Paul Hess

I took this class to fulfill a prerequisite for my career. As someone who did not take AP Physics in high school, I felt like I did a decent job in the class. I will say, Professor Hess knew that there were former AP students in the class, and failed to adjust the curve for students who were completely new to the material. Lectures were poorly organized, and whenever I'd ask him a clarifying question, I would always leave feeling more confused. We had 2 problem sets per week, and you absolutely had to go to TA hours if you wanted to understand the material. The TA's were honestly more effective in teaching than Hess. Lecture and lab were intertwined, which is not what I have experienced in other lab courses at this school. Lab was students' opportunities to apply what they had learned in lecture. Prelabs were easy- watching videos about how to use the equipment and sometimes deriving some equations. If you take the course with Hess, expect to spend lots of time out of class studying and teaching yourself.

I took this class to fulfill a prerequisite for my career. As someone who did not take AP Physics in high school, I felt like I did a decent job in the class. I will say, Professor Hess knew that there were former AP students in the class, and failed to adjust the curve for students who were completely new to the material. Lectures w …Read more

It's a very conceptual math focused course which might not be the best thing ever for some people, but Professor Hess does a pretty good job of explaining those concepts. He is also very flexible, recording his lectures and allowing students to watch those in lieu of attending in person.

I was very scared to take this class and it turned out to be not that bad. The exams are exactly like the problem sets. There are two problem sets a week which take up the most amount of time but are manageable. Paul Hess is great. He can sometime be a little confusing in class but he is very passionate. Do not be afraid of this course.