Glob/Legal/Soc Env Bus (Spring 2017)
- Instructor: Malekafzali, Farhad
- Subject: Business Environment
- Catalog & Section: 325 30943
- Enrollment: 76
- Responses Incl Declines: 67
- Declines: 17
Please share with us your thoughts on the course: (62 comments)
Q: Please comment on the instructor’s strengths and areas for possible improvement.(ONLY SHOWING FIRST 30 RESPONSES CLICK HERE TO VIEW FIRST 30 RESPONSES) |
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| 1 | “I particularly enjoyed the course and found the material interesting. I thought you utilized class time well. I overheard students around me complaining that they didn’t like when we would watch the longer videos in class because “why are we paying to watch videos that we could watch on our own”, but I thought it was helpful to discuss them. I appreciated when you handed out notes. I thought it was kind of stressful to try to write everything that I thought was important down though. A few times you didn’t share your opinion on certain topics and whenever you did share your opinion, you made sure to clarify that it was YOUR opinion. I know some people don’t like that, but I did. It helps students (me in particular) better understand the topic of discussion. It also helps students add to the discussion when you share your own opinion. I really didn’t like when you removed the last few weekly questions to submit articles for. I wanted to do that to help my grade and in the updated version of the syllabus, you took out the previously stated questions. Finally, even though the material is not cumulative, I wish we were given the option to see/ go over the exams in class. It would help to see what questions you got wrong and where to focus your efforts for the next exam.” — Mora Connelly |
| 2 | “Prof. Farhad makes lectures more fun, and I like it.” — Yaomiao Sun |
| 3 | “nothing” — Cole Berk |
| 4 | “I really enjoyed this class. Professor Farhad is clearly passionate about what he teaches and it shows. He taught in a interesting and engaging way and I learned a lot in this class and feel that I understand how important ethics are in business. A truly interesting course that I enjoyed.” — Jessica Chew |
| 5 | He was a very good teacher and kept class interesting most of the time but his tests seemed to have questions that weren’t based on the important points from the course. |
| 6 | I felt you were very engaging and a good lecturer. I also liked when you would make jokes. |
| 7 | The lectures were good when you incorporated some jokes which was often…well done. |
| 8 | My grade is going to be average, and that for the most part is my fault. However, I found class to be incredibly dry. It was hard to stay focused because of the lack of effort put in by the instructor. There was minimal effort to try and engage students. |
| 9 | Goes through information a little fast for not having most of material on slides. |
| 10 | “Professor Malekafzali was a very good instructor, it was very clear that he cared about what he taught us. He was always organized and prepared for class and gave us a lot of good examples, and was good at clarifying questions. Professor Malekafzali had very strict guidelines that he made very clear at the beginning of the term. For example he emphasized the importance of punctuality and staying off our phones in class. I really appreciated this about him and really respected his standards for professionalism. I wish other professors held the same standards. I hope that he continues to promote these standards in his future classes.” — Elizabeth Hara |
| 11 | Personable and had a good mix of lecture and movies |
| 12 | He is funny and approachable. |
| 13 | He was a witty, fun professor that made class fun and interesting. |
| 14 | “Instructor was fairly clear and went into detail about all the topic you need to know for the exams. The slides are very vague however, and even if you’re in class every session but miss a few talking points it’s hard to get information on it when you look back. The review sessions held outside of class were helpful and courteous.” — Hannah Gray |
| 15 | Instructor was clearly knowledgeable and passionate about the topic. |
| 16 | more detail powerpoints please
good lecture material and videos |
| 17 | “Clear lectures and expectations for class time and exam content” — Logan Goldsby |
| 18 | This class is so long, and there really needs to be a break. Lecturing for two straight hours is way too long. |
| 19 | Funny professor. Very opinionated. |
| 20 | “Class time included a mixture of lectures, videos, and discussion of current events that kept students interested.” — Abigail Brown |
| 21 | While knowledgeable, the professor taught with a biased view on certain topics and used some less than credible sources. However, he was open to debate and took in other people’s opinions. The classes only helped so much on the tests. I felt that most of the material had to be self-taught. |
| 22 | “He is a very nice guy and clearly is passionate about what he teaches, however he throws so much information at you – and so fast – that it’s very hard to decipher what is important and what’s not. This makes the tests (the only thing worth points toward your grade) very challenging and rigorous to prepare for. There could be more guidance and clarity when it came to instruction for the tests” — Kristin Boone |
| 23 | “Farhad has been one of my favorite teachers thus far. He is easy to listen to, and his rule of no phones isn’t noticeable because his class is rarely boring. He uses relevant examples from the world and makes clear his opinion and covers multiple views. The book really didn’t contribute to the course except on the test but it wasn’t discussed in class very much so seems kind of useless. The syllabus kind of acts as a study guide but a more specific guide for studying would be very helpful as there is a ton of content for this class.” — Nadia Bair |
| 24 | “Farhad is very good at being open minded when it comes to students views on hard issues. Most professors I have at this school will immediately shoot down a theory or reasoning behind something because it is more conservative than their political beliefs. Farhad would always answer with “Yes that is a very great point and could be true, but the other way you could view this is…”. He is obviously extremely knowledgable on what he is teaching and he opened my eyes up to a lot of things that I either didn’t know, or chose not to pay attention to. Although he and I have very different political views, I admire his respect and his ability to make me think about what he’s saying rather than seamlessly arguing about who is right or wrong.” — Trevor Brand |
| 25 | High expectations and unreasonable amount of reading assigned on a weekly basis. Does not discuss assigned readings in class, which would have been beneficial for everyone. |
| 26 | “I enjoyed the lectures because I thought they were both engaging and informative.” — Karishma Shah |
| 27 | Professor Malekafzali was able to cover sensitive and often political concepts in a very light and humorous way. He was very knowledgable of the material, and always made sure to separate his opinion, from other facts. I loved his lecture style approach, with minimal words on the slides, and instead elaborated on each point. It made for better note taking because I would listen to what he was saying, instead of just writing from the board. My only critique is I know that the textbook did not necessarily line up with the class directly, but I know that it is required to get that and Professor doesn’t have a huge choice. |
| 28 | “I really appreciated the review sessions provided during tests. I really think they helped improve my grade. I liked the use of short videos throughout the class because it broke up the lectures to make them seem not as long, and the videos shown were actually really interesting. I liked some of the articles, while others seemed dated and not relevant to the subject matter. Overall, I liked the use of outside sources to add to the course material and textbook. The professors strengths include punctual, well-informed, fast responding to email, and provided interesting outside sources. The professors weaknesses include invalid facts during some of the lectures and a lot of opinions were given in the classroom. I know that with a class like this, opinions are bound to come out, but I felt like people having more conservative views (like myself) was not allowed to be a part of disscussion in the class because I was just told that my views were wrong. That is the reason I felt I couldn’t actively participate in class.” — Jennifer Walden |
| 29 | I want to begin by saying that I think Dr. Malekafzali offered a very interesting perspective on of the issues discussed in class, but I felt like all the material in the class was very one sided. I don’t feel like Dr. Malekafzali was trying to force any opinion or way of thinking, but I do sincerely believe the material presented was skewed to one side. I agree with many of the things he said, but maybe more focus on the justifications for certain practices and evaluating them from a business perspective would be beneficial. Most, importantly, more dialogue about solutions. It’s great to bring awareness to ethical issues, but if we don’t discuss how to rectify these issues what’s the point? |
| 30 | The slideshows don’t seem to add a ton of value to the course because there is so little information on them, and the tests are based more on the dialouge of class, so having some sort of notes available for that would help students who cannot write as fast or have a hard time hearing or understanding the topic. The instructor is very good with using real life examples for the class, though, and making complex issues seem less complex |
| 31 | “Farhad is a great professor, he makes class interesting and uses the class period efficiently. I really enjoyed his dry humor and how he uses real life examples in his lectures to make things more interesting.” — Stephanie Huynh |
| 32 | I am liberal myself, and yet was offended by the bias in the course. Nearly every issue was presented from only one side and all sources were from huffpost or commondreams.org or ny times. |
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Q: Please comment on the strengths and areas of possible improvement for the course as a whole.
1″I think the book should definitely be changed. I read every assigned reading and took notes on all chapters and articles. Although parts were interesting, the book did not correspond well with the rest of the course. I took 23 pages of notes on the book chapters for the third exam, and I wish I hadn’t wasted my time, because my grade did not reflect the effort I put into studying. Also, I think you should base the students’ grades on something more than the exams. Again, I put in a lot of time and effort into this class (because I like to get good grades and because I found the material interesting), but I feel as though exams are not enough to accurately depict someones effort, knowledge, and understanding. I liked the articles and felt that they helped build off of the material covered in class and put it into context of the “real world”.” — Mora Connelly
- 2″I am not a native English speaker, sometimes I find hard to write down important notes in time. It would help if he can put some of those materials on the power point.” — Yaomiao Sun
- 3″Professor Malekafzali us incredibly organized, on task, knowledgeable and friendly. I felt that each class period I was actively listening and involved in the lecture.” — Cole Berk
- 4″Interesting class, real life examples, very engaging and interesting. A lot of reading but I learned from it too. Thank you!” — Jessica Chew
- 5It is good the way it is.
- 6I really liked the videos and felt they were very beneficial to the class. Some of the articles were informative, but the longer ones, especially the ones in the last section were not that helpful.
- 7Don’t do 4 tests determine your grade. Add problem sets or small quizzes because it’s stressful knowing a mini mistake can tank your grade. Also, add more small videos, those are great. Being let out 15 mins early was very nice.
- 8Organized Well
- 9Enjoyed the articles and videos that we watched that related to course topics because it gave me a better understanding. A study guide for tests would be helpful and more material on slides. Also could follow textbook readings more closely in lectures.
- 10″I learned so much from this class. This class did a good job of showing me how little I knew. It gave me a lot of important ethical things to think about moving forward in my business career. Something that I would’ve been interested in learning more about is patent law. I think this would’ve been relevant to entrepreneurial business.” — Elizabeth Hara
- 11Clearer instructions on submitting articles
- 12I wish we could have reviewed the textbook materials.
- 13The tests were difficult, a practice Exam would have been helpful.
- 14″The Exam only model is nice because you’re able to study and do work on your own timeline. However, the model doesn’t leave very much room for error besides the participation aspect. If you have any stress or anxiety with exams, it makes this class really difficult and stressful.” — Hannah Gray
- 15Course was structured and organized.
- 16more assignments to make up test grades
- 17″Other opportunities to get points besides exams” — Logan Goldsby18
- None.19 Our grades were comprised of four tests. These tests were very unpredictable and extremely hard to study for. So much of the test was book material and not enough of it was covered in class to be properly learned. I don’t feel it’s fair to have to learn so much of the course outside of the classroom.
- 20″I really like that the only grades are the 4 tests because it eliminates busy work and unnecessary assignments. It has also come to my attention that other BE 325 classes had much different focuses. It seems unfair that it’s not standardized across all the teachers and course times because we have learned a ton about social responsibility and ethics in the workplace while other teachers seemed to focus on introductory law” — Kristin Boone
- 21″Maybe add a short paper for those who don’t test well.” — Nadia Bair
- 22″Tests are very in depth which is fine if thats the goal. It seems like a class like this could be better if it was more conceptual rather than the exact date something happened or the exact article in the constitution that it is pertaining to. I think that is important but for the sake of non-law students it could be beneficial to make sure they actually understand the concepts behind each topic rather than trying to remember what specific thing has to do with that concept. The course should end on a positive note since we talk about so many negative things. For instance he can lecture how he does about the serious problems we are all facing but it would be very nice to see more about what positive things people in the world are doing to help these issues. I think it could be very beneficial because I feel like a lot of students feel hopeless after hearing all the bad things and if they had a little positive reinforcement I believe this class can really make people excited to make a difference.” — Trevor Brand
- 23Clear structure for the layout and grading of the course.
- 24″I like the textbook and I really enjoyed the material in this class.” — Karishma Shah
- 25Other than the textbook dilemma, I really enjoyed this class. I thought the material was very relevant and very applicable to the current events occurring at the moment.
- 26″I did not like the textbook. The textbook was not organized well and jumped round a lot throughout the chapters. I also didnt like that our whole grade was based off of 4 tests. There was no homework or study material and so I felt like sometimes I didnt know what to study, or if I was on the right track. Other than that, I thought the rest of the course was well organized. Excellent syllabus.” — Jennifer Walden
- 27I think a legal perspective would be very beneficial to the class. There were a lot of legal questions asked by the class, and I honestly don’t feel like the were ever answered. Furthermore, there needs to be more tie in with the material presented and the book, because honestly the book material and class material seem very far removed from each other. I see how they tie together, but it can be blended together much better.
- 28The course’s book does not correspond well with what we learn in class and there is a lot of non-useful information in the book, so it is frustrating to have to buy a book that doesn’t relate to the class and waste our money.
- 29″The articles we had to read for class were super interesting and probably my favorite part of the class as well as the movies/videos in lecture. The lectures were short and concise and got straight to the point which was very beneficial. Reading the textbook was probably the worst part of this class because chapters are very lengthy but compared to textbooks in every other business class, this textbook was actually really interesting. At first I thought having only exams going toward my grade would be terrible, but I had improved every exam and they honestly were not bad at all! I really enjoyed the topic of this class.” — Stephanie Huynh
- 30The course needs to be more objective and not a way to mold the thinking of young students to match the viewpoints of UO and Farhad’s socialist ideals. I was offended as a liberal, I am not sure how I would be able to get through the class if I were a conservative.
- Instructor: Malekafzali, Farhad
- Subject: Business Environment
- Catalog & Section: 325 30944
- Enrollment: 30
- Responses Incl Declines: 27
- Declines: 4
Please share with us your thoughts on the course: (34 comments)
Q: Please comment on the instructor’s strengths and areas for possible improvement. |
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| 1 | Maybe include something so that it’s not 4 tests as your whole grade. Professor was able to make class fun with current events. |
| 2 | Very easy to get in contact with outside of class for additional help. Review sessions were extremely helpful. |
| 3 | Very passionate about course material. |
| 4 | “very passionate” — Erik Westerman |
| 5 | -Hard to get a feel for what the tests will be about -Unimportant details showing up on exams -used class time effectively -a 5 minute break would be nice |
| 6 | Great instructor, great guy! |
| 7 | clear with class expectations |
| 8 | His lectures were interesting and helpful for understanding the textbook information better. I do, however think his arguments were far too liberal. |
| 9 | “Great at answering questions about current events. Slightly biased. Throws a lot of information at you but can explain any of it if you ask.” — Duncan Boone |
| 10 | NA |
| 11 | He could be less opinionated |
| 12 | The instructor is good and enthusiastic about the course material but the choice to not put class notes on canvas makes the course very difficult. |
| 13 | It seems like the professor can be very opinionated sometimes. Some of the things we learned seemed like they had less to do with ethics and more to do with liberalism and global warming. |
| 14 | Farhad’s lectures were boring, but it was interesting when he showed videos and we discussed afterwards. |
| 15 | “Instructor includes false information in lectures. Instructor addresses students who question validity of material in an aggressive manner. Instructor belittles students who respectfully disagree with course material. Instructor denigrates students knowledge and professionalism if their contributions are contrary to instructor’s assertions. Instructor is conceited and unwilling to review their claims on course subject matter.” — Troy Sherwood |
| 16 | “The lectures were clear and concise and very effective.” — Nick Miller |
| 17 | Instructor was very knowledgeable and answered any questions the students may have had.
Q: Please comment on the strengths and areas of possible improvement for the course as a whole.1This class is a good one and a necessary one for business students. 2Focused on issues of ethics that are relevant to the business world. 3 Have grades apart from the four tests. 4Possibly more review time 5″strictly tests and no homework is nice” — Erik Westerman 6 Interesting course 7 Great slides 8 The class was interesting, but we were given a lot of work, with not a lot of guidance on how to do well in the class. I’m a straight A student and none of my normal study techniques work for his class. It would be nice if our grade wasn’t solely based on test scores, or if he could give us a study guide for every test. 9.”This course is difficult, but the material is difficult regardless. 4 tests is a lot, perhaps 3 would suffice.” — Duncan Boone 10NA 11 He is is passionate 12 This course is good but maybe adding some homework to offset the test scores would be helpful 13 I like there to be more homework and things out of class. When 100% of the class grade is dependent on tests, it makes students less likely to engage and more likely to cram material before a test, only to forget it soon after. 14The course felt a little disorganized, but the topics we touched on were important. 15More instruction on the Littlefield simulation beforehand would have been helpful. 16″This course was supposed to cover ethics, and business environment. The class took an ENTIRELY negative position on business in general as admitted by the instructor. This course did not address what TO DO, but only what NOT TO DO. Course readings were almost entirely biassed to the instructor’s personally held beliefs, with the exception of an essay by Milton Friedman, which the instructor was sure to twist in an attempt to preemptively reject dissenting opinions. The tests were easy regardless of attendance, since the skew of the material was so large, students could simply guess which answer the instructor would agree with politically. The course teaches various false information that the instructor chooses to base on Wikipedia articles, which he has emailed to the entire class. The course is not designed to inspire ethical business practices, but to paint businesses as universally evil. This course should focus on how to be simultaneously ethical and successful in the business environment, as BA101, and BA352 partially cover.” — Troy Sherwood. 17″The course was well organized and I liked incorporating the articles into class discussions.” — Nick Miller |
Glob/Legal/Soc Env Bus (Winter 2017)
- Instructor: Malekafzali, Farhad
- Subject: Business Environment
- Catalog & Section: 325 21106
- Enrollment: 48
- Responses Incl Declines: 44
- Declines: 16
Please share with us your thoughts on the course: (24 comments)
Q: Please comment on the instructor’s strengths and areas for possible improvement. |
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| 1 | Very passionate with the topics of this course and definitely seems like he loves doing what he does as a professor. I would suggest small breaks or something just cause the class does seem a lot longer than 1 hour and 50 minutes |
| 2 | “Really enjoy the lectures, especially when we would watch the videos and then discuss them. Some of the videos we watched in class I found very eye opening and knowledge.” — Dixon Hinderaker |
| 3 | provides a good outlook on the business and political environment of the US. Could tone it down on the opinions to show a more non-biased stance on issues. |
| 4 | Farhad is passionate about the material he is teaching which is awesome! He is very knowledgeable and presents the material in a way that is engaging and promotes critical thinking. |
| 5 | Farhad knows his stuff and is very up to date on current and past events. Learning from him came natural because of his knowledge of the subject. |
| 6 | Great teaching, uses discussions wisely to engage the class. |
| 7 | Farhad was great at providing levity to tough topics. He is funny and made the notes less dry |
| 8 | “Professor Malekafzali has been my favorite professor within the Lundquist Business School so far. He was entertaining and informative, and was very easy to touch base with after classes about any confusion. He always involved students, and discussed differing ideas and opinions that were brought up. He did a great job of keeping students informed as to what were the important takeaways throughout the course, and was an all around great professor.” — Conor Belzer |
| 9 | “Professor Malekafzali taught a very difficult subject. There was a good amount of discussions in which he tried to get everyone engaged.” — Sofia Velasquez Monney |
| 10 | Extremely organized. We knew exactly what was coming and what materials to study. |
| 11 | The instructor did exceptionally well at presenting his bias as fact and presenting illegitimate statistics as solid proof. I agreed with most of his bias, but using your personal opinion as fact is unprofessional and, ironically, unethical. He also presented statistics, one in particular about deaths related to hospitals, that were simply not true. |
| 12 | “Strengths – personally I very much enjoyed coming to this class everyday. This was my favorite class this term and one of my favorite classes I’ve taken in the business school. I appreciated Farhad’s willingness to argue common opinions and showing a fair point of view that wasn’t too ‘right’ or ‘left’. I found him to be hilarious and having our best interest at heart. Thank you for this term and I will continue to recommend you to friends.Areas for improvement – I would have appreciated separate study guides for each exam because they got quite confusing with the overlap.” — Megan Danielson |
| 13 | It was a very interesting course and definitely one of my favorites that I have taken here at UO. I felt like I was able to learn a lot that most classes do not expose to students, especially about current issues regarding politics and businesses. |
Q: Please comment on the strengths and areas of possible improvement for the course as a whole. |
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| 1 | The course was broken up into 4 midterms. The amount of material covered, and required readings varied so greatly from midterm to midterm that is caused legitimate panic and concern over what would be tested on for 2 midterms. |
| 2 | provide more insight to the other sides of the issues. Why business and politics work together and do the things they do. |
| 3 | I love the structure of the class with 4 tests making up your grade. Keeps it simple and students know what to expect. |
| 4 | The lectures are very boring, they make me not want to come to class because they are often dry and dull. I suggest more videos and finding other ways to teach than powerpoints. |
| 5 | Good material, good mix of book and lecture on tests. Nice use of real world examples. |
| 6 | This course was nice because it was just 4 tests instead of a lot of busy work. |
| 7 | “I liked how the class worked. It was graded in a way that allowed me to really focus on the present material, and I enjoyed the fact that it was more discussion based than lecture based. In the future, maybe send students home with more videos to watch as to allow for more discussion time during class? That’s about the only suggestion I can think of.” — Conor Belzer |
| 8 | “Strengths – Personally I have never had any classes about politics or many of the topics that we discussed. I learned so much in this course and feel it is incredibly important for business majors to learn what we learned. Especially when it comes to the topics that shed a bad light on the business world, the points of view shared were very valid and I have had a lot of takeaways from this course.
Areas for improvement – I felt it was more of a law class so maybe the course title should be changed? That would be my only recommendation.” — Megan Danielson |
| 9 | “I found myself having to learn more about what the opinion of the professor was more than learning more about the ethics and the different laws associated with business. I wasn’t expecting it to be too opinionated and I feel like my grade took a blow because of it. I’d suggest for the class setup to be a bit more “terms” and “laws” based than just opinions.” — Sofia Velasquez Monney |
| 10 | It would be more helpful if we got some sort of study guide or even a brief, 5 minute review of what was going to be on an exam of the main topics. I am aware that everything is fair game on the test, but sometimes I felt like I studied a part of the textbook that was not even mentioned once on the exam. |
| 11 | Overall teaching of materials. More interactions, more activities than just exams to learn the materials. Videos have been benefical. |
Teaching Evaluation Summary (Fall 2016) Comment Summary Instructor: Malekafzali, Farhad Subject: Business Environment Catalog & Section: 325, 10916 Course Title: Glob/Legal/Soc Env Bus Enrollment: 43 Responses Incl Declines: 35 (Declined: 2)
1. Please share with us your thoughts on the course: Please comment on the instructor’s strengths and areas for possible improvement.
“Very well structured curriculum and exams that covered all aspects of class and reading, rewarding students who did all the work. Great discussions and positively provocative content that challenged the norm of complacency. Also covered intricate details of the American legislative system, which I found to be very interesting.” — Marius Becker
Good at providing a different view of business ethics
Passionate
“Professor Malekafzali is a great teacher, he is so excited and knowledgeable about the topics we discussed. He created discussion classes to make the class think and talk about differing view points. I was excited to attend class every day because I knew that it would be interesting.” — Arianna Hashimoto
“Class meetings were very interesting, as I always was excited about coming to class and learning about all of the material that we talked about. I enjoyed the way Professor Malekafzali taught and felt that he was very knowledgeable and cared about each topic we discussed. There was a good mixture of lectures and discussions and I thought the readings and movies we watched in class were exceptional. I have a much better understanding of business law and politics which will help me become a better business woman. It was so great learning all that I did in this course, I really respect Professor Malekafzali and believe he is one of the best professors I have had in the business school. Tests were challenging and fair, and providing a test every couple weeks kept the concepts fresh and I was able to remember them much better than a simple midterm and final test.” — Grace Dolan
“Farhad did a great job capturing the audience. I found it to be very easy to listen to his lectures. I found the content to be extremely interesting and Farhad did a good job conveying these topics.” — Tyler Packard
This instructor is very enthusiastic, he is very good on connecting the material with contemporary events, great teaching style.
“The class meetings were both productive and interesting. There was a good balance of lectures, discussions, and educational videos. Both the educational videos and readings were useful and interesting. I particularly enjoyed the article on how much the average American family pays in subsidies. In addition, both the short and longer class videos enhanced my learning experience and were very well tied in with the themes of the course. Professor Malekafzali was enthusiastic in his lectures and knowledgeable about the themes of the course. This helped greatly when learning about more of the boring subjects. I believe he also taught the course objectively, which can be difficult to do with some of the themes of the course. I also enjoyed his short anecdotes relating to the material during lecture and his small jokes about himself, which I believe kept the class lively. All in all, I enjoyed this class and the professor, and feel I have learned material that is relevant to life beyond college. And I am grateful for that.” — Martha Gehrig
Farhad has genuine passion for ethics in business. He generates compelling arguments and demonstrates those arguments in lectures.
Farhad allows his political bias to determine the content of the course. Readings assignments often consist of opinion pieces written by obvious proponents of certain political agendas. While this seems particularly disingenuous, I hope it is simply negligent.
Strength- engaging the class Farhad did a good job connecting topics to current issues. It was often hard to understand him.
“Farhad is obviously quite passionate about the subject, which is great. It was easy to get involved in class because he brought great energy about the topic. He structures the class very well, too, as he offers a good range of PowerPoint, videos, and class discussions. I always felt pretty engaged in class, especially for a 4:00. There were days when I was rather sleepy, but he would put on a (quite relevant) clip from the Daily Show and it would wake me up, which was great. Overall I think he did a great job of examining the material in a thorough and thought-provoking way. There were students who claimed he “leaned left” and was “ultra liberal.” I thought this was fairly ridiculous. Sure, there were a few times that politics were brought up and it sounded like he was somewhat liberal, but he would always preface this by saying “this is just my opinion, not anything you will be tested on,” which was fair. I think many students interpreted some facts as opinions – such as global warming or the fact that minorities are discriminated against. This is the own students’ fault, not the professor’s. He also was very good in asking the class frequently if what he went over was clear or not and welcomed all types of input.” – – Timmy Thomas
“Farhad was very enthusiastic about this course, and I like him as an instructor. He tied in what we were learning with what was happening in the real world. I thought his lectures were enjoyable, but I do think that he could work on teaching with less personal emotion and more focused on the subject at hand. I thought he included a lot of great videos that made the lectures more appealing to be at as well.” — Matt Leitch
“The instructor was very well organized, had great knowledge of the material, and was engaging with the students. The class meetings were interesting, especially when there was a mix of videos in the lecture. If there were no videos, some of the lectures seem to go pretty long. If the videos went long, I wish the instructor could pause it once or twice in 20-minute increments and discuss what we have watched so far. I loved the discussion part of the class where students can identify the clearest and muddiest parts of the lecture. The readings were fairly interesting; however, some of them were very text heavy and difficult to understand. For example, I had a hard time grasping the one about Elizabeth Warren and her ties to health care. The instructor’s personality is very engaging and likable. Although, some of the lectures or videos were a bit too liberal for my liking. I wish there were more videos that were “middle of the road.”” — Andrew Karcher
“He is good at lecturing. I would recommend not having every lecture about how business sucks and we need to government to intervene with everything.” — John Belz
More discussions. Lectures, while intriguing, could get mundane after so many in succession. Videos were interesting and helpful.
“Some of Professor Malekafzali’s strengths were that he was very knowledgeable. It was easy to follow his instruction during class, and he organized his course in a very straightforward manner. I appreciated how he wrote the topics to be discussed on the board and how he would welcome clarification questions in the middle of the lecture.” — Carolyn Taclas
“I Think it would be interesting to compare the sucess of students in this class based upon their political standing entering the term. Some would argue there is a leftward bias to this class which I would agree with, but i do not find that a problem, just needs to be acknowledged as such.” — Karl Bedal
He definitely knew what he was talking about and is passionate about the subject.
Professor Malekafzali is one of my favorite professors in the business school because he is incredibly passionate and knowledgeable about the subjects we talk about in class and really make us think. I am excited to go to BE 325 every Tuesdayand Thursday because I love the material we cover and his teaching of it. He is an excellent professor and I have really enjoyed taking this class with him.
2. Please comment on the strengths and areas of possible improvement for the course as a whole.
“On every exam there were generally one or two (of 50) questions that were worded a little vaguely or in an unclear manner, making it difficult to reach 50/50 points.” — Marius Becker
The in class discussion, articles, and videos were all interesting and very relevant.
Too opinionated in lecture sometimes
“Professor Malekafzali’s lectures were all very interesting and well structured. This topic is a very interesting one and I wish we had more like it.” — Arianna Hashimoto
“N/A” — Grace Dolan
“It is always an interesting decision to make a course grade weighed solely on exams. I did not mind this method, but I can see how some individuals may strongly disagree with this option.” — Tyler Packard
This class is critical for business students.
The structure of the class should be reorganized. There should be more ways to evaluate students’ performance other than 4 multiple choice exams. For someone who struggles with test anxiety, it was very challenging to succeed in this class. Not all students learn the same way and thus there should be numerous ways to check their understanding of subjects.
“I think the course was a really good blend of issues very relevant to business. I liked that we looked at specific issues such as fraud, corruption, and scams, but also looked at general issues such as racism/sexism/environmental issues. This class was extremely relevant, and I’m really glad that business majors are required to take such a class that focuses on such relevant issues. I think it’s easy for business majors to get caught up in the numbers or professionalism and forget about many real societal issues that are important to ALL people” — Timmy Thomas
“The class really isn’t a huge work load, as it is purely based off of 4 tests throughout the term. I think I would have like to have had some graded assignments or worksheets on the videos we viewed in class, or just something graded each week to keep us heavily involved in the course. The pressure of taking 4 tests (25% of the final grade each) definitely got to me as I feel like I got a little nervous for each test and under performed, especially on the first test which was my worst score. Also, I felt like the tests were a little opinionated which was hard to answer with multiple choice questions. Other than that, the class was laid out very nicely and efficiently and I thoroughly enjoyed taking this course with Farhad.” — Matt Leitch
“The course really teaches you how businesses run in America and how they interact with the world. I loved learning how businesses and government interact with each other, and feel as though I have an understanding of it now. The course should not be based solely on four exams. Rather, there should be quizzes and/or homework throughout the term that count for points.” — Andrew Karcher
“Everyone in the class is in the business school and the entire class was about how business sucks. The professor was concerned that people had described the class as being super liberal, which it is. I do not think we spent any time talking about business that had good business ethics.” — John Belz
Difficult to understand what kind of questions will be on the exam. Study guide would be useful, even simply a list of topics to know.
“Some strengths of the course was the use of class time, the different mix of lectures, videos and discussions. I felt like the lecture discussions (not video discusssions) could’ve been more structured, maybe a set of questions instead of one on the syllabus would be nice. I liked the shorter videos, and would recommend for future courses that the shorter videos be peppered in the lecture as opposed to one longer video for a chapter. There was a lot of information in the longer videos that sometimes it was hard to watch the video, identify what question it properly answered, then write it down. I would recommend that if the Professor were to do long videos, he would find some with a cutoff time of 10 minutes and also pass out the discussion questions with ample spacing below each question.” — Carolyn Taclas
The class was well organized and the videos helped with understanding certain topics and learning something new “He did a great job of bringing in relevant outside information, and personal narratives that contributed to the overall learning process” — Brandon Dumas
Teaching Evaluation Summary (Summer 2016) Comment Summary
Instructor: Malekafzali, Farhad Subject: Business Environment 325, 40305
Course Title: Glob/Legal/Soc Env Bus Enrollment: 68 Responses Incl Declines: 44 (Declined: 5)
1. Please share with us your thoughts on the course: Please comment on the instructor’s strengths and areas for possible improvement.
The instructor was direct during lecture.
“His power point slides only have 5 words at most. If you don’t attend class and write down everything he says, you will do poorly on the tests. First test is tought but once you figure out his teaching technique, you improve. I really enjoyed his teaching methods. Plus, he’s a funny dude. Class is always laughing.” — Trevor James
“He is a good teacher that keeps the class engaged.” — Jacob Stranahan
Very knowledgeable and willing to help. Very informative and enthusiastic of the material. Really cared about the students understanding the material.
He is a very intelligent professor and the course is organized very well. Overall a great teacher and pretty funny which is always a positive.
“I thought that the professor did an excellent job with the lecturing of the course. He effectively concentrated on important points.” — Hayden Rear
“He is really knowledgeable and gives us lots of resources to learn from” — Hailey DeBoer
Good use of videos in class. <br/> Clear illustration Lectures were on point, lots of information crammed into a short amount of time. Covered a lot of current ethical issues in our society.
“well organized. Farhad went out of his way to stay objective. he didn’t influence student opinion. I felt Farhad had received a reputation in which he doesn’t deserve. I had a couple of his previous students in another course and they weren’t very positive about their experience. I truly believe he is the right man for the job and does a fantastic job.” — Brandon Palmer
“Engaging lectures and clear expectations.<br/>Test questions occasionally worded to particular viewpoints rather than being open to philosophical differences.” — Peter Anderson reading
materials are interesting and helpful
2. Please comment on the strengths and areas of possible improvement for the course as a whole.
The organization of the class was great, but class discussion should have been in small groups. It would have allowed more students to get participation points. The tests also had some material on them that we had not learned yet.
“Being a four week course, the challenge on staying on top of the work was high. Yet, I really enjoyed it. Having an exam every week was intense but made you focus and kept me in line. Great class.” — Trevor James
“Study guides for the exams so we know what to prepare for.” — Jacob Stranahan
The articles were very interesting, as well as most of the videos. I am not sure if the class is usually 100% tests but I personally did not like that. So far I have done good on the tests so it hasn’t affected me negatively but if there was some sort of research project for this class I think that would be a good improvement. A research project would be a great way to bring the real world into this class even more and not make the class boring.
“The strengths of this course are effective lecturing and concentration on important points. He made us think critically about ethical issues in business today. Any inadaquacies in this course were due to the increased pace of the course.” — Hayden Rear
“Really important class, just depressing because it feels we can’t do anything to change who gets a real say when it comes to law making” — Hailey DeBoer
With so many politics in our current world, it’s hard to discuss these issues without exhibiting bias towards one side or the other. He attempts to do this although occasionally let his personal opinions make his way into the topics and lecture.
I thought it was all done well. No real criticisms. There was very little class time to work with and this seemed the most efficient route to accomplish the course goals. “not really. the subject matter is infuriating but it was delivered well.” — Brandon Palmer
“None. Excellent structure given the constraint on time.” — Peter Anderson
it is so hard for international students to take this course in summer. so many readings even though I read the textbook more than three times but I still could not get an average score in the exams. I hope this course could be graded fairly not only the exam scores.
Thank you for a wonderful term, I truly enjoyed attending your class and listening and learning from your lectures. Over the term, I found myself shocked about the way corporations are such a
huge factor in US politics, the government and even the world and Lunfortunately how most of them use their power only for the betterment of shareholders not stakeholders, so thank you for really opening my
eyes on those important issues that many Americans are unaware of.