Reviews of professor Simo Makiharju

Rating: 1.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
very vague, class is totally random, very time consuming and confusing. Advanced Matlab skills are needed to complete all homework, lab report etc. but no one teaches how to code.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 2.0/5
Professor Makiharju was one of the best professors I've had at Cal, and really made me enjoy the subject matter. He was very accessible outside of class and turned a hard class into something manageable and enjoyable. Aside from that, he is extremely caring and heavily values student feedback. I would absolutely recommend taking 106 with him

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
This was a wonderful class to take with Prof Makiharju. The classes and lectures are well structured and will save you time when it comes to doing the HW. Office hours are very helpful if you are stuck (most people get stuck). Watch out for the reports-many people received low marks because the grading criteria wasn't clear in the beginning.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Lectures were unengaging powerpoints, although he is very knowledgeable and helpful. Really only need to reference the powerpoints to complete assignments. Group labs with the microkits were good. Virtual labs were very unengaging and the few homework were pretty difficult. He adapted the class for remote learning and was understanding.

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Great person. He will help you a lot if you are lost in a topic. Assignments are long and graded very harshly - but that reflects to the curve.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Prof Makiharju is very effective, clear, and knowledgeable. Through his lectures he covers many useful techniques & skills that are necessary for industry/research work, and prepare me well to transition from university into the workforce. The lab component and homework assignments are well-designed and thorough, and I learned a lot through them.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 1.0/5
Professor Makiharju is a very caring professor and accessible outside the classroom. His office hour is very effective. I wish I could come to his class more often but his lecture is not quite helpful and tend to be dry. I don't feel I learnt a lot from his ME103 in general.

Rating: 1.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
Awful, expect to learn nothing.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Great professor. Labs were very enjoyable, course content was interesting. Grading was fair and clearly defined, if you try you will do well.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
The GSI's were very helpful in understanding the material. I really liked that the focus was on the labs and not on exams. That being said sometimes the homework and lab expectations were not clearly identified. There was a lot of learning that had to be done individually. Overall it was an extremely useful class and I wish I had taken it earlier.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Simo is my boy! Cool and Chilled A caring person

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 2.0/5
Fair class.