Ramos, George  

I would have to agree with those people here who say what a worthless horrible proffesor Ramos is. I'm glad for everyone who will be here for awhile. I wish he left from dept. head before I graduated. This guy is a conceded, smelly, arrogant bastard.

This man should never ever ever have been hired at Cal Poly, let alone be the journalism department chair for so long. Yes, he won pulitzer prizes, but I'm sorry that does not give ANYBODY the excuse to be an arrogant prick who does not give a shit about anybody but his mustang daily staff. The journalism department has three different concentrations, and if he is going to shit on every concentration but print (literally he will tell you straight up that he doesn't like broadcast or pr...to your face) than he needs to get the hell out of the department. He was my advisor and literally every time I went to talk to him about graduation requirements, course offerings, etc. (DURING his office hours mind you), he either told me to go away because he was busy or to make it quick because he was busy. He might be an intelligent man and is no doubt an amazing writer, but he does not belong in a university setting and seriously needs to stop being so damn conceited and self-richeous.

Easy class. Learned some fun facts about journalism. Otherwise not much to it.

Arrogant

George Ramos is a journalist. Plain and simple. And he told us that on the first day of class during Fall 2009, that he\'s more of our editor than our teacher. For those of you who want to be print journalists, I suggest you take Ramos to get an idea of what it\'s like to work in a newsroom. First of all, his classes aren\'t for the full three hours. The longest lecture I had with him was a review for the final and it was a little over two hours. The shortest I had was fifteen minutes and all we did was turn in the midterm. He lectures about how to write the platform; then you jump on the computers, write the story, turn it in, and then you can leave. The only problem with Ramos is that you\'re either going to love him or hate him. I loved him because during his lectures, he told us stories from his experience as a journalist working for the Times. I thought it was interesting. A friend of mine thought he was arrogant because he would talk about himself. In addition, his current events quizzes will screw you over if you don\'t study for them. I would\'ve gotten an A/B, but it was my own fault for not studying for those harder.

I don\'t know how Ramos is for the upper division courses, but for intro to news reporting and writing he was a pretty good teacher. He definitely knows what he\'s talking about and he has a lot of great stories to tell. He may seem repetitive sometimes, but that\'s just cause he wants you to remember the material. The class is not too hard, but it can be hard to tell what he expects. As long as you read the news and are a decent writer you\'ll do fine.

Ramos is what he is. He has his pros and cons. He does apply the \"learn by doing\" approach very well. He gets to the point of what he\'s trying to reach during class and then let\'s you practice what you have just learnt. He\'s a real print journalist, or at least the perfection definition of one so overall, he was a good teacher. I learnt a lot from him. His personality though can go either way. You can either love him because of all the experiences he\'s gone through or you can hate him because he seems self absorbed and self righteous.

Professor Ramos is the greatest asset to the journalism department. Yes- he's biased (especially when it comes to Mexican American issues), yes- he's subjective when it comes to grading, yes- he thinks print journalism is the most important form of media. But this guy is the most realistic professor in the major. He spent 25 years at the LA Times, he's won three pulitzers and he knows his stuff. He's a tremendous resource and he loves to share his knowledge. He greatly cares about the department and wants his students to grow and succeed. Going to class and turning in assignments isn't enough; you'll most likely get a B or lower. Ramos wants you to defend your writing because he's preparing you for the real world where reporters have to battle off the bias of editors. 304 was a lot of work, but Ramos doesn't waste your time. He lectures for about an hour and dismisses the lab time so you can work on assignments. You'll learn how to report on police stories, local beats, community heroes, city council meetings, NBC's "meet the press," and local news. You'll also learn how to deal with sources, how to use public records to find people and many other invaluable tips. This was the most valuable class I've taken and I feel confident to work as a reporter. TAKE THIS CLASS FROM RAMOS IF YOU WANT TO BE A JOURNALIST.

Don't let all these people scare you. Yes, hes all the things they say. But just stand up for yourself, go into his office hours, get to know him a little bit, find something in common with him and your golden. Oh yeah, and anyone who thinks its a heavy workload is full of it. The assignments are not time consuming, AND you can turn them in late and he barely takes off any points. He tries to scare everyone in the first class, and then it turns out his class isn't even that hard. Why would it be though? Is any Journalism class hard?

Although Jour 304 is supposed to be 3 hours long, the longest we ever stayed was 2 hours--and that was on the first day. After that, George kept us anywhere from 10 mins to 1:15. Outside of class, he had us running around the entire county for our stories and enticed us with extra credit if we got police reports--which are misdemeanors for whoever gives them to us (not for us). As a professor, George is better than he is an administrator but I felt like my writing improved little. My leads got stronger but that's all that George really focused on. If anything, this class will get our department head to know your name and how well you write.

Ramos is awful. I could write a novel about his arrogance, self-centeredness, and disregard for students, but I'll try to focus on his teaching ability. I learned absolutely nothing in either 304 or the Mustang Daily. While it's true that the 304 class sessions can be short, the time spent running around more than accounts for those lost hours. One student had to drive to Cayucos every week because that was her "beat." Other students had to go to Santa Margarita, Nipomo, Morro Bay, Los Osos, etc. I understand the need to get out and report, but it would be more practical if the region you were covering were within 30 miles of you. As for the daily, even more running around with very little gained. All I gained from the whole experience was a determination to become anything but a journalist. He was completely untouchable. Finally, as department head (though I meant to avoid talking about this), he's a nightmare. Completely unqualified, difficult to meet with, and shows little concern for the average student. He made a friend of mine take journalism classes for a couple of years before allowing him to transfer into the department. It started w/ Ramos's request that he earn an A in 1 class, but then he continued to raise the bar until the student took every major requirement before he reluctantly signed his form. Another friend was hoping for a course substitution. Ramos didn't even look at his request for weeks, then had him jumping through hoops for several more weeks. In the end Ramos said he never intended to allow the substitution!!! I earned A's in all of his courses, but would have gladly taken C's with a professor who was both qualified to teach and cared about his/her students. Avoid him like the plague!

Before taking Public Affairs Reporting I read the reviews on polyratings and got very intimidated. However, this class was not that bad. Ramos is a pretty easy grader when it comes down to it. As long as you do everything you are basically guranteed to get an A or B. Perhaps he got the word that his arrogance was hampering his teaching ability, because he was actually very nice and understanding. For those dreading this class, just remember that I was too. In the end it was a pleasant surprise.

Ramos is awesome. Don't believe the stuff you read on here. Seriously, we NEVER had class longer than an hour and a half. (The class is scheduled to last three hours.) You'll learn all sorts of shit that will help you in the reporting world. Lots of 'how-to" stuff. He's a good guy, and he's not out to get you, like some of these other reviews might suggest. There's only one real ass in the department that I've encountered: Hanvandian. He's the one to avoid, not Ramos. Ramos is the real deal. He knows his stuff.

This class was worthwhile because it gave opportunities to do things you otherwise wouldn't get to do outside of the classroom (i.e. police and court reporting). You generally have one assignment per week, which gives you the chance to polish your work and conduct interviews at your own pace.

Ramos challenges you to think outside the box and "learn by doing." In many ways, Public Affairs Reporting is one of the few classes that actually gives you a taste of what working on a beat for a newspaper would be like. He allows you to get your feet wet, and has no hard feelings if you ultimately decide that newspaper reporting isn't your long-term goal. The key to doing well is showing him that you care and are willing to do your best, and being confident with your abilities.

Ramos is self-centered and extremely biased toward print concentration students. I have recieved high grades in all of the previous journalism courses but Ramos gave me low scores for my stories. Lab and beat work counted for nothing, I got a B- but when I figured in all the work I had done, I should have received a B+. Ramos is also very impractical. He decided he did not like the opinion stories we were turning in, so he made a requirement that we can only turn in one opinion story to count toward our grade. Now the Opinion editor will have a deficiency of stories because of his unlogical reasoning.

I like George a lot. Now maybe that simply comes from the fact that I'm print-concentration (in fact, print-obsessed), or that the self-proclaimed "World's Greatest Mexican" has amazing stories from his field days (three Pulitzers, two death threats, two libel suits among other things) but George has brought an energy and swagger to this department that it has not seen in a long time. I firmly believe that under George, we'll become one of the best J-Departments in the country in short order. With that said, though, it also means that the days are gone where journalism could be seen as a cushy major with joke classes. Sorry to every slacker out there who thought this class in particular would be easy, but your shitty way of doing things has dragged this department down for too long. On the other hand, I'll take George's outlook any day of the week.

George is a funny guy, but his grading on stories seems rather arbitrary. He doesnt write enough comments to explain the problems with your stories. And his surprise announcement that he wouldnt accept opinion stories in the count did not make anyone happy. For those of us journalism people who arent interested in blah-blah-blah news stories, we did not receive preparation in the department for how to write opinion, sports, features. However, he expects us to just "know" how to write them I guess. The editors are the saving grace of the Mustang Daily and are much more approachable than George. But overall he probably will do more for the dept. than anyone has in the 3 years ive been here.

As everyone knows, the journalism department has encountered a number a problems in the past few years. George Ramos, appointed department chair and adviser for the Mustang Daily, came onto the scene in Fall of 2003. Now, I'm not really sure HOW he's able to teach classes or be an administrator since he doesn't have a Master's, but for some reason he does. According to him, three Pulitzer Prizes equal a Master's... *raises eyebrow.* Ramos has plenty of experience working as a journalist but has NO experience teaching a class and helping students learn. He creates a very unapproachable environment and then wonders why students don't come to him about problems. He's a strong advocate for news stories, which is fine, but there are quite a few other sections of the newspaper that need to be filled. He made a blanket statement half-way through the quarter that opinion stories won't count toward the 18-story count minimum. No such information was ever outlined in the syllabus. Frankly, he plays by his own rules and makes them up as he goes along. His grading scale and comments on articles solely depend on his current mood. He often refers to himself as, "The World's Greatest Mexican." To put it as kindly as possible, I'd have to disagree...

I'm torn about Ramos. Sometimes he seems inspired and approachable, other times he seems like the last thing he wants is to be bothered by students. The way the class is set up is horrible, too. None of the new students understood how anything worked until probably the 3rd week... and by then you're already behind on your story count! You have to spend an UNGODLY amount of time writing stories and an additional 3 hours in lab every couple of weeks for a measley 2 units!! If you're going into print media you have no choice but to take him and the Mustang, but be warned: Ask a lot of questions the first day whether the editors/Ramos seem like they want to be bothered with them or not and start your stories RIGHT AWAY! If you can, take the class credit/no-credit! It will save you a lot of pain! Trust me!

The entry below mine sums up Ramos fairly well--he's bipolar. Because of all of his successes, I was initially excited about having what I thought would be a knowledgable professor--a rarety for our department these days. Instead I found myself (although he hates that phrase) frustrated with both his self-centeredness and sketchy teaching skills. He would show up to each class to give a few words, but other than that seemed totally unavailable. I used to be passionate about journalism, but after attending Cal Poly and suffering two terms on the Mustang Daily, I've decided to go into a different field entirely. This class was unbelievably frustrating. DEFINITELY TAKE THIS CLASS CREDIT/NO CREDIT!!! There's waaaaaay too much work for a lousy 2 units. I would suggest to almost anybody to put your efforts into a good internship for practical experience, and take KCPR for this requirement--it doesn't matter whether or not you're going into broadcast. Ramos seems just plain unfit to be dept. head.

Ramos is a journalist, and not an educator. Period. He might provide some insightful methods about reporting (and his knowledge is endless), but for some reason he lacks the ability to convey what he knows in a helpful manner to students. Each week Ramos spouts off some hollow rhetoric about the paper, and fails to identify ways for the students to improve. He corrects each story by reading the first few paragraphs, then unmethodically gives it a grade. The Mustang Daily is a classic example of lazy, non-enterprise journalism and Ramos has no intention of using his experience to improve it. The editors have a tendency to form a newsroom clique, and often ignore blatantly important issues (and important story ideas, unless the reporter is willing to write the story themselves). As a result, the paper has no credibility on campus. Make sure you write two stories a week, turn in story ideas and make yourself known to the editors if you want to do well in this class. Be prepared for a time commitment. Please don't be turned off to journalism because of the paper; just realize it merely reflects the incompetence of the department and not your potential.

The person below pretty much sums up the Daily experience. I think we're all sad because Ramos seemed like the solution to the department's problems, but the department is beyond hope because no one's willing to make serious changes. He's a great reporter and he was a good mentor for Journalism 304 (everyone should take that class from him- it was great experience). However, his grading for 352 is questionable, he doesn't really identify ways for the students or the paper to improve and the paper's news coverage is completely unorganized. Make sure you stay on top of your story count. This class is the most you want to make out of it because Ramos sure as hell won't challenge you.

Ramos is awesome. Don't listen to the other reviews on here trashing him. They probably got a bad grade on a story they thought was good. Either way, Ramos is the best. Treat him like it.

Ramos is the shit and you know it. He has three Pulitzers for a reason, so back the hell off, haters.

I don't know what all this "Ramos is the man" stuff is. I've had this guy's classes and gone to him for advising stuff for 5 years and I try to give him the benefit of the doubt and be nice to him... but when it comes down to it, he's lazy, incredibly stuck-up, rude, overly self-congratulatory and sexist to the point where, at times, he should lose his job. Oh yeah, not to mention his classes usually feel a little pointless. Sorry to say it, but he really just needs to get over himself.