Kyriakides, Chrysanthos  

Professor Kyriakides is on of the worst educators I have had in all my years of schooling. First of all, he is EXTREMELY condescending. I took this class because it is an entry level physics class, a class I needed to fulfill a GE requirement. I had never taken a physics class before this one, so I didn't have much physics background to begin with. Whenever I would ask for help, he'd explain it vaguely and in a condescending manner (like he expects me to already know the information) which made me not want to ask him for any help. The workload is not too bad: pretty much just one homework assignment per week. There are quizzes once per week as well. He grades the midterms VERY harshly. If you forget to draw a diagram, he knocks of 17 points (or more) for it. When it comes to studying for quizzes/midterms, the only resources he gives you are the homework assignments and worksheets he hands out in class (worksheets that he only posts the answers to, not how to achieve those answers, making them practically useless.) There is no study guide. If you must take this class, find a different professor. I REPEAT. FIND A DIFFERENT PROFESSOR. If you take Prof. K., you'll end up having to teach yourself an entire quarter of physics on your own. He does not explain any of the material clearly at all.

This was a dreadful class! Dr. K struggles to explain even simple physics concepts in a clear, succinct way. Yes, he is an extremely bright, but he should NOT be teaching intro/general physics. He is out to trick you. According to him, TOO MANY students did well on the first test of the quarter, so he decided to make the next test much more difficult. He does not prepare you for the tests (no review, hints, study guide etc.), nor will he even tell you what topics will be on the tests unless you explicitly ask. The homework and in class problems do NOT accurately reflect or prepare you for the tests. If you are inherently good at physics (like a portion of my class is) then you will be just fine (you will get a B). However, If you need extra clarification, help or review, you WILL NOT get a single shred of help from Dr. K. I learned more from my physics tutor in one day than I did from Dr. K in a month. Your grade is made up of homework (incredibly unhelpful),5/6 quizzes (which are not too hard!), 2 tests (one is easy, one is hard), and final (very challenging, hardest final I have ever taken). On the 2nd test and final, expect to see questions that are like nothing you have ever seen before. Like I said before, he is out to trick you! He purposely only shows you basic examples in class, then on the test combines three concepts with three equations and three diagrams. Tips: 1. get a physics tutor (if physics isn't your strong suit) 2. do all the worksheets he hands out, though they are NOT a sufficient review for everything on the tests they are CERTAINLY better than nothing 3. do not memorize how a certain problem is done because it will be altered on the test; be prepared to combine equations and concepts and figure things out on the fly. My physics tutor is an A student majoring in Mechanical Engineering and she even had trouble with Dr. K's worksheets. It is a miracle that I received a C in this class because Dr. K really doesn't care if you succeed or not.

Save yourself the pain and suffering... This class was the most brutal class I have ever taken in my time at Poly. His indignation and simple inability to teach are just a few of the many flaws of taking this course with Dr. K. He condemns people based on their major (as if only the majors that require physics are the only REAL majors), showing surprise if anyone, save for the engineers and physics majors, gets above a C on his tests. In addition, through out the quarter he failed to be of any help in the preparation of the exams. I taught myself everything I knew and suffered for everything I couldn't teach myself. It makes me very sad that HE had such a devastating impact on my GPA and school record... He can try to be a nice guy but his vast inability to teach has ruined many future ventures I may try to attain. All because we got screwed with the "STAFF" classification from PASS... Beware.

Professor Kyriakides... I'm not sure where to start. A) I don't know my grade in his class yet, so I don't know how poorly I did. B) I've never had a worse professor in my entire life. I clearly remember sitting in class on the fist day and thinking "wow this class is going to be a cake walk" and it was easy initially. I got a B on the first midterm ( should have gotten an A- he marks points like no other). And like someone else mentioned as he was hanging them back he commented on how the class did too well because the average was a C and 8 people got A's. Then we started with forces- and boy oh boy that man did not teach forces for shit. We had a quiz where only one person got an A (dude took AP physics in hs) and because of that he wasn't going to curve the quiz. Then comes second midterm and that was hard. One problem was like nothing we had ever seen before. One of his "easy" questions was from his worksheet that he never explains. Then in the last three weeks he shoves new information down our throats and does a terrible job explaining it. In class and in his office hours he proudly proclaimed that the final wasn't go to be as hard as the scone midterm (average was a D). But that was complete bullshit. Hardest final I had ever taken. There were problems that we didn't even come close to talking about in class. Right now I'm just hoping to pass the class. C) he's a smug asshole. After you turn in tests/ quizzes he will look them over and once you leave the room he will mutter a snide comment about how poorly you did. Thanks. He also acts better than you and if you go to his office hours for questions he humiliates you. D) he's a creep. He looks at female students oddly. he looks at the female students and makes them feel extremely uncomfortable. I wish I had dropped this class when I still could. Then I wouldn't be here right now contemplating if I failed or not.

Class has 2 midterms and a Final with random quizzes. Quizzes were either extremely easy or extremely hard, with often just one question. He grades pretty harshly and is often looking for ways to take off points. The test questions were most closely related to the worksheet questions, however he would rarely go over the problems. If you asked him how to do a problem, he made you feel stupid.Lectures are basically pointless and the homework questions aren't very similar to test questions. I basically stopped going to lectures and just figured out how to do the worksheet problems on my own and used the book to understand basic concepts. Many of us ran out of time on tests. He is a cheating Nazi and looks under students' hats and even makes you open your backpack if he remotely suspects you of cheating during a test. One last thing that irked me is that he told us multiple times that we would be tested on an incline pulley problem and never were.

Physic for me was the most challenging class I have ever taken. I took this course last Spring quarter and got a D+ which definitely hindered my 3.6 GPA, so I decided to retake it and I ended up in Dr K's class. He's lectures were mildly difficult to stay focused in and he definitely wasn't always the best at explaining the concepts in full detail. However, after I decided to start being more proactive about my attempt to truly learn the material (i.e. consistently going to office hours, emailing him, asking questions in class) it all started to click so much better! Physics is just a class that a lot of people need to work HARD at to understand and although I wouldn't say that Dr K is the best professor, he truly cares about his student's success and wants to help in any way that he can. I encourage anyone who reads others feedback on this professor to take it all with a grain of salt because not everyone really puts forth the effort that is necessary to be successful in this class. I could not have been luckier to have gotten him as a professor and I was able to pull off a C in this class, which I was ecstatic about!

Worst professor for physics Just dont take him, If you have to take physics one quarter and he is the only professor left, then dont take physics at all. I dont even know how I got a C. He is impossible.

Dr. K was honestly not too bad. A lot of people in my class seemed to hate him, but they were mostly freshmen and I think they expected him to be more like a high school teacher. He doesn't go out of his way to help you, but if you go out of your way to ask for help he's more than happy to oblige. He can come off as a little bit rude, but I think its partially just the way he speaks and partially just that a lot of students asked questions that were, frankly, stupid. I missed 2 labs of his and although he wasn't happy with me, he let me work it out and figure out some alternatives. His tests were a joke, and I don't think I got less that 90% on any of them (between both 121 and 122, I had him for both). If you do the homework and show up to class you should be fine. I missed a few lectures but I taught myself what I missed rather easily from the textbook. Which brings me to my FAVORITE thing about him! He doesn't make you buy the textbook. He uploads pdfs of all the homework questions straight from the textbook, and puts all the important figures into his powerpoints. In conclusion: if you're the type of person who needs really interactive learning, he's not for you. But if you're happy just showing up to class and skating by, he's awesome.

Professor Kyriakides is extremely smart. His quizzes are the simplest questions regarding the topic they go over, as long as you have a basic understanding you should do well on these. On the midterms make sure that you write down all the information you can, don't assume he'll just know what you are doing because the more you write down, the more partial credit you can get. GO TO OFFICE HOURS!! He is extremely willing to help students who show they want to succeed. The one thing I didn't like about how he structured his class was that the midterms would be on material that he had talked about weeks before. Often instead of trying to understand his current lectures, I would be studying old lectures to prepare for tests and then I would fall behind on new information. Otherwise go to office hours and keep up with the work and you will do fine.

I am a very understanding and flexible student. I ask questions, visit office hours, take part in study sessions, work with other students, etc. I don't expect A's but do expect to be graded fairly, taught clearly, and treated with respect. None of my expectations were met this quarter. On a academic level, I do not believe my hard work and understanding is accurately represented by my grade. Quizzes in this class are much "easier" in his opinion and hold purpose to "skim the surface of our understanding of the problem" but then drastically increase in difficulty, complexity and foreign nature (meaning, nothing that we'd practiced or learned or provided examples to prepare for had ever been seen before)for midterms. There has also been extreme inconsistency and unfairness in grading. On a more personal level, I have felt VERY uncomfortable in his presence. He has called me out in class and singled me out by email among other instances. Additionally, I have watched him patronize and embarrass students in class for asking a question or not understanding, tell students in his office hours that they "should quit their job so that they can focus on his class" as well as tell students that "they might as well drop the class because at this point they aren't going to pass". Many of these students have left his office crying. This professor concerns me... There have been multiple times that he has shown up to class with a glassy look in his eye, spacey during lecture, and very little control of his explicit language. I have had to seek council to bear this class all quarter. I am not sure where I stand in this class grade-wise, but I believe that amidst the crap I've had to endure... that I deserve at a minimum a B. I hope something can seriously be done to prevent what I've been through for students who might take his class

Having a high school background in physics, I found it easier than most to follow along in this class. I have never seen so many students be so disrespectful to an elder EVER... it was sad. Yes he could be confusing at times, but if you showed him you were trying, he would do anything to help you. Most of the people who got "put down" were asking really stupid questions that only require some thinking to figure out.... A lot of the students wanted him to just hand feed them the material, but that is not how you learn. Overall, I highly suggest Dr. Kyriakides as a professor if you really want to learn something and willing to put in effort.

Avoid this professor at all costs. He is extremely smart but also very lazy and terrible at teaching. He really doesn't care about the students and seems like he just wants to leave the entire time. The concepts of the class are super easy but he somehow makes them confusing and difficult.

Eh. This class is what your high school teachers were warning you about. Dr. Kyriakides mumbles a lot and tries to explain concepts, but he just doesn't do a very good job of it. I believe at least part of it is due to the fact that PHYS 122 is not calc-based, since I understood what he was saying when he mentioned things about calc, but then he should be teaching the calc-based stuff. Anyways, since this class is pure algebra you really just need to do all the worksheet problems, all the homework problems, and learn what each formula means and you will do fine. I would recommend still going to class since a) you have to for quizzes, b) thats where he hands out worksheets, and c) one day he gave out extra credit cause everyone was missing.

This guy gets slandered on here, really not that bad. I read reviews and was apprehensive about this class, but I ended up ok. I got a B+, but I think most people in the class got C/C+, as that was the average on the exams. Homework is worth 10% of your grade, lab 10%, quizzes 10% (always really easy), 2 midterms are worth 20% each, and the final, worth 30%. Studying is a little tricky because he doesn't have you buy the book, so you are learning everything off his slides and homeworks. However, he posts the solutions to the homework, which proved to be the best way to learn how to do some of the tricky problems. Only bad thing I would say is his final was very difficult. If you are on the border of a grade, the final probably won't boost your grade, unless you manage a miracle and kill the final. All in all not bad if you study a decent amount and do well on the two exams and hw/lab/quizzes.

I enjoyed taking College Physics with Professor Kyriakides. He looks a bit intimidating, but is just quirky and really into physics. He makes his own slides because he isn't a fan of the textbook, and he posts any HW from the book, so you don't need to buy it. He sometimes gets on tangents and explains concepts that you don't need to know for tests, but he always warns you ahead of time. He is very clear about what will be on exams. Study the quizzes and take advantage of any worksheets he posts; similar problems usually show up on exams. He talks kind of fast, so if you missed something during the lecture, ASK RIGHT AWAY. I didn't have a problem following him at all because I'm decent at basic Algebra and this is a no-calc class. He wants you to succeed in his class and will help people who are clearly trying and who ask him for help as they need it, not only right before an exam. Overall, I would recommend taking Professor K if you have a good background in math. He keeps class interesting, but is not for everyone.

so i walked into his room, and he was smoking a fat one. cons: I could barely see what he was doing on the blackboard with the smoke. pros: Even though i didn't know physics, i was still happy. He doesn't do drugs unless you do his professor survey though, so thats what the B is for. other than that, great friend.

Before I even gave him a chance, I was told I would not like Dr K. However, I really enjoyed the guy. His class is fairly easy as the solution manual pdf should give you a 100 in the homework section, the quizzes are even easier than that, and the tests are fair with a curve. Plus the class is curved.

I liked this professor. Wasn't always clear when explaining information but was definitely a fair grader ALTHOUGH SHOW ALL YOUR WORK! every equation, every conversion, etc. if you don't want to lose points. Overall pretty good class but beware of the fourth question on the exam they are basically impossible and 25 percent of the grade. just write down a bunch of stuff and hope for partial credit

DO NOT AVOID TAKE HIS CLASS BASED ON HIS LOW POLYRATINGS. I had him for 132 and 133 and he is one of the best physics professors at poly. His lectures are organized and his quizzes are ridiculously easy. He genuinely cares about his students and wants to see us succeed. I would definitely recommend him.

Dr. K is seriously underrated on Polyratings. He's super helpful and if you get the help you need in a timely fashion (not right before a midterm or final) then he will appreciate your effort. Do the worksheets. Questions on it will be on the midterm and will help you get a better and deeper understanding of physics. His class is math based and you will need to brush up and integration (nothing intense though) and do all of the homework and you'll be prepared for the midterms.

Had him as my lab instructor...and thank god that is all I had him for. If he were my lecture instructor as well, I wouldve changed classes in a heartbeat. He is a great lab instructor, in that hes chill with grading as well as shortening/changing the lab as need be. Three hour labs? They became more like an hour and a half average. But seeing him do the little snippet of lecture material for the lab in the beginning was probably the most driest, confusing material I sat through. He is terrible at explaining things if you dont really understand the material, and probably will make it a lot more confusing because he seems to only know 'one way' of doing/explaining things. And thats also the part that makes him seem condescending. If you have no background of physics whatsoever or want a professor who will knock your socks off, this guy is not the way to go.

I've had Dr K for 132 and 133 and as much as he gets put down on here, he is an awesome teacher. He really wants to see you succeed, and he tries his hardest to see that you understand the concepts. He may be unclear just because his accent but I am honestly appalled to so see such a low rating for him

Professor Kyriakides did not make it clear what his expectations were for when he graded midterms. There were plenty of times when he would dock points on my test or a classmate's test because it was missing something he was looking for. However, we had no clue he was looking for it because he never told us, and in class, Professor Kyriakides would do similar problems and NOT do the specific thing he was looking for. Dr. K did not put in the same effort he expected us to put into the class. When I negotiated my test score with him for 7% that I lost on a question I got the right answer on, he told me because I did it a "different way" I should have wrote a sentence or too explaining my reasoning. How was I supposed to know that? Shouldn't me explaining my reasoning in office hours be enough? Dr. K's class was extremely frustrating and the calculus he did in class was very hard to follow. I would not recommend him.

Honestly, this is the worst teacher I have every had. Do anything you can to get out of his class. He makes easy concepts difficult and tries to trick you on the tests. He wrote a problem on our first mid term worth 1/10 of the test and literally nobody in either of his two classes got it right and he refused to discount it. also the homework is far more difficult than his examples in class and you are not well prepared for it at all. he grades every homework problem you do out of 10 points and takes points off if you dont show work etc. hes not helpful at office hours, i have gone a good amount of times. he is lazy and works a problem a third of the way out on the board and then says "you can work the rest out at home." its truely a wonder this failure of a professor has not been fired yet. he doenst care about his students at all and seems to take pleasure in making us do poorly. Do not take this colossal dipshit if you can avoid it

Worst professor ever. He cannot teach. Do not take this class. He is boring, makes mistakes, grades harshly. I don't have anything good to say about him.

He is terrible and picky at grading. Does not cover the information well. Only reason why I did well in the class is because I took AP physics B during high school.

Dr. K is the pickiest grader I have ever had, and as someone who had never taken a physics class before, I was completely lost. He is awful at explaining concepts and is very condescending when students ask questions. I never went to office hours because quite frankly he scared the shit out of me, but from the way he answered questions in class, I could not imagine them being very helpful. I do not recommend him at all. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

DO NOT TAKE HIM. By far the worst teacher I have ever had. Avoid him at all costs.

I dislike him as a person, with a passion; but he is a pretty decent professor. Tests are definitely hard, not an easy A, but if you put work into it you'll learn.

I hate this human being with every inch of my body. He scoffs at people who ask questions, grades incredibly hard, only teaches the class on basic information but then expects his students to apply it to much, much more difficult questions. The first day of class he explains how he makes his class hard so we "will have a fighting chance against cal tech kids." Cal Tech has an 8% acceptance rate and is one of the best math and science schools in the country. I can't even begin to understand his logic. Also, we had a quiz where a lot of people got 100% so he openly said how he needs to make the quizzes harder because that isn't ok. The basic message I'm trying to get across is this guy is by miles the worst professor/teacher I've ever had and wish like hell I could go back in time and not take this class.

Not a class if you have no physics background. He does a terrible job of explaining the subject. It comes down to how well you can learn from the textbook and Kahn videos. AVOID.

General summary: This man is by far the most horrific professor on campus and is a disgrace to cal poly as a whole. He is terrible at explaining. He cannot think clearly (actually though, I'm not kidding about that). He only teaches general concepts and then tests on problems that are nothing like the lecture or even the homework. He grades incredibly difficult. I don't know what else to say other than to avoid this class and this professor like genital warts...

I took AP Physics in highschool and had a 5 on the AP test. Busted my ass for a C in this class. Kyrakides is possibly the worst teacher at Cal Poly. AVOID AT ALL COSTS

Terrible teaching style. Hard to follow his train of thought. Do NOT take.

The only reason I am writing a review is because I want to discourage anyone from taking this professor. If I get too into this I will become angry plus I think enough people have divulged enough. I have yet to meet one student who likes him as a person or professor. I would be ok with him if he were just a dick but a good/fair professor (the best teacher I had in HS was an asshole) but he is not at all. Trust those who have crashed and burned before you, DO NOT TAKE HIM!!

DO NOT TAKE ANY CLASS WITH THIS PROFESSOR! He is honestly the worst professor I have ever had. I went into the class with a fairly solid knowledge of physics. Leaving it now I realize that I know less now than when I started. Let me start with his lectures. First and foremost a monkey would be better at explaining the concepts he goes over. His slides have minimal information and when he does explain the material he explains it in a demeaning way as if you should already know it. If you ask a question during the lecture he will act condescending towards you and most likely confuse you more than when you first asked the question. As for his grading you can get the answer completely right and only get 50% credit while someone who got the wrong answer but wrote the equations down on the question will get 50-70% depending on his mood when grading. If for some reason you are forced to take his class make sure you can solve everything conceptually as his tests are mostly conceptual work. The first test is relatively easy and straightforward but the next two and final are rough. The class on average goes down roughly 20%. He does not curve these tests or any questions. On our first midterm their was a problem that not a single person in the class got right and he still refused to drop it insisting that we should have been able to solve it. He usually has at least one of these questions per test that he admits we will have never seen before but should be able to figure out. As if thats not enough he does not give you anything to prepare you for the final. There is so much more I could say but overall he just deserves to be fired. He may have his doctorate but he does not know how to teach. If you do get him KAHN ACADEMY IS THE BEST WAY TO SURVIVE THIS COURSE. Goodluck.

This teacher is probably the worst teacher I've ever had. He doesn't do anyhing during class besides gives us worksheets. He writes BS tests so no one will pass unless you already know physics. Our class average was a 66 on his last exam. If your work isn't 100% exactly like what he wants, even if it's right, he'll mark you off for it. He thinks he knows everything. Literally hate this class. AVOID THIS CLASS AT ALL COSTS.

Without much hesitation, he is one of the worst professors I've ever had. PHYS 141 has some pretty interesting materials, but all he does is write equations on the board and make people solve it. But also to be very honest, the tests werent that bad. Most of them were almost an exact copy of a WS problem that was done in class. The thing that I absolutely cannot stand, as many others have pointed out, is his teaching style. He only accepts one right answers (namely his); so even if you solve the problem another way that is completely right, he'd still take points off. Oh, and do NOT ask questions. He'll proceed to make you sound like a complete dumbass in front of the whole class. Tl;dr: yea, just avoid at all costs.

Ah Chrysanthos, what a wonderful greek man with luscious flowing locks. Unless you are a natural born physics genius, I would avoid this class. I read the polyratings beforehand and was expecting the worst, but then the first two weeks all we did was vector addition and I thought, "ahh, this isn't too bad. I don't know why everyone hated on him so much." But then BAM, it hits you. His midterms were only 4 free response question, and each time he would make the last question something we'd never seen before to "test our understanding of the concepts." On both midterms only 1 kid from all of his sections got the last question right! In addition to this, he shoved a ton of new material at us the last days of class. He didn't even touch on work, power, or spring constants till dead week. The hardest part of his class was trying to find an effective way to study. With only 4 questions you never know what he'll throw at you, and they're usually not similar to the homework. The only reason I passed this class was the final curve at the end. Consider yourself warned.

Professor K. was okay. You definitely will not know what your grade is until after the final, cause he doesn't curve until the end. He did not curve the first exam, but greatly curved the second one. Only reason why I passed this class was due to my enrollment in workshop and study session. He needs a Brazilian blowout cause 100% of the time his hair looks like he just rolled out of bed.

At the beginning of the year Dr. K said that he wanted to prepare us so that we could compete against the other CSUs the UCs and the Ivy Leagues. He kept that goal in mind, which is awesome, but he I think I learned more in the two days before the final than I did the whole quarter. He gave us the equations and derived them so we didn't have to memorize them. He is an okay teacher. The lectures are dry. At office hours he can be a little bit of a dick but he seemed to be willing to get to know his students. I feel like he would be better at teaching an upper level class than an intro.

The best part about this class was that if you missed part of the lecture of didn't understand the material, you could get the power point on poly learn. There are worksheet days where you work on problems (that are very similar to how the tests will look) in small groups. The trickiest part about this class was on the tests we had three problems that were seen before, or related to HW problems but then the fourth problem was an apply your knowledge problem, where you had to use the information you knew previously to solve a problem you've never been exposed to before. those were always the hardest. He is not a bad teacher, and if you do the homework, go to class, and pay attention, you will do fine.

Dr. K is an incredibly smart person as well as a thoughtful and caring educator. He is consise, to the point, and always willing to go into detail if you are willing to seek extra help during office hours. Physics is a difficult course which means it is essential to look into the material and clear up any confusion before class the next day. If you do this, you will do great in Dr. K’s class. If you are wanting to just get a grade and slide by without genuinely learning the cool aspects of physics then don’t take Dr. K. Otherwise, you’re set.

Fine teacher, but a little dry in the presentation. I wouldnt suggest having her at 8:00 in the morning, might be difficult staying awake.