English And Comparative Literature · Columbia University
She made the workload manageable and gave us time in class to workshop.
Wonderful professor! I had her class in my freshman year and it's still one of my favorite class I've taken at Columbia.
Typical UW workload. However, she gave 0% grading weight on the homework, so I ended up not doing most of it. The essays are a good amount of work for when they are due.
The class was okay; from what I heard, it was a very typical University Writing experience. My section was supposed to be "Contemporary Essays", but Professor Waszak made it into a "Race and Ethnicity" section due to the fact that she had two other sections of "Race and Ethnicity" and just gave us the same texts. What became clear very early on was that in order to get good grades, you had to agree with her personal opinion of anti-assimilation. As long as you wrote about what she spoke about in class and did not disagree with her opinions, she gave good grades.
normal weighting for UW class. Her grading is very accurate: put in the effort, and you will get a good grade. P3 was definitely a much longer essay and required a lot more effort but she extended the final draft deadline for everyone since it was a busy time.
Honestly, I loved the section since I was really interested in race and ethnicities in general. Professor Green Waszak is wonderful-- super understanding and will grant extensions if you ask ahead of time. She made the discussions super interesting and taught us all the fundamental skills needed for university writing. She will also bring snacks for the class during discussions or peer reviews. She also keeps the environment welcoming and accepting. Loved taking UW with her.
We had 4 essays; the 3rd is the worst one since it is a long research paper, but Prof extended the deadlines multiple times. Overall Prof Waszak is very lenient with her deadlines. I would say her grading is fair to lenient; in high school writing was not my strong suit, but I did fair in Waszak's class. I spent a lot of time perfecting my essays in her class, and that was the majority of my work on this class. Honestly, I was never too stressed in UW compared to other students in other sections. I would def recommend this section. Also she brought snacks to get us through. Def take her class.
Prof Waszak's UW Class reminds me more of a high school English class (in a good way). A lot of the class is doing free write activities and discussing with classmates which made the class less scary for my first semester. She will give feedback on your essays in conferences with her. Some of the essays had confusing prompts, but she explained them well. To be honest, I feel like after a few weeks many people stopped doing the required homework readings bc Prof didn't really notice. She understand we had a lot on our plates and it was a particularly tense time with the Israel-Hamas war which was effecting a lot of students personally. Everyone in the class was very supportive of each others writings even if they wrote about something they disagreed about; the course theme was tense (Race and Ethnicity).
Read 10-30 page articles for homework twice per week; write ~250 word responses twice per week; write 4 main essays (with PLENTY of time to edit, revise, and meet with Prof if needed).
Prof Waszak taught the Ethnicity & Race section of UW and consistently brought in exciting readings from Cathy Park Hong to James Baldwin. She came to class with positive energy and enthusiasm, always offering office hours sessions or pointing us in directions to improve our writing through radical revision. the writing center, or consulting with a librarian. Although the class was only 75 minutes it often felt longer because Prof Waszak can tend to talk in circles to ensure we all understand our assignments perfectly. Most people in my class began the year engages and keen on learning, but by the end everyone around the table was head down and either on their phones in class (like not even hiding them under the table but fully stretched out elbows on the table type deal) or laptops and shopping, reading the news, or playing games. I have to assume Prof Waszak knew they/we were doing this, but she never said anything. She would bring us snacks occassionally and tell us about her family and weekends. I wish she taught other writing courses because she was so kind and empathetic—very willing to give extensions or have leeway in deadlines to emphasize mental health and well-being.