Knight, Charles  

This dude just said an 86 is an A and we don't have to take the final I am crying.

Granted that it's bio 111, Knight couldn't have made it more boring, slow, and painful

Prof Knight is such a nice and intelligent guy; however, Knight is one of the worst teachers I've ever had. We have had 4 lectures so far, and he rips through information so fast that I cannot even write down the slide title before he flips the slide. He attempts to complete an entire chapter in a hour and 15 minutes, but little to no-one in the class can follow. I look around and everyone is completely dumbfounded because he will not say a coherent thought that we can write down. I am considering doing credit/no credit because there is absolutely no way I can pass his class. All in all, try to avoid this lecture. He's a great guy, but in my opinion, far from excellent lecturer.

Dr. Knight is very intelligent and is probably an excellent professor for upper division bio courses where students understand the basic material better. I do not recommend taking him for Bio 111. He gave us another professor's syllabus which was not followed so I had no idea how to calculate my grade come finals week and neither did he when I went into his office hours. Our course was 3 midterms and a final and that is your grade. He pulls his test questions from some other source and it was evident that he did not make them himself. They are about 75 questions long and very confusing. This was a class full of non-bio major students who have not taken a bio course since 9th grade (when we were 14 years old). I managed to pull a C in the class and put this class before even my major classes that are actually important. Not even half the class shows up for lecture because he reads off the powerpoint very quietly with his monotone voice and the powerpoints are online. There are 14 chapter that are covered and about 100-150 slides per chapter. When asked how to study for the cumulative final he said, "Make flashcards for each powerpoint." Ill save you the math and let you know that is over 1,400 flash cards (c'mon man you're a bio professor lets save some trees here!!!) Try to avoid him.

Professor Knight is an extremely nice guy and is passionate about biology. The problem is he expects everyone else to be just as passionate too. He assumes that we know way more about bio than any non-bio major does and uses extremely technical terms without explaining them. He would go through topics extremely quickly and expect us to just already know or absorb the information. He is just so smart he does not know how to teach clearly and dumb it down to an entry level class. His tests were difficult and went into a lot of detail barely anyone in my 200 person lecture got A's on them. Even then the curve was not much. That being said, he was helpful at explaining things during his office hours, though I couldn't go enough times to have him reteach me. I took him his first quarter teaching BIO 111, so maybe he has gotten better but I would not recommend for an introductory class. This class took up a lot of my time and was definitely not worth it.

lol do not take prof Knight, 0/10 would not recommend and rip my GPA. He is the worst and does not even make his own slides or tests. His lectures put me to sleep and it is just a homework hour for me now because listening to him makes me more confused. His midterms are very difficult and I am truly praying I can pull off a B-. All he does is talk about how he doesn't believe the scientific evidence on the slides........here's an idea: make your own. If you want to learn and actually pass a biology class do not take him. He is a very rude man and suuuuuper unapproachable.

^^^lol I take it back, prof Knight ended up being a nice guy and really helped our class out. Regardless, it is a boring class, he does care about what his students think.

Knight is the absolute worst professor I have ever had. His lectures are awful... no one comes because they are so bad. He doesn't know the information so he reads right off the slides. He decided to no longer use the textbook and use an instructors manual but tested us on the textbook. OH and did I mention he gave out some answer keys on accident during our midterm and did not change grades to reflect the fact that people had all the answers. To make things worse, he is quite creepy and appears to be hitting on a student. He changed how he is grading the class so many times I can't keep track. Am I even in BIO 111 anymore? DO NOT TAKE HIS CLASS NO MATTER WHAT EVEN IF IT MEANS STAYING EXTRA TIME TO AVOID HIM.

HE SUCKS. literally do not waste your time with this class. you'll be in a giant lecture and he basically whispers so you can't even hear his mundane lecture. my lab instructor taught me more than he ever could, and she was only a grad student. he cannot teach and is so unorganized and literally changed the whole outline of the class half way through the quarter. why, you ask? because he failed to do his own job and read the textbook before he assigned it to us. also, he told us to buy the online textbook which was like $70 and the free trial ended up lasting basically the whole time before he changed the outline and by then when we actually needed to use the book it wouldn't work so we all wasted 70 fucking dollars. even if you study your ass off, good luck getting a good grade. literally please take anyone else.

I have never been as frustrated or disappointed with a class at Cal Poly than I have been with this class. Knight doesn't know what he is talking about and will admit that over and over again. Once the whole class failed the first two midterms, he tried to change the way the class was formed to only take a quiz every week, but still the damage had already been done. He gave around 10 people the answer keys to our second midterm and didn't do anything about it until a few people had already turned in their tests. His lectures don't follow the slides or the textbook so it is impossible to follow. Because of that is impossible to study for the tests because they don't reflect the class. Its week 10 and he still hasn't put in assignments we submitted week 3 so it is impossible to see where your grade stands going into finals. The only thing I have learned from this class is what my TA has taught us in lab and what each of Knight's tattoos mean cause he has spent a lot of time discussing them. Do not take this professor it is not worth it. If you do have to take this as a last resort I highly recommend taking it credit/ no credit because that is only thing saving my GPA right now.

Professor knight is not the teacher that should be teaching the BIO 111 course. First off, all he does for the entire length of the class is talk in a whisper, mundane voice. No interacting, no engaging or anything else but listening to a monotone voice talking to us. Half of the things that Dr. Knight says are irrelevant to what we’re learning. It’s almost as if he’s spitting out pointless information that might be relevant for a 400 level class, but certainly not for an entry level biology class. It is currently week 10 and he has JUST NOW entered in only 2 grades in the grade book. Before this there was nothing at all, and no one had any idea of what their grade looked like in the class. He changed the entire outline of the course Halfway through the quarter because he realized that the online book that he raved about the first weeks of class were not helping our grades on the test a single bit. Knight will give us quizzes every week and has told the class that the quiz will be on two chapters, but when people have gone into his office hours, he will tell them it’s only on one. When we ask him how to study or what are important topics to focus on for midterms and quizzes, he responds with “everything is important”. Overall, the entire class was constantly confused because of his laziness, unorganization, and the poor job he did of teaching things that were actually relevant and a proper level for the class. PLEASE AVOID KNIGHT AT ALL COSTS.

Basically Knight just rambles on and on during lecture and gets no information across to the student. Then the test/quiz is really hard because class time wasn't used to go over course material. Definitely frustrating. Overall I would not recommend his course. Everyone I know has a D+ or C. Praying to get credit for this class.

Simply do not take this class with Professor Knight. You might do well, but if aren't a first year and you have other classes that actually matter to you, good luck doing well in this class. Professor Knight is a nice man who cares a lot about Biology and Botany. That is about all I have nice to say about him. Professor Knight's lecture is genuinely pointless. That's not my opinion either. In his office hours, he told me coming to the lecture is not necessary, since all he does is read from the powerpoint the textbook provided him. Even if you wanted to go to the lectures, which are painfully boring and monotonous, he speeds through the powerpoints so fast that I had to start bringing my laptop to class so I could take notes on the powerpoint at my own speed. When I asked about my grade in the class since he never puts grades in, he told me this class was his "last priority" and he does not know anybody's grades (mind you this was finals week when I asked him this). He changed his teaching style and study recommendations twice throughout the quarter, suggesting we study different sources each midterm. However, it did not really matter what we studied. I got a 69 on the first midterm, and after studying twice as hard for the next midterm, I got a 64. This was after I answered every question in the book that he told us would be on the test. I learned more from an undergrad without her masters in a bio lab than I did from this professor. He gave us our final grade scores, and 64 students scored below a 70, while only 55 scored above a 70. More people got an F on the test (18) than those who scored a B (14). This class was a nightmare that took up so much of my time. I neglected other classes and performed worse in other major classes to still end up with a 70.1 in his lecture. If you have to take him, I'm sorry. Find a study group, pair up with the smart kids. You will not have a fun time if you try to pass this class on your own.

Here's things simple: 1. Rent the textbook from Chegg for cheap. 2. Don't go to lectures, stay home and dedicate time to reading the chapters he bases his slides off in depth and take lots of notes on them. 3. Study these notes. Especially the unit on evolution because it's his favorite. His lectures are completely pointless, he just speed reads pictures from the book that are just copy and pasted onto slides for the entire class period. If attendance was required for online in-class quizzes I would just bring my book, study, and ignore him until it was time for the quiz. A lot of these reviews say it is impossible to get the A, but if you are good at teaching things to yourself its totally possible! The quarter I took this class he was so disorganized he made the final optional three days before finals week and ended up curving the class by a whole letter grade. There's no doubt he has endless knowledge about biology, I think the problem is he is just bored in this intro level class and doesn't care. A lot of people say avoid this class at all costs but if you are like me and would prefer to read from a book than be taught verbally I'd actually recommend this class.

Very easy surface level bio class. Everything is straight forward and he posts his lectures online so you don't have to go to class unless there is a quiz or test. We had no homework besides studying for the whole quarter. The lab is also super easy.

This is a 1 day a week class for 2 hours. He mostly just showed videos of other people lecturing, which sucked, and most of the class left these days. He lectured 3 times throughout the quarter, but when he actually lectured, you could tell he was really knowledgeable and passionate, and the lectures were interesting. He was assigned to teach the class on late notice, so he told us to cut him some slack, and in future quarters he would have an opportunity to be more prepared and do his own lectures. We had 1 midterm and a final, where the questions were taken STRAIGHT OFF the notes. There were a lot of notes, but still, you can't ask for much easier. Pretty sure there was a curve at the end of the course too.

Bio 213 is a joke, somehow he made it a bigger joke. Eight out of ten classes were instructed through online videos, several of which i had already seen. You are graded on on 10 pt 1 sentence short answer midterm and a 30 question multiple choice final; nothing else. If you want an 'A' going to 'lecture' is worthless, just take adderall and study the question sets he gives as 'study material' the night before. Worst course yet

This should have been an online class. Almost every lecture consisted of watching a video of someone else lecturing, which could be found online. Only go to class if he is lecturing. He gives you a question set for each lecture/video. The final and midterm are composed of the exact same questions on the set, but there are a ton to study. If you're missing a few answers, which you are bound to be by the end of the quarter, you're going to lose points on the midterm and final. Just study the question sets and hope you get lucky with the questions he picks.

This was honestly one of the worst classes I've ever taken. He was asked to teach this class a couple weeks before the quarter started, but even that all we did was watch videos that were free online anyways, and your whole grade is based of a midterm (in which the final was a 60%) and a Final. He said that if you did better on the final you would get that grade, and even though I spent hours studying for it, I thought I got an A on it but ended up getting a C in the class. He doesn't respond to any emails you send him, there was no syllabus for the class. Be prepared to have a joke of class in which you are going to get a C in no matter what.

Since people are already giving perfectly accurate rants on this professor, I will be the one to steer towards "what to do if you get this teacher". Class Overview: The class is lecture based, one 2 hour lecture each week. You are given a paper/packet of questions you need to fill out based on the material in each 2 hour (ish) lecture. Each lecture (nearly 99% of the time) is a video. Near the end he may give a lecture or two himself. Each video and question set is posted on polylearn. Issues: EMAILS This teacher is very unresponsive when it comes to emails. I recommend you email him 1 time each day repeating what you said until you get a response. If you have a question and email the teacher over the weekend, do not expect a response until late the night before the next lecture. You may have to resort to confronting the teacher in class before each "lecture" to get your questions sorted. TIME It is important to not waste too much time on these lectures. I recommend you spend the class time watching the videos online and answering them on your own time. This is important because you're more than likely to miss a question or two, and you'll have to go back and watch it anyway. You can also pause and take a break which you can't do in class. SYLLABUS There isn't one. You are not graded on your answers for the packets/papers. You are graded on 1 midterm and 1 final. The midterm is a 10 point short answer, and the final is a 30 point multiple choice, from ANY questions from all 10/11 lecture questions (AKA lots of memorizing, USE NOTECARDS). So it is important to be accurate on your answers even though they aren't collected. Overall: This class should really be an online course. This teacher (and has even admitted) is very lazy. Do your best to teach yourself the material, and hope for the best!

Attention "Dr." Knight, we do not need to memorize the name of random ass fly genes. We do not need to remember EXACTLY how many years ago something happened. We do not need to know the percentage of evolutionary mutations in mice over X years. There were simply too many pointless questions to memorize for a 2 unit class. TWO UNITS. NOT FOUR, TWO. Dr Knight needs a serious reality check on that....most engineers have tons of other time consuming classes already...wasting time memorizing trivial facts is simply pointless. Also the "forgetting about the midterm" was a lie. I thought he was a decent lecturer, and seemed like a chill guy too, but he lost my respect after the final. This pointless class needs a total revamp badly.

All in all, Dr. Knight is a nice guy... That being said, I would much rather have a teacher who was an outright asshole and a good teacher than have Dr. Knight. It's an easy class. It just left me with a disappointing sense that I could probably graduate college and never actually have to learn anything... If that is what you are going for... Take this class!!!

Lecture was three days a week "50 mins each" and usually resulted in Dr. Knight running out of time to finish his lectures. I found that reading the book was a great tool that aided my understanding of the lecture material. Dr. Knight makes all his power points available online and is worth downloading and looking over when reading through the chapters. The mid terms were ok. Some of the material in the test was basic concepts while others were derived from only the lectures. There was also some outside reading not related to the text book which was long and should have been covered in lectures. In all I could tell Dr. Knight is new but with time he should only improve. I would say he did a good job with Bio 263. The Averages of the two midterms were both 81% and the finial avg was 69.5% Good Luck

Dr Knight is a nice guy but he's incredibly unorganized and doesn't plan well. The lectures were always cut off due to time and the lab was insanely terrible. The TA's that taught the labs were mean and never knew what was going on because Knight was so unorganized. The lecture tests weren't so bad, pretty easy actually when I was expecting them to be so hard since there's so many math equations you learn. Overall a tolerable class but just annoying to go through.

I went into Dr. knights office hours because i needed help understanding some of the material. He got really defensive and did not answer any of my questions. He simply said " It's all in the power point" and implied that if i didn't undertand i must have not come to class (which i had). He is more interested in doing his own research then actually making sure students learn. He is not open to suggestions and not flexible. It's not fair that he is the only teacher that teaches some of the bio classes. cause i wouldn't recommend him to ANYONE for ANYTHING.

Dr. Knight is simply the worst professor I have ever had in my entire schooling career. He is pretty much evil. I hated to ask him questions because it was like he had to go out of his way to answer them and he was NOT helpful at all in his office hours. Some of his test questions are ridiculously stupid and he tests you on who wrote a certain book...who the hell cares that does not test my intelligence, but my ability to memorize stupid facts. That is what this class is about, stuffing your brain with enough stupid random facts until it hurts. Good luck people, and avoid him at ALL costs if possible (although he is the only 263 teacher). BTW its not hard to get an A, you just have to start memorizing as much stupid shit as you can as soon possible.

dr. knight is addicted to talking about his research! his lectures are a tad on the dry side and his test questions seemed to come right out of left field at times, but they aren't terribly difficult. he tried to scare us at the beginning of the quarter with "pop" quizzes and such, but towards the end of the quarter he stopped caring. lab isn't much fun (the first three are on the computer) and it's an easy A if you read the lab material. overall its an okay class, don't take it with dr. knight if you have the choice, or if it isn't required!

It is not hard to do well in this class. The labs are easy and for the lecture, you just have to memorize all of the powerpoint slides. That being said, DO NOT TAKE DR. KNIGHT. Although he seems like a nice guy to begin with, he is in fact rude and uninterested in teaching. He is only interested in his own research. He is never there for the students and doesn't like to answer questions. He will even go as far as to make you feel stupid. I would not recommend him to anyone.

Dr. Knight is one of those teachers that is constantly going off and talking about irrelevant stories. These do not add to the lecture or help you remember them, but rather waste time in lecture. I had him for Bio435 (plant physiology) as well and he did the same thing, even to the point of talking about water on Mars in a plant class. He is very caught up in his research and will talk about it more than once. The tests are not hard to study for: memorize his slides and don't bother with the book. These should have been interesting classes but I spent more time rolling my eyes than enjoying the material.

well all things considered...i barely did anything for this lecture...and made it out with a B. the lab is what is going to kill you in the end for this class...it requires all the work. Knight is a relatively new professor with a boring subject matter...what can he all do? His tests are his lecture slides and he puts the slides on blackboard...so what is the point of going to class? I certainly found out no benefit in doing so. Overall i would put him as a relatively easy teacher with a boring class and boring style of teaching. But when its all said and done, i put in almost no work for this lecture and made it out with a B...not too bad i suppose.

Dr. Knight was sooooo boring! Yeah everything is on the slides for the most part, but the material is so dry and boring that you can't help but fall asleep in class! I could go into class wired as all hell, and still be nodding off 10 minutes later. The hour and 20 minutes twice a week was painful. He is also addicted to talking about his research. He could be talking about something, and then go off on a tangent about what he's done. In one lecture towards the end of the quarter, he even put about 12-15 slides on the presentation about what he's done (even though it didn't have to do with what we were doing in class). He then proceeded to tell us we should work with him NOW on our senior projects. The lecture part itself wasn't all that hard, you just have to study/memorize a lot of crap. It's the lab you have to worry about. They were horrible! Most of the shit we did didn't even have anything to do with the class. It was a waste of time and it was hard. Avoid the class overall if you can help it, but if you can't...don't take Dr. Knight.

This guy does not know how to teach. When I have troubling sleeping i just think about his lectures and then I�m out. If you want to take a class that features the least engaging professor, you found your man. His test miss the point, memorize the formulas and your looking at half of the written portion of an exam. Don't worry about what they mean, that's not going to show up on the test. Ah, it was a very frustrating and boring experience. He kills the subject.

Dr. Knight is an extremely boring lecturer whose lectures are often filed with many tangents and references to things that don't convey what the class should really be on. He puts all of his slides online but be warned if you don't go to class you will miss some videos and things he talks about. But his lecturing is extremely boring and you will fall asleep. He talks about many things and what he stresses many times misses the point of the subject and his tests. He also tells you over and over that you need to come help him with his research if you want to have a successful career. I would definitely recommend that you find another teacher or at very least don't take him in lab as well.

Knight somehow manages to turn an easy bio class into a difficult game. While his lectures are fun and seem understanable, his tests are beyond difficult. He literally told me that I should be careful which concept to assume on the test, as in \"try to guess what I want you to say here.\" Walk away if you can.

Knight is a great, awkward guy. He knows what he is talking about and has a total man crush on Charles Darwin. His exams are a lot harder than you would expect considering how easy the material is, mostly graphs and vocabulary though, and all multiple choice.

Knight fucking sucks. Honestly. He's on tenure and he totally abuses it. I had him for lab only and he didn't correct any of our labs throughout the entire quarter. This pulled my entire class grade down. Avoid at all costs.

I normally don't like to critique my professors because ultimately we as students are the ones that have to learnt he subject. However Dr. Knight has got to be one of the most awful professors I've ever had. He doesn't care about teaching which can clearly be seen by his lack of preparation for every class. He literally prints outlines from the teachers guides before class and talks about random insignificant information that doesnt even show up on exams. He's just a terrible lazy professor i would avoid him if possible otherwise be prepared to learn and understand all the information on your own or like i did by asking other professors.

Please do yourself a favor, seriously, avoid this professor at ALL COSTS. He's lazy, he doesn't help you during office hours, he's lazy, his lectures don't help, and did I mention that he's lazy? Everything he has from the powerpoints to lecture notes aren't his. He isn't willing to go and find your scantrons and the midterm for you during office hours for you to look at it more, I think he even said don't even come to his office hours because he would need to go through that stack of papers to find your test. Seriously, you guys need to avoid this professor no matter what because he is someone that will make you question, "Why is he even a professor?".

I absolutely hate this guy. Flat out hate him. Please do not take him as a professor. Boycott all of his classes so that Cal Poly can kick this fucker out!!

Dr. Knight is a nice guy, but a far below average professor. He seems more interested in his research than teaching, which leads to this being a mostly self taught class. I would recommend looking for another professor if possible

Dr, Knight seemed to be very distracted in class and never really taught. He was a nice person but I felt he could have put forth greater effort on his part, not a terrible class though

Dr. Knight is one of the most laid back teachers I have ever had. He is really helpful in office hours and he posts the lecture notes and powerpoints. Overall, there is little work in this class except for studying, answering pre-lecture questions, and writing a 10 page report (at the end of the quarter). I would highly recommend this class with Dr. Knight especially since the labs are essentially field trips with a few quizzes and lab reports. Also, many of the quiz questions are on the midterm and final. Dr. Knight allowed students who were content with their grades to not take the final which is what I did. There aren't many teachers who would make that deal with students.

Dr. Knight's teaching style took me awhile to get used to. He is very awesome in that he tries to see what is best for the students, and doesn't just drone on using the same old tired powerpoint slides forever. He listened to our evaluations on the lecture style, and implemented changes halfway through the quarter. Which means he actually cares! The lectures can be hard to follow, especially when you are not a botany major. Also, it would be nice if he made actual study guides for the tests instead of expecting people to memorize tons of info about everything we ever learned. Make sure you remember the names and studies of specific examples he gives, he puts those on tests. The tests were hard for me. Naming the plants in the field was actually enjoyable, and less tedious than the lab work. This class takes a lot of time and energy. But Dr. Knight is a caring guy who is really enthusiastic and listens to his students. That alone makes him worth taking!

I heard a lot of people complaining about Dr. Knight's teaching style, but personally I thought he was great. He didn't follow the text completely and went off on a lot of tangents, but they were all relevant and really interesting. He's a super nice guy and really knows his stuff; he'll answer any question you have and is super willing to help you out and be flexible with hours. He grades fairly, just study up and you'll be fine. Pay attention to details though, he does ask names a couple times on quizzes and gets to the nitty gritty in some processes. Like I said, just study and pay attention and you'll be fine.

Just wanna start off by saying: I love plant ecology. I took Dr. Knight's plant ecology class and the class seemed cool at first. I took a plant ecology class in high school and its why I picked my major. As an environmental major, I love my environmental classes. Dr. Knight is not a good professor. That's what it comes down to. A professor makes or breaks the class and he is just not a good professor. He is very contradictory and its apparent that he has not planned many of the lectures until the day of. He ignores students who email him and isn't helpful in office hours. Its hard to get a concrete answer out of him and will answer the same question differently every time you ask him. Its a bummer because I really like this subject but Dr. Knight ruined the class. The entire class is a headache filled with work thats irrelevant and wasted paper. The overall "message" of the class is very important but Dr. Knight is not a good professor. I would recommend avoiding this professor if possible but not the class itself.

Regardless of what anyone says, I really enjoyed having Knight as a professor. He is definitely more laid back than most professors here but I actually felt as thought I learned more in his classes than in the more rigorous ones. I had him for BIO 414 as well and still thoroughly enjoyed him. Knight's enthusiasm about what he is teaching keeps your attention and he's also a really cool guy with a lot of experience under his belt. BOT 326 was one of my favorite classes I've taken here because we went on so many field trips and hikes out to look at the plants like Big Sur, MDO, and Death Valley. He is a fair grader, but very slow and also curves the class at the end which is nice.

I really loved this class. Dr. Knight is an interesting guy with a unique teaching style. There was a decent amount of reading, but without the reading there was literally no other way to learn all the things we needed to learn in a quarter - there simply wasn't enough time to lecture on it. Dr. Knight was so flexible! I was sick a couple times and needed to reschedule an exam and several quizzes. He was so understanding and worked with me every single time to ensure I could take them. He's so helpful during office hours and really is invested in student success. Never expect his class to be easy.

Dr. Knight does not understand time or linear concepts. His test questions have answers he wants, but they do not actually answer the questions he asks. And he will send out a LOT of primary literature to read, which is fine, but he sends it out with VERY little time left to actually do the work. He doesn't understand that some of us have jobs and 5 classes to work on all day, every week day, and so at least need a weekend to read these detailed papers and write our analyses.

Professor Knight is an inspiration to those willing to be present. His classes are tough, but they are all upper division Biology. I've found that if you go into his class and actively learn you will succeed and get a great grade. Students who complain about the difficulty really should evaluate their own difficulties. Professor Knight is the man.

I took Evolution with Dr. Knight; this class does not accept the idea of God and takes all opportunity to belittle it (on an anno. biblio. I mentioned God and he had several handwritten comments insisting chance). Bio 414 with Knight embraces the religion of secular humanism despite the fact that science and the scientific method first thrived in the Judeo-Christian European Culture. Despite the title of the class it has very little to do with true Darwinian Evolution, its real focus is change in variation. The lectures are a bit bland. The first test was both regurgitation from lecture and problem solving. The final took me by surprise because it had no problem solving and all regurgitation. Usually, you have to write at least one or more annotated bibliographies per week about either an article he chooses and/or ten bibliographies for your term paper. I honestly didn't really understand my own topic when I researched the term paper. The term paper dealt with molecular evolution of [your choice]. I chose a topic with plenty of data, yet the articles themselves were so confusing I desperately molded something that resembled a paper from the mess (and I did well when I took Genetics!). What surprised me was that Dr. Knight gave me a high grade on the molecular evolution portion, while giving me a lousy grade on my writing style- which is exactly the opposite of what I would have given myself If I were grading my paper. Of course it was his first quarter teaching evolution. Hopefully you will have more luck.

Knight, although new, is a good instructor and will probably only improve with time. The comments made by the student below just underscore how stupidly christian this university can be. Why the hell are you bringing up God, in any way, shape or form, in a biology class? Hello, 21st Century calling!

avoid dr knight's classes at all costs. he is the worst teacher in the bio department. his lectures are boring, confusing, and useless. his tests difficult, make sure you go over all the lecture notes. lastly, dr knight is arrogant, a complete asshole, he does not know how to teach, and he does not help you outside of class at all, he makes you feel like your bothering him when you ask a question.

Well the last person who left comments must be retarded because Knight does not teach bio 434. he teaches bio 414 and 435, he may also be teaching plant ecology. personally, i have to agree with the guy who said he is an arrogant prick, he is, and the person who liked knight was obviously a girl and she got an A. the facts are that his classes are not too hard but, you must study lecture notes(not the book), you must attend class, and you must kiss his ass. he is definately an asshole, who is still new, so he can barely teach a class. im sure plant ecology(326) will be no different. i was going to take bot 326 but not now that Knight is teaching it. take my advice, either dont take his classes or if you must then make sure you either get on his good side and study hard all quarter or maybe better you can hide in the shadows and hopefully avoid talking to the bastard ok i dont want to write a term paper here, so ill end it by saying that Dr. knight isnt that bad if you make a big effort to have him like you, once he doesn't like you, then your screwed and your only chance is to attend class always( he is so boring you may think its okay to miss classes, its not, he takes it personally!! i think he forgets that people have busy lives outside of his little world(school) and get really good grades. remember many of his test questions are word for word from the lecture notes. the final has past midterm questions on it, GOOD LUCK.

Lectures are pointless. I was more confused after attending them than I was just reading the book. He stumbles and slips his words up A LOT. Plus his tests are random and pretty trivial. Term paper sucked ass but I got a 97% on it and it was writen pretty poorly so at least he grades easy on that. Final is ridiculous- totally accumulative and memorization but he gives powerpoint slides and outline notes so by studying those you can be guarenteed an ok grade. either way this class is going to be hard- it's 400 level but it's kinda a joke that Knight is teaching evolution. Bad call cal poly. I'd suggest a different teacher.

Dr. Knight is a very good professor. He presents some very interesting material and even gives one or two breaks during class. His tests were difficult and sometimes a bit random. However, I feel like I learned a lot. I could easily explain evolution after taking the class, and that's what counts.

Charley is not as cute as you think. And yes, Waldo is much MUCH cuter than Charley. The information he presents is clear, but at the end of class you may find yourself wondering what on earth any of that was REALLY about. Nobody knows. When I took Evolution, there was a recitation that went along with the lecture, which was OK, a little time consuming, but nothing to b*tch about. One of the answers on his multiple choice test was: "Big". Not a number, not an actual scientific term, just "Big." Ugh. I heard from other who took this class a couple quarters after I did: same deal. Charley's hair: Big. Charley's expressiveness: Small. Charley's class: Blah. Ho hum. Evolution can be really exciting, but not this class.

I took BIO 263 forever ago with Knight. It was his first quarter, and lets just say he struggled. I was expecting the same thing with Evolution, especially after reading the comments here. It was not at all; he completely changed the class structure and made it awesome. A lot of the course material was student guided, which may sound stupid, but you really learned it (you have to present it). His lectures avoided the book as much as possible, and he focused his lectures on current items (a majority of the info we were taught had been discovered in previous months, if not weeks). There were assigned readings for every class, but like I said, its not out of a text book. The readings were actually interesting and relatively short. Overall, if you took BIO 263, give this guy another chance, he seems to have gotten his shit together.

Avoid Knight at all costs. He's the worse biology professor in the ENTIRE science department. He takes a pivotal class, fundamental for all students in the life sciences and turns it into such a painful course. He treats his students like crap. Don't even bother asking him questions, he could careless and you'd probably end up more confused if he responds. My friends warned me how awful he was and I didn't listen. I should have. HEED THIS WARNING: I had him in another class as well (many of us have no choice), this guy has only gotten worse, just hope someone else teaches the courses he normally teaches exclusively. I think the other bio professors have heard enough complaints on this guy that more teachers are teaching those courses as well now too. Take anyone else but him!

He is the worst professor I've ever taken. He has absolutely no enthusiasm for what he teaches. The lectures are numbingly boring. His tests are random and pointless memorization of sentences. He stumbles often, and says the wrong word. He shows no interest in helping his students. If I went to him for help, I think I would be even more confused. Why is this guy teaching the capstone of all biology courses?

I would have learned more about Evolution if I were to stare at a freakin' ROCK!!! Lectures - Worthless Exams - Random and Super Hard Paper - Sucks "Bat Testicles" (Yes, you will learn about these!) and finally, Knight...ummm Nice Guy...Horrible Teacher!

Lets see...I would have to say that Dr. Knight is one of the nicest teachers that I have had at poly. I had him for Bio 263 lab, Bot 325 and finally Bio 414 and I can't get enough of him...he is absolutely hilarious! If I were you I would take any classes that his teaching...you will enjoy him and his stories! Nice guy....great professor...one of a kind!!!

This guy is an awful professor and an even worse person. I had him for Bio 263 lecture and the class was only bearable because he was not the lab professor. Bio 414 was far worse. He's an anal retentive prick and you will see this as soon as the first day. He demands you have Bio 351 specifically, rather than equivalent genetics courses the catalog allows (and you won't have more than two lectures worth of genetic material for the entire course). IF you don't have it, he does not care and has lined dropped as much as a third of the class because of his random requirement (because he's lazy). Ask around he's a very lazy professor who's rude to his students. Should you ask a question be prepared to leave feeling stupid as he is very condescending. His lack luster lectures, warrants skipping his unnecessary class, attendance is pointless and boring, despite a pivotal and amazing subject. You can learn everything from the Powerpoints. And don't harm his fragile 6 year old equivalent ego or you will pay dearly, he holds grudges longer than an ex girlfriend. He has a 10pg+ paper he grades slowly and demands a lot from you. Also, by finals don't be surprised if you still haven't seen the graded paper. Tests are straightforward and forget buying or reading the books, though they are interesting. TAKE ANY OTHER PROFESSOR IF POSSIBLE. Though he tries to monopolize core capstone courses like Evolution or Plant Physiology, which are required courses for many many Bio and Bot students. I hope with the new budget restructuring and fee hikes from the budget crisis, that professors like him get re-reviewed, and we all complain about this terrible guy more, so he can get fired or teach lower division courses. IF your forced to take the course just study the powerpoint and my condolescences...

I know what you read below is pretty bad, I want you to know that Knight is doing a great job. I have him for Summer School right now and I\'ve learned a lot already. I think he has grown a lot because of the sabatical he just took in Germany. He does these Think Pair Share activities which are really great. Take what people say here with a grain of salt. Knight is doing awesome and I\'d recommend him.

Dr. Knight sucks! AVOID HIM LIKE THE PLAQUE! He is inconsistent, rude, unhelpful in office hours, unclear, and not flexiable...AT ALL. Horrible teacher - worst one I have taken at Poly. Don't waste your time...take ANY OTHER PROFESSOR that him.

By far the worst Professor I have ever taken. He is such a nice guy so I feel bad saying this, but it's 100% true. Every single class period: Read chapter from text and chapter from book. Answer about 25 to 40 questions on each. Go to class and go through the entire question set (with students answering the questions, not him) He does not lecture at all. It's entirely student-answer based information. There is only one midterm and the final. Both are taken directly from the question sets, but by the time the final rolled around we had a total of 700 questions to memorize, so it wasn't exactly a walk in the park. This class is 100% memorization and busy work. I did not learn a single thing that I remembered a week after taking my final. AVOID HIM.

First off, Knight is really chill and really nice but the way this class was structured made it a living hell. Every period we would go through one chapter from the textbook and one chapter from a book called "Endless forms most beautiful." By the end of the quarter we had read 17 chapters out of the book (about 700 pages, FML). He would give a question set for each chapter for the text and the other book that usually consisted of 20-30 questions that you would have to answer BEFORE CLASS. This is because every period, he would not lecture. All we did for the two hours was go around the room and answer the questions. Also, participation counted to if you did not do the reading questions you could not participate which meant you got no participation points. I spent a good 6-8 hours a week just answering the questions. Granted, I did learn a lot, not just about evolution but about biology in general, so this class was kinda a double edged sword. You work your butt off but you will learn a lot. Just as a kicker, the "study guide" he handed back the wednesday before finals was 700 questions long. If you know all the answers, you are pretty much guaranteed an A because the test questions come directly from the question sets. I tried to be fair about the pros and cons about this class, but all in all the cons definitely outweigh the pros. Take another teacher if you can :/ And Dr. Knight, if you read this, please take this to heart because learning and understanding 700 questions from 17 chapters is A LOT to ask of students who have three other classes. Tone it down a bit.

very nice guy but by the end of the qtr you have done 700+ questions and you have know idea of those questions will be on the final of 50 questions. hey we had no term paper so I am good with him just one mid term and a final that had the mid term and final in one. I.e of 150 points for final 75 were for mid term 2 part of test and rest were for final.

Dr. Knight is a super nice guy and clearly goes over the concepts in class. This class DOES take a lot of time since there are question sets for each chapter (about 30-40 questions average per chapter) BUT if you do all the question set, you will definitely do well in this class because the midterm/quizzes and final have the same exact questions on them His quizzes and exams are all free responses, no multiple choice. Overall, if your quarter's not too busy, I definitely recommend taking Dr. Knight.

Dr. Knight is a boss. He should probably go over the readings more before class, but he makes you think differently about things, and it is awesome

I love Dr. Knight's teaching style for this class. He gives you question sets for each chapter or article you read and you have to answer the questions before you come to class, then he goes over all of the questions in class. Yes it is a lot of work, but it's definitely worth it. All of the quiz/test questions come from the question sets, so you'll know exactly what to expect. In the end you end up with over 1000 questions to know for the final. The biggest piece of advice I can give you is go over the questions/answers that you have once a week, then the final will be far less stressful.

Although I have done well in Dr. Knight's classes, he has not taught me anything. Evolution consisted of a large question set which is supposed to be done before each lecture. Most of the answers are available online but you should still read and know the material. He will randomly call on you in class to answer a question from the assigned ones or a dumb question he pulls out of his butt. He did not use powerpoints or any type of note system for this lecture which really annoyed me since he didn't really teach anything. All we were supposed to "learn" came straight from the question sets and the textbook but not from Dr. Knight's teaching ability. The majority of the quizzes were peer graded in class which always helps to bump up grades in the end. Actually study for the quizzes because it will make studying for the midterm and final much easier. He also requires you to do a presentation on one article out of many he offers. Don't stress about this since everyone gets credit for just getting up there and saying something. I would still recommend taking him for any class but be ready to deal with all the busy work and his disorganization.

Knight seems like a nice guy but teaching was the wrong career. He is one of the worst teachers I've had at Cal Poly. Class consisted of him sitting up front, quickly flipping through slideshows saying "yeah I don't want to spend too much time on this stuff you can go through it on your own." Oh really, that's a little hard when it takes you 3 weeks to even post the lecture slides, or oh yeah he just never posts them. For most of the class he just goes off on tangents and focuses on one minuscule aspect of the chapter, when you're required to know every little detail about the chapter. It took him about 4 weeks to grade our midterms and give them back to us. We didn't even get to look at them or know our grade until week 8. We followed nothing on his syllabus, including due dates, the weight of quizzes, tests, or projects, and the dates for anything done in class. No one ever knew what chapter we were on in the books or what was going on in class. Then you get to his quizzes and test which are based off a set of ~50 questions per chapter that you have to memorize the answers to verbatim. Each quiz covers about 3 chapters per book (there are 2 books). If you're able to completely teach yourself on your own then go for it, or else avoid him at any cause (at least for BIO 414).

Please listen to your instincts when they tell you to avoid this teacher for all evolution themed courses. He is an excellent professor when it comes to plants and data crunching, but he is not a good professor for evolution. Just take Korullu or anybody else.

Okay, here's the deal: Charles Knight is not the worst human in the entire world but he gives negative 73 fucks about this class. His philosophy is that reading is the means to knowledge, and though he provides you with question sets for the assigned readings, the work load is absurd and the lecture does not do much to help you understand concepts that you were perhaps confused on when you were attempting. You will be reading two texts simultaneously all quarter and it is very hard to keep them straight, especially when you are trying to familiarize yourself with evolution vocabulary that is not always consistent between the two books. The second half of the course ended up being a little easier to get through because A New History of Life was less dense than Endless Forms Most Beautiful (though endless forms was far better written), but it is still tough to read that on top of the Evolutionary Analysis textbook. You will watch many people fail quizzes and the single midterm that essentially determines your grade. On that note, if you do end up taking this class, commit to working hard at it for the first six weeks so you can do well on the midterm, because there's not much you can do to salvage your grade to getting a B or higher at that point. The final is optional to take if you do want to raise your grade after all the points from the midterm have been added up . It is a longer version of the midterm as it is cumulative, and you would be studying roughly 1,200 questions at that point, which can range from asking you to design an experimental set up to asking you what person discovered this one type of fossil. I don't know how they did it, but some people managed to get A's (ONLY SEVEN) and then a few lucked into getting B's (ONLY TWELVE). The majority of the rest of us, a roughly 60 person lecture, got C's, and then a few D's and F's. He will tell you to trust that the class is curved heavily, but don't expect it to be what gives you a B versus a C. Final note: IF I HAD KNOWN JUST HOW MISERABLE THIS CLASS WOULD MAKE ME I NEVER WOULD HAVE TAKEN IT AND I'M TRYING TO SPARE YOU WHAT I WENT THROUGH. And if you still decide to take it, because obviously people have ignored these reviews before, good luck and you will be in my prayers.

Oh Dr. Knight. Where do I even begin? Evolution is one of my favorite subjects and I was really excited to take this course. I was severely disappointed by how this course was taught. He makes you read a chapter of the textbook before each class (with about 30-40 questions per chapter) and then another two chapters from a "fun read" with addition questions for each chapter. Quizzes are made up from these questions that are pretty much all about minuscule details from the chapters (no big picture stuff, only memorization of facts = no learning). I gained absolutely nothing from this course which is especially disappointing because evolution is so crucial in the face of all biology. His grading is unfair and the presentations every student has to do are not even factored in, he only takes it into account if you are borderline a grade; if he thinks you did poorly on it he will bring you down. This did not happen to me, it actually bumped me up to a B but I still find it incredibly unfair as it is so obviously subjective. Please do not take him for evolution, he may be a smart guy (maybe) but teaching is the wrong profession for him.

Nice guy, worst teacher iv'e ever had. The volume of homework that he assigns will ruin your life and make your grades in other classes suffer. He doesn't teach either, in class he only wants to talk about the "interesting" parts of the chapter but tests you on the ridiculous amount of information you are expected to know. Avoid at all costs.

I almost never write reviews here, but taking BIO 414 with this professor was literally the worst decision I've made here. I usually still do well in classes with professors that have bad ratings on PolyRatings. However, this professor was extremely true to the ratings on here. I worked my butt off for 10 weeks, went to office hours, stayed on top of my readings and assignments, and still got a C- in this class. I have never received such a low score in a class, especially one that I put such an extreme amount of my time into. I did not learn a single thing in this class. He is extremely detail oriented and does not ever have "big ideas". This class with him is brute memorization of the tiniest, most insignificant details. I am planning on retaking this class with a better professor to not only boost my grade, but also actually walk away feeling like I learned something.

Before anyone denounces this great review of Knight as crazy let me say that since teaching 414 last quarter he has restructured his class. The restructuring still involved a lot of reading, but the reading was nearly the only work we had to do for the ENTIRE quarter. His tests were no big deal if you did the reading and took good notes, and the reading itself was, for the most part, enjoyable. He picks new scientific literature papers for everyone to read at home and review, and the entire class is based around discussing these articles/critiquing them. If you are comfortable speaking in class and like the idea of a (kinda) inverted classroom for evolution, I say go for it! Make sure you show up and have something to contribute during discussions and you'll be fine.

Dr. Knight has been trying to find out a new way to flip the classroom. For my quarter, he decided to assign students sections of the chapters then have them make power points and lecture to the class...for the first 3/4 of the quarter he did not lecture at all. There was a LOT of homework assigned. It was difficult to understand the student lectures only because they too were learning the material for the first time!! I wish Dr. Knight had just lectured because he actually seems very knowledgeable on the topic. But sadly I will be coming out of this class with very little learned.

Dude is awful. I read all the polyratings, but my schedule made it so he was the only option. He's incredibly narrow minded and I would even say ill informed. Some of his information is straight up wrong. He rarely replies to emails, but expects you to always be prepared. He's not afraid to shove his incredibly liberal beliefs down your throat. He'll misinterpret data to try and force his agenda. He really doesn't know what he's teaching and his audio and ignite presentations are a clear sign of that. He likes to talk about how teaching each other is the best way to learn, but it's really just because he can't be bothered to teach the class himself.

Dr. Knight is the most unorganized teacher I have ever had. If you had Erker for chem this guy has to be worst. He makes shit up as he goes and literally wants you to memorize everything from the textbook. Do yourself a favor and DO NOT TAKE HIM.

Dr. Knight seems like a nice guy to me, but for the entirety of the course I felt confused both by the material and his instructions for various assignments. He was very vague about assignment deadlines, mostly for the chapter audio powerpoint assignments and the ignite talks. It was very frustrating when he would change his mind last minute or not mention things due online in class. Because of this, I missed a few assignments and I never missed a day of that class. There is a ton of outside work, as to be expected from an upper level bio class, but I found it pretty ridiculous and difficult that we were expected to teach ourselves everything from the audio powerpoints and the book and ask him questions in class about it. He would only give a vague overview of highlights of the chapter in class and have us ask questions about the chapter we were supposed to read before class began. This made a lot of concepts hard to understand. In addition, his tests are all free response and very difficult, the same for his quizzes. However, this does mean he gives a lot of partial credit on exams. The class average for both midterms were extremely low, both in the 60-65% range. Basically, looking back I would have chosen any other professor for this class over him

Dumb ugly noodle looking headass. Can't teach. When i went to office hours he was of no help. Extremely slow (talking, walking,thinking, etc.) Can't get a name right to save his life. Professor Knight, do us all a favor and stop teaching.

Knight was extremely disorganized. He had trouble establishing clear expectations for the class, and material wasn't presented in a predictable or even understandable way. He needs to have rubrics with clear expectations for assignments and he needs to grade exams on the same criteria for all students. There was one student in my class who consistently received good grades on exams for answers that were the same as other students, and Knight gave him more points on the reasoning that "I know that he knows the material". I often didn't know how to study for this class because we were rarely told specifics about what would be expected of us. He assigned so much reading that there was no way we could actually absorb the material or gain anything from it. Over 200 pages of reading was assigned during dead week. I have never felt like a professor had no respect for students and all the work that we do, but Knight made me feel this way regularly. During our second midterm he was having a loud, personal phone conversation during the test which was extremely distracting. He also doesn't seem to care what we have to say about any of the assignments because "It's an upper division course" so we should be prepared for that level of work. This is nothing more than a cop-out for actually taking student's needs into account. Knight makes last minute changes to the syllabus (most often he adds more work than there originally was) and expects us not to complain because it was on the syllabus and we should have known in advance. I enjoyed that he kept the class current and valued our participation but he needs to do this in a way that does not take up all the class time with ineffective student presentations that don't help us learn the actual course content, whatever that is. As if all this weren't frustrating enough to endure, he showed up late to all our exams because he was still printing them. From what I've seen of this professor's time management, organizational, and planning skills, I am confident that Charles Knight would not be able to handle the workload of his own class if he were a student.

I came onto poly ratings and was very sad when I read what students had said about Dr. Knight. I took plany physiology from him and I've never really enjoyed plant classes, but this was a very good class. He was very straight forward and his exams were as well. I don't think that the exams were very hard, there was just a lot of material. He was very helpful in office hours, and he made an effort to remember everyones name in the class, and still greets me by name a year later when I see him on campus, and I've only had the one class from him. If you studied at all for the class you were sure to get a good grade, and he will help you with the material if you're struggling. The lab was the best lab I've ever taken at cal poly. Instead of just sitting around for 3 hours doing some trite little experiment that will "teach" you something obvious, we learned methods of data collection during the first few weeks and then designed our own lab and wrote our own lab report. I believe that some students even submitted their work for publication! I learned more about doing real research and writing a real scientific journal article than I have in any other class. I really recommend this class if you plane on eventually doing any research in science, even if its not concerning plants. As far as the religious comments from below, I think that in this "21st century, hello!" age of ours, evolution is a very difficult class to teach specifically because there is such a great rift between science and religion. Perhaps you should think about how you would feel if you had to lecture on a topic you really enjoyed and studied extensively to students who were required to take it and came in with a huge chip on their shoulder? And to the person who is angry about the christian community on our campus, religion is and has been a part of human evolution since its inception, and its not going away.

Dr. Knight is outstanding. He has so much enthusiasm for plant physiology. He pushed us to write well and follow the correct journal article format, which is valuable experience. Tests were challenging but reasonable. He's eager to help and values student input. It's refreshing to have a prof who is as excited about ideas and teaching as Dr. Knight is.

Dr. Knight is an awesome teacher because he does not just teach you but lets you learn on your own in lab. His lectures are a bit boring and sometimes hard to follow if you do not stay on top of the material but his tests are not hard if you study your notes. For non-Bio majors, this may be a tough course because most of your courses are easier and not so science/detail oriented. But for Bio majors it's not bad; you have most likely learned at least half of what he goes into more detail about. GET GOOD GROUP MEMBERS that don't slack and you can work well with. I had great ones that made my life much easier. If you have to take a physiology TAKE THIS ONE!!! Dr. Knight is super nice and I loved him. Clark Kent anyone?

Dr. Knight is a very fair grader. He gives a quiz every two weeks that is directly off of the powerpoint presentations he does during class. You don't even really need to get the book, just go to lecture, take notes and look at those to study. There are two copies of the book on reserve in the library if you need to clarify things. Lab's not too bad if you get a good group. The final is VERY similar to the quizes so you know exactly what to expect. Would definitely recommend taking this class, even if you aren't really into plants.

Dr.Knight is a great professor who is knowledgeable and able to convey the information very clearly. He is very organized and very very fair. I had him for two classes this past quarter and I have enjoyed both of them immensely! Quite a nice guy and highly recommend him!

Dr. Charley Knight is a shorter bearded Jesus. Not that he is a short man but rather his beard is shorter than one would expect Jesus to rock. Brilliant, in-touch, and comedic genius are all words I would use to describe this man. His goal isnt to penalize anyone but rather to bring the entire class to a transcendent understanding of the inter-workings of plants, in only a way Morgan Freeman could narrate. Somehow, Charley does it better. He is both a graphics wizard and an architect of extended metaphors. You will never be bored. He will carry you to the salvation of plant Nirvana. You are truly the master of your own destiny and need only show up. The choice is yours. Also Sir Mattias of Lennon, Klaus & Penelope, and the other Kylie say hi :) Oh and very little reading necessary

This story begins on the shore of the Nile river, near Matay, in the Menia Governorate, in the majestic country of Egypt. At this time in my journey I was spending my days and nights on the shore of the Nile, I had sought refuge there away from the bustling cacophony of the south east of Paris, Antony where the humming and roaring of the airport had finally chased me from my place of birth. I had a strong urge to life from the fruit of the land, and seeing as how I had found myself without plow and without homestead from which to harvest these fruits, I had contented myself with the meager salvage obtained from these historic waters. I slept in a lean-to, this sanctuary that I called home was constructed of correlated sheet metal crudely nailed to drift lumber with keys lifted from oblivious tourists. It was not nearly as comfortable as the humble apartment I had once occupied in Paris, but it was enough, and I was happy. Late one afternoon, as I was skimming the water for the fate driven scraps I sold to local merchants, I lifted my brow to the horizon to see a caravan of technicals. This was not unusual for this area, but the conviction with which they approached myself was startling, and concerning. I fled to my shelter, but was intercepted by the first of the caravan. The man demanded my name, and before I could answer him, I found myself bound and blind. My condition had been made such by coarse braided flax and a hemp sack which had been bound around my wrists and face. Without knowing the reasons or conditions for my capture, I was whisked across a vast, hot, jolting distance that I can only assume was the Sahara desert. During this long, grueling journey the only stimulus with which I was permitted to keep my mind sharp was a laboratory manual, authored by Charles Knight. I found peace and solace in the message of Charles Knight, I was both encouraged and compelled by his apt descriptions of stomata, and as the journey progressed the very idea of laying an unbound appendage upon the stamen of a delicate lily was enough to cause my skin to flush, and my pulse to quicken. After many days, and nights, a countless haze of moments, the caravan arrived in what I was soon told was Lagos, Nigera. "It is time" my captor whispered in my ear, as I felt a hypodermic needle plunge into my thigh. I awoke a time later, in a bush outside of the Frog and Peach pub in san luis obispo. After gaining my bearings, I ventured into this strange land. After searching for meaning an purpose in my sudden journey to this unusual local, I eventually discovered that this Mecca, this paradise I had been deposited in was home to the Charles Knight that had excited my imagination. I soon found myself under his tutelage, and life has never been so sunny. A+ would be kidnapped again

Take HIM!!!!

Listen here, folks. Save yourself now, and never take a class with this man if there's anything you can possibly do about it. Take less than 12 units and suffer the consequences before you pay money for this, because I guarantee you it will be a waste of your time, money, and faith in Cal Poly. Only twice in my entire Cal Poly career have I felt like complaining to the authorities about a professor, and both times were in direct relation to this man. One was because of his impossible instructions for the BIO 263 lab, and now for this class. Every time I attend lecture, I often find myself wondering how someone who appears to be in his 40s must already be tenured; or in the shocking occasion that he isn't tenured, how does he have a place at this seemingly-prestigious university? There is one saving grace for you, however, that may make this teacher the one for you! Do you enjoy classes where your teacher doesn't teach, but quite literally sits (in a chair) during every lecture and "discusses what he thinks is interesting"? Do you also believe, like Dr. Knight, that the most efficient way to learn is by reading countless pages of a dense textbook, rather than having a useful lecture? Would you like to take midterms where only 30% of the material was actually discussed in class? Then this is the guy for you! I personally enjoy learning by teachers attempting to teach me; if the only way to learn properly was by reading a textbook, teachers wouldn't exist! There would only be textbook authors, and "school" would simply be enrolling for a book, reading the book, and immediately absorbing all of the information contained inside of it! Essentially, I'm unbelievably disappointed by the lack of effort and enthusiasm displayed by this man. I've never felt so uninspired to study for a class in my entire life, and it hurts me deep in my soul that I am personally paying money for this. "I just want to get out of here... and not talk about this anymore." -ACTUAL quote from Dr. Knight during lecture, recorded in my notebook.

I have never despised a professor or maybe even person more in my life. Knight has zero ability to teach an elementary school class, never mind an upper division college course. "I strongly believe that reading is the best way to learn" is what Knight stands by for his lectures, or should I say sits by since he literally sits in front of a chair and does absolutely no lecturing that is worth listening to or spending tuition on. His deadlines and expectations are extremely unclear and change on a day to day basis which makes is very hard and frustrating to follow along with the course and do the work that he actually wants. His "quizes" are based on 4-6 chapters of a dense textbook that you are expected to read on your own (1 chapter for every lecture). He then follows up your reading by taking about a few figures that he thinks are cool and tests you on literally everything else that he never mentioned. THIS IS BASICALLY A SELF TAUGHT CLASS. I have no idea how Knight has been allowed to be a professor for so long. Waste of time and money, any of his classes will only leave you wanting to rip your hair out.

During this entire quarter all I could think about was how this professor reminded me of that small little dog that runs through the back of scene 23 in The Incredibles by Pixar. Seriously, if you look it up you will only be able to see it...