Wissel, Stephanie  

I didn't actually take this class, but I have experience with this teacher through contact with her outside of classes, and I have had to hear detailed stories about her class on a weekly basis from a friend who took her class. She isn't dumb or a bad professor, but she is a terrible teacher who doesn't seem to understand that respect is a two way street. She simply doesn't care about her students, and goes out of her way to make things difficult instead of trying to actually teacher. It isn't even a matter of her just not being nice, she it straight up demeaning and rude to students who approach her.

I didn't think Dr. Wissel was too bad of a professor. Her lectures are a little unorganized but I understand trying to learn how to present material can be hard. Her quizzes are not that bad, if you pay attention, participate and do the homework and practice problems you should do well. Also office hours help a ton, go often! Her midterms are not the worst, but always be clear in explaining why you did something if the question says "explain your reasoning." She wants sentences! I honestly think she could've made the course more rigorous and in depth. Not to try to screw kids over but if we're getting engineering degrees we need to learn how to teach ourselves difficult material to prepare for the professional world so I support professors that push students. Overall, slightly easier of a course than I thought itd be, kind of wished I got more out of it. Maybe I just like physics but I would like to see more questions on the midterms that truly test my knowledge.

Wissel has trouble pacing her class. The material is learned through "lecture tutorials" which are worksheets that guide you through the introduction of various physics topics. She expects you to discuss with your lab partners, but if none of you understand it, you're effectively wasting your time. She then provides an answer overview of the worksheet, but does so by zooming through a PowerPoint, giving you no time to write down anything. In the end, I feel frustrated and learned nothing. I felt it would be best if she just taught us the material first hand instead of making us guess through the lecture tutorials. Sometimes, she also has the online LONCAPA hw due BEFORE she taught the material on it. Weekly quizzes and 2 midterms were surprisingly easy compared to 133.

Professor Wissel is a new teacher that has no teaching experience which holds her back from presenting the material in a clear and effective manner. Her weekly quizzes are generally pretty easy if you do the weekly textbook problems and her 5% LON-CAPA problems are nearly impossible leading to constant frustration. Her true fault is her attitude. She thinks being a professor is a hostile environment where the students would take advantage of her if she's "weak." Because of that, she's simply not a friendly person so it's hard to approach her with concerns or questions. I would recommend not taking her for her lack of teaching experience, terrible teaching technique and bad attitude.

Because she is new to teaching her lectures can sometimes be difficult too follow. She is extremely generous with partial credit in quizzes and exams to make up for their somewhat difficult nature. The best thing you can do in her class is go to office hours because she is super helpful, effective, and personable (fairly certain the rating below never attempted to go to her office hours or get to know her because that is all false).

Doctor Wissel's class had me scared at the beginning of the quarter, however, after she got the hang of things, her lectures became much easier to follow. She wants to see you succeed, and when she recognizes that something she tested on was unfair, she will try and give back some credit. Tests and quizzes were fair, but homework is extremely difficult unless you're adept at Googling. Overall, Wissel knows her physics, and will try to help you out if you put in the effort.

SWissel's teaching style was difficult to understand, which was to be expected being a new teacher. However, after attending class, learning nothing, then failing the first midterm I decided that my time could be best used studying the text book rather than attending her class. This was proven to be true after getting an A on the second midterm. That being said, she does grade the quizes easier and gives points back. To all of the other people who say that she is helpful in office hours, not everyone has luxury of time to attend office hours. The material should be presented clearly during class the first time.

Honestly the best Physics professor I've had in my PHYS I-III series. Perhaps it was just the difficult material, but Prof. Wissel was able to keep my attention every class. She was new and had some stumbles but in the end presented the material about as well as you could expect anyone to. She was always prepared for class and was kind during office hours. Better yet, we got cookies during the final, which were delicious. I'd recommend her.

If you like integrals, Wissel is the teacher for you. If you want to know how to actually use them in context with the class material, find a different teacher. Wissel spends most of lecture slowly going through the derivations of every concept before finally arriving at a simplified equation. By the time she's finished, there is barely enough time for her to show when, where, or how to apply these equations. Our class was 2 weeks behind of other professors, and she even had to move the second midterm back a week because we had not gone through enough material. Also, her online homework is overwhelmingly difficult and complex. Google taught me more than she did.

She makes a lot of mistakes and students have to correct her during lecture. One time, half of classtime was used trying to figure out a mistake she made. She's just not good at teaching.

She is extremely condescending, and I can guarantee she won't get very far with that attitude. I overheard her telling a female student "You need to be more cocky" during her office hours. She covers up her lack of knowledge with her arrogant demeanor. Do not take one of her classes, you will not gain a thing!

Wissel is a very average professor, but she really isnt the worst thing to happen to you. There are much worse professors out there and Wissel isnt the end of the world. She sometimes makes mistakes in lectures and spends time fixing them, which is a bit of a waste. She is decent in office hours and sometimes can be pretty understanding. 2 midterms and 1 final, all of which werent excessively difficult. Overall, I probably wouldnt recommend Wissel as a first choice, but it could be so much worse so if you have to take her dont sweat it.

Overall I was pleased with this class and Dr. Wissel's teaching. The material in 133 started off pretty easy and got more difficult *for me* as we got to stuff like capacitors and circuits, then got better again for the magnetism section at the end. Lecture was sometimes a bit dry but usually all of the information was important and would show up on hw/tests etc. Weekly LON CAPA homework usually wasn't that bad except for maybe 1-2 problems that actually require more serious thought. Midterms were fairly challenging – not because they didn't match the class material but because there was so much potential material to cover and if you don't know what you're doing you would run out of time fast. However, the midterms weren't weighted that much and they were honestly harder than the common final. Dr. Wissel was helpful in OH and answered all of my questions efficiently and thoroughly. Overall I would recommend her for this class.

I liked her a lot. She was very fair, nice and straightforward. If you ask questions and care, she will answer and explain it as many times as you want. She really wants her students to do well. She is also a genius. IDK where all of these bad reviews come from, i thought her tests were fair and honest and I thought that she was very helpful. She was easily my favorite physics professor at poly and one of my top professors overall!

If you value your GPA, and more importantly your education, I'd suggest dropping immediately. She is condescending when helping students individually and typically this "help" is nothing more than just reminding you how much you don't understand the information. This goes the same for office hours with her attitude toward students coming for help. I am not sure if she feels the need to put up a barrier between her and students as some sort of authority, but it only comes off as unprofessional and extremely unhelpful. I do not recommend this professor one bit.

Professor Wissel definitely wants students to succeed in her class. However, there were times when she did not cover all of the topics we needed to know and it was left to us to read the textbook to understand most of the concepts presented in class. There were also some concepts on the tests that weren't sufficiently explained in lecture. She is very helpful if you ask questions though, and is a sweet person who really knows her physics.