Robert Pollack

I landed in Professor Pollack's Frontiers section in Fall 2008 as a freshman and stayed in the section because Prof. Pollack seemed to be a nice guy who brought food to class and ran a laid back section. However, in retrospect not switching out of this section was one of my biggest mistakes at Columbia. Prof. Pollack did not prepare his class for exams; rather, he rambled about any random subject he felt like (irrespective of whether it had to do with the course material) for two hours each week. However, Prof. Pollack's spaciness and general disinterest in teaching the Frontiers curriculum wouldn't have been so problematic had it not been for his completely opaque and frankly arbitrary grading system. He would not reveal how grades were calculated until the end of the semester. At the end of the semester, he revealed that students could only get a maximum grade of 90% unless they wrote the optional "extra credit" paper (which could boost you into the A range) and/or if your final exam was two letter grades higher than your midterm score (if you got a C on the midterm and an A on the final, you got an extra 5% added onto your grade). Although I got an A on the midterm, an A- on the final, 100% on the homeworks, and an A+ on the extra credit paper, I wound up with a B+ in the course... I was one of 16 people in Pollack's two sections to contest my grade (an absurdly high number…

Professor Pollack is a nightmare. Why did they make him the overseer for this course? I really wish they hadn't done such a thing. He is extremely difficult to talk to and hopelessly rude via email. I have tried to contact him and his replies are stern, one-worded and often completely unhelpful. If you try and talk to him about a situation in lab, he retorts back. I realize that he may be an effective teacher for other classes but in my opinion he is old fashioned and extremely unhelpful. As the Columbia connection for this course, he is only succeeding in making it extremely stressful for students to the point where they don't feel like even talking to him about any problem they may have, just because they expect a cold retort. If he doesn't have the time or the concern to handle this class then I would hope he quit this position now rather than waste students' time and injure their interest in research. If you are planning to take Independent research do yourself a favor and chose a fabulous PI so you never have to go through the nightmare of the Pollack. One more thing- don't mix up his name with that of a fish or he'll probably bite your head off. So all in all, he has succeeded in making this class which is generally one of the most interesting in Columbia, one of the most painful. I do not recommend this class because he is hard to get by and while people who have had a…

Whoa. I don't know where all these positive reviews are coming from. DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS if you can at all avoid it! Pollack's lectures are utterly unitelligible and his tests are even worse (I couldn't even understand what he was asking on some of the short answer questions). The only way I got by was remembering some things from my high school bio class. Taking good notes will not help, because 75% of the stuff that comes of Pollack's mouth is convoluted gibberish, and the textbook is so detailed it's hard to pick out the important stuff. This class made me not want to concentrate in EEEB. If you are interested in majoring or concentrating in the department, the only advice I have is to take this class P/F. Good luck!

It's difficult to find words that correctly describe Pollack. "Grandpa", "Thunder Cat", and "Teddy Bear" all come to mind, and "Grandpa Cat-Bear" about sums it up.

It's difficult to find words to correctly describe Pollack. I would venture to say "brilliant" but somehow that term doesn't quite capture him. He is by far the most amazing professor I have had in my four years at Columbia. He is charismatic, patient, and encouraging. Don't let him scare/intimidate you out of the class. Many people drop it because of the fact that he chooses people at random to give presentations. Just go over the readings carefully with special attention to the data. He just wants to see that you put forth effort. If you are wrong, its no big deal and he helps lead you all towards the right answers. I highly suggest taking this class!

This was the best class I have taken during my first semester at Columbia. As many reviews will tell you, lectures are not enough to get your grade. Reading the book is crucial for the exams. Still, I enjoyed the lectures very much, they were really inspirational, don't miss them. Taking extensive notes is not possible and unnecessary. If you don't have background it might be a good idea to read the book ahead in order to grasp the lectures in all their beauty .

This course is co-taught by Pollack and Joe Loizzo. I agree with the below review, Pollack's lectures were good and clear, however, he wasn't really interested in student input (although on the first day, he made it sound like he was excited about the diversity of student backgrounds and potential discussion - don't be misled!). He and Loizzo just wanted to argue with each other in front of an audience. The course is mainly philosophical and religious texts. I was hoping it would explore the political and social clashes of science and religion throughout history, but there is pretty much NONE of this. If you want to study this sort of stuff, don't take this course. If you like philosophical and religious debate about huge questions such as "What is the nature of consciousness?" and "Is there life after death?" you will probably love it.

Pollack in general is a pretty cool guy. Taking a seminar with him is mostly him talking and a few people raising questions on parts they didn't understand. I found his seminar interaction overall not too bad, and he even brought us food every class. The problem with his seminar however is the fact that his grading is extremely subjective and on average quite difficult. From he beginning of class he tells you that 60% of the grade is tests and the other 40% is something subjective. He doesn't even tell you what exactly it consists of, but one can probably guess its some combination of participation and just what he thinks about you. He even tells you to "not worry about it". I personally scored a high 80 (with the average being a high 70) on the midterm and over 90 on the final (I asked at the end of the semester), did all my hw, attended all the lectures, and even wrote the "extra credit" paper, and ended up under an A-. I personally asked him what the grading distribution looked like at the end of the semester and he told me only two people out of a class of around 20 managed to score in the A range and B+ is "well above the mean". I think this class is fine in terms of having a knowledgeable professor but the 40% subjective grading can really be a wildcard. Just be warned that grading is tough.

Initial proposal, Progress report, Paper, etc. largely for administrative purposes. He has all these rules about when the paper is due and the deadline but gives hopeless feedback so I wonder if it even matters? I didn't even get a remark on my paper.

There was so much information and detail to learn in such a short amount of time, I think there could have been twice as many lectures with the same amount of material and that would have been fine. He is a nice, smart guy who really wants to explain everything as clearly as possible to you. He just wants you to know an insane amount. I had taken advanced biology and chemistry before, and it was still a lot. There were a lot of lectures rescheduled for the optional recitation time, which sucked because since recitation wasn't required I hadn't known about it and I had a conflict and couldn't go. Definitely go to every lecture - that is your best bet. I felt impossibly lost whenever I missed a lecture because so much was covered. Go to lecture, sit down, shut up, and write notes as fast as you can. I ended up missing a lot because I was still writing the previous thing down. Having a legible shorthand will help you. GO to recitation to ask the questions you didn't get a chance to ask in class. He will pause occasionally to look for raised hands, but take that opportunity because he can go 30 minutes without looking at the class or pausing for breath. It was an OK class, but I am still reeling from the shock of so much information. An enzyme he mentions once in passing will probably be on the test. Write it down.