Clague, David  

Biomedical Engineering

2.11/4.00

28 evaluations


ENGR 123


Senior
A
Required (Major)
Nov 2011
Had him for a variety of BMED classes. He is friendly, funny if you can relate to him, definitely approachable. Though all too often I felt that Clague's lectures, whether they covered the topics of fluids or heat transfer, were way over our heads. One minute we'd discuss something as elementary as converting SI units and the next we are deriving lists of equations we don't even know how to apply. I will say that his tests and homework, though not always easy, were always fair. And he would help us as much as we needed in office hours. Take him if you get the chance


Graduate Student
N/A
Elective
Apr 2018
I had this guy years ago. This guy is still allowed to teach students?? An embarrassment of a teacher who thinks he is really funny, with absolutely zero awareness. His lectures were never understandable, and grossly immature. Cal Poly BME, you have lost so many points as an alma mater for hiring, and still keeping him around. The program was unaccredited when I was there, and hiring decisions like this is why I am embarrassed of this department and as an alum.

BMED 213


Junior
B
Required (Support)
Mar 2016
This class is a bit of a joke in that I passed with a B and didn't learn anything. There is no homework, which is nice, but there are quizzes. The quizzes are a combination of vocab and kind of topics from his slides. Honestly a lot of the vocab feels out of nowhere too. I had to google what each term meant in order to recognize it on one of his quizzes. It's the sort of class where you better hope you managed to stumble across the data that he's going to test on. The midterm was fair, but the final felt like it was straight out of nowhere. I knew the lecture slides, but it still wasn't enough. I don't know how I scraped by with a B, but this class was all over the place.


Freshman
A
Required (Support)
Feb 2017
Clague is a friendly guy who is really passionate about science but doesn't really know how to interact with college students. The class is no work and only consists of quizzes, a midterm, and final. The material on quizzes/exams kind of comes out of nowhere but you can skate by in the class with hardly any effort. Hope your prior knowledge of biology is good enough to figure things out, because you won't learn much in the class.


Junior
B
Required (Support)
Dec 2017
The easiest class at Cal Poly and I ended up with a B+. LMFAO I'm a joke. I guess I deserved it for not reading the powerpoint lectures before the quizzes. I only studied the stuff he mentioned in his emails. Definitely do that AND read the PowerPoints if you have no prior biology knowledge. tl;dr DEFINITELY take the other bmed professor. I heard Griffin is a free A. If you end up with Clague it's not the end of the world.

BRAE 213


Junior
A
Required (Support)
Jun 2008
What a funny guy. Weekly short quizzes (40%, no notes) and two exams (30%, notes). All with little but reasonable difficulty. Just study for an hour or two before each quiz, and make proper note sheets for the midterm and final. Each lecture had an "extra credit word" at the very end for the next week's quiz. If you don't stay, find someone that does to get that word. Sometimes he even gave us the answers to some questions as a joke.


Sophomore
A
Required (Support)
Mar 2010
Clague\'s class was alright...this is the complement to Bio 213, but both sections are barely related and kind of do their own thing. This was much less work than ONeill\'s BIO section, just show up, watch powerpoints for an hour and a half of the two hour section, and leave. You don\'t even really have to go...he gives out a bonus word at the end of every section which is worth 2-4 extra credit points on the next weekly quiz, but you can ask a friend or copy it from the person next to you. The quiz questions (and midterms!) are just mainly fill-in-the-blanks based on the powerpoint, and maybe a few true-or-false questions. Easy class, and we could probably get out in an hour if we didn\'t talk about South Park or watch Youtube in between slides. So just look at the powerpoints, got it?


Sophomore
B
Required (Major)
Jun 2010
This course was a survey of biology that engineers should know for preparation for industry. I found that freshmen could not appreciate the experience. I however could connect the professors experience with real life. The professor uses humor to re-engage students in the subject matter, but clearly teaches what is actually important in industry. Freshman have no experience in life and do not understand what is important. This course was exceptional and brought real world applications into the class. The instructor was in industry for several years and communicated this information. Some underclassmen didn\'t understand the importance of what was being taught. The information was up to date and even beyond they biology department, e.g., aptamers. I highly recommend this course. I also recommend ignoring noob freshman who really don\'t know sh....t, especially those who get a C in this course.


Senior
C
Required (Major)
Jun 2010
I am a senior. This was a good course, but I did not work. The instructor used humor to help us stay involved. It worked for me and kept my interest. He allows crib notes on exams. So it is possible to get an A every exam. I found that freshman and sophomores would complain. I don\'t think they know what is important. The instructor brought in information from 10 yrs of industrial experience. New kids don\'t understand the importance of the course. I didn\'t do so well, but I am thankful for the course and do understand that the information was genuinely important to my future in industry. I did find my people from CS and the IT organization on campus arrogant. If they took the time to study and understand, they might benefit from the class.


Freshman
A
Required (Support)
Jul 2011
Many people think this course shouldn't be required. Dr. Clague gets this and doesn't force the material down your throat. If you're serious about learning the material, you can either talk to him in person or visit the links he gives to the class. Otherwise, you should be thankful that he keeps that class entertaining and gives a broad overview of the techniques used in bioengineering.

ENGR 213


Freshman
C
Required (Support)
Dec 2009
This guy was the worst teacher I\'ve ever had. He didn\'t take the class seriously the entire quarter and his overabundant, time-wasting jokes about South Park and the like were not funny. I struggled because Dr. Clague frontloaded all of his PowerPoint lectures with a massive list of vocabulary whose definitions were explained in other text-heavy slides throughout the lecture. It would have been more logical to introduce terms as we went along and to use more pictures and diagrams. My friends and other students found this class to be easy, but \"easy\" isn\'t the same as \"worthwhile.\" I learned nothing in this class, and at the risk of offending, I think Dr. Clague an embarrassment to the Biomedical and General Engineering department and to Cal Poly as a whole. On the plus side, the guest speakers he brought in for one class were absolutely fantastic--enthralling and inspiring. Why couldn\'t other lectures have been more like that? Hopefully your experience with this guy is or will be better than mine.


Junior
C
Required (Support)
Nov 2010
I\'m the same person who submitted a rating on 12/29/09 about the experience I had the year before in Dr. Clague\'s class. To the person who wrote the comment two below this one: you\'re an arrogant asshole. Here you are, a sophomore who got a B in the class, calling a freshman who got a C in the class \"a noob ... who really [doesn\'t] know sh....t.\" Obviously, I have more college experience now than I did two years ago, and my perspectives have changed in many ways; with that said, I continue to stand by every word I wrote at the time. Of course Dr. Clague TRIED to connect the material to real life. Of course he TRIED to \"[use] humor to re-engage students in the subject matter.\" He TRIED to be a good teacher, but in my opinion, he failed. All I ever claimed, and all I continue to claim, is that Dr. Clague sucked at conveying information in an effective manner so that his students could understand the material clearly and be inspired to apply it in their lives--you know, actually TEACHING. I\'m super-happy that you found ENGR 213 an \"exceptional class\" and I wish you the best in finding future \"exceptional class[es]\" where freshmen who \"have no experience in life\" are incapable of \"appreciat[ing] the experience\" in the same way you do. But please, if you\'re going to post on this site, don\'t waste your time hoisting yourself onto a pillar and ridiculing others who have opinions equally valid as your own. (I also find it curious that the two comments below this were posted within 15 minutes of each other, but that\'s a different topic for a different day.)


Senior
N/A
Required (Major)
May 2011
I graduated Poly last year, and no, I did not take ENGR 213, I graduated as a BMED. I took a couple courses with this guy. Although he is very approachable and pretty entertaining, he can't teach.

BMED 400


Senior
A
Elective
Jul 2013
This guys needs to grow up....

BMED 425


Senior
C
Required (Major)
Jan 2013
Liked him as a person, but he is not a teacher. You can tell he's a smart guy, but when it comes to presenting the material to students...BEST OF LUCK.


Senior
B
Required (Major)
Jun 2015
He always joked around during lecture and lab and always talked about his dog. He is crazy obsessed with his dog which is extremely sad because he talks more about his dog than his kids. What really ticked me off about him was that he played favorites. So if you were one of his favorites you probably ended up with a very good grade while the rest of us worked our asses off for our grades.


Senior
N/A
Required (Major)
Oct 2015
Dr. Clague may be a knowledgeable person in his subject area, but the sad fact is he is a very poor instructor. He wastes a lot of his class time on, as others have said: his dog, his background, his hobbies, sports, his weekend plans etc. He is disorganized and inaccurate. Material he posts to poly learn often have critical errors which cause students to waste a lot of time attempting to solve problems that are stated incorrectly. As a solution to this he suggests attending office hours, where he subsequently finds his mistakes as confused students bring his errors to his attention. This is not what I expect from a tenured professor. I give him more benefit of the doubt than I do my other professors since he did have a severe stroke a couple of years ago, but the harsh reality is he shouldn't be teaching if he is incapable. If you take this class with him expect to spend a lot of additional time in office hours and working out bugs in the prelabs & HW.


Junior
B
Required (Major)
Jun 2017
Dr. Clague is a really smart guy, but really does not seem to want to help students understand the material or listen to questions with open ears. He would rather joke around and make of fun of what you say rather than being empathetic and listening to your question and helping you better understand what is going on. The class material is very tough, but very interesting and Clague definitely tells you everything you need to know, I just wish was more receptive to student concerns and took it a little more seriously. His humor is really dry which I actually enjoyed when he wasn't being a prick, so he is hit or miss. What are you going to do, he is the only teacher for this class so see what you think.


5th Year Senior
N/A
Required (Major)
Nov 2017
Dr. Clague is a funny guy and a good person, but he is an average to subpar teacher. The 'purpose' of many concepts explained during lecture are not explained and thus, makes knowing when to use the learned concepts in homework and test problems difficult. He does not give the 'why' and 'when to use' explanations for many concepts and equations. The student has to resort to reading the text to find the 'why' and 'when to use' for these equations. When going over HW problems in class, Dr. Clague does not provide the 'givens' and 'finds' for each reviewed HW problem. Instead he just starts writing the solution without premising the background of the problem. This makes understanding the in-class HW solutions difficult and hard to follow. During tests, Dr. Clague will become agitated if someone asks him what the value of a constant is. He expects all constants and equations to be either known by the student or on the student's cheat sheet. This personally doesn't make sense to me because even in industry, it is not uncommon for the most seasoned engineering to double check a constant they intend on using in a calculation. He does give extra credit sometimes, however. Since most of the class ran out of time or did poorly on the second midterm, he gave us an extra credit problem to do to raise our grade. Unfortunately Dr. Clague is the only teacher who teaches BMED 425 at the moment. However, if another teacher teaches the class, take that teacher.


Junior
A
Required (Major)
Jun 2018
Clague's an interesting dude. He's obviously very smart – you'll hear multiple times about his tenure at the national labs etc. – and he knows this material inside and out. However, sometimes the true content is masked by his somewhat eccentric personality. Some people love his jokes, some hate them, and everyone else ignores them because they're trying to figure out what we're supposed to be getting out of this lecture. However, Clague is SUPER helpful in office hours, where many of the jokes are dropped and he'll thoroughly address all of your questions (a good question to ask is "what kind of problems should I review before the midterm?"). The material itself is interesting and critical if you're interested in microfluidics or drug-device design. It's also pretty challenging, so be prepared to put some time into the homework and reviewing if you want to do well (midterm averages were in the low 70's, but there's probably a curve at the end and the final is optional). The lab is using COMSOL to solve lecture-style problems, which again is fascinating but I would have liked more of a basic introduction to the program before launching into shear stress surface plots et. al.


Senior
A
Required (Major)
Dec 2018
Not a good teacher, not pleasant to be around, probably won’t help you if you ask something he thinks you should know.... also I’m pretty sure he writes fake reviews on here to boost his rating so don’t be deceived by his 2.12/4. He judges students as people by how well they do on his tests so if you’re not doing well he doesn’t like you. He also knows everyone’s test scores and what questions they missed off the top of his head which was very strange... Chances are if you’re taking him you don’t have a choice since he’s the only one that teaches 425 so good luck


Senior
A
Required (Major)
Dec 2018
Professor Clague has been one of my favorite professors at Cal Poly thus far. Yes, the material is challenging, but its genuinely interesting and so important to those of us pursuing careers in Biomedical engineering. Clague is extremely understanding and gives every student the opportunity to do well in his class... he is literally always in his office waiting to help students, goes over problems that are challenging on the homework with the entire class BEFORE its due, and he drops the lowest test score. My guess is that the students that reviewed Clague poorly never went to his office or talked to him after class at all. He is hands down one of the most knowledgeable instructors in the department and I can't recommend his class enough.

BRAE 425


Senior
A
Required (Major)
Jan 2010
Clague is AMAZING! This guy is so hilarious, making tough and somewhat boring classes, really fun! He is a fair grader, and helps you out because he genuinely wants you to understand and succeed in his classes. I would take Clague for anything.


Senior
N/A
Required (Major)
Oct 2011
I seriously hope that he would be a little bit more serious and teach us something in this class. Too much jokes

BMED 500


Graduate Student
N/A
Required (Support)
Nov 2012
I actually caught him looking at this site in his office. I am pretty sure he writes some of the positive reviews. That shit cray. Dude earn your points by the way you teach.

BMED 520


Senior
A
Elective
Mar 2012
Clague is the most brilliant of the biomedical staff at poly. His lectures are invaluable- the material is difficult but incredibly useful with regards to industry. Clague keeps students interested and entertained with his off-the-wall antics and great sense of humor. He is a genuinely nice guy and is always eager to help students who wish to learn. Go to office hours if you encounter difficulty- he will walk you through anything. I would definitely recommend this guy, he is a mathematical wizard and innovative engineer.


Senior
A
Elective
Oct 2013
Clague is entertaining and knowledgable. Lectures feel like rocket science, because the material is difficult (physicochemical hydrodynamics). You must ultimately learn the stuff on your own. This said, lectures and office hours will help a lot. Your math and engineering skills will be tested and improved. Clague's courses are the dissertations of a funny man who knows a hell of a lot more than you. Don't listen to people that say he can't teach- they were not interested and cut out for the material.

RELS 582


Graduate Student
B
Required (Major)
Nov 2016
During this entire quarter all I could think about was how this professor reminded me of that small little dog that runs through the back of scene 23 in The Incredibles by Pixar. Seriously, if you look it up you will only be able to see it...