Reviews of professor Derek Aguiar

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
3500 is a HARD class. Derek knows that but he's incredibly reasonable. Reach out to him, he will accommodate you. I was doing so bad early in the semester but I started going to office hours and asking questions. He wants everyone to succeed. Gigachad professor. Also he is a very generous exam grader :D

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
3500 with Aguiar is one of the hardest courses in the undergrad curriculum. He even says that his section is harder than any other sections. But by the time your done you will be an algorithms god. He is also very available in office hours (which you will need) and the final makes up for the midterms.

DON'T TAKE THIS CONCURRENTLY WITH 3100 OR 3666

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
The homework in the latter half of the course was a bit difficult for me, but that is only because I've never taken CS before (and thus, it takes a bit of work to learn, just like any other class). Everything in the first half of the semester was really easy. TONS of extra credit opportunities during lab times -- take advantage of it!

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
There's an online textbook, but it's not that great. So the class is a bit harder if you haven't been introduced to python yet. Overall, not too bad. The course starts pretty easy, but after the midterm, it picks up. There's a curve on both exams and plenty of extra credit for each one.

Rating: 2.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
The homework is insanely hard and the exams are as well. he does not curve the class but has a different system at the end but that sucks because It barely brings your grade up or might not even. he also made a failing grade below a 50 which is the only good thing hes done. also hes easy to reach out too and sometimes is understanding.

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Due to the class set up, we mostly learned from an interactive textbook instead of Derek's lectures. However, it is clear that Derek is very passionate for programming. The workload does become excessive toward the end of the year, but at least you can tell that Derek truly appreciates the subject and wants to see all of his students learn.