Kuriabova, Tatiana  

Thick accent, but just do the mastering physics and don't come to lecture and you're probably set. Don't underestimate the accent though- she's pretty hard to sit through.

I think if you're going to take this class it is best you only show up to take the quiz and leave because the way she teaches makes it much more confusing than just learning it on your own. I got an A in the class but that was from a lot of guys I know who are engineering majors and even then itd take them a little while to get the right answers. Id really suggest against this class

She has a thick accent, but you get used to it by week 2 or 3. The frustrating thing is English is not her forte, so her quiz question wording does not always match diagrams on quizzes. When the whole class missed a problem due to following the wording instead of the diagram she simply told us "you should have just gone with the picture, life's not fair" and chuckled. To me, this does not embody a professional professor. The class consists of weekly quizzes, 2 midterms, and a final. The midterms were easier than the quizzes. When assigning grades, she handed out grades based on your class ranking rather than your actual grades. She curves your lab grade down in order to contribute to have each person have a ranking in the class. She rounded the lower half of the class up, and the higher half down to get that perfect bell curve grade distribution. This was never stated in her syllabus (that she would curve you down) so final grades were a shock to many people because she curved some down more than others. Since she never posts grades to polylearn, you cannot know your grade until the end of the quarter.

I had a physics background, so I may not be able to give much for those of you who are worried about this class. But if you consider yourself pretty comfortable with physics/math, this class is not hard. The homework is very straightforward in terms of that's what will be covered on a quiz or test. She doesn't emphasize conceptual type questions specifically, but you should be able to articulate why your calculated answer made sense for whatever scenario the question asked you about. She requires a one sentence explanation minimum for all homework questions and exam questions. Sometimes all I said "The answer calculated corresponds to _______ Law and was solved using the provided variables" and that was enough. I think she presents info pretty clearly, and what I didn't understand, I looked up on Youtube. The first few chapters covering potential energy, potential difference, voltage, blah blah blah, took me a solid couple of hours to get straight so I highly suggest not letting that get away from you in the beginning of the quarter. ProTips: 1) Sit in the front. When I sat in the back, I often didn't pay attention and all that did was added to the amount of time I had to spend on the class outside of class. 2) Ask questions when you don't understand- she's always willing to reexplain. 3) Don't blow off homework, that's the way I studied and I always ended up doing well on tests.

Dr. Kuriabova is not an excellent professor, but she is pretty good as far as the Cal Poly physics department goes (I hear there are great professors out there, but I never had one). Her lectures were a bit fast and confusing at times, but reading the book and doing the homework helped. She assigned weekly homework and there was a weekly quiz, so you have to stay on top of the class. Lab was pretty easy, with weekly group reports (we were often able to turn them in at the end of class) and 2 individual reports. I didn't do very well on the quizzes or the midterms, but I managed to get a B in the class. I'm not sure if this was because I did way better on the final or because she adjusted all of the final grades. However, I would say that by time the final rolls around, if you study the midterms and the homework assignments, you should be okay. She posts quiz and midterm solutions so make sure you figure out all the problems you got wrong, similar ones will probably show up on the final. She's also very kind and helpful in office hours. In summary, she's not an incredible professor, but definitely don't avoid taking her - you'll learn a lot.

She has the hardest exams and quizzes. Better off to take another professor.

I think that Kuriabova is a good professor! She's super nice. Compared to my 121 professor, she's an angel. I think that her weekly quizzes and the two midterms were very fair. She doesn't ask too much of you. But I just took her final and that was pretty gnarly. Just make sure your grade is cushioned before the final and you should be good. Knowing that Poly's physics professors aren't amazing, I'd recommend Kuriabova.

Lecture is not organized in a clear way - I wish I had read the text before so I knew when she was changing topics/equations/theories. Homework is in an online format and she draws the majority of test questions from that. Big picture type questions are on tests when she doesn't cover these trends or cause-and-effect relationships very straightforwardly in class.

This Kuriabova is not the best option for Physics 1. Overall, the difficulty of the class is actually pretty simple. She has no homework and the material is fairly straightforward. Take her if you want a light workload and easy A but nothing else.

Although this professor is obviously a very smart and well researched individual, she is quite bad at teaching and conveying material and physics concepts. The only ones who are following in class are the few that are already very good at physics. She'll spend all of class deriving a few equations and then will barely go over what the final equation is and how we actually use it.

Can be confusing, doesn't go over many examples or really teaches well for that matter. Does a lot of theory, and gives really long homework assignments.

She's not terrible, but she's not great either. She talks quietly so SIT AT THE FRONT OF THE CLASS. Anything past the second row and forget it. You're not going to hear anything. Quizzes/Tests: Basically there are 2 midterms and 1 final. If you spent some good time on the homework the midterms will be much easier, but there are still some curveballs on the them. Same for the exam. The final takes all 3 hours so it's quite long. Every other week you get quizzed twice, one lab quiz, one lecture quiz. This gets SO TIRING because it's so confusing because on the weeks you don't have a lab quiz, you have to do lab reports. They are easy and take an hour to do, but I would rather just do lab reports than quizzes period. Lectures are straight up boring. Monday and Wednesday are 2 hour lectures. The lecture go on forever and are so boring that committing seppuku in the middle of class seemed like a more entertaining alternative. She's okay. If you can get past the really boring lectures, and the somewhat excessive amounts of homework, you'll be good. The only reason I got a C was because I bombed the first midterm, but studying for the second one was very helpful.

It becomes very apparent after the first lecture or two that YOU WILL DO WHAT SHE SAYS, even if she doesn't say it. It is a well-known fact that she is deeply involved with the russian mafia, although she never specifically states it her subtle actions throughout her lectures and labs say otherwise. Be careful when following her notes, she writes her 9's as g's and her g's as...well g's. So, speaking physics-wise, 9g's, as far as we know, may be g^2, or m^2/s^4, a whole new unit, OR it may just mean 9 m/s^2. You'll never know, but you better damn well figure it out correctly because if you screw it up the mafia will have a hit out on you.

Professor Kuriabova is a very knowledge professor. During lecture, it can get confusing at times but if you go to her office hours, she is very helpful. She is very friendly so do not be afraid to approach her if you are struggling. Every now and then, she makes jokes in class. She has recitations normally after every lecture so it helps clarify any problems you have. The midterms and final is straight forward. I would recommend taking her class.

Great professor. Her accent is a little hard to understand at first, but I got used to it by the end of the first week. She does give fairly challenging exams, but the quizzes are all pretty easy and the lab portion can bring your grade up. She also posts solutions to all previous exams, homework, and quizzes before the final, which is a great help in studying. Overall, pretty great experience.

Though at first her accent may make her seem hard to understand, Kuriabova is actually a very good teacher. She presents the information well and also will take all the time needed to make sure that anyone with a question fully understands the content. She is also a very nice lady and a good person in general. She seems down to earth and is actually quite funny if you pay attention to her subtle humor. All in all, I definitely recommend you take her if you can.

I love this professor! She's a soft-spoken Russian lady, and it may take a bit to get used to her accent, but she has a dry sense of humor that I'm completely in love with. She's really bright and loves physics, so it's quite fun talking to her. Her quizzes were about average difficulty. She presented material well in lectures, but sometimes conceptual questions popped up that weren't completely clear. Exams were similar. I believe she curved our final grade after all exams, so that was pretty cool. Definitely would recommend doing the homework. Would definitely recommend taking 132 with her!

I personally had a very bad experience with Kuriabova, however I don't think my experience is standard. First off, SIT IN THE FIRST TWO ROWS OF THE CLASS. IF YOU DON'T YOU WILL NOT HAVE A GOOD TIME (I sat in the back so that probably explains my grade). Kuriabova is a very quiet Russian lady who knows the material but isn't able to project her voice past the first two rows of the class. The labs are very straightforward with each week alternating between having a lab report due from the previous week's lab or by having a lab quiz about the previous weeks lab. There is also a weekly lecture quiz. She uses MasteringPhysics for her homework (which is a complete waste of money and time) but the system could be worse. I had a very bad experience in her class, but honestly if you sit near the front I think she would be a very good and informative professor.

Don't worry about the accent, it takes about 2 days to get used to it and her English is flawless. She's an average professor. No amazing comments, but no complaints either. She assigns weekly HW, has weekly quizzes (which are usually pulled from the HW problem set, so that's to your advantage), and gives FAT partial credit. She definitely cares about each student, and tries to memorize everybody's name.

She starts every class off by retardedly clapping like some kind of deranged walrus in a futile attempt to gather the attention of the class. Futile because this is the only class I've been in where not a single person in the entire room wants to be there. Enough insults though. The reasons she is bad is that she doesn't explain concepts very well, and her homework assignment don't help either. She gets so lost in lengthy derivations that she forgets what the purpose of the class even is, and most of the time honework problems challenge your math skills and patience far more than your actual understanding of the concepts. This is so bad that she often does homework questions in class because she can't actually teach the concept that would allow you to solve the problem on your own. She does know her math well, and she is a nice lady, but she doesn't understand the concepts at all and even if you get a good grade, you likely won't have learned much about thermal physics as her tests are just like the rest of the class. If you do end up stuck with her, read the book heavily, look up other resources, try to practice using conceptual questions, and just grind homework problems until you've memorized them to prepare for tests.

Missed the first day, went to the second day. Went to the midterm. Went to the Final. Three days of class total. I got a B, easy. This kind of shit gives our school a bad name.