Shaffer, Richard  

Dr. Shaffer is a good professor, and he presents the material well. He gives two midterms and a final (no written assignments), which are given leniency to be retaken for a better grade. He takes the better of the two, so you have nothing to lose. His curves are also pretty generous. Take notes on his lectures and know everything he gives you on the study guides, and it won't be difficult to get a passing grade. It's also really helpful to make flashcards for the vocab. I highly recommend him for this class.

A bit corny sense of humor, but a very good teacher overall.

Dr. Shaffer was a pretty good teacher overall. His power point presentation made it really easy to follow along and make up missed class days. I think I would have gotten an A in this class if I had read the syllabus more carefully because you need to STUDY THE KEY TERMS in the text; this helps a lot on the tests. Also his study guides were really helpful so it's not too hard to do well as long as you study. I would recommend him for a teacher.

If you're going to take this class make sure you go to class. He does these power point presentations that are the basis of some of his questions on the test. The rest of the questions are the reading, which he never discusses in class. Make sure that you make vocab cards becuase he requires that you memorize the words for the test. Overall, he seemed like a nice guy, but the test results aren't too great. Plus, he drops your lowest test score. I know a lot of people that were dissatisfied with taking this class with him.

Shaffer's classes are rather dry and his attempts at jokes are pretty bad. However, he is very knowledgeable and grades fairly. He is very approachable and will listen to students. Tests are multiple choice, 50 questions, 10 fill-in the blank. You must read the book and I highly recomend you use multiple-choice questions in the study guide. 10% of his ?'s are straight from the study guide, about 50% from the book and %40 percent from lectures. If you keep up with everything and go to class, you will not get lower than a B.

Dr. Shaffer is a very easy-going and approachable man. He is straightforward with his lectures and gives you very specific study guides for each of the 4 exams (no comprehensive final). He drops the lowest test grade and grades on a curve. Lecture material didn't really correspond to the book, though. he often let us out of class early; sometimes after only 40 minutes of class to make up the upcoming test. His class is well worth taking.

I really enjoyed the class. I like psy and soc but found the material really interesting. I did the reading and made flash cards and got and A, not having to take the final. He made the class fun and not too diffacult. Study key terms. Yeah its nice. He cancelled class or let you out early almost every week. Make sure you use the study guide. A lot of stuff is from it will be on the test. Study handouts too.

Shaffer's class was very good. I had it in 4 hr chunks. It was hard to stay awake when I was tired because his lecture is all on power point (meaning lights off), but I woke up on the hour, every hour, when we had a break. I was able to do well in his class (grade based on 3 of 4 midterms/final grades and attendence) because his tests were all multiple choice with 10 fill in the blanks, and the questions were almost completely based on the text. If you like this type of class, like I do, Shaffer's great.

Professor Shaffer was quite interesting. He loves tangents, loves to laugh at himself and his jokes are unpreditcable. But most of all, he cares about what he teaches, cares about his students, and has a very fair (aka easy) grading scale (except one test was actually very tough). A student's experience in sociology depends very much on his/her professor, and I would recommend Shaffer to everyone. My only criticism is that sometimes I wish (*gasp* - i know) we learned more.

Dr. Shaffer is a great teacher. He presents his lectures on powerpoint and then explains them. He incorporates videos, pictures, animations, in class exercies, you name it, into his lectures which makes them more interesting. He grades based on attendance, 2 midterms (there are 3 total but he drops the lowest) and then a cumulative final. He is very passionate about the subject and truly loves teaching.

DR Shaffer treats his students like they are still in high school. He takes attendance everyday and sometimes twice a day, so don't leave early! His class is comprised of 3 midterms and a final(he drops the lowest midterm).His grading scale is fair but his tests are not. You must study for his class like it is an upper-division course. Shaffer is the only one that laughs at his jokes and his class is extrememly boring.Good luck if you have him.

So far, I'd say Prof. Shaffer has been my favorite teacher here at Poly. He always managed to stay lively~ and keep me awake for the most part as well as always having his lectures litereally laid out for you on a power-point presentation so it was super easy to follow and take good notes. As for the tests, there were no surprises~ so as long as you study there's no reason for you not to do well.

Go to class cause he takes roll, sometimes twice, cause if it is a two hour class lots of people leave at the break, so go to class and stay the whole time. I didnt read a word, just made notecards from the notes and the key terms in the book. Easy class, if you hate to read and dont mind going to class.

Shaffer is a good lecturer, and presents with decent slides and videos. The main problem with this class was in the wording of the test questions, as well as much of the material in the study guide (which was used for a lot of the test questions). The tests were multiple choice, which I am normally a big fan of, but in this class there were many questions that were so ambiguous you could make a decent argument for at least two of the possible answers, so it was basically about guessing which one Dr. Shaffer felt was best. Plus they were worded very poorly, with run on sentences that lost meaning about half way through. Some of them actually didn't make gramatical sense. He should have an english professor re-write the exam questions to clear things up a bit. Although I feel I learned most of what was taught fairly well, I doubt my grade will reflect that.

I liked Dr. Shaffer's Comparative Societies class. He made it easy to take notes by putting all the pertinent facts for the course in a PowerPoint presentation. The tests basically tested concepts and key terms--some of the questions asked you to read a description of a given situation and identify which concept was exemplified, while others just straight up asked you to define a concept. I'd have to say this was a pretty easy class overall. It got a little tedious toward the end of the second hour, but it wasn't half bad.

SOC 110 is the most boring, worthless class I have taken at Cal Poly yet. Shaffer is the perfect compliment to such a painfully pointless class by formatting the entire lecture as one big Power Point nightmare. Honestly, this class is as useless as most junior high social studies courses, no shit. At no point are you required to form an opinion or respond to the information-- it's just Shaffer clicking away through hundreds of bulleted factoids and terminology, and memorizing vocabulary from the text to be regurgitated on a FILL IN THE BLANK midterm. The class was even more of a time warp when Shaffer actually started taking role. Holy shit, are we in college yet? Maybe Cal Poly freshman are considered to be so immature because they have to take these mindless classes where they are treated like derelict high school kids... DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS UNLESS YOU HAVE TO! Yes, it is really easy. Yes, you can get a good grade without thinking. But is that worth the torture of meaningless busy-work memorization?

Alright, honestly Shaffer isn't THAT bad. Although his powerpoint presentations are a little tedious for 2 straight hours, but he's not too difficult. His tests are a complete joke because he makes you memorize sometimes 80 vocab terms for the fill-in. I have basically bombed every test because of this. He drops your lowest test score (3 tests and a final). He is a very nice guy who constantly cracks his corny jokes (then laughs at them when nobody else does), but as far as the class goes, it's lame. Also, if you hate going to class this is not for you - he takes role everyday (sometimes twice) so make sure you show up. Overall, i would not recommend this class to anyone unless you have to take it (and even then i would think twice). Take something else if you can. This class is long and boring. If you do get stuck with Shaffer - good luck staying awake!

Dr. Shaffer is a great teacher. he presents the marterial to you very cleary and makes it easy to understand. he then takes that material and puts it right on the test. as long as you pay attention in class, do the reading and do the multiple choice questios from the study guide the tests are very easy. about ten of the questions will be the exact questions you had in the study guide. if you are going to take SOC 110 definitely take it with Dr. Shaffer b/c class is fun and its easy.

Holy shit what a waste of time. I'd learn more in pottery class. The topics are entirely subjective, but good ol' shaffer seems to have all the answers-- you just have to memorize HIS opinions about society and spit them back out on a test 3 times... His tests are so ambiguous and vague that most of the time 2 or more answers are applicable. The most annoying thing (besides Shaffer taking role) is the load of vocabulary-- these terms are useless because you could never use them in regular dialogue. Most of the terms are counterintuitive and nobody besides another soc 110 person would care to know these definitions. I became dumber from taking this class.

Here's the deal about this class. First of all, if you are someone who likes to skip class or not do the reading, this class is not for you. It is unbearable if you are one of those people. Aside from that Shaffer is a pretty good teacher. His lectures are interesting and to the point from Powerpoint and the slides are available online, so you could save yourselves some writing if you wanted to. Attendance will really help your grade if you are like me. For the tests, you are at a great advantage if you get the study guide because the test will include questions directly from the study guide. You have to memorize and regurgitate a bazillion vocab terms for the fill-in section. My recommendation for that is to use flashcards and read from the definition side to guess the term. Then you'll automatic get a quarter of the test. If you are good at memorizing, this class will be cake. You cannot skip the reading because there are questions on the test that refer to history and examples not covered in the lecture. We have three midterms, with the lowest dropped but you cannot miss them, a final, and attendance that make up your grade. Shaffer has a strong passion for this class and I actually enjoyed it even in a class of 120. But only sign up if you are willing to work hard and attend class.

This professors class was pretty easy to get through. The key to getting an a in this class is to come to class. He takes role and about 35 points in the class are given to attendance. His lectures are always on the tests, so take great notes. The other most important thing is to make flash cards of evry single vocab word in the required reading. These are extremely important for the fill in questions he asks during each exam. Read all the chapters assigned and if possible get the study guide because he takes many of his questions directly from it. There are three midterms and the final. He drops the lowest test score from the midterms. Although he is a bit of a nerd and can at times be boring, he isnt all that bad of a teacher.

Shaffer wasn't that bad of a professor if you can read the book and learn everything because his lectures were useless. He takes roll everyday so you have to go but the test are straight out of the book so it's useless to listen to him. And don't try to get someone to sign in for you cuz he counts the number of people in class and the number of people signed in and he'll figure out someone's not there. Its kind of a lose-lose situation cuz you have to go to the lectures, but all the important stuff is in the book. Have fun figuring it out!

Shaffer's lectures are confusing, boring, and irrelevant most of the time. The only reason I got through the class was because he grades on a curve and the course text was interesting. He makes you read a shitload of chapters and tests on about 10 percent of the material. Focus on the theories (fundamentalist, social exchange, conflict, ect.) because he tests mostly on that (especially for the first test). I did all of the reading but most of it wasn't on the test. Know the lecture material, do the study guide multiple choice section, and the bazillion vocab words. Attendance is mandatory and actually helps your grade because it is worth 35 points.

I hated this class. I got a B- which is alright but I seriously dreaded going to hear Shaffer talk. He in incredibly boring and his outlines for his lecture are pointless. Good luck if you take his class.

This class was a waste of my time. You must go to class (high school anyone?) but his lectures are absolutely pointless. Read the book (don't skip the special sections), memorize it, and memorize every vocab word. Be able to give the word when you hear the definition. Thats right, over 100 vocab words for every test. Boring, pointless. He also gave misinformation. I actually corrected him a couple of times with info from other classes and then he still got it wrong. I am a nice person and I would not bash a professor unless he really sucks.

While I found this class mostly satisfactory, I found the required attendance a little arcane. I would not mind the requirement except for the fact that lectures comprehensively duplicated the textbook. Between the lectures and textbook, however, I got a firm grasp on the principles of sociology. The vocabulary regurgitation portion of exams was tedious; I wish Shaffer would narrow down required memorization to a more manageable level. Otherwise, Shaffer was clear and the videos shown in class were interesting. His Power Point presentations were a little wordy, though. The nice thing about his exams is the lowest score is dropped, which helped me keep a B+ even though I bombed one of the exams. I have been told numerous times Shaffer is the best SOC 110 professor, and based on my experience I would recommend his class.

If you are someone who misses classes on a regular basis, unable to withstand large classes where it is hard focus, or is not good at memorizing, look elsewhere to fulfill this requirement. How good this professor is to you depends on your position in these matters. He does take attendance, which is intended to give you the incentive to attend all lectures and help your grade. He gives pretty interesting lectures himself, that is, if you do not zone out. He knows the subject inside and out and is the best of the SOC 110 professors out there. As long as you print the notes he has online and bring them to class everyday, memorize the questions from the study guide where most of the questions come from, and remember the definitions to alot of vocab words, this class should be a breeze. Take him only if you are willing to attend all classes.

he's a really nice guy. good teacher, very interested in the subject AND gets you interested. he laughs at his own jokes, and the class laughs at him laughing at himself, when he thinks we're laughing at his jokes too. the key to this class is flashcards for the vocab. i never read the book, just did flashcards and the online quizzes. lots of interesting movies, make sure not to miss them. definitely one of the best professors I've had at poly!

Dr. Shaffer is an overall nice guy. He no longer takes attendance (which is GREAT if you're someone like me who hates to go to class) and all his lecture notes are online, so the material is pretty easy. I would recommend actually doing all of the ready, plus getting the study guide because his tests can be pretty tricky. He rambles on about Thailand all the time and has some really corny comments and jokes, but if you can sit through him he's worth it.

i loved this class. i think a lot of it was because the book is very interesting, but i really enjoyed it. Dr. Shaffer is just a nice man who loves to ramble about sociology. the tests were cake, i never got below an 89% on them, all you have to do is read the chapters (what a concept!) and do flashcards of the vocab in the chapters. the flashcards can be a hassle because there are so many, but it's easy if you just split it up with a friend in that class. the study guide is pretty much only useful for the multiple choice questions it includes, because he often takes questions straight out of it for the tests. i highly recommend this class just for the content alone. Shaffer may be weird and sometimes creepy, but definitely not a bad teacher.

This was one of the most interesting classes ever because you learn all kinds of things about the world that most college students don't even care about. For example, did you know that Pepsi sells to Russia in exchange for old submarines? Very cool class, interesting, and not that hard. There were only 4 multiple choice tests, and the final was only partially cumulative. I was 2 points away from an A because I missed parts of about 5 classes. If you go to every class and read the book and memorize a lot of key terms, you can get an A easily.

Unfortunitly for me I had horrible priority spring quarter and had to take my last ge classes all at once.It really didnt help when one of them was soc 110 with Richard Shaffer. A friend of mine had just taken the class and told me it was passable but Shaffer was so corny and incredibly borring. He shows random vidios that always end up on the midterms, that force you to go to class and sit on those unconfortable blue chairs. The key to his class, like any is to be there all the time to get hand outs, especially the study guide for the next midterm since there are 4!!! All of which have questions about material covered in class and the study guide tells you exacly which chapters to read, and even more important is that the study guide tells you which definitions from the 4........ long, small font, ocasional picture, damn I'm falling asleep again while reading the text book chapters. Since the midterms are worth 80 points, 60 points come from multiple choice (which is material covered in class, alot of nit-picky crap out of the text, and the few difinitios the study guide says wont be in the definition portion of the test.) The definition part of the test is the last page and it is worth 20 points. Here your given 10 different definitions and have to be able to come up with the exact term that matches out of your head, no notes are allowed. The best thing you can do is somehow memorize all the definitions the study guide says will be on that portion of the test, then read every word on each page of the chapters. I did it for one test and got an A, after that I couldnt handle it any more. I just made shure to memorize the right definitions for the tests and try to make good judgment on the 60 mutple choice worth 1 point each. Sounds like a great time dosent it? What makes it even more monotinious is that the final is partly cumlative and the rest new material, same amount of definitions, yet, a tidle wave of of even more multiple choice. If you do have to take this class, your in for an interesting ride, and if you think I'm being to harsh, just count how many times he mentions prostitution and when he demonstrated how man kind developed waveing to each other after meeting for the first time, you think to your self, this rating hit the nail 100% directly on the head.

After reading all the stuff about the other Soc 110 professors, I decided Shaffer was my best bet. Some of the class was really interesting, the book for example is really good and you learn a lot of stuff but the problem is the tests. He tests on the most random crap and ALL the vocab words. This means for each test you have like 200 flashcards to memorize. It was so ridiculous. On the tests too he'll have a question that has numbers in it like "What is the divorce rate? a) 25%, b) 44%, c)45%, d)50%" If you are good at memorization than this is the class for you, but if you're like me and think that a GE class shouldn't take more time than your major courses and feel like you have more important things to do than write out a million flashcards and go bankrupt at campus market buying them, then I'd suggest another class. Oh and another thing, like no one got an A, I think I looked and 3 people had one. Shaffer is ok at lecturing, the movies are really interesting that you watch but for the first couple weeks EVERY example is about prostitution. He even tells us a story about how him and his wife would watch the prostitutes get their johns from a hotel window and how his wife wouldn't let him go down and check the price. Ok eww. Anyway, I am glad to be done with this class.

Shaffer is great! He doesn't stress too much over covering a lot of material in class, and we watched lots of movies, so even every 2-hour lecture was always interesting and never dull. He let us out early alot, too. His lectures are clear and concise and he goes over everything very clearly, and is also very understanding when you have questions or get confused. Just talk to him after class or during the 10-minute break you get with every 2-hour lecture. The class is broken up into 3 midterms (the lowest of which he drops) and a final, which are all fairly easy. You do have to learn the vocabulary from the text, which can be time-consuming, but isn't that hard. Just use the website's flashcards instead of wasting time making your own - I just remembered the basic definition of each word (I didn't bother writing examples from the text or my own lfie like he suggested), and got every single vocab question right. To do really well in the class, you should do the reading and remember the examples from the text (don't bother studying the text, though), which is the most time-consuming aspect of the course. Still, the reading is not that long or difficult, especially if you're interested in sociology. Just take good notes, come to class every time, pay attention, do the reading (just skim the "student voices" and such boxes if you want), learn the vocab, and study your notes, and you should get an A in the class.

EXTREMELY BORING CLASS WITH AN ANNOYING AND CORNY TEACHER. he wastes so much of the 2 hour lecture on random crap that should only take 5 minutes to explain. the tests cover specific details from the text, not basic concepts. a ton of vocab too. the only thing good about this class is that he drops your lowest grade of the 4 midterms.

Schaffer is a funny guy. The lectures are cool and if you really study the material in advance and memorize all the words you'll do all right. You definately need the book. You have to read the scenarios and such out of it. I didn't and didn't study and ended up with a C+. The tests are very confusing and you really have to buckle down and study. You have to KNOW all the concepts. Being able to answer all the questions on the study guide will only get you a C or so, so if you want an A, study, study, study!

Shaffer is a nice guy, he makes bad jokes and talks a lot about things that arent always relevant, but the class is totally bearable. His class is based on 3 midterms and a final, and he drops 1 midterm score. It's not super easy, but it's doable if you do you reading and make flash-cards like he suggests. He uses power point in class so if you go and just write down what is on the screen you have almost all the notes you need (and I suggest bringing the crossword puzzle to class because every once in a while he will go off on some tangent and if you have short attention span you'll lose it) I would take Shaffer again if I had the chance, his classes go by quickly and he is really fair.

Pros: Interesting topics that I found relevant. Shaffer has a very quirky sense of humor that wasnt always funny but still kept me awake. I found the tests to be relatively easy if I studied, but very hard if I didnt. Cons: The reading can get long, and the flashcards took me an eternity to make (but they helped). Overall: Highly recommended. I found the class very interesting.

He's a good professor. The class is hard but fair. There are three exams and two relatively small group projects. A lot of people did really poorly on the first exam. He gives you a study guide (it's really long) with everything you need to know on it. What some of my friends and I did was we divided up the chapters and each person outlined the info we needed to know from one of the chapters. We did the same thing for the essays and it worked really well. Overall I liked the class and I would recommend Shaffer.

Overall, I really liked Dr. Shaffer. His tests are fairly difficult and there is a ton of reading, but I think the reason I did so well was because I was actually challenged and wanted to work hard. He is VERY approachable and is willing to help students in any way he can. He is also prompt when returning tests and projects. If you are looking for a challenging class and a helpful professor, then I certainly recommend Dr. Shaffer!

Dr. Shaffer's Soc 355 class is very challenging but if the work is done and turned in on time than you will be pleased with your grade. Do not let the amount of work overwhelm you, keep up with it. I strongly recommend this class during a quarter where you are taking a light load. He gives you study guides for all the tests and quizes. If you do everything on his studyguide you will pass. He is very nice and will work with students with everything but the pre-requisite.

If at all possible, take this class from Daly. Shaffer is never in the lab for help and believe me you will need it. He is very boring in class much like kerbo, likes to talk about stuff he knows nothing about.