John Kender

A lot of people throughout the semester complained that even though the class is called an “Honors Intro” class, they felt like it was not an intro class because what is asked of them is really hard. They took their complaints to Piazza almost every time an assignment was released. Although I personally disagree and think it’s fine as an intro class because it is an HONORS class, I want to point out what the students felt like at the time. So do expect the class to be really challenging. The assignments will take a huge amount of time. It is almost impossible to do them a night before (unless your goal is to only pass). The exams are not particularly easy but they’re not insanely hard either. If you just study the lecture notes and skim the book and assignments you’ll be fine. My only complaint is that sometimes the questions on the exams are vague or open to interpretation but the professor wants a specific answer in mind, and if you don’t write what he wants, then he marks it wrong. However, like other reviewers pointed out, the curve is enormous. A raw final grade in the high seventies will land you an A or A- depending on that year’s curve. He’s also not that intimidating as he seems, but actually very approachable and nice. He always asks for feedback and even gave the class an extension once (don’t push it though).

Terrible class. Half of the lectures are spent reviewing the useless material from the previous lecture. You don't learn anything about actual coding in lecture, just theory that will only be useful on the homework. The bigger problem is that you are given 30-hour assignment with "2-4 weeks" to complete them, but only learn the first half of relevant material the lecture before they are due. The professor doesn't know how to write notes on the whiteboard (you can't understand what he's saying simply by copying him). 1007 is more (tedious and difficult) work than 1004 or Data Structures, but you're learning less. I can't emphasize this enough: TAKE 1004 or DATA STRUCTURES. Professor is not helpful in Piazza either.

this class was awful! class was rough since there's SO much to write, there are no electronic notes available and although professor kender tells an anecdote about writing and speaking clearly during lecture, he quickly started writing incredibly small on the board. the homeworks are killers and the midterm was really hard. LISP is touted as the language of choice for AI, but having it thrown at us in a couple of weeks was just not helpful. i can recognize LISP code, but i can't tell what it means. apparently professor kender is trying to get a LISP course organized that you can take before AI which would probably fix this huge problem.

He makes lectures very interesting and fun. You'll definitely enjoy the class even though the subject matter is rather difficult. I had a great time in this class and I believe that he is one of the best professors in the Computer Science department. The class can be really difficult or moderately difficult, depending on who you have as your Professor.

This review may not speak to the content of 1007 so much as the culture, but I would like to note to incoming students that this class has a surprisingly pre-professional and competitive atmosphere. I remember on the first day, Kender listed a number of languages - Perl, Python, C++, and asked students to raise their hands whenever they heard a language with which they had experience. I immediately felt so lost; I'd signed up for the course knowing just what was required to take it. I was, in fact, prepared for the course. I'd taken AP Java in high school; I'd done well; I for the most part continued that trend in 1007. But there wasn't a moment of this class I didn't spend questioning my abilities or worth as a CS student, even when I did quite well on the assignments. There were a lot of things Kender could have done to abate or eliminate this competitive aspect of the class, but instead he seemed to constantly make choices that worsened it. First of all, he'd post a list of the naked grades (everyone in the class' grades stripped of names) after every assignment. Seems whatever, but he did it in a way that each row would represent a person, and each column their grades on a particular assignment. To me, this seemed like an overabundance of information; Kender could have released the mean and perhaps standard deviation for each assignment, like most CS classes do, and that w…

First of all, W1007 is now Honors Introduction to Computer Science and no longer Object-Oriented Programming and Design in Java. If 1004 and the old OOP course had a baby, this monstrosity of a course would be the result. The course had no target audience. It was excessively basic for some, and impossibly difficult for others. In fact, this was evident from our midterm scores - the curve had two peaks! That said, this was an exceptionally well taught course thanks to Professor Kender. This man can teach. Kender is truly silver (possible gold) nugget worthy. While the content of the course was not the best, (not Kender's fault - he has to comply with the CS department) Kender did an amazing job at teaching it. His lectures were a joy to attend. He is organized and methodical and teaches in the order of the chapters in the book. He has a great sense of humor and tells at least one awesome joke per class. He also gave us lots of cool extra information because this is "an honors class". Also, he has this strange, but fun obsession with the Principle of Least Surprise (PoLS). Don't let Kender's imposing figure scare you. He is a very approachable and reasonable professor who will take the time to help you out. If you're too intimidated to ask him a question in person, there's always the online solution. This course used Piazza which was great since it allowed us to ask questions an…

I didn't like him when I started the class, but I sadly got over it and really enjoyed this. He's a gruff, bitter old man but secretly a pretty nice guy -- lectures are interesting, tangential, and often include lame jokes. Has a lot of experience and generally will not waste your time. Overall, a surprisingly good introduction to the CS department, no matter how he comes off at first.

I have to disagree with the review below me on multiple accounts. First, workload: There are five assignments, a midterm, and a final. For each assignment, we were given at least two weeks if not more. Kender, though as inscrutable as Dumbledore in his answers, will point you in the general right direction through discussion boards, and office hours with the TAs and Kender himself will help you if you're ever feeling totally lost--but to take advantage of this, you MUST start the assignment earlier than the weekend before they're due. They can take up to a whole weekend to do but often much less. They are difficult, but they can be fun and you'll learn something from each one. Second, as for the phrasing of questions, he just likes for you to state the reason behind the answer rather than rote memorization. To reiterate what previous reviews have said, he seems grumpy but he's really a sweet, witty, silver nugget-worthy guy. He's like an m&m with a hard crunchy outer coating but is really just a sweet, melty, softy on the inside. If you really took his exasperation to heart, then do yourself a favor and get over yourself. He's not a kindergarten teacher who will hug you and listen to your feelings but he will go well out of his way to help you as much as he can without straight up giving you the answer. He wants you to oh my god forbid learn something instead of cruising out w…

Kender made my first comp sci class ever a pretty good experience. His dorky computer jokes were a constant source of amusement. He was very organized, everyday going over announcements, assignments, review of the last class, and new material. Asked for feedback regarding the projects and exams so he could try to improve them for future classes. Fell behind every now and then, but shortened the projects if necessary. The course got harder as time went on, but I always found it interesting.

I have no idea why this guy has a silver nugget. He's not a good teacher. At all. He always has a very, very specific answer in mind when he asks questions. In class, this leads to him calling on several people before he hears exactly what he wants to hear. He often gets exasperated at people not saying the right answer immediately. What's important to note is that often the right answer has been said, but he just didn't notice because he was too fixated on having it said exactly how he thinks it should be. That's how it was on the exams as well. Clearly, he thought of the answers before he thought of the questions, and didn't spend much time thinking about how to phrase the questions. They were completely incomprehensible. On the midterm, he even gave us all an extra 8 points because he admitted that one question was so terribly convoluted. On the final, the chalk boards were covered by the end of the exam because of how many changes he made to the directions. I must have lost 20 minutes going back and redoing stuff because he was redefining the questions as we were taking the exam! The work load is enormous in this class. Again, the questions were often ambiguous. If you badgered him on the discussion board, he'd sometimes clarify things. He also didn't check the API before assigning some of the graphics stuff. I must have spent 20+ hours combined trying to work around bugs…