Borland, Jim  

the course booklet was written by Paul Weber, but Borland used it for his first time teaching the course. Jim did not lecture in this class. Every day he would just say "this is pretty straight forward, so let's just get it in by noon." When there was an assignment that actually stumped the whole class, Jim didn't seem to know the diference between his ass and a hole in the ground. He cut out the entire portion of material having to do with CSI, which is supposed to be a significant part of the class. I could have wiped my ass with a piece of paper and handed it in and his response would have been "wow, this is a great example of feces, you get an A." If you really give a shit about this class, wait till Paul teaches it. You might have to work your ass off a little more, but at least when you do run into some trouble on an estimating assignment Paul will work it out and there will be an actual resolution instead of "fuck it, everyone gets full credit."

waste of my time and money. Jim doesn't care about teaching this class and it shows. I mean it is easy and super interesting so you can teach yourself and do fine but jim doesnt spend anytime on the material which can be a littel confusing at times and is definatly vital to our major. he hated being in class so he cancelled it 1 out of 4 days a week. he doesnt grade assignments he just checks them off. there is nothing out can do casue it is hard to get classes and he is tenured but now oyu know what oyu are getting

Let me begin this evaluation with this: as a person with above average intelligence, I often take Polyratings with a grain of salt. It seems to me that every other teacher has some profanity-laced comment written about him or her, more than likely by some student who failed their class, but claimed to have earned a

Take a serious look at the evaluations on this page. Some people seem to have skipped out on third grade spelling, while others are very intelligent. Either way you dice it, one thing remains constant. THERE IS A SERIOUS PROBLEM WITH JIM BORLAND'S TEACHING. Jim is one of the most disrespectful teachers I have taken at Cal Poly. His complete lack of motivation and care for his students is evident in every class period. He may know the material, but let me tell you he doesn't care one bit about conveying that knowledge to you. I may be the only person who wants to learn something in this major that I truly enjoy, and I got nothing out of Jim. Jim does have one thing going for him; he makes class as short as possible every day. My favorite thing to watch is Jim leaving class. He knows he's leaving 2 hours too early, so he first peaks his head out the door and scans for Al. When the coast is clear he's nowhere to be found. Have a question about the material? Good luck! His grading policy is not based on any point scale whatsoever. It's basically spelled out in the syllabus that he will give you whatever grade he feels like. It's a shame the tenure system allows this man to keep his job. Al, if you ever read these, PLEASE PLEASE take a serious look at Jim's performance...for the sake of all of us who actually want to learn.

I would rather cut my own testicles off with a rusty knife than take another class with Jim. This guy obviously hates hi life....and takes it out on his students every day at work.

Borland is the type of person who you will either hate (like I do) or despise. If there are actually people out there who actually like him, I will pray for your sanity. The breakdown of this class is basically this: quizzes every week (they are straight from the book; you better read it), and homework assignments scattered throughout the quarter, and one test, the final, which is just the quizzes put together in one hella long test. He has this really bizzare point system, eg, 100 points for one homework assignment but only 150 points for a quiz. However, a word of caution, quizzes pretty much make up your grade in that class. I kicked ass on all the quizzes (I was in the top ten out of almost 65 students), so dont toss them aside. He fucked me in the end though (I had an A going into the final and it was only supposed to be worth 25% of my grade but he arbitrarily changed the final to 40% of my grade). Unfortunately, Al Hauck wont fire his boney ass, so you will have to take him for at least two of your major classes, including CM 331. This class was a fucking joke; I didn't learn shit.

weekly quizzes, pretty straight forward. gives you the study questions for the quizzes but is very specific. no grey area when it comes to partial credit. make sure to read the paper or do other hw while he is lecturing, he hates that so do it as much as possible.

Lots of students who took this class hadn't taken accounting before, but Jim was really patient about explaining the basics to them. He tended to skim over detail in the material, but he did focus on what is important to know about construction accounting. The only serious problem with the course is that the textbook is 20 years out of date, and that is no exaggeration.

Avoid this man like the plague!! Wait a quarter if you have to just to avoid taking a class from him. His lectures are SO boring and completely pointless. In mechanical you learn useless crap, in accounting he keeps it so basic that you want to fall asleep, and in scheduling he will screw you over if your schedule print-outs don't look "dressed up" and pretty. I have never wasted so much time in class and learned so little. Al needs to get rid of this guy but he can't because he is tenured.

Jim lectures well. Read the book because his almost all of the test questions come from the book. I have no clue on what criteria Jim bases his grades. I set the curve on the first test, had the 3rd highest grade on the second test, and again set the curve on the last test. I completed all the homework and quizzes, and missed 3 days of class. Yet, he gave me a B.

Jim is very knowledgeable of the topics he teaches. He has a very black and white thinking process. "He is always right." If a student proves him wrong about a fact or topic, he gets frustrated and directs it towards the student. His is difficult to approach. He makes you feel somewhat like on idiot when you ask questions. He teaches the students like kindergartner. He regurgitates what he reads (text books/program manuals) and when he quizes or tests the students, he expects the exact terminolodge the author uses. That's impossible unless you memmorize the chapters. His tries to hold the students accountable for their reading on exams. That is fine for a teacher to do that but he goes to the extremes to which the test questions have nothing to do with the topic at hand (ie, what example did the author use to illustrate this point? --pointless and insulting question). Unfortunately, whatever courses he teaches, he is the only instructor for the course (you can't avoid taking him). Like all other seniors, I have had him for the 3 cm courses he teaches.

Jim is basically a nice guy. I think he must have a lot of kids because he talks to the class like we are children. His teaching techniques are very straightforward, however and there is usually minimal homework. The only thing that will get you through is doing all the reading. You have to know what was said in each chapter because he'll ask something like "list 3 things from chapter 6" or some crazy question like that. His class was easy, I found it boring but what class isn't. You'll learn a lot though and that's all that matters I guess...especially when you have no choice of what teacher to take.

JIM is an ASSHOLE. He is a tenure track professor who is just here so he can keep getting a paycheck after he reitres. He does not care about his students, nor does he really teach. Midterms are hard, and if you don't memorize word for word, you get no credit. I went to his office to get help. I went there to learn, and his exact words were: "Get out of my office, you're wasting my time. I've got better things to do." Thank God he is retiring in June. Jim if you are reading this, go fuck yourself -kthxbye. AVOID JIM AT ALL COSTS

Wow, good luck with this guy! He doesn't care what you get out of his class as long as you don't ask any questions. He is always right, even when he is wrong! He wants students to fail so he can laugh and feel smarter than them, cool teacher huh. It sucks that we are forced to take cources from this man!

Fine teacher, but a little dry in the presentation. I wouldnt suggest having her at 8:00 in the morning, might be difficult staying awake.