Paul Hertz

I'm gonna start this review by saying Paul is a good guy. He's nice, he tries to keep the material interesting, and seriously is invested in what he's teaching. The lectures are by no means miserable to sit through because of this, however, he does not take attendance and its at 9am 3 times a week, so I found myself skipping a lot. Try not to do this. He knows kids do this and will put a good 4-6 questions on each exam, sometimes more, on stuff he only says in lecture and it can be hard to miss, but if you are invested, it will be obvious to you on the exam. I found the workload to be a little much, he covers 2/3 of the textbook (that comes directly from his mouth) so its an insane amount of reading, but if you spend about an hour or more a day you should be fine-- again, I found it hard to do this and ended up cramming the textbook reading onto weekends, which is quite miserable. The material itself is not hard, its extremely simple plant botany, evolution, Darwin-based stuff that I'm sure you've heard of before in any environmental science/ecology/biology class. It's just A LOT, and because he knows the information isn't incredibly challenging, he will nitpick from the textbook and make the questions on his exams pretty difficult. Definitely pay attention to the little things, even though that can be difficult with the amount of chapters each exam covers. Do well on the mind…

You aren't going to learn very much from the Research Apprenticeship Seminar, and you will get really really bored in seminar. The readings aren't very interesting or thought-provoking or useful, and we spent too much time going over them. Professor Hertz is great in a big lecture like Intro Bio, but in a smaller class setting, he's just not good at keeping the ball rolling. The lab rotation is a good opportunity, but that only takes up one month of the semester. You don't get much say in the type of lab in which you'll work, but avoid Psychology or Physics or anything with vertebrate animals because you won't get to do anything hands-on. However, if you want to do research, you should apply to take it anyway for a few reasons... Point A: If you're in the seminar, you're guaranteed a small stipend if you get an unpaid position in a research lab for the summer. Pending continued funding and all that jazz. Point B: You'll get a few hours of research experience to write about in your applications for those positions, and you may meet someone who can write you a recommendation. Point C: It doesn't take much of your time, at all.

Prof Hertz is a perfect professor for a survey course. This course cannot be phenomenal as it is a massive survey lecture, but Hertz is organised and his exams are no surprises. The questions are tricky but if you make a point to carefully go over the book before the exam, and then his notes, you should have no problem. It is a no surprise course.

I loved his class. He is so organized and has a funny sense of humor. The tests are reflective of the material covered in class, and I like the short papers we write on each section. I took this class Spring 2002.

Professor Hertz is an incredibly knowledgeable guy and I love his love of Anolis lizards. His lectures can get a bit monotonous at times if you aren't self-motivated to pay attention, but he does try to throw in a corny joke every once in a while to get a chuckle from his students. If you've got a strong background in bio, you basically don't have to go to the lectures since he really just goes over what is written in the textbook, but I try to always go just to make sure I've got the main ideas in my head when reading. This class will be a breeze for you if you're great at memorizing and have a good background in bio, but it's a lot of textbook studying. It's really all about the hours you put in. If you spend more time doing the work, you'll do better on the tests. Definitely a tough but manageable class.

If you actually did the readings, it'd be a fair amount, nothing excessive. But you won't do all the readings. During the seminar weeks, you'll spend maybe an hour on average outside of class each week, skimming the readings and writing your blog entries about them. And for a month you'll spend 3 hours a week in a lab rotation. Your grade is mostly determined by just doing the assignments, not by how well you do them.

Professor Hertz is my favorite teacher at all of Columbia and Barnard. He's really organized. This is what people say about him, but that's not what I think is most impressive -- he really *really* cares. He wants you to learn. He thinks the subject matter is exciting, and doesn't look at the details as ways to bog you down, but as ways for you to tune your knowledge keenly. I think he's brilliant. I loved the Intro class so much that I took Vertebrate Evolution simply for the hell of it. Vert Evo is my favorite class I have ever taken with a really reasonable amount of work and reading. There is no way you will leave his class without having learned a ton -- and this knowledge is applicable to dinner conversations and the works :o) Did you know that rabbits eat their own shit? Their digestive tracts are very inefficient. As Prof. Hertz said "Mammals are disgusting." And he smiled. He's a really enjoyable, informative, together, open-minded, and interesting teacher. Go for it. Take this class (or both of the classes I took from him, for that matter). If you're wondering, grading is totally fair. Do what he says, you get an A. Slack off, and your grade goes down proportionally. Duh :o)

I disagree with the previous review. I found Vertebrate Zoology to be a thouroughly enjoyable course. While the three assigned museum trips were a bit time-consuming, I found them helpful and interesting, and a great way to weave an excellent NYC resource into the course. The course is incredibly well-organized; Hertz has obviously been teaching it for a long time and has developed this great lecturing style in which he forms an outline on the board as he lectures, making it really easy to take well-organized notes. Furthermore, his three exams are very straightforward, and you can leave out a question or two in each section, which is good if you blank on a topic. He also has two cool lizards (yes, real lizards) in his office.

Intro to Organismal and Evolutionary Biology is definitely not the class for you if you don't read textbooks. There is a lot of information you are expected to know for each test, but all of it is in the book. I attend his lectures just to get an overview of what I will be reading about so I have a little something to guide my reading, but the lectures are completely unnecessary if you do the reading, as everything he says in class is directly from the book (he wrote the book). The material is super neat though, and it is pretty well organized. Overall a great survey class that isn't too intense as long as you read and make quizlets/flashcards/study guides for all the chapters so you can cram the night before the test. It is especially great that there is no cumulative final anymore, just three unit tests.

Prof. Hertz knows his stuff. He is a very organized lecturer which is very much appreciated when you consider how much material is covered. It's a challenging course, but thorough reading of the assigned chapters will get you a good grade.