Einakian, Sussan  

Avoid

Don't get me wrong, she's a nice lady, but her lessons and some instructions are often times hard to follow. I advise actually reading the book before and after going to class if this is your first time coding because that is the basis of what she will be teaching except in slightly broken English. She is willing to answer questions, but there is usually a language barrier causing often misinterpretations. She's willing to help in office hours, and is sometimes effective in assisting with concepts and labs. If you do well on her quizzes and midterms OR labs and projects, you will most likely pass the class. If you do well in at least 3, you'd get a B, or maybe an A. The class was still very fun despite receiving such a low grade.

First off I want to say Sussan is a sweet, nice lady. With that being said I dont even think she knows what teaching is. She writes the book material on the board, gives minimal examples and then gives you projects with coding that I have no clue what to do. This is my first time dealing with any type of programming and may never want to use a computer again after this class. Honestly you could pass the class with a loot of effort but the projects, unless you get a tutor as a first time programmer, you will never get. This teacher blows chunks as a teacher even though shes a sweetheart.

She hardly speaks english, misspells words and writes illegibly on the board, and purposefully calls on students in class who don't know whats going on. Her midterms and quizzes aren't bad. The projects are extremely difficult, though they are the same projects as done in all sections, Einakian doesn't teach us how to do them. She has incredibly poor lecturing skills. If you have never coded before don't take this teacher. If you already know python, then probably don't take her either because her lectures are a waste of your time, yet she takes attendance.

Dr. Einakian often has trouble communicating concepts in a way that is easy for students to understand. Her accent and broken English can make it difficult to understand what she wants, especially in a subject as particular as programming. She is very nice and willing to spend time to help her students, however. While you could probably find a better professor, you can do well in Einakian's class if you start on your projects early in order to give yourself time to go to her office hours and clarify any ambiguities or misunderstandings.

She has a very hard time communicating with students clearly due to her problems speaking English.

Do you enjoy figuring everything out on your own? Do you enjoy doing projects without learning any of the material until two days before it's due? Do you enjoy TA's that never come, and vague instructions with broken English for projects? If yes, take Einakian. If no, take anyone else..

Honestly, Sussan is the most underestimated professor I have ever seen on Polyratings. First of all, her accent is not that unacceptable, at all. Her lecture is actually pretty clear from my point of view, you definitely could understand what she trying to say. 2 midterms and 4 quizzes + 5 projects + 8 lab assignments, those are not hard if you study the lecture notes and ask for help. However the final actually is brutal. Since CPE department makes common final for all fundamental CPE classes, the final is really hard. 14 pages, and you need entire 3 hours to complete them. I was having a B+ before the final and after taking the final yesterday I'm pretty sure it drops my grade to a C (don't know if it's a C+ or C-). But after all, if you have to take Sussan, go ahead with no doubt because she is a good professor. And you have to make sure that you get top scores in class so you won't be killed by the common final.

Overall, I would give Einakian about a 2-2.5 on polyratings for CPE 101. She is a very nice lady and overall her class is pretty easy. If coding comes naturally to you there isn't as much outside work as a typical 4 unit class. Her lectures aren't amazing and sometimes (pretty infrequently tho) she will give incorrect information. The textbook for this class is very good and pretty succinct, so I recommend reading it if you can't understand her lectures. It is very doable to get 100% on all of the projects and labs. for some projects she'll tell you exactly what the output of your code should look like, so just take the time to make yours match it exactly. The tests are not particularly hard if you feel you understand the material and are able to do the labs and projects. As for the common final, she prepares you pretty well for it. I didn't study at all for it and was very sick and still got an 88%. While Einakian may not be an amazing teacher, I think her polyrating is unfair and would recommend taking her over someone like hollister if you have the choice for cpe 101.

Honestly people make Einakian seem worse than she really is. She's a really nice lady and presents the material fairly well in class. The course load is fairly spread out, making deadlines easy to make so long as you start on time. Some people complain about her accent, but MOST people get over it fairly quickly and is not a problem by the end of the quarter. Overall, Einakian is a great professor for CPE101 and I would recommend her regardless of what her poly ratings might say!

Einakian is a literal god. The only reason she gets bad ratings is because of dumb people.

Einakian is super underrated. She gives you everything you need to know in lecture and the labs/projects that will teach you the fundamentals of computer science. The only negative is her accent, which is nothing compared to some of the professors I've had. She only has low polyratings because of people who are lazy and don't start the projects early. Overall, she is a god, a legend, and deserves much higher polyratings.

Sussan is really not as bad a people think. She actually teaches the material unlike Hollister. I have a god set of notes that were really helpful on midterms and quizzes. We started quizzes like the 7th week for some reason. Even though she has an accent it is not terrible to the point you can not understand what she says. Labs super easy if you copy from https://github.com/justinnuwin/cpe101. Only thing you should actually do are the projects. Like actually do them and you will learn. Literal GOD and one of the best. Only bad part is the common final.

Einakian doesn't really know much and doesn't teach. Grading is insane, she takes off 10-15 points off if you miss a negative sign. Stay AWAY!!

If you are familiar with coding and like to learn on your own Einakian is a fine professor but if your new to cs like I was prepare to have a bunch of work for this class. She presents material in very unclear ways and has a very shaming tone when you ask questions or dont understand something. The first couple weeks were the hardest just because of getting used to how to simply write code. I ended up really liking the class but not because of Einakian. Its really easy to not do well with her if you are not willing to learn all of the material outside of class.

I failed this course the year prior to taking it with Prof. Einakian, and although I had no coding experience I failed because of my own errors and not applying myself correctly. During lectures with Prof. Einakian this year, I would often think about how much easier I had it with a professor that was able to relate to how students commonly struggle with the material presented in this introductory course. Her accent and tendency to misspell words aren't too much of an issue, but the real issue for me and other students in my class specifically was that her answers to student questions are unclear and that she is not an empathetic person when it comes to small mistakes (despite her typically making spelling errors and then marking off a ton of points on exams for similar mistakes). Also, she takes attendance very seriously and made it a point that she "has the right to fail someone for missing x amount of classes." This is not incorrect, but on a personal note I feel that if you can't convince students to come to your class to learn the material they are being graded on, it probably means that they feel like they aren't learning anything from you. If you have prior experience coding, then you should take Einakian if you don't have a say in the matter. If you're a newbie, I'd say it would be best not even try unless you also plan on getting a private tutor.

I was valedictorian of my high school and have gotten nearly all A's throughout college. I'm not telling you this to brag, but as a warning. This class, and Einakian, broke me mentally and spiritually. She's a nice lady. She even worked with me before class because I needed more help. But her class and her teaching abilities need to retire. I've never failed a test before...boom, but now I have thanks to Einakian. To the kids who already know tons of CS prior to coming to college, you'll most likely be fine. To everyone else, I'm sorry. I went to her office hours 3x a week and 2 hours of department tutoring every night it was avaliable. My only advice is to switch into another CS class or just avoid it entirely if at all possible. For the sake of your mental health, please don't put yourself through this. If you choose to ignore this warning, so be it, but you can't say you haven't been warned.

Dr. Einakian is certainly a nice lady, she's mostly helpful and does her best to make sure her students succeed. That said, I would advise against taking her if you are completely new to programming as a lot of her assignments require more than what she teaches in class. The class consists of 8 Labs, 6 Projects, 2 Midterms, and a Common Final. The labs are relatively straight forward, and as long as you come to class, you shouldn't have any problems completing them in the allotted lab time (though for certain labs homework may be required). The projects were more difficult, and the concepts required to complete them usually weren't discussed until just before the due date, which made them much harder for those in my section without a prior background in Python. The midterms were around a 7/10 in terms of difficulty, but as long as you studied, you got a decent grade (the midterms are only a small part of your grade in this class anyway). Overall, she's a good professor and certainly knows a lot, but be careful in taking her if you don't have a background with programming.

Dr. Einakian is unfortunately an awful professor. Her lack of command of the English language genuinely impacts her ability to communicate with the class, resulting in confusing instructions and aggravated students. Additionally, projects are disproportionately hard relative to the rest of the class material, which is unfortunate because they are weighted more heavily than the final. If you have prior programming experience it's still possible to get an A, but I would warn against taking her unless you have no other option.

Pyton

Dr. Einakian is UNDERRATED. People tend to hate her, but I have had a good experience with her. I think that the people who don't like her are people who hate computer science. You have to keep this in mind when reading these reviews. If you hate CS, then CPE101 with ANY professor is going to suck. English does not seem to be her first language, and she does have an accent. However, I have never had a problem understanding her. Most of these poly ratings are overstating how bad of a professor she really is. LECTURES: She doesn't do a great job of explaining concepts right away. ASK LOTS OF QUESTIONS DURING THE LECTURE. She is extremely easy to talk to. If you don't understand something, speak up. She is surprisingly good at explaining things if you ask questions. EXAMS: The exams are not difficult. They are fairly basic compared to the actual labs and projects. If you take the time to learn the code during the labs and projects, then the midterm and final will be a breeze. With that being said, she is not an easy grader. If you miss certain syntax in your written code, she will take points off. GRADING: She is honestly one of the best professors for 101 in terms of code evaluation. Some professors run your code through an extensive analysis program that counts your functions, mem usage, etc. She grades them in an easier way that simply checks the input and output of the program. Einakian allows for more flexibility with how your program handles its data. You will find less frustration and less specifications when working on an assignment with her than many other CS profs. PERSONALITY: She is the sweetest old lady you will ever meet. She is really nice, and she seems to really care about her students. Her sense of humor is actually really funny. We had a few interesting personalities in our section, and she would say the funniest stuff about them. OVERALL: She's really not that bad of a professor. I loved her. If you have no experience in computer science, you will struggle in 101 regardless of who you have. She might make it more difficult to understand certain topics.

Professor Einakian is an extremely good instructor and I don't understand why people put bad reviews. CPE 101, in general, is one of the hardest classes at Cal Poly so of course, you need to put in time and work. I understood her pretty well and If I had a question I would ask it in class, don't be afraid to ask questions. Also if you go to her office hours she will help you. Although I got a C, that was on me for not putting in more time and being lazy. She's a nice lady and will help you learn. Honestly, she is one of the best lecturers compared to other CPE 101 professors because her Projects and Labs are easier.

Professor Einakian is an excellent professor. She has been teaching here for 6 years and can get the job done. She sets up the course well by allowing students to work together in groups to solve problems and has the quizes and exams be hand-written to ensure that the syntax of the code you learn is engrained in your brain, which is a healthy practice for people looking to code to ensure less mistakes are made. She clearly knows what she is doing and I would recommend her. If I had one tip of advice though it would be to make sure that you do the projects early as they can be tricky and hard if you procrastinate on them as they are an exceptional chunk of your grade.

I am a business major and I was considering a comp sci minor so I took 101 with this prof....I now have decided NO WAY on the minor because of the experience I had with this prof. She doesn't teach the correct pace of the class and her English is so bad you cannot understand her verbal questions or her questions on the exams. If you have any prior experience with coding you will be ok, however if you dont, you will be struggling a ton in this class.

First off, I want to say that Sussan Einakian is a very nice lady, and she always has a smile on her face. But that's the only good thing I have to say about her. As a computer science major who has never programmed before, I have never been more lost. Her experience in python seems limited, her grammar is absolute garbage, and her ability to teach is nonexistent. Labs and quizzes aren't as bad, but the guidelines and specifications for projects will be the end of you. The only way to get a decent grade if you haven't coded before is to cheat. It pains me to think that the Cal Poly administration thought she would be a good teacher for some people's first experience to coding, and I am on the verge of switching majors because of her class.

Please don't take this teacher if you are new to coding. The projects she assigns are difficult and basically rely on how well you can google the material. She is incredibly nice, however, she is useless when it comes to instructing an introductory computer science class

Although I agree with the students below that professor Einakian struggles with conveying some aspects of computer science (partly due to English not being her first language), she is a very kind professor who truly endeavors to help her students learn. She doesn't ignore her student's struggles, will give extensions when needed, and her lectures mirror the textbook she uses. I had no background in programming before this class and although it was definitely a challenge to do well in this class, I do NOT blame the professor, but just the essential challenge of the major itself. TLDR; she's not the worst out there.

For those who got bad grades and blamed Einakian for not teaching well, unfortunately, this is how life is. By complaining about what you are given, you are setting yourselves up for failure by blaming external circumstances and not yourself for putting enough time in the course. Obviously, you have other courses and a social life to attend to but be reminded, you are a student. And in the end, if blaming your professor for a substandard grade feels correct, then you have yet to learn a lesson in humility. Now, that's not to say Einakian is a great professor. She is definitely difficult to understand at times, etc. However, I walked away from this class realizing that if we do recieve an amazing professor who is willing to go the extra mile for us, we are LUCKY. It's not a requirement; we are just extremely fortunate to have this opportunity. Many people necessitate having a good professor but they do not realize that most people in this world are average. With that said, Einakian is just an average professor. However, even though she is average at what she does, I walked away learning how to fend for myself in this cruel field. In short, if you want a good life lesson in both learning how to work and recognizing that having a good professor is luck, not a requirement, take Einakian. Otherwise, if you want your hand to be held, take someone else.

The accent wasn't that bad. The bad part was that she wrote on the board completely incorrect material and assumed we understood what she meant. The bad part was that she gave us labs and projects which she never taught us how to approach until the day they were due, and then wouldn't accept late work. The bad part was that she made spelling mistakes on quizzes, midterms, and finals that cost students a lot of credit then she refused to accept her mistake. I honestly don't even know how she is a CS professor, or a professor at all. Obviously, like everyone else said, she's sweet and always smiling, but that is no excuse for her complete inability to covey accurate information. She wants you to learn, and that's great, but she has no idea how to teach. Stay away from her at all costs.

Einakian is a very sweet lady who genuinely cares for her students to succeed. Unfortunately, her lecturing ability isn't effective at explaining the material clearly, her thick accent on top of that makes actually learning useful material in the class very challenging. On top of that, the lectures rarely actually match the topic of the lab for that day, in fact it's more often than not simply chance that she will lecture about the lab that we're currently doing. There are weekly quizzes (that are relatively easy) and weekly labs that are due once per week (usually at midnight on Saturday). The final is a common final with all her classes and also isn't too challenging. The class itself isn't too difficult compared to other professors, and if you have past coding experience you'll be able to make it through pretty easily, but stay away if you don't know much about coding.

Einakian is actually the best Computer Science Teacher. Better than Hollister. People complain too much about her because they fail the class. She teaches everything pretty well. Just do work and don't slack off. Literal GOD

you deserve what you get on those tests. don't blame this prof because of her accent. it's ridiculous.

She deserves a 2.00. Come on guys, stop complaining so much.

Awful

She's better than the damn Hollister. Comeon guys what you trying to say.

It is beyond my comprehension how this professor manages to teach a university.

People are too hard on her. She wasn't the best at communicating the information, but definitely wanted the best for her students. If you go to her for office hours, she will do her best to help you understand the material. Put in the extra work and you will do fine in this class.

She is patient and willing to help. Don't complain use the opportunities and resource you have.

Although I slightly agree with the below comments I don't think she's nearly as bad as those below are claiming she is. Like most courses (not just CS) you will need to go the extra mile after lecture and read the textbook/Google/office hours/etc. if something is unclear to you. She's definitely not perfect, but I think if you're willing to put in your side of the effort then you will do just fine. I personally wouldn't think it's the end of the world if you got her due to the high amount of resources there are to learn some stuff yourself. Also, on the topic of her accent... It really isn't hard to understand if you've heard anyone but perfectly speaking English speakers speak English. If you know English you'll understand her. Also, if you don't understand a word she's saying it's perfectly okay to ask her to clarify what she was trying to say. She often joked with our class when we couldn't understand a word or so. Overall, there's definitely better and there's definitely worse out there.

Lol Einakian. I had a different perspective then most because I took 103 with Buckalew and got wrecked by his final. So retaking this class, I had a very solid understanding of everything that was taught going in. I can definitely see how people have trouble with her. Her lectures were not very clear and she does just pretty much lecture right out of the book. Her midterms were not extremely difficult, if you study all of the material on the study guide thoroughly then you will be fine. Her labs are pretty easy although rather confusing at times, you can work with a partner and turn in labs for each other. Definitely avoid her if you've never taken 103 before. Pretty effortless B+ though to me. (Fuck you Buckalew)

Okay so this class is easy. Easy does not mean a guaranteed A or B though. She posts all of her notes online, so while her lectures are sometimes hard to follow there are many good videos online as other resources. Her exams are easy if you can do her class examples and memorize the Big O notation for each data structure. The partial code sections come directly from labs and assignments so make sure to understand those. The labs and projects themselves are not too difficult but will require you to be a solid coder in java. If you stay on top of the course material, there is no reason for you to not get an A or B. It is easy to slack because the lectures are boring though.

If you want to learn good code-writing, do not take this professor. Her example code that you have to use for labs is horrendous. She has a very strong accent that makes it hard to understand what she is saying. Additionally on midterms she just makes up the answers from how she would implement things, which as I said before, is not optimal. You'll have to argue with her about how she's doing it wrong if you want points back for doing things right on the midterm. Her lectures feel like high school; she takes attendance and calls on you if it looks like you're googling the subject to actually understand what she's talking about.

You are better off studying on your own.

Her accent is not a problem at all, but Einakian is an incredibly boring lecturer who doesn't convey concepts very well. Fortunately the code for most of the labs and projects can be found online which makes her class easier than most 103 sections. If you're looking to get by with an easier professor (midterms were pretty much all spacial and not based on code) she's a solid way to go, but you won't learn data structures very thoroughly.

Everything about this teacher I despise to another level. She is a nice person. But she is a nice but horrendous teacher. Please switch out of this class to another qualified professor. She teaches us basic functions which is fine. But then she roundhouse kicks you in the face with fat labs and projects that are very hard to do. She does not teach us enough information to do the lab on our own. Instead, we are just fishing for information. Also, what is this curriculum? SLO placed me in a Python class when I don't know anything but Java. What I really hate is the teacher expects you to know Python going into the class. There should be an intro to Python class or better yet, implement an intro to Python chapter instead of making people who don't know Python suffer and people who've been coding since birth succeed. AND PEOPLE WHO KNOW HOW TO CODE PYTHON DON'T EVEN KNOW HOW TO DO HER LABS, WHICH IS WHY SHE IS SO INCAPABLE AND SHOULD SERIOUSLY RETIRE AND WORK AT A BUTCHER SHOP BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT SHE DOES WITH THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. And I'm blocked into CPE 203. Someone pray for me because I will have to suffer for another quarter. I really hope she just disappears because she clearly is doing it for the money and not the job itself. Probably got her PhD, tried to get a job in the computer industry but people saw how useless she was and had to resort to being a professor. Get someone else. I am telling you. If you don't you will regret it.

This was my second time taking 202 and my second time having Einakian as a professor (I previously had her for 102). The first time I took her course it was frustrating and I didn't attend often; however, for 202 I found her to be better at conveying the material and found her to have a better understanding of the course than Hatalsky (my previous instructor). She knows what she's talking about and a good 60-80% of the time when someone asked a question in this class it was because they weren't paying attention or they thought she was wrong (she wasn't wrong very often). The most infuriating part of her class this time around was listening to CSC and CPE majors mansplain data structures to someone with a PhD and then ask a dumb question that would either be below the scope of the course or something that had already been talked about in lecture. TL; DR : Great prof, knows her shit, all you need to do in the class is shut up, listen, take notes, and ask clarifying questions.

Pretty interesting course especially for the labs and projects where I think you can really learn the most. Professor was pretty good at explaining the concepts although had a little bit harder time likely because English is not her first language, but for me personally was not much of a problem at all. If you are struggling in this class my first recommendation would go to office hours at any opportunity you have especially if you have any questions or concerns that you feel cannot be answered through piazza. She is a much better teacher 1 on 1 in my opinion and she can really help if you get stuck. That being said if you want a teacher who is a great lecturer and you get annoyed by smallish mistakes in teaching or understanding questions you may want to try a different professor.

Professor Einakian does not deserve the bad reviews shes gotten on this site. She does have an accent, but it was not hard to understand what she was trying to say. I went into this class with no knowledge of python and fell behind in the beginning because I did not do the work outside of class to learn it. I recommend learning the basics of python before class so you are not confused like i was. Also, she is a very sweet lady who really wants you to succeed and it really helps to get help from her during office hours or through piazza. If you read the online textbook she provides before you start your labs/projects, they will be much easier to understand and complete. Quizzes and exams were relatively easy if you study the textbook and understand your code for the labs/projects. Professor Einakian really understands the material and is very friendly, so dont be afraid to ask questions!

Sussan is really not a bad professor. Some people are just too picky. Getting bad grades is your problem, not professor's.

Easy A. Peace.

One of the best professors stop complaining. Everything is easy up until the final. Just ace the projects and you will for sure pass.

Professor Einakian is a nice woman who smiles a lot. However, her class is, nicely put, a disaster for most. If you have a strong foundation in computer science, this class should be fairly easy for you. The material in essence is very straightforward, quizzes are fairly easy (and she's pretty flexible, our class collectively did awful on a quiz so she replaced our bad grades with the grade of the next quiz which was a LOT easier), and exams are a bit trickier but still very reasonable if you know what you're doing. That being said, if you are newer to CS and are picking up Python or coding in general with little background, this class will be hell. Her English is sub-par so any questions you may have that don't relate directly to the current lecture frequently get misinterpreted, her lectures sometimes seem like a disorganized jumble of theory, pseudo-code, and Python code that's crucial to the current project or lab, and the worst part in my opinion, the PDFs for assignments don't explain nearly enough. The vast majority of them leave you assuming what she wants, then promptly failing her tests (and losing 10 percent of your grade per failed test). The saving grace of this class was the Piazza, a class forum where classmates can post and answer each other's questions. It felt like throughout the class there was a group of 10 or so students acting as tech support for everyone else, keeping us all afloat. My consensus: If you're inexperienced, this class will be very tough and you won't do well. Don't take her. If you have lots of experience, this class will be fairly easy once you get the hang of correctly assuming what the hollow specification PDF is asking for. But don't take her. You won't grow as a computer scientist.

She knew the material well and was always available to answer any and all of your questions. She is a very generous lady who truly cares for her students and their struggles. She knows how to adjust her class to student learning and will never hesitate to clarify anything someone might be confused about.

To start, Einakian is a nice professor, and she genuinely seems like she wants her students to succeed. But please, do yourself a favor and take another professor if you can. She is inconsistent and unclear when explaining concepts, and misunderstands students' questions the most of the time (as you've probably read from other reviews). Not only that, but her explanations are sometimes just... completely wrong. If you know your stuff before coming into this class, then these mistakes are quite clear, but those who don't know much about Java or OOP and take her word like gospel are going to be misguided. Furthermore, if she doesn't know the answer to a student's question, she either takes a wild guess at the answer or says something along the lines of "It depends on the compiler." No, it doesn't. This isn't C where anyone can make a compiler. Her core teaching style is sloppily coping code from her paper to the whiteboard and reading it out loud. She also frequently calls on students to explain content she hasn't even taught yet. It almost gives the illusion that she forgot how something works and she's hoping someone from the class will know. She gives very little prep material for her midterms, which are poorly worded, and taking them requires wild mental gymnastics, mostly dedicated to figuring out what on earth she's trying to ask. Furthermore, her grading is incredibly inconsistent, and she often messes up the math when scoring midterms. If you do end up taking her, make sure to double-check her math when adding up your midterm scores. Sometimes you can get an entire letter grade back. Her lab assignment specifications are vague, so it's often hard to know exactly what she wants (even after asking her :s). And sometimes she'll mark you down because your program doesn't pass her test cases which, again, were not described by the spec. In general, she seems to have the attitude that there's exactly one right way to solve a problem. Some of the reviews here complain about her accent, but that's the least of the issues about this class imo. Even if you have trouble understanding accents in general, you should be be able to understand her. Overall, if you already know the content being taught in this class, you'll be fine. But keep in mind if PolyLearn ever shows a grade significantly lower than what you expected, definitely ask her about it since it's very likely a grading mistake. If you're new to Java/OOP, try to switch to another class. If you can't switch, then good luck.

The amount of hate she gets on PolyRatings is honestly ludicrous. Sure there's somewhat of an accent barrier, making class difficult to follow but the commitment she shows to helping her students out whether it be going through java documentation after java documentation or extending her office hours time to help out students is amazing and im honestly extremely glad i had a professor like her. spent a good amount of time panicking this quarter about my grade in this class and she's taken a lot of time to help me out a ton and i dont think the critic of her on here is quite fair tbh

This is the first C I have recieved in my entire life. I hope that says something to all of you out there watching their GPA. Do not take him--this class was a nightmare!