Just want to get this off my chest... I knew this class was going to be a lot of work going into the semester, but I genuinely feel like all the changes they're making to this class are turning it into the worst class experience I've ever had at Berkeley. Instead of 1.5 hour midterms, we have three 3 hour midterms. Not only that, but they unveiled an entirely new homework literally 1 month before the end of the semester, with an Ed post titled "Schedule and Deadline Changes," like they were trying to sneak it past us or something. It's not a trivial homework, either; we literally have to read through a sixteen page paper before even starting?? When people reacted badly to this (and rightfully so!) they justified it by saying that this homework's been in development for a long time. Okay, then maybe put it under development for a few more months and release it next semester?? When the students can know ahead of time that they're going to get six homeworks instead of five before the early drop deadline?? Not to mention, people still hadn't gotten regrades back from the first midterm by that point. Why not put staff hours towards providing students with more clarity on their grades and more feedback, instead of releasing this?? Now we have a midterm the second to last day of class, and a project and an extra homework due the very next week, during RRR week, when we're supposed to be studying for other classes...
Not to mention, there's literally no transparency with grading? We don't get grades back on design docs or projects at all, and there are a few homeworks where I don't know how I was graded; I would've been more okay with this if this had been clearly stated in the syllabus, but I literally don't see it anywhere. Would it not be more productive to give us our grades and feedback on our design docs and project reports, so that we know where to improve for future assignments? I have no idea how I'm doing in this class; I literally just want to pass, and I don't even know if I'm on track to be able to do that.
So many of my interactions with course staff have felt actively antagonistic. When people voice their worries on Ed, they're usually met with passive aggressive comments. At my design doc reviews, my TA has genuinely seemed like they're irritated after having held all their other design doc reviews and has snapped at my group multiple times for not getting an answer quickly enough. I know, personally, how hard it is to be a TA, and how hard it is to be patient with students (I'm course staff myself), but I feel unsupported, unseen, and diminished in this class. One of the semesters I was course staff, my professor gave us a speech where he told us to be mindful of how we interact with students, because the things we say can stick with students for the rest of their lives. Did 162 never get this talk, or..?
I was genuinely so excited to take this class. I had just started using Linux the year prior, I really did want to know how operating systems worked, and I thought I would get to work on some cool stuff! But this entire class has soured the concept as a whole for me, and it's honestly destroyed my mental health for the semester. It seems like they just don't care that students have other classes, research, work, etc. to care about, and they just want students to be dialed in on 162 24/7. Sure, in an ideal world, I'd love to just work on interesting assignments all day. But I have to make rent. I have to pass my other classes.