STAT 2120

Richard Ross was better than I expected. That being said, my expectations, from what I was told before taking his course, were very low. He is a genuinely nice dude and gives opportunities for extra credit. However, the amount of work he sends is ridiculous. The homework each week takes at least 2 hours to finish and thats apart from the group labs he sends. His lectures are alright, and its helpful that he allows us to use our class notes and resources during the exam. But honestly, the TAs are the worst part of the course (At least some of them). They all seem in a rush and rather give you a wrong answer or advice just to get it over with. Some were helpful though, but most sucked tbh. The project was fine, just not explained at all.

Professor Ross and the TAs were not very helpful. This is a course with a LOT of content and units. There was an extremely large disparity between students with and without coding backgrounds that was not justly accounted for. Professor Ross did not receive constructive criticism well (when it came to technical issues of virtual exam formatting) and was quite hostile in response to many students.

To put it simply, this course is a lot of work. You have lecture twice a week and lab twice a week (my lab was online which wasn't ideal but obviously not a fault of Ross) and homework due almost every saturday, so you're doing some sort of work for this class almost everyday. The first two weeks are chaotic because you don't have a consistent lab group until add/drop ends and because you are simultaneously having to learn how to use Python outside of lecture on top of stats content. That said, Ross does give you some leniency - he offers a decent amount of extra credit opportunities and your 2-4 lowest scores on lecture quizzes, HW, and labs are dropped depending on the type of assignment. I felt that lecture was sufficient in teaching the information, and the textbook is 100% optional but some people like having it. While this class is definitely doable and you can do well in it, I wouldn't recommend it unless you are really interested in stats or need to take it as a pre-req - if you're just looking to fulfill a gen ed I would not recommend taking this course due to the workload. If you have a little bit of time before taking this course, I would recommend trying to familiarize yourself with python a little (nothing extreme, just the basics of how the program works) so you aren't caught completely off guard at the beginning of the semester.

This class isn't too difficult content-wise, but it's pretty time-consuming. There are 2 labs per week that you do with your group of ~4 people; the class time given to complete the lab is 50 minutes, but if you don't have a great group, it usually takes about 20-30 extra minutes to finish the labs (the labs are fairly long). There's one homework assignment per week; I worked through the homeworks fairly efficiently, but it still took me about 2 hours on average to complete it. I also went to his office hours every week to clarify homework questions that I was unsure about, which was helpful. Although Professor Ross doesn't give you practice exam questions, which makes it difficult to know what to expect, his exams are fairly straightforward and he also offers 2-4 extra credit points. #tCFfall2021

How should I put this, let me start with a conclusion: Don't ever take this course if you don't have to. If you are interested in statistics, take a higher level or different stat course cuz the contents is mostly covered in high school. If you have to take this for perquisite, then good luck to you and your GPA.

I would say no doubt that Ross is a knowledgeable instructor that is more than capable of teaching this course. However, he is not a good professor nor a good educator. Many of the course's content is covered throughout your high school whether you studied IB, AP or even A level statistics. He often makes simply content way harder for students to understand by explaining and using a method that is much harder for students to learn well and understand. The workload for this course is heavy but understandable, given the fact that it is a 4 credit course. However, Rich Ross is the most nitpicking and weird tempered instructor that I have ever met. Not only his exam grading procedures are extremely nitpicking (removing all points for a tiny partial error), he also set his exams to have weird and confusing questions that completely differs from the quizzes and homework we have done throughout the course. His homework and lab questions are worded really bad where you don't know what he is asking, this was even agreed by his TAs when we seek help trying to understand the question, and the TA told us to just "Do the best you can since I am not sure either." Ross isn't reasonable either, as a person or an educator. Ross gave us opportunities to earn extra credit on midterms by posting review questions on campuswire, while ignoring the fact that campuswire could not handle questions and answers that is too long. When approaching Ross and tried to work out some solution around this uncontrollable technology error that prevents many students from earning their extra credits, he simply replied "We will grade all posts made to Campuswire that meet the conditions for grading. It is each student’s responsibility to ensure that their submission is visible on Campuswire. To deviate from this would undermine the equity of opportunity that I offer to students." While Ross thinks he is ensuring "the equity of opportunity" that he provides to each student, he is discriminating unfairly against those students that faces an unavoidable technology error where it is completely not their fault.

Ross is more than worthy of teaching at UVA with his expertise on statistical knowledge, but maybe not a introductionary course that has more than 400 people.

I took this class as a pre-req for econ, and I had heard a lot of bad things about it but honestly thought it was fine. It's 2 lectures and 2 labs per week, and the labs are super helpful for understanding the material, and so are the homeworks. The workload really isn't bad - it's just a lot of class time, but outside of class, there's one homework per week and post-lecture quizzes that take 5-10 minutes which you can do just by looking at your notes. I felt very prepared for exams just from labs and homeworks and I didn't have to study much outside of making the cheat sheet - rewriting my notes was enough studying for me. We had P2L for this class, so go to that, especially before exams because they have really helpful practice questions/tests. Also for homeworks, you're allowed to work with people. This class used campuswirse (similar to piazza if you've used that in other classes) and you get extra credit for answering other people's questions, which was great because every time I had a question a bunch of people answered really quickly. He also offers extra credit for exams so that's some easy points you can get.

I think Professor Ross is a great teacher. He explains things very clearly and uses a lot of examples during lectures. I also think he's very fair and cares about his students.

If you don't have any background in coding/python it can be a little hard at first, but the coding is pretty easy once you get the hang of it - he gives you most of the code you need and you just alter it a little for specific questions.

Overall, I thought this class was interesting and a good intro to stats and very doable if you stay on top of things.

When most people talk about this class, they either really hate it or are pretty much indifferent. There are weekly homework assignments, post-lecture quizzes, lab assignments, 2 midterms and final, project, and lots of extra credit opportunities. The lectures were recorded and posted on Microsoft Teams, so if you really needed to miss a class or just missed something during the live lecture, they were easily accessible. As for Rich Ross, I would say that he is a pretty straightforward professor, which can sometimes make him unlikeable. But, for the most part, I appreciated this about him; he was clear in his class expectations. I didn't like though that, sometimes, the homework/lecture quizzes/labs could have really ambiguous wording (SO frustrating). I mainly went to TA office hours, and often times, it would just be a bunch of students all confused about the same question. The lab TAs were really approachable and tried to be helpful, but since they don't grade the homework, they didn't always have the answer. Overall, I enjoyed this class, but I also just generally like statistics. I thought the workload was manageable (as long as you don't procrastinate on the homework and try and collaborate with other students - you can miss the smallest detail, which they take off points for), the exams were straightforward, and DEFINITELY DO THE EXTRA CREDIT. In terms of the project, double check your work! Just like the homework and labs, you can get points off for the smallest details, which add up in the end.

I didn't particularly enjoy this class, but I'd be lying if I didn't say I learned a lot. Using python for statistics, while confusing at first, was really cool to see. The most frustrating part of this class is that the grading on tests is harsh. Most of the stuff on the tests is conceptual, and you really have to pack in buzzwords in explanations or you aren't gonna get full points. To succeed in this class, I would form a study session with people and collaborate on the homework. Textbook and calc 1 knowledge are not required. Seriously. Also, I found that going to P2L sessions really helped (you'll know what that is when the class starts). Overall okay class, but much is left to be desired.

Unnecessary amount of workload for very little benefit. Getting good grades on labs/homework is dependent on your ability to read Ross' mind, as his assignment questions are often open-ended despite him only looking for a certain answer in certain wording. He seems like a nice guy, but it goes to waste as he is unforgiving in exams and labs when it comes to help and curves. (There are no curves) Seeking help from the guy himself isn't very helpful as he often contradicts himself and can leave you more confused than where you started. During our final lab project, for example, the instruction sheet had something that was contradicted by another post by Ross. When he made a second post to clear the confusion, he ended up not only failing to address the initial contradiction, he added more detail for a solution that included material that wasn't taught in the course (and therefore not usable in the final project.) If this class isn't a prereq for you, please take any other stat class.

This class could be conducted in a way better manner, but unfortunately Professor Ross is a very difficult teacher who doesn't seem to care much for his students. He throws python at you without teaching it at all. He assigns an absurd amount of work every week. He isn't a very forgiving teacher and the grading on exams are god awful. His lectures put you to sleep. The pacing is fast and the material taught for the final exam is rushed and not well explained. Though many students need tot ake it for a prereq just know that this course is not it.