibrations is a tough class no matter who you take it with. It starts off quite normally- almost like dynamics III but then just gets weird after about week 5 or 6. The other thing that bugged me about the course was the lack of integration between lecture and lab. I think the vibes lab could almost be a seperate course from lecture like the fluids or thermal science lab. Cooper is decent in office hours but her lectures- one of which involved making a compound pendulum using pencil sticks and tape- really aren't all that helpful. What's worse is that she put her lectures on handouts making it even easier to ditch class....or so you think. She threw pop quizzes in there to make sure we were attending which blows for a 300 level. I probably would only take her again in worst case scenario and I really don't think she should be teaching anything past ME 212.

Mary Cooper is one of the nicest professors in the ME department. I would NEVER take her class again. She should not be teaching anything above ME 212. Very confusing. She grades labs more on format than quality of report and information included. Learn her formatting and she'll give you a better grade. But, she is nice.

Mary Cooper should be fired. She plays favorites with her students. If you do get stuck with her, kiss her ass and NEVER ask a question in class. If you make her look stupid (which is really easy to do accidently) she will hate you. If she hates you, your grade will reflect it. For example, on a midterm, she took off 5 points because I "didn't solve for x". Well not only had I solved for x (right answer), but it was neatly boxed at the bottom of the page. When I asked her about it, she claimed she didn't see it! No one is that blind! I don't want to know what she "didn't see" on my final. And avoid her at all costs for lab. If she doesn't like your choice of formatting, you'll get, say, 12/20 for something with the right content. And unlike Dr. Thorncroft, she doesn't tell you what kind of formatting she wants. It's a shot in the dark. Vibes is a really interesting class. I just wish I had had someone who knew the material.

Cooper was a good teacher. She is very patient with students that have questions. As most people have said, she is not quick to answer questions in lecture, however during office hours she will take the time to help you figure out problems. Also she is great in lab. If something is a little confusing she takes time to explain things. Your final grade is a combination of two midterms, a final, hw & quizzes, and lab. the average was high enough that she there wasnt a curve. Each midterm and the final were straight forward with no curves. My biggest complaint was that hw was collected at each lecture, however i would suggest to take Cooper if you get a chance.

Prof Cooper is a very nice lady. She really tries to help you in her office. Her tests were fair but at 7am seemed difficult. Homework was collected just about every lecture, which kind of sucked even though it was only a few problems at a time. Even the final ws pretty reasonable, its just really easy to make little mistakes in vibes. If you did well in dynamics you have an advantage, if not you better study. Also Prof Cooper brought cookies and donuts to class which was pretty cool. I would probably take another class from her.

By far one of the least inspiring and least knowledgeable instructors on campus. She gets irritated if you have an honest question that she can't answer. The lab final just plain sucks too; you have to remember how to operate all the wacky lab equipment. Anyway, a decent effort should get you to pass, but don't expect to learn much.

I'd been at Cal Poly for 16 quarters before I took Cooper, and I hope never to take her again. She gives out numerous written handouts, which I didn't like. She runs through them way too quickly, but not in enough detail (even with the handout included) that you've got a fully worked-out problem. If you like teachers who work out problems fully in class, Cooper is not for you. She also says and does very strange things. In the lab, when I couldn't get my MatLab code to compile, I asked for her advice and was told that the MatLab compiler errors "don't mean anything". Uh, they do. I didn't know what the compiler errors meant because I wasn't the teacher. Cooper didn't know what they meant because...? The lab final involved setting up an oscilloscope or spectrum analyzer for every experiment, which was a colossal pain in the ass and also not a good gauge of our knowledge of vibrations. Do the homework.

Cooper is a good teacher. She delivers handouts regularly, so have a place for them. The final will be open notes, and those will be useful then. In lab, she's helpful to a point. It's sometimes hard to distinguish between when she wants you to learn for yourselves, and when she's willing to show you what is needed. She might help you with a five minute task one week, and then let you make a fatal lab-long error the next. The latter case is most likely that she just doesn't realize what problem you've encountered. There will be demonstration videos online you should see in advance, but they won't cover everything. Keep your wits about you, slug through the difficult labs, and the lab final will actually be easier than you expect. There's no need to dodge taking a class with Cooper, and she's fairly consistent in style through all the classes which she teaches.

Cooper does not understand Vibes. She Passes out dittos and expects her students to learn from the dittos. The last time i got dittos i was in 7th grade!! If you ask her anything more than a very basic question, she can not answer it and simply says, dont worry it wont be on the test. If you dont want to learn anything, then by all means take cooper and you wont. I got a B in her class and i honestly could not answer more than a handful of problems out of the vibes book. Not a hard teacher but definitely not a good teacher.

She\'s a good teacher. She teaches off of handouts and only uses the book to pull homework problems from (a good idea since the book used for this course is useless). She presents the material well and does a good job of telling the students what she expects you to know. If you listen in class throughout the quarter she will mention what she wants you to know for the midterm and final. She\'s a little too critical when it comes to grading you in lab, but overall a very solid professor. I would definitely recommend her.

Cooper was actually pretty good for lab. She was only teaching 1 lab section during my quarter, so I feel like it could have been b/c she was a lot more patient than usual. Labs were due the same day so you didn't have to do such big writeups that everyone else had to do for HP. It was nice because you may be there an hour after lab (sometimes, it depended on the lab), but once you got out you were DONE. She was also a lot more helpful in lab than in other lectures I've had her in. You have to keep an eye on her though, sometimes she'll come by and explain IMPORTANT stuff to "all the groups" doing a certain lab, but if you're not paying attention, you'll miss it. After you're done with your lab, she also comes by and tells you what to expect on the final for the lab you just did. Taking notes on this was EXTREMELY helpful when it came to the lab final. After talking to other kids, it seemed like she was a lot more laid back then HP was.

Cooper is a good teacher. If you pay attention in class you will learn everything and get a good grade. The only thing I didn't like about her class was the amount of HW. Its slightly rediculous how much she assigns. Vibes is a hard class but it doesn't require 3 hours of hw between every lecture. If you take vibes with her you will end up bull shitting a lot of hw. I don't like BSing hw but when everyone in the class is doing it its hard not to.

I am not a student who is out to just bag on the professors I don't like. In fact, on a personal level I think Mary Cooper is a nice lady. With that being said, she does not take pride in her work. She will present material in class from handouts that she has been regurgitating for many years by literally reading it straight off the page. You might as well come to the first five minutes of class to get the handout, then leave. Her explanation for some of the material is, "it's magic". Numerous times she literally said in class, "I'm not doing a very good job of presenting this material, you're going to have to figure it out on your own". Numerous times, her response to questions was "I don't know" or "you are approaching the boundaries of my understanding of the material, I don't know". She answers homework questions in the beginning of class, but if she doesn't have her solution, she is lost. She doesn't even know how to apply the unit step function, which is an important aspect of solving some of the differential equations presented in the course material. Avoid her if you can.

I would say Mary Cooper is an above average professor. Each lecture was pretty much the same thing, she gives everyone 2-3 handouts to introduce the new material, and then by the end of class she will go over a few problems from the homework. By the way, she assigns quite a bit of homework with an assignment do every lecture. I didn't mind this though, as it actually helps with learning the material. By the time the midterm and final come around, you know what to expect to see. Overall, Cooper is a bit of a tough grader, but fair. I think she is much better than her polyratings give her credit for, so don't take these reviews too much to heart.

Eh, she was fine. She’s a nice professor and has a good smile so you’d think she’d be a great professor but she really isn’t. She does lectures by giving out handouts of the lecture material. She’ll sort of go over it, but also isn’t 100% sure on all of it. She’ll look at some of it and say “you don’t really need it” and skip over it. That’s pretty annoying because then what’s the point of giving it to us? It just makes the lecture more confusing. The textbook that we used was just as confusing and didn’t appear to follow lecture very well. She isn’t really that prepared and doesn’t help convey her lectures. She’s pretty scatterbrained and it just didn’t work for me. This was the lowest grade I have ever gotten, even less that fluids 2 with Hans. I could’ve learned more, but she didn’t cut it. If you need structure in your lectures, I’d avoid cooper.

Dr. Cooper probably was a decent professor back in the day, but now she is just tired and really doesn't care about her students. I have never got as low of grade in a class as I did in hers. She is VERY unsure of the material that she teaches and often asks students for help recalling equations when lecturing. When you ask her a question, she never really gives you a correct answer or opts to give you a convoluted explanation in order to mask her lack of knowledge about your question. In lab, unless you just ask a very basic question, she just shrugs you off and tells you it's in the lab manual. I wouldn't mind this that much, but I figured out that she would brush you off EVERY something came up in lab that you had a question about. Overall, you shouldn't take her class because you don't really get the opportunity to learn much. I've heard you can't learn much in Dr. Noori's class but atleast your grades don't suffer for it. Also, she collects homework EVERY DAY OF THE WEEK. So if you want to work your tail off, not get anything answered for you correctly or in a nice way, and not learn vibes very well, take Mary Cooper.

Mary Cooper is very bad at communicating with her students and making sure that everyone understands the material. She will just hand you a worksheet with the days lecture and procede to read the worksheet in your hands and skip all of the necessary math because "Im just being lazy" or because "This stuff should be second nature to you by now" when in reality she is skipping over all the really tough parts that students need help with. She is very frustrating in this way. She also has homework due every single day of class which is both annoying and encourages you to not actually learn it and just get the homework done. I would encourage anyone to take a different professor if available unless you are supremely self motivated and on top of your schedule.

COOPER IS A POOPER. Her favorite phrase is "I am just going to be lazy and skip these steps", when 'these steps' are critical steps you need to know for the final. She passes out poorly organized worksheets with long problems crammed into one page so it is very hard to see what is going on, then proceeds with lecture by copying letter by letter the worksheet, not taking time to explain why or how any of it works out. She focuses in on the small math so much that it is easy to get lost in her problems during lecture, then she proceeds to glaze over the complex VIBES part of the problems which is the point of the course. If you have the opportunity to take someone else for this class, jump on it quick, or Cooper will jump on you and keep you from learning at all costs.

Fuck this guy. Id like to stick my tounge up his ass.