4 HW's with 1.5 weeks to finish each, 3 online quizzes bi-weekly. Lectures were so confusing but necessary to succeed so attend all. Midterm and final both took questions from the practice exam and had 50% R output interpretation 30% Derivation/Proof 20% MC/TF and extra credit. Attend sections right before the exam, TA's went over helpful topics.
If you want to be concerned about whether you will graduate on time due to a single question on a single exam, this is the class to take. Prof never responds to emails/Nectir (Slack).
Random in-class quizzes, bi-weekly homework assignments which were challenging because in-class material didn't help, a midterm and a final. Final was completely unfair and irrelevant to what we learned. I would only take this class when Professor Sang-Yun Oh teaches it. Most of the class felt like they learned absolutely nothing. Avoid, 0/10 class
HW assigned biweekly, labs were not required but were briefly gone over in section without solutions released. Quizzes were in class on canvas, and the final was very difficult with two questions, one being worth 50/70 points. Professor/ hws did not prepare the class for exams and in general it was a low quality class.
I took her for PSTAT 134. The course load is actually pretty light she just doesn't really do anything to prepare you for the mid term and finals. There's not enough in the assignments to prepare you. Final had 50/70 points in one question that I couldn't finish.
Extremely unclear lectures, slides are so vague it's useless. Teaches difficult topics as if you already know them. No continuity between lectures (very random). No grading syllabus, no clue which assignments got graded, no place to check your grade until it showed on GOLD, and no response to emails. Even TA's felt lost. Terrible experience!
Without a question one of the worst professors I've ever had in my 4 years at UCSB. She straight up does not answer emails and you'll be lucky if she responds to anything on Nectir within a week of posting a question. Her lectures were terrible and relied on slides to teach. Grading rubric was "entirely up to the professor." Super unclear/vague.
Horrible course. NO feedback during the whole quarter. You even don't know the grading criteria.
Baracaldo spends the littlest amount of time possible to tend to her students (Doesnt respond to emails or slack) and downcurved the class. If you're in her class, you're on your own with your peers
Never respond to emails and grading rubric is horrible.
Her lectures and overall the course is very unorganized. She down curved the final grade which is ridiculous.
She is the worst professor I've had at UCSB. She promised a practice final, told us never mind, and then released it after student complaints WITHOUT solutions 1.5 days before a final worth 40% of our grade. She said we would have an extra credit assignment to increase our grade by 5% but then randomly made it 2% until we complained again...
Organized lectures and excellent explanations in class and during office hours. Attending the office hours of professor and tutor is really helpful for homework and quizzes.
Flip-flopped on whether there'd be a practice exam up until the day before the final. We were promised all quarter a 5% extra credit bonus for our final grade, which was then changed to 2% after our final had already passed. Quizzes/homework were pretty easy, but then the final had a class average of 55% and over three-fourths of the class failed.
Professor Baracaldo is not available outside of class, has unresponsive TAs, and reads off of lecture slides. Does not teach that well, and takes forever to grade and reply to students. Ridiculously unorganized and has inconsistent times between assignments.
Overall the lectures are decently clear to follow and definitely make a difference in understanding the material so I wouldn't skip them, but they don't align very well with homework and quizzes, and all understanding of proofs is meant to come from these lectures as well. Attend section and work with the labs as they were the biggest hw help
Like other reviews have noted, the class is disorganized and the professor is difficult to contact. TAs aren't provided course materials, so they won't be much help in exam preparations. Lectures are theoretical, and there's a gap between what is gone over in class and what's tested on quizzes. Beware that there are proofs/derivations on the final.
Professor Baracaldo doesn't really reply to her students on Nectir and lacks organization. Assignments are due right after they're assigned, the instructions are unclear, and lecture doesn't really line up with the assignments. She typically just reads off the slides, but does answer students questions clearly through examples in lecture.
Took Baracaldo in F22 and it was decently hard. You had a biweekly quiz that were ~5q's (worth 20%), 4 assignments (40%), no midterm, and a final (40%). The prof was really bad at responding to emails, but definitely go to office hours if you can -- that will really help with the hw's. She is offering extra credit for 5% to ur grade which is nice.
Took her Fall 22. We had bi-weekly HW, no midterm, quizzes, and final exam. She's overall OK, but very unresponsive and so were the TA's. Self-learn a lot. She's new so I'll give her that.