Smilkstein, Tina  

I really don\'t want to say anything mean about Tina. She\'s a nice enough lady and she clearly loves her digital design. It\'s hard to convey just how thoroughly disorganized Tina is. She comes into class often unprepared and unable to get her computer to project her power points for a few minutes. This typically kills 5-10 minutes of lecture time. If she can\'t get the slides to work, she\'ll scrawl on the blackboard randomly with barely readable numbers and words. Don\'t expect anything, chalkboard or powerpoint, to be cohesive. Her powerpoints are a mashup of her own mistake-ridden slides and publicly posted Berkeley slides (found them while google-learning the class). She consistently sends out emails updating/removing homework problems and often changes due dates or makes certain problems due later. I probably skipped more of her lectures than I attended; they were pretty much worthless. I got a B in the class because I basically taught myself. I didn\'t do the homework very often, but if I had, I could have pulled off an A. Her tests are quite hard, especially for the short amount of time available, but she curves grades very strongly (highest grade in the class becomes the 100% that others are graded by). I would not recommend Tina. She is a nice, smart lady, but does not have the gift of teaching.

Very eclectic and unorganized teacher. Lecture slides are confusing and hard to follow She assigns ridiculous amounts of homework every week that have failing class averages. Deadlines are constantly extended, sometimes the night before at midnight, because students are unable to do the homework. In lab, all groups except one are two weeks behind. Avoid this teacher at all costs.

Boss class my @$$ you liar! The prof was majorly disorganized. So many errors and typos in the lecture.

BO$$. tough class + generous deadlines = forced to learn tough material

There is no such thing as finishing the lab within the given time.

The guy below me is a liar. Your life must REVOLVE around this one unit class. Not worth it...

Who said she's a bo$$? I Demand to know the name? He's a liar! Get him!

Tina is by far one of my favorite EE professors. She is very talented in boiling complex subjects down to simple explanations, and never gives away any information, she makes you work for it. I am currently taking her for EE 348 lab and I am very content if not excited to read her ~12 page prelabs, because frankly, they make sense. She is very good at being able to conversationally explain electronic subjects, not just point to equations and expect you to figure it out on your own. GO TINA!!!! She's fantastic.

You will always see her in the 20A lobby, really has a "HARDWORK DEDICATION ERRYDAY" mentality to helping out students understand homework problems or concepts. She gives practice problems for both the midterm and final so if you can do those you should be chill for the class. You just need to chilllll bro, those tests aren't meant to be high stress trick questions/minute details like some other professors. Only downside is that the homework (aka LTSpice Simulator 2016) can take 20 years to complete. With all the bugs I kept encountering, I have already discovered 72 new species of beetles crawling in my circuits. Should have switched to biology, I would have a PhD in that by now.

Tina is a fantastic instructor who only lectures on material of relevance in digital electronics. She provides review material before the class begins (know the regions of operations!!!), so enroll early and prepare yourself. Compared to 306, this class is way easier to understand and she isn't as disorganized as I thought she would be. She tailors her teaching style and approach according to how much you know and what you want to learn, which is awesome. However, the LTSpice homework and final project is ridiculous and demanding. Definitely be prepared for learning real-world skills, but also note that this course will be much different from any other EE course you have taken.

Tina is the best. She is always in 20A helping students out and she really knows her stuff. Her midterm was completely manageable and the topic itself was interesting and something she cared a lot about.

tina is the nicest person ever and her lectures are incredibly and helpful. she teaches in a very visual way that is easy to understand. Her homeworks take a while but they really help in understanding her class. She grades pretty fairly too

Tina is probably one of my favorite professors when it comes to electronics. She was very helpful during office hours, to the point where she cleared time out of her schedule to help me out. Although she may be unorganized for other courses, she was very organized when it came to her electronic courses. In order to do well on her exams, make sure to go over the homework assignments and possibly take her for lab. In her lab, YOU WILL LEARN! just make sure you ask questions, attend office hours, and show that you work hard and you will do very well in course. Overall, Tina made me a better engineer when it came down to learning electronics and if you have any problems be sure to let her know.

Yeah shes very unorganized but I learned a lot from her class and office hours. Also, held the world record for number of pogo stick jumps

Tina is just okay as a professor. I had Braun for 307 and Tina for 308. The organization between the two are night and day. Tina, while incredibly unorganized, makes it in your favor because she gives extra points occasionally. I found her midterm to be okay, but her final was hard as hell. She jumps around a lot which makes it hard to learn because she's not consistent at all with her lecture schedule. She is really good in office hours though, but it can be a pain to get in because everyone else wants Tina's god-like help in office hours too. He homework can be long and tedious, but you HAVE TO do the homework to do well in the class. Her homework is fairly useless as it is MATLAB/LTspice isn't on the exams. At the same time, the LTspice is really useful for later courses so keep that in mind. Overall, she's just meh, but she's enthusiastic about the subject and is not intimidating in the slightest during office hours.

Tina's teaching style is fundamentally different from any previous EE professors and the material sticks because she emphasizes industry practices/standards. She is all about learn by doing with the LTSpice HW -- it really is good practice. If you're concerned about theory and derivations, Tina's class isn't for you. If you want to be a practicing electronics engineer, enroll in this lecture. I'm going into the final with an A in the class.

Tina is bae. She acts like your class mate that just happens to know a ton more than you. She is accommodating to a fault. We end up spending half the class time answering student questions instead of getting through the material. The midterm was pushed back 2 weeks because students kept coming to her with excuses. Everything from the group examples we sometimes do at the end of class to her habit of getting other students to explain the material really pushes the idea of learning and understanding. If you want to memorize and regurgitate Tina might not be for you. If you want to engage in the class room and the EE lobby I highly recommend taking this class and any other EE class with her.

Tina's lab is tough because she adds a lot of things to prelab, lab, and postlab. However, we often skip labs that aren't relevant and focus on key concepts. Be prepared for a lot of LTSpice simulations and debugging with equipment and your circuit. Buy your own jumper wires or breadboard to build the circuits outside of lab and save time! Try to recall CPE 133 material for the quizzes (no lab final).

Like Tina says at the start, 346 is no design, 347 is some design, and 348 involves mostly design, and 449 is all design. Lots of simulation and thinking, no longer "mindless" procedural labs!

I like Tina for all her help she gives during office hours and such, but I feel like I am spending too much time for a 1 unit lab on the prelabs, labs, and postlabs. I recommend her only for lecture, and Prodanov for lab, not the other way around. Good luck.

Great professor.

So far so good.

A gem in our department. If you like structured courses where you regurgitate a formula and plug and chug for a quarter then don't take her. You'll learn real world use of the class you're taking.