Flores, Carlos  

Dr. Flores is an extremely nice man. HOWEVER, he has a thick accent and speech impediment that make it very difficult to understand what he's saying. Our class was his first ECON 311 class, so he may change the format in the future. Ours consisted of: Homework (25%): 4 assignments, highest three graded. About four problems each, he gives you a full week or more to complete them, which is extremely generous. Midterm (35%): Only 1 midterm! Literally the problems from the first two homework assignments with different numbers. I got an A with only studying for a few hours the two days before. Final (40%): Literally the problems from the last two homework assignments with different numbers. 40% of the class got over 90% on the final! Dr. Flores tries hard to help out the class when we're struggling to meet deadlines, but even one on one, it's still very hard to understand him. I got by purely because of the free tutoring/workshop offered by the College of Business several times a week. Go there, meet people in your class, and form study groups to work on homework assignments together! The book doesn't really help you do the homework, but is useful for its diagrams and for understanding broader concepts. Flores covered about half the material Zambrano does in ECON 311, so take Flores if you want a less stressful quarter.

So.......it is true Flores has an accent with a speech impediment, which might be overwhelming at first. But, I can assure you this class will be one of the easier ECON classes you will take at Poly. Not only does he make the homework due at a reasonable time (usually a week and a half after he assigns it), he is a VERY lenient grader. For example, I got an 8 point question COMPLETELY wrong on the midterm, but yet I received 4 points for it somehow. Overall, he is a very kind person, and if you can get through the first 2 weeks of "math review" I assure you, the rest of the quarter will be a lot more tolerable. But then again, it was his first time teaching this class, so he might change the structure a bit, but I don't believe it will make too much of a substantial impact on your final grade.

D-d-d-d-do-do-do-don-don-don't take this professor! Not only does he have a terrible studder, but he also is a horrible teacher. He spends WAY to much time reviewing math that you don't need to know and got through half the material we were supposed to cover. You have to teach yourself everything and don't try asking Flores questions. It will take him 2 minutes of tripping over his words to tell you he doesn't know the answer. Stay clear!!!

Terrible lecturer, but very nice during office hours. I hated going to this class. Lecture was so horrible.

He has an accent paired with a stuttering problem which meant that sitting in class was disorienting. You would end up with three back-to-back pages of notes that made no sense because it was almost impossible to clarify what was going on. You can only ask him to re-explain so much, you know? He also added confusing multiple choice questions to his exams that did nothing but confuse his students. Everything covered in class and homework was mathematical applications; the multiple choice did nothing but harm the students as they were not a focus of the class. Many say that he is a very lenient grader, but exam averages were quite low for both exams. The free tutoring in the business school is the only reason I passed this class. I felt directionless at all times.

Carlos is the man. Super nice guy and was the most efficient econ teacher I've had. No bullshit. He just tells you what you need to know and that's that. Lucky for you if you don't understand something, you can be sure that he wrote it out explicitly on the board in lecture. So go to class and take notes because the homework comes straight from the notes, and the exams come straight from the homework. There were 0 trick questions, so in addition the the easy homework points and a curve on the midterm, there is no reason why you can't kick ass in this class. Also, I'm not much of a math guy, but I'm pretty sure the only calculus was taking the first and second derivative. No sweat.

Professor Flores is actually a very strong professor despite negative reviews. He has a strong accent and a bit of a stutter, but if you can get past those then you'll be fine. There is alot of calculus in this course which I feel causes students to panic and blame the professor when it is just the material of the class. He writes his notes on the board so you can copy at a reasonable pace, exactly as he has them. 1 midterm and 1 final. You can do well if you put his speaking impediments aside. You are bound to work with people in your career who have a thick accent or a stutter, better figure out how to deal with it now.

This was his first quarter at Poly and I think he did pretty well. The material is challenging but he does a good job explaining it. The book is optional and you can probably find help through other sources if you need it. You should be pretty solid at calculus before starting this class.

He is extremely sweet. Math Econ is not easy to teach or learn but he is extremely thorough and attentive and does everything in his power to make sure that you understand. He takes the time to prepare detailed notes which he replicates (in great detail) on the white board. Everything he says he will write on the board for you because he wants to make sure that you have everything you need to succeed. The topic is hard FOR SURE but I cannot think of a better, more dedicated professor to teach this class. He is very approachable and eager to help. Although this is his first year at Poly, he is already a cut above the rest. It takes a little while to adjust to the way he talks, but that is never a problem because he provides you with everything you could possibly need to succeed.

After four years at Cal Poly, Flores was probably the most approachable and genuinely nice professor I've had. I can't believe the audacity of those making fun of his speech impediment on a public forum like this. Whether or not he will ever see this - if you had any idea how much courage it takes to overcome a disability like that to become a college professor, you'd probably think before posting. He is well aware of his stutter, and he takes additional measures to make certain that it doesn't prevent students from getting the material they need. He writes everything on the board, and is more than willing to accommodate questions and clear up any confusion in office hours. The fact that he is more clear than half of his non-impeded counterparts/professors at Cal Poly speaks for itself. I'm inclined to believe that any negative reviews on here are from Frosh babies that haven't acclimated to the college learning environment yet. Take Flores, he's the man!

When I took it last year, 408 was an applied differential equations class without linear as a prerequisite. Flores did great under the circumstances, but the class itself seemed lacking, and it is impossible to talk about one without the other. Due to the impossibility of teaching the foundations of linear algebra and an economics class in one, the mathematical proofs for in-retrospect simple methods like Cramer's rule were swept aside quite often. This left many students proficient at solving many permutations of differential equation problems (credit to Flores), but doing so without an understanding of why the tools provided worked (credit to the administration's oversight). These concepts were then applied in standard economic models (quasi-proofing) and farbicated situations (given the relative behavior of variables, optimize allocation to each as appropriate or find the stable/unstable equilibria). Dr. Flores's lectures were clear on how to execute each step, and he was readily available for questions, be it in his office, or via e-mail (both very helpful). Then of course there was the elephant in the room: the stutter. This was extremely distracting for the first several weeks, as was his very strong Mexican(?) accent. In that time period, this was easily fixed by cross-referencing notes with those nearby when something was unclear, and asking him to please repeat something he had said. Afterwards, one became accustomed to both, and they became complete non-issues. The grade was made up of roughly 5(4?) deceptively long problem sets (assigned a week before they are due), as well as several quizzes and exams. All the questions on these were variations on the problems presented in class, not trick questions. Just about every question required a mathematical answer (very few purely conceptual economic questions). Attendance was not enforced, but was made essentially mandatory due to the lack of a textbook to fall back on (aka make sure you have a way to contact your class mates for notes in case you miss a lecture). Overall, I would highly recommend Dr. Flores as a professor. However, I would also recommend that all students interested in taking the most from Econ 408 first take a linear algebra class.

Flores is the man. Your hand will hurt a lot during this course because you have to hand write all the notes. However, textbook is not needed. Midterm is easy. Final is more difficult but he curved it to an 83. I would work on problem sets with others and make sure you get all the correct answers. Easy A if you put in a few hours per week.

He graded easily bc he knew it was a hard class - only a few people got a C and half the class got an A. I got a B+ and I had no idea what was going on for whole the 2 week class. The material itself is not super difficult, it's just a lot to do in 2 weeks and he did the best he could. Great prof

I felt so angry reading the comments above that I can't help but decide to post my evaluation. DR FLORES IS DEFINITELY AN OUTSTANDING LECTURER, AS HE CARES ABOUT HIS STUDENTS SO MUCH AND SPARES NO EFFORT TO COVER ALL THE CONTENT. How dare you even made joke on his stuttering? How do you decide what you need to learn? If you refer to the content you need to learn to pass Dr. Flores' exam, keep in mind that it's because he makes the exam easier to ease the pressure. Don't underrate the difficulty of a course based on the exam. And if you refer to the one you need to solve real world problems, say one more time that you've learned all. I attended Dr. Flores' GSE518 class in this summer, during which he tried to cover Statistical Inference in only two weeks. I have to confess that at the beginning I wasn't used to his accent and speed, but during the class he tried so hard to cover all the important stuffs and to make sure that everyone understand. He would answer every question sincerely and, yes, slowly, which yielded some precious break to catch up the content. Dr. Flores is not perfect in many aspects, but you'll feel his care and feel like you can figure out a way to master the knowledge with his guide, which to me is the point of learning. If you can't see the real value of a person, and can only attack on irrelevant details, how can you call yourself a sophomore?

What else is there to say? Fine person, nothing interesting. Class was meh... Blah, blah, blah... Fine person.