Banghart, Andrew  

I did not like this class because it was a waste of time and i felt like I learned nothing. I’m an engineering major and I’m rather strong in English already, but I really didn’t see any point in going to class to read an article for two hours. He never put grades in and still hasn’t even put my final project grade in, which is why I had a B. I took this class two quarters ago... and my grades still aren’t finalized; when I asked him about it, he said he’ll get around to it but I don’t see it happening. Waste of time but easy class.

Professor Banghart starts the quarter off with a very clear idea of what the course will be. It takes only two classes to realize that he is extremely disorganized and everything he says is misleading and not what you'd expect. To start, the course schedule wasn't followed and he ended up cutting one of the assignments and putting more weight on the final. He's almost never available during his office hours, partly because he doesn't show up, and partly because most of his office hours are filled with his "meetings" which leads me to the worst part about this professor, his grading. For every assignment in the class, you only get to see your grade in a mandatory meeting with him in office hours where he gives actually helpful advice. Unfortunately none of the assignments build on one another so by the time you get the help, its too late. Anyhow, from my speculation, and from many other classmates, he grades every assignment on the spot when you get to the meeting. I am almost 100% confident that every assignment he grades is opened up in front of you and read for the very first time. You can tell by the fact that he opens the emails for the first time in front of you and how every time he looks at your work he says, "hold on I need a minute to refresh myself on this one." If all of that didn't make you think he was disorganized enough, he hasn't responded to a single email I've sent him all quarter. In conclusion, DO NOT TAKE THIS PROFESSOR

In this class you will 1) Sit and wonder why you're given seemingly arbitrary instructions to do things like make a paper airplane instruction manual. Then after doing that for 2 hours you will discard it without properly discussing anything you could possibly learn other than "use pictures lots" leaving all your time wasted 2) Do daily writing assignments about how to make paper airplanes and also what soda you want for lunch 3) Write technical documents about stuff, then go to office hours and hear "Well uh I think you got a B" 4) Ponder if anything you turned in actually was looked at for more than 5 seconds because no grades were put in to PolyLearn or ever really even told to you, yet somehow at the end of the quarter have a final grade assigned 5) Curse your luck for having to show up to do pointless writing assignments in order to prepare you for the graded pointless writing assignments 6) Honestly, maybe learn a modicum of how to write technically. Just a bit, but you'll probably learn something. Overall this class was a waste of time and extremely disorganized. All I wanted was to get papers actually graded, so we could get real feedback like "this part is good, this part is bad" rather than a 1 minute blurb in office hours followed by "I think I gave this a B/B- or so." For a course on what is essentially communication, everything was disorganized and far too little feedback was given. I advise you to look at other professors for your tech writing class.

While Banghart is a new teacher to Cal Poly, he is NOT inexperienced. he has experience at other major universities, and definitely knows what hes doing, and what he's talking about. He's a chill dude who isn't afraid to let loose and have fun in class, but he also expects you to get your shit done. He isn't a ridiculously hard grader but he expects you to put in time and effort into the class, which isn't difficult. the class is broken up into in class writing assignments (not too bad), class attendance, and projects/papers to be done out of class. He made an 8-10pm class not absolutely hell, and I'd definitely recommend him to anyone who needs to take a class hes teaching. 10/10.

Banghart is a great professor to take if you just want to get through Tech Writing with a relatively minimal amount of work. There's a few big assignments/projects, and he expects that you put your full effort into. He also grades pretty hard, but if you're an organized writer and can explain/articulate your thoughts clearly then you have nothing to worry about. His classes are pretty boring, but he'll randomly grade attendance, so you really need to go to all of them. All in all, it was a pretty easy class.

Andrew Banghart is an awesome teacher. He is really fun and down to earth about a lot of things but will still get you to learn things. We do a lot of classwork and participation is mandatory so if your planning to not come to some classes then take another professor. There are not a lot of projects and your grade ultimately comes down to 4 major projects (Memo, Usability Report, Proposal and Popularization Article). Super fun, glad I got to take his class.

Banghart is a great guy. Hes new, but hes clearly getting better. His class was well organized and the workload was super managable. He was an easy grader and the class was at the back of my mind most of the quarter. Hes funny, and is very comfortable in the classroom. He brings snacks sometimes and isnt afraid to swear. Overall, I highly recommend him.

Banghart's technical writing course lacks any actual technical writing. While my coeds in another tech writing course with a different professor were writing resumes, cover letters, and documents for local tech companies, we were writing pretend articles for magazines, diagrams for building paper airplanes, and studying designs for posters and magazine articles. None of his material teaches anything useful for everyday writing as an engineer, and the assignments feel like you're in another gen-ed English course. The homework load is not too bad however some of it is incredibly sophisticated English and many students will struggle to understand even a little. Almost none of it is actual writing from engineers. None of the homework really has any overall benefit and is just pointless busywork. You will be given assignments like writing memos, explaining visual designs, and learning web design. None of which actually comes into use later in the class, and most of which isn't even useful for engineers. His grading is fairly tough and students who are weaker at English writing or who have a harder time putting their thoughts onto paper are punished for it much more than necessary. All in all, Banghart doesn't teach the course like it's for engineering majors and instead teaches the course like the students are taking a run-of-the-mill English course. Banghart is not a terrible man, he is actually pretty cool, but I do not recommend taking his course.

Banghart fails to teach you anything about technical writing or how to write technically. He never gives you any useful feedback on any of the assignments he actually grades. As of the day grades were due we had no grades on any written work, only participation and group activities and there were maybe 5 out of 13 grades in the book. He also grades very arbitrarily and gives such vague rubrics that often you have no idea how to do any of the assignments given. I ultimately got nothing out of this class and would definitely recommend taking a different professor.

If I were to have a squirrel for a teacher, I would learn more. This man is 100% useless. He doesn't grade any of our assignments and has no rubric. He just arbitrarily assigns grades based on who he likes the most in the class. God knows why anyone would want to voluntarily take his class. The only reason you should take this class is if you are a sociopath who derives pleasure from your own pain. Otherwise, find someone else and avoid the eye-gouging experience.

If you are interested in the topic of technical writing for engineers, I suggest you select another professor as this professor will only have you do one engineering-related writing project which is a graded group project proposal. The rest of the class consists of creating instructions on making an airplane using software like InDesign. It is very basic work. You also have to submit in a resume and assorted documents that are not helpful to engineers. You read a lot of literature that discusses the difference between writing styles in science. You do some rewrites of documents but they are not very interesting or super engineering-related. Almost every "engineering" topic discussed is based on simple civil and/or structural engineering. You take two easy midterms and a final that is basically the lecture notes word for word. Going to class is pointless but attendance is noted (thought I've only seen him take attendance once). We mostly spend the lecture reading out loud or reading to ourselves while the professor is on his laptop. Then, he has you do assignments in class that aren't actually collected or graded. It's a very awkward setting and mostly uncomfortable. The professor comes off as very pretentious at times when providing feedback and it can be discouraging for students to give ideas. Nearly all assignments returned to you simply have a grade on top but hardly any explanation as to why you lost points. It is really difficult to contact him via email when you have to submit a late assignment. You never really know if he saw your email or not because he doesn't reply and when asked in class, he usually says he hasn't seen it (me and my group members experienced this). Frequently, assignments are lost and never returned so you have no idea what grade you get 90% of the time. It's annoying. Overall, not a good professor. Can't communicate well. Uninteresting class that was disappointing. It's just all busy work to keep the time passing. He seems bored all the time and it doesn't help the class vibe. Passed but didn't learn any valuable new skills which is fine since hands-on R&D is the main focus for engineers.

I feel like he spends more time grooming his hairline and beard than grading assignments. In all seriousness, nobody that I asked in class got anything higher than 92% on any assignment... It's like his go-to grade if there is nothing wrong. Multiple assignments were never returned to me (and everyone else in the class), I was just told "I have it at home" over and over. Two large assignments that I DID get back had 92/100 on it, and no other mark ups, corrections, comments. So nothing is wrong, but I get a 92... Okay. Personally the worst part is that I had a 92 virtually across the board all quarter, and after final presentations, (which I doubt I crashed and burned on) my final grade was a B+. The curriculum basically consisted of instruction manual writing, use of InDesign software (semi-useless), in-class writing assignments that weren't graded, rewriting of technical documents, and a large group project in which we had to create a webpage for iFixIt (look it up, it was pretty cool). The final is a presentation on an engineering project proposal thing, which could potentially be fun and very helpful for your future, probably the most interesting for civ engr. The rest of the time in the class is spent with busy work. Bottom line, if you can show up, do InDesign, iFixIt, and the final with little to no errors, and are well articulated, you will get a 92%... Which will then get rounded down to a B+. Good luck.

Banghart's class is dumb. The class is super slow, feels like it provides nothing, and makes you feel like no matter how hard you try you will end up with a B. His grading feels really arbitrary, he makes you buy a subscription to Adobe InDesign which is super useless. Nothing about this class made me feel like I was better equipped to write technically or use skill that would make writing as an engineer easier. The only fun part about this class was the iFixit project. All in all, you put in average work and get a B, so if you want that, go ahead I guess.

Honestly, I don't get why anyone hates on Banghart so much. He's a pretty chill guy and made an 8-10 pm class tolerable. The iFixit project was easy if you just followed the instructions (my group got 99/100). His go to grade for most assignments in a 92 if you did well so it is pretty hard to get an A but it is an easy B if you show up and turn stuff in on time. The only thing I really got out of the class is I finally made a resumé and cover letter and I can put InDesign on my resumé. I would take him again if I had to.

This guy is a joke. He is unprofessional and this class is really pointless. You can try as hard as you want and most likely end up with a B anyways. You are also required to buy Adobe InDesign for the class, which is rather pointless. If this guy worried less about cussing and trying to be cool then maybe he'd be decent...maybe. And if his eyes were any farther apart they'd be on the back of his head.

He is a fairly chill teacher and the course work isn't too bad. But on the other hand it is like very hard to get an A. I think I got an A on only 2 assignment. Hes grading rubric is extremely ambiguous and misleading. You will have to go to his office hours before the assignment is due and have him read it over for discrepancies. And even then you will still get a B with absolutely no helpful feedback.

Missed the first day, went to the second day. Went to the midterm. Went to the Final. Three days of class total. I got a B, easy. This kind of shit gives our school a bad name.