Oulton, Rebecca  

Before I write this review, I have to clarify. With the structure of CE 112, you don't have on professor for the entire quarter, instead you have a rotating panel of professional engineers who each teach 2 lessons on their specialty. You have Oulton who does Sustainability, and then five more who do Geotech, Water Resources, Structural, Construction, and Transportation. This review is not specific to Oulton in particular, just the structure of the class. I am a second year, and changed my major to CE so I am taking the class with mostly first years and transfers. My other CE friends who took it last year said the class was a breeze, with online quizzes and a final presentation. The structure of the class is now HW assignments every week, two midterms (which were simple enough for me because ive already taken statics and CE 204 but some people in my class REALLY struggled with some of the sections on the midterms) and then a final group project, which proves to be more work than you would expect. To top it off, you can't choose your group, and presentations are 4-7 PM on the Friday of finals week. It is a fair amount of work for a 2 unit class, but more than I was expecting. Side note: It is beneficial to learn about the different types of civil engineering, and I wish I was able to take this as a first year rather than a second.

Dr. Oulton is new to Cal Poly this year in the CE/ENVE Department. Let me begin by saying that Oulton is probably one of my favorite Professors at Cal Poly because (1)she knows how to laugh at herself, (2) she makes class fun with her enthusiasm and real world examples and (3) explains the material to the best of her abilities. She is a new teacher so she sometimes struggles explaining some of the material, but she will spend hours (literally) outside of class finding various ways of explaining one concept so that everyone has a chance to understand it. Her HW is not the easiest, but prepares you well for her midterms and finals. Her exams are extremely fair and she is generous with partial credit and even offered extra credit points for knowing some conceptual stuff. We had some design projects that are very tedious so don't procrastinate on those. Overall Oulton is extremely fair, and knowledgeable about anything engineering. I mean, come on, the woman has 2 PEs. She knows what's up! If you have a chance to take Oulton for any classes, I highly recommend it!

Great Professor, a bit unorganized sometimes but she is new, but is very passionate about making sure you really learn and understand the material. Her tests weren't too bad either!

Oulton is good lecturer: she makes concepts clear, presents important equations in a concise manner, and does a lot of in-class examples. She doesn't make exam or homework questions tricky -- they are straightforward so long as you know the equations and how to use them. I got 95% and 107% on the two midterms, and subsequently didn't try very hard on homework or projects. Don't make that mistake, her class is heavily weighted on homework and projects.

Dr. Oulton is probably my favorite professor I have taken here at Cal Poly. She is enthusiastic and tries her best to make the material interesting for students. Tests are fair with a high average, and homework assignments are a very reasonable length. There are no book solutions to her problems, but she is helpful during office hours if you are lost and need some guidance. She's also great in upper level classes, and she emphasizes group projects since that is most applicable to what engineers will be doing in industry. Do yourself a take Dr. Oulton.

Dr. Oulton is a very quirky professor who obviously cares about her students. Her midterms were fair; the homework load was slightly more than what I expected (two small assignments assigned each week and both due Wednesday). For the midterms and final, you are allowed cheat sheets. There was also a SGMA project she had us do, which was like a townhouse meeting where everyone pretended to represent a client with a stake in groundwater (Big Oil, Big Ag, water purveyors, ecosystems, etc). The project was very low-key. Overall, I enjoyed putting work into the class. I thought the information was interesting and well presented.

BOYCOTT!!!