3.4
Quality3.8
Difficulty56%
Would Retake223
Reviews56%
Would Retake
223
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
5
78
4
43
3
38
2
26
1
38
What Students Say
“The guy knows CSC, let's get that out of the way”
SENG265 - 1.0 rating“Overall, bad experience taking this course from him”
CSC115 - 1.0 ratingClass Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
30%
Textbook Required
45%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
B+
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.47 avg changeRatings by Course
SENG265CS
5.0
(1)CSC360330
5.0
(1)CSC33036
5.0
(1)CSC36033
5.0
(1)SENG265CSC370
5.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
30162
5.0
SENG365
5.0
265321360401
5.0
CSC230
4.1
SENG265
4.0
Reviews (223)
No Comments
Extremely helpfull, If you having any problems with the assignments, GO SEE HIM
Fair marker, good assignments.
he has a lot of knowlodge in computer science and he is very nice instructor
He doesn't help student, but he is smart
Good lecturer, very smart
Improved
Cool guy, easy final!
No Comments
Interesting lectures, covers a lot. Nice guy.
Great teacher, lots of helpful notes and a good lecturer. Assignments were good
No Comments
Actually cares whether students understand the material. Awesome guy.
A great teacher who really cares about students.
Excellent prof, you'll ACTUALLY learn in his classes. and he's a really cool guy
Excellent instructor.
Awesome teacher. But challenging midterm and assignments. prepare to work hard !
Very clear and easy to understand... kind of funny... just don't fall asleep!
stop with the slides and just use the chalk board.
Since having a baby, Zastre has become a Dezastre!
Need to be at his level to understand what he is saying
Makes difficult concepts interesting. Knows his stuff. Cares about the student
Awesome prof. Very fair tests. can be lotsa work. great lecturer. clear.
Very clear, fair, and helpful. Best prof I've had so far.
Good teacher, talks above class sometimes.
great teacher, but thinks he is better then students, power has gone to his head
Very capable with material, really good lecturer. Very hard tests and _LONG_ assignments, especially CSC 330. You will learn, but have to work hard 4 it
Excellent Professor. Zastre really knows his material, and is exceptionally helpful in his office hours. Definately tries hard at making his lectures interesting.
His assignments aren't the easiest, nor are his exams, but he seems to be the alpha-geek in the department, and you can learn lots of useful tidbits from him. A very good prof.
No Comments
His assignment and test are hard. But you will learn a lot. He is a great prof.
Very helpful in his office hours, but I think a little overrated. Talks very fast; assumes that students are already familiar with the material before taking the course. Amusing jokes, but takes too many technical asides that go over my head.
The labs are totally insane. You will be notified what program you are to make at the beggining of the lab, and you should finish it in 90 minutes or you get 0 for the lab. For the midterm, you will not get enough time to write. He totally sucks.
he is really hard................but he is good.
assumes you know everything. talks in a very monotone voice....slowly....falling....asleep... anyways, he knows his stuff but needs to realise WE DON'T! why else would we be in the class? labs suck too. need more time and knowledge
he has no ability relate to students. his tests are difficult. which would be fine if he didn't make them so long you needed 5 hours to write the final.
If you intend to become knowledgable in a field, you sometimes need to apply yourself and work hard. Mike Zastre is just the kind of prof you need to take - with him, you feel like you are doing REAL university level work.
Zastre is great but his assignments are long.
He is very helpful, and if he says something that goes over my head, I can interrupt him, get an explanation, and then we carry on. Unlike other very bright profs he never makes me feel stupid. Funny, fair.
Do not take SENG 365 with Zastre. His marking schemes don't make sense. Other professors will require you to do much less work.
took seng 265 and csc 370 w/ him last year. assignments are very time consuming, but not overly difficult and very helpul in learning the material. tests are tough tho. still, highly recmomended.
well, what can I say about him? This is like my 4th course with him (believe or not, I've been trying to avoid him but it almost seems like he purposely choose to teach these courses lol). His asses are insanely difficult but at the same time he is he
No Comments
He was an exellent prof for csc370 as he explained everyhting in a clear consice manor. The course assignements for seng 265 were a little to long for a course I took in my first year. All in all though one of my favorite profs I've had so far.
Very knowledgeable about modern computing topics and a very good teacher (hard tests though, yow). If you're interested in the course material you will appreciate his teaching style and practical knowledge; if you're not interested or otherwise not very smart he probably won't cut you any slack.
Mike is a great teacher, if you want to actually learn something then take a class with him. For everyone who says that he's too hard, you should go back to highschool. We're here to learn, and Mike forces you to do that!
Great professor, will teach you alot. He is a really nice guy who knows his stuff and isn't condescending like other profs (*cough cough* derek church!). His assignments are kinda boring, but his midterm was great, just do a lot of practice exams.
dizastre.
Dr Zastre is a great professor. His slides/lectures are clear and concise(albeit a tad boring)(hard to make the topic interesting in a lecture). The labs are rediculously time consuming for a beginner like me, but I feel like a Perl and Unix pro after 2 (and ~40 hours). As said in another comment, we're here to learn. Suck it up and do the work.
Best prof I've had at Uvic. Zastre and Nigel H. know their stuff. Try to get in their classes. Zastre is very clear. Nigel has mastery of the material.
Very clear lecturer, and the assignments were long enough that they actually taught you what it's like to work on a big project. HIGHLY reccomended.
he speaks too fast sometime and students could not follow.
This professor is a very decent one. His assignments are always helpful, he explains the material very well. Probably one of the best profs I've ever met.
He teaches well, his lectures were rather boring at times but at least he was clear and thorough. Plus his assignments were very useful without being too difficult, and his tests were easy.
This class was pretty easy, but Zastre made it interesting. Really tries to encourage debate. He's knowledgeable and seems actually interested in his courses unlike a lot of profs. Highly recommend!
SENG 401 is a very subjective course. Get on Zastre's good side and show some effort and you'll have an easy A.
One of the best profs in Comp Sci. His assignments are long but cover the course material that you need to know and that shows up on the midterm. He is one of the few profs who is empatheic to students with regards to assignment submissions. His projects are pretty heavy on coding, so watch out for that. Overall, he is def. a good prof to have.
Very good teacher. Brings a lot of personality to the lectures. Easy to follow. Midterms and final can be a little tough, but overall great prof.
Excellent prof. Kept the class aware and engaged despite some dry material, even at 4PM. Takes time explaining material and makes sure everyone understands. Posts his slides. Very approachable!
Zastre is an awesome prof. He teaches concepts very well, and at a very good pace. He makes sure his students know what is going on and is very approachable outside of the classroom. He is a very fair tester and a really cool guy. I highly recommend him.
Great professor. What university classes should be like. Isn't afraid to experiment with different teaching styles. Engaging way of teaching. Not too hard. Really interesting and relevent. Take his classes! Favorite csc prof.
He expects you to understand all of the material and any background material he lectures on, if you don't, then you're stupid. Assignments are ridiculously long and marking scheme is terrible unless you get 100%. Don't take his classes if you're taking more than 3 classes. He's full of himself. Not recommended.
Assumes you know more than you know. Uses terms/acronyms without explaining them. Some assignments are really easy while others are ridiculously hard. Very unfair marking on tests. Overall, poor experience.
I enjoy they class, exceot some parts of the tests...The thing I didnt like, was that the assignments were all 100% coding, (They were a good difficultly level IMO), but then he asks rediculously indepth and specific questions about something he mentioned in class for 10 seconds. I just wish he would have given us knowlege questions on assignments!
Zastre is a smart guy, but he acts a bit stuck up. He expects students to know more about the material than what he teaches, which means you'll have to figure out a lot without any help. Also, do not be critical of Zastre-it is best to suck up and agree with everything Zastre says or your grade will suffer. He leaves room for subjective grading. :(
This course was weird. Dr. Zastre is a good lecturer, and explains most things well. His assignments were either too hard or too easy. Midterm was ridiculously hard and final was too easy. Plenty of people went into the final wondering if they would fail and came out alive with a B/B+. Clearly, work throughout term did not represent final grade.
Very good lectures. Explains concepts thoroughly. Enjoyed the material and the projects. However, the midterm was insanely brutal; he taught material full speed ahead until the last class and spent 15 minutes in the last class talking about the final. I'm not sure yet if I passed. I plan to avoid his classes for the rest of my degree.
He tends to expect you to know more than he teaches and asks questions about things he only mentioned for 10 seconds in lecture. He only gives full marks on the assignments if you do something extra that he didn't ask for(this can be whatever you want) which is kind of silly. He tends just stand there and read out the slides as well
It is impossible to pay attention in this class. He just stands there and reads the slides which really, really does not work for such a boring course. Also, the midterm was very hard. No one knew what to expect because there are no assignments(just one big project done in the labs). Overall, this course sucked.
Zastre was a good prof. He explained the concepts fairly well, and anything that I didn't understand was usually explained pretty well in the lab section. I did find it hard sometimes to pay attention during the lectures, but that was probably more due to the fact that I wasn't always interested in the material. Overall a good prof.
Very good teacher. Explains concepts clearly and takes the time to make sure you understand (hint: ask questions). THAT SAID, when you are given his programming assignments, start on them THAT DAY and work on them EVERY DAY. The assignments will be long and intense, particularly the C ones, and you may not have too much time to complete them.
He is really entertaining and though he only uses slides, we dont need to take lots of notes.
Fantastic prof, approachable and helpful if you have any questions about the assignments. His lectures are quite interesting if you care about the material. That said, his marking scheme for tests is absolutely abysmal - the man does NOT believe in part marks, and the class average reflects this. Other than that, though, he's great.
Maybe a great computer scientist. Not so good at teaching. like the other says. assume you know the material. talk about something important for 10 seconds. Really bad at grading, giving exam. thats why average grade is low.
His lecture slides don't offer any insight or context, while his lectures seem to avoid simple explanations (Will spent 10 minutes talking about something without explaining it properly, a quick google search explains it perfectly in 2 sentences), assignments are excessively hard.
Zastre always makes courses harder than they need to be. Assignments are long and marked on a arbitrary scale. Tests for this class were very concept based, the questions were vague but were marked very specifically. Crams way to much info into lectures and expects you to retain all of it in detail. Lecture slides were OK.
Not a very good teacher and get's his examples wrong.
He really knows his stuff, but he assumes that you already know what he is talking about. His midterms are next to impossible with most of the class failing (average of 50%). He doesn't give enough time for the assingments and does not give you an A even if you complete all the assignment requirements, you must do "extra" for an A. Avoid him...
He knows his stuff, but doesn't teach it effectively. Grading is extremely harsh. If you want an 'A' on an assignment, not only must you complete all the assignment specifications (Which are tough enough as it is), but you must also add extra things, otherwise you will receive a 'B'.
Knowledgeable, but no good at teaching. Lectures have so much info, and he will test on a subset of small details. Preparing for his tests is impossible, you have to know all the details. Low averages. Harsh marking scheme. Huge expectations. Can't please this guy.
Assignments were graded without feedback and class discussion was rushed. Ran out of time for filesystems but still tested heavily on it for the final. Entertaining and enthusiastic, but has a reputation for deliberately making students' lives hell. Midterms are concept-based; read the textbook and you will do well on them.
Zastre is a a very smart guy that much is clear. However, he assumes too much prior programming knowledge out of his students. Midterm wasn't bad, assignments are DIFFICULT especially the last one and the final... let's just say I'm still trying to "walk it off". The final tested on some very small details out of his ~600 slides.
He really knows about the subject, but... 1-The subject is huge, and it is impossible to cover all the subject. The problem was that he tried to cover so much detail, and it makes things pretty hard.2- Difficult assignments, and if you do everything as the specification, you only have a B because you need do extra. 3 -Hard e conceptual tests.
I actually disagree with a lot of the comments, I don't think he's very knowledgeable about operating systems. Lots of times he gives examples that are wrong, for example if he's trying to teach a definition he makes a mistake and by reading the textbook this becomes clear. Still he does sound clever.
Nice guy but not very helpful when it comes to explaining things.
Zastre is really nice and funny to have as a prof. But like everyone is saying, his tests are not easy, and neither are the assignments. He assigns them before we've learned all the material we need to do them and still expects us to have them done with so little time. Final was ridiculously hard and specific. Studied everything for days, got 50%.
Very knowledgeable guy but his lectures were so boring. I agree with everyone that his tests were hard but isn't that how its supposed to be? Aside from his monotone voice, the only thing that I found especially annoying was that a lot of the questions on his test were trivia which he would go over VERY briefly in class. Otherwise, good prof.
He followed the textbook religiously; I found that his slides and explanations were taken directly out of the book. The assignments were easy if you know C, but the marker made a lot of careless mistakes and took out marks for things she didn't understand; Mike was unhelpful and unsympathetic about this.
Easy tests/assignments. makes you do "Extra" for full marks, who knows what that means? Expect 80% on assignments if you do everything perfectly. Doesn't Answer Emails. Doesn't care about his students. Actually I don't know what he really does at all. 110 made me more interested in csc, but less likely to take another course from the uvic csc dept
The CSC dept needs more teachers like him and less incompetent ones. He might be tough but you will for sure learn his topics.
Decent lectures and powerpoint slides, but he was not very helpful if you had a question or problem with an assignment. And doing an assignment perfectly would get you 80%.
Very poor teaching method. Try to make himself look good by studering and sounding complicated.
I agree with the comments about his poor teaching style, unfair grading, and making himself look good. He ONLY uses slides, no explanations to go with it. He always complicated concepts. He stutters alot making it hard to follow. Don't take him even if CSC is your life, it is not worth it. I wish people rated him in detail before I took his class.
Consistently talks over students heads (and seems to enjoy doing so), has boring lectures and VERY difficult assignments and tests. He's a fan of m/c questions with a "pick all that apply" format, and believe me they're not easy. I'm an A student and failed the midterm. Do yourself a favour and take this class with a different prof.
Consistently talks over students heads, has boring lectures and VERY difficult assignments and tests. He's a fan of m/c questions with a "pick all that apply" format, and believe me they're not easy. I'm an A student and failed the midterm. Do yourself a favour and take this class with a different prof.
Avoid at all costs. He makes CSC classes and assignments a chore to even the brightest students. I don't understand how he became a teacher. If you are new to CSC, do yourself a favor and don't take your classes with him because your interest will likely diminish.
Zastre is tough for sure. His exams are brutal, his marking is harsh, and he gives an insane amount of work. That said, I think he is the best teacher at UVIC. He teaches a lot of the courses that I think are very important, and I feel that he does them in a manner that will give you a deep understanding if you participate. Knows his stuff.
Assignments are tough, which is fine, but you have to do random extra work to get more than 79% and this is totally subjective. His slides and lectures contain huge amounts of information that isn't well coordinated at all: he lectures non-stop about obscure details that unfortunately don't teach you anything. Random questions on exams..
extremely difficult assignments, difficult tests. Not an Easy-Going at allllllll!!!
Horrible instructor I have not had. Lectures is too boring, basically, he just read, and 90% of students don't know what is going on. Two midterm is very difficult. I would not recommend him to any one. He does know how to be a teacher or professor.
Terrible lecturer, waste of time to go the class normally. His assignment grading criteria will give you a maximum of 80% unless you go above and beyond and complete bonus work. Midterms are fair, slightly hard multiple choice but if you study you will get a decent mark.
Some of the things said before are true. He is a tough marker. Getting the assignments to work only gets you a B. You need a bunch of "extra features" to get the A+. Assignments are not that tough. If you're struggling with them, CSCSENG might not be for you. The midterm was ok (tricky multiple choice questions). Lectures are very informative.
Knows the material well but often talks over students' heads. Very tough grading. Flawless code will get you 80%. Instructions are often unclear or have errors.
The guy knows CSC, let's get that out of the way. His grading and tests are insane. For flawless code, we get 73%. For anything above that, you have to do "bonus work" and even then, you have to go argue your bonus work with him. If he likes it, you might get a B+. Midterm was ridiculous. Same class last semester was 10x easier by different prof.
Zastre is a very good professor. His lecture are full of information, but can be a little boring sometimes. The assignments were rather hard and required a lot of work, but you learned A LOT from them. The midterm was hard, only because of his multi-answer multiple choice with no part marks. Overall a good professor; you learn a lot from him.
If you are a Non-cscSEng student, but required to take csc115, Do Not Take from him, Unless, you like challenging yourself or, you just wanna kill time or, you like 20% lower score or, you like extra work or, you like overloaded material so that you learn A LOT in a 1st year course else,prepare to consume HUGE amount of time
He cant teach. try to not take him if you can
Really important to go to lectures because his notes are useless without hearing what he has to say about them. Hard exams with circle all that apply multiple choice, no part marks. Assignments took 30-40+ hours each and you need to do extra work to get above 79%. Very unclear what is considered and A+. He's tough, half the class dropped mid-way.
lectures are good, grading screwed me over
Extra work, extra reading, extra self-study, all he did was reading through PPT slides. Besides, there are many hidden information which you can't see in those slides without attending his boring lectures. If you are not very top student, never dream of more than 80% on any of assignments.
in midterm2 question 6, he asked "in the usual recursive method(as discussed in lectures)", you can't do such questions without memorization. his information is very disorganized and unclear. bad DICTION and bad grammar makes his language hard to understand. Overall, bad experience taking this course from him.
Quite confusing if you don't know remember the previous classes' or course, then you are almost lost forever. CSC 115 is huge jump from CSC 110.
I say would this course is being handled by a tough instructor. He is very thorough. and I think he is a good teacher for much more advanced and technical courses.
Good but hard. Love the way evaluation is done.
Super easy class, midterms were based all on his slides so you knew to just read them and you would be good. Marking for the assignments were super lenient and often you could resubmit after it had been graded to get marks back.
Zastre is by far the BEST professor I've had. He's tough, that's for sure but WHO CARES!? Life's tough, and this guy prepares you for the industry. His assignments are difficult, but actually enjoyable and really pushes you to grasp everything you can. I learned A LOT in his class. Do a class with him, forget the rest of the comments.
Easy class, easy tests, hard assignments.
Zastre knows what he is doing and I'm sure he is good at it, however he teaches the course how i would expect a 4th year course to be. Very detailed but almost more details on how things work than how to actually use them... Would not recommend if you are not a genius because otherwise expect a B if you put everything you have into it.
Maximum attainable grade for the assignments are 8/10 unless you do bonus, Does not take consideration of student workload.
Zaster is very excellent! His lectures and class slides are really useful because he explains every concept very specifically and the slides include all the information you need. Assignments should have extra work to get 10/10, but you just need to copy a program in later chapter to an extra file. Marking on tests are very fair and easy.
Funny, good speaker, engaging. Explains things very well.
I don't rate professors often but I went on here to rate Zastre. He knows his stuff but his marking schemes are ridiculous and his expectations are frankly stupid. There is no consideration for students out there that take more than three classes. His tests have 'circle all that apply' and long answers that take way too long. Do not take this prof!
Don't take the course with him if you have no prior knowledge with programming. You may think you can get help from friends and do well, but his assignments are hard. Like what people before have said, if you do your assignment perfect you only get 8/10. So, don't stress yourself with this prof and wait for another one.
Unless you already know the course material, you won't get an A. Highest you can get on assignments is a B (if you do everything perfectly, most people had to put in 30+ hours). Exams are difficult with select-all-that-apply m.c. A+ student working my butt off to get a C in his class. I strongly recommend you don't take a class with Mike Zastre :(
Don't bother taking a course with him unless you have lots of coding experience. Grading scheme is ridiculous. Do everything perfectly and you'll get 8/10 max. Also, I found the assignments way too difficult for an intro to java class. Take CSC110 with him if you wanna lower your GPA
Zastre is a very good prof, he explains everything very well and gives many examples for each new concept. There is the whole "8/10" thing on his assignments but you can easily get those 2 marks by reading a chapter ahead and add only a few lines of code (maybe 15-30 minutes tops) to get the extra credit.
First off Mike definitely know's his stuff. However succeeding in his class is a bit too much work for a first year programming class. A perfect assignment, that does all required, will score you 8/10 unless you do unspecified bonus work. I'll admit the midterms are fair, but generally focus on very abstract questions.
take this prof if you wanna lower your gpa
He's a nice guy, but the class itself is fundamentally flawed. You will do no coding, you'll just talk about coding. If you need this, its important to not go to this class, but stay somewhere and code more than you will ever code in your life, or you'll lose your co-op. Its a flunk out operation. Leave class and REALLY study, and read notes online
Mike is someone who really understands what he's doing. However, this does not always equate to good teaching. Lectures are broad and you need to read the textbook in order to understand concepts fully. The mid terms are fair but not a ton of time is given. Assignments are marked very hard. It's advertised as an intro class but I disagree.
Unless you are really into programming, do not take Zastre. He teaches the course well above an introductory level, and the assignments are extremely challenging. He killed whatever interest I had in programming. He may be very knowledgeable, but he seems unwilling to teach the course as an introduction.
Pretty dry lectures, ended up just ditching and learning everything through the textbook. Zastre's assignments take some time and effort, but the labs help out with general concepts and there's a lot of resources. Tests are more than fair if you do your work. I have no prior coding experience and ended up with an A.
zastre is in a word spiteful. its obvious that he hates giving the kind of student he doesn't like a good grade. i managed to do ok but a lot of the stuff i was doing to jump through the hoops didn't help my learning of the subject material. the subject material is quite easy but the assignments take forever
The assignments require 30 more mins to get the extra points. Just skim through the textbook ahead of the lectures and try to incorporate new techniques into your program. If you cant grasp the concept, go to his office hours or ask TAs for help. They will be more than happy to help
I learned a plethora of practical concepts from Zastre in a way that was enjoyable and digestible. His slides are minimal but concise and his commentary was clear and simple. His marking scheme isn't very fair for assignments, ie. he forces you to do extra work to get above 80%, however the assignments are manageable and pretty interesting.
Mike Zastre is my favourite prof at UVic. He really knows what he is talking about and is completely open to questions during lecture and office hours. Do take advantages of his office hours, he can be really helpful. Midterm and final were quite easy if you enjoy programming. I had fun writing the final. Just pay attention to the MP's questions.
Lectures were almost word for word taken from the textbook, so I ended up not going to any and just studying from the book. Assignments are difficult but not impossible, however don't expect more than an 8/10 unless you are a chapter ahead of schedule. Midterms and final had a mix of easy and difficult questions.
His lectures are pretty decent
hard homework but easy test
Do you like writing code or seeing how to implement new concepts?! If so, don't take Zastre. He's what most would call a "diZastre". For those who are new to coding and learn best by seeing profs write code I highly recommend taking someone else as you will sit through boring lectures listening to him read off of a powerpoint.
Great Professor. He is funny, friendly and very helpful at office hours. He put so much effort writing feedback for each student's final paper (5000 words). Midterms were not bad as long as long as you understand the concepts.
Zastre is a really smart guy and knows what he is talking about. Assignments are fair and require a bit of extra work to receive 100%. Midterms are fair as long as you study. Textbook questions and his past final exams are a good way to study, as he takes questions directly from those.
lectures are boring, tests are fair
The professor is on a crusade to root out cheaters. Likely someone in his past life got ahead of him in school by taking shortcuts. Mike invests much of his time to make assignments confusing so it would be difficult to find online resources. Other professors resent him since he does not share solutions with future course professors.
It takes 2 days just to understand what the assignments are asking, his multiple choice questions are nothing short of vicious, and his notes require a great deal of deciphering outside of class. You'll do twice as much work, but you'll grow as a person, and never learn more. If you're serious about your future, choose Mike Zastre
The multiple choice on the tests are rough but manageable. Zastre is a great prof from a learning perspective; after this course I feel like I have a solid foundation in C and Python. Assignments are no joke, but start early and they're doable and are where I did most of my learning. Go to lectures, write his past exams, and you'll be fine.
Mike Zastre is a tough no-nonsense prof who excels at explaining how code works visually at a low level. His lectures are well-paced and clear, his assignments are well-thought out and his exams are fair. I didn't feel like the class was particularly hard, just that it was well taught and covered all the material in good depth. Recommend!
I like this prof. I take SENG265 and CSC230 with Zastre, and the overall experiences are great. Although his assignments are pretty hard, you will learn a lot. The tests are not hard and very fair. One tip: start his assignments right after the assignments are posted, then you will have enough time to seek help from classmates or Zastre.
I'll admit I skipped far more classes than I should have, but one thing I need to mention is how well put together his lecture slides are. I was able to catch up on the material very easily just by reading his in-depth lecture slides, posted online. The labs were terrible but that wasn't his fault. Homework assignments were tough but very fair.
Have done two courses with him until now(in second year right now). Easy to get through if you follow what he says exactly and pay attention in class,
Just want to say, he likes to imply things by giving sort of examples but I don't usually make sense of those as he paces through slides. Hope you do!
Mike is a good lecturer but his slides should be sufficient for the class. Mike only marked one of six assignments when I had him and he gave great feedback on what you could do better even.
Awkward guy but he's a good prof. My first time learning computer science. Lectures are boring. The labs are good but I wish there was less automated marking. I found the tests and assignments to be easy, studied night before and completed assignments in less than a few hours (two weeks to complete). First time course is in Python, but it went well
I took CSC 230 and SENG 265 in the same semester with Zastre. It's undeniable that he has very time-consuming, difficult assignments. However, if you put in the effort the tests will be easy for you. The tests themselves are very fair in terms of difficulty and they're graded fairly as well. Zastre is a good lecturer. Would take again.
Zastre is a great professor. He is hard, so if you want your easy A tough luck. If (you want to learn lots) Take Zastre;
He does not have the most engaging lectures but the overall structure of the course is great.
Dr. Zastre is one of the best professors I've had so far. He is friendly and very knowledgeable about the material. His assignments are hard, he tries to trick you on midterms, but he will greatly improve your skills if you put in the effort. Also, his lecture slides are amazing.
Zastre is a great prof - explains everything clearly, has a good sense of humor, and respects his students. His midterms can be somewhat tough, and grading can take a while but those are really the only downsides of having him as a professor.
Dr. Zastre is a fair, caring, and humorous professor. He puts in a lot of effort to ensure students' understanding of the lecture content; however, his assignments were much more difficult. On the other hand, the exams were straightforward. Students who put in hard work should have a fairly easy time succeeding.
Zastre handled COVID-19 very well. The assignments were A LOT of work... but are worth it because you learn so much (I spent 3-4 nights to finish them). The only exam we did was straightforward. Amazing slides. I took CSC110 with him, now SENG265 too, and I wouldn't hesitate to sign up for another one of his classes.
Dr. Mike Zastre is a solid choice. He has made the transition from on-campus to on-line seamlessly. He adapted the course and made the assignments super fun and engaging. The labs were also very fun and engaging. I loved the assignments and obtained 100% on all of them. The exams were very tough, but overall I think they were fair.
Dr. Mike Zastre made a lot of effort in converting this course into an on-line format. He setup a local development environment and it worked really well. Assignments were very well written and helped me strengthen my knowledge. I obtained an A+ on all assignments. The tests were hard and not always fair...
I'm surprised Zastre doesn't have a higher rating. Brilliant guy, amazing lectures, really knows his stuff. Assignments are tough, but you learn SO MUCH doing them, and he's there to help if you're stuck. He genuinely cares about your success. You gotta put in work, but the amount you learn makes it so worth it. Definitely recommend for any class.
The uvic computer science program would not be what it is without Zastre. You have to put in effort to get a good grade, but he will never leave you high and dry. Great explanations, he's always prepared, makes lecture entertaining. If Zastre teachers the class, better to get him than any other prof as they will most likely use his slides anyway.
Heavy work and hard test.
The assignments are somewhat heavy and difficult , he expects you to have extra knowledge beyond this class , the test is so random the material he tests is practical and hard as hell and he doesnt review before test , he also covers more materials than any other profs. Hes a responsible and excellent teacher but not know how to adjust difficulty
Had him a couple times now. Lectures are great and he's a good guy.
The lectures are kind of boring, he just keeps talking and talking, you have to rewatch the lecture several times to understand the materials. Super hard assignments. The tests are not so hard but must be careful and must understand the lecture.
To be honest, I always scored A or A+ in CSC class. However, until I met him, I just hoped my grade would pass the class because his lectures were super boring, just reading from the slides. But the assignments and tests were super hard. There were some parts that he just touched a bit during lectures. However, the test covered all those parts.
My favourite thing about zastre is how organized he is!!! Everything from lectures/assignments are planned to a T. Ive taken Seng 265 and now csc 360 with him and have only great things to say. In both classes he was well organized and super caring to his students!! Great prof :)
Lectures are him reading slides for an hour plus and going on (somewhat) unrelated tangents frequently, hard to pay attention. Assignments are hard and require clarification due to vague write ups. Good practice though as you won't find material on this course anywhere else. Tests on things only spoken of in lecture weeks prior with no practice.
Zastre is a great prof. This is a difficult course, mostly due to the assignments. Be sure to start them all early, especially assignment 1, as all the assignments build on each other, so getting a good understanding of the first assignment will set you up. Tough class, but having Zastre as your prof makes it easier.
Zastre is super eccentric, in the worst way. Will go on rants and riff off of slides, which have a lot of mistakes, in very tangent and unimportant ways. Won't tell you what will be tested on at all, so test are really only difficult because you have no idea what will be on them. The material itself is pretty cool, but Zastre ruins a lot of the fun
Zastre got a bad rap from kids who were used to open book tests. The midterms were definitely tough with the average pretty consistently hanging around 60%. But for the most part all the material was pretty fair. His lectures were more engaging than most 2nd year csc classes and the assignments and labs were really well designed.
Mike Zastre is a tough prof. Be sure to study tests real hard since assignment and lab exercises are nothing like what's being tested on exams. In addition, he provides very little resources so be sure to google a lot on your own to understand the material.
I would say Zastre did an okay job conveying the material to the students, as the course is conceptually hard, he is definitely knowledgeable and understands the material well. He is organized and good at answering questions, however, the tests are very hard. It seems like he is trying to trick you in the tests. He is not very approachable either.
Mike is just messy and just wants to finish the material without any quality teaching or attention to detail. His teaching style is just reading slides out fast and doesn't provide any insight on what to watch out for or what tricks to use to minimize coding mistakes or misunderstandings of concepts. Tests and assignments are vague and challenging.
Condescending, unapproachable, lectures by reading off slides, super boring and dry. Tests are insane. Class average is regularly around 60 or lower. Theres writing challenging exams, and then theres making it hard to do well on purpose. Assignments are very demanding. This class couldve been really fun, but Zastre butchers it. Avoid at all costs.
Even though Mike is knowledgeable, he does not know and want to adjust the difficulty of the course. The tests are tested for memorization and are not nothing like questions from labs and assignments. He gets mad when students ask questions about midterm which makes you confused about the course. Try to take this course with another prof.
He has taught this course incoherently, with tests being nothing like assignments. Thinks a mid 50% is a good class average for midterms, and there are few resources to study with. He also failed to provide info on what the final would be like, as well as the midterms. This class is brutal, and if you can avoid taking any class with him, do so.
Go to his lectures, it's really that simple and you'll be fine.
Genuinely stunned by how incoherent this class was, while Zastre is clearly a very knowledgable person his teaching style is very strange and inflexible, his assignments are really difficult, his uninformative slides, lacklustre teaching, and really unapproachable manner made this class terrible, if you want to learn basic python go elsewhere.
CSC 230 is a challenging course with Mike because his slides are convoluted. He doesn't provide extra resources and recorded videos for students and the tests are conceptually hard. If you want to do well in his class, make sure you google a lot on your own and look at his past exams. Try taking this course with someone else.
He expects to know a lot of prior knowledge of coding even though this is supposed to have some introductory levels. When going through the slides he generally goes too quick and doesn't make it easy for us to understand.
This is a hard course and Mike makes it unnecessarily harder. Average of the midterms was in the low 50 and the questions are just unfamiliar. Doesn't provide resources for you so you have to work real hard. If you are someone looking to have easier time with 360 take this course with someone else
I don't doubt Dr. Zastre's expertise in the content he teaches but his style was not effective for me at all. he seemed very unapproachable. if you prefer interactive lectures, I would not recommend. he doesn't have a problem with making it clear if he feels a question asked is dumb. assignment grading is quite harsh.
Super Knowledgeable, very effective at his job. Tough course, but I learned so much from him.
Teaches hard classes but makes them interesting, only had a few strifes with him
My favourite CSC course I've taken. Dr. Zastre is knowledgeable and charismatic, and his lecture slides are dense but clear. Assignments are very difficult yet oddly satisfying. I believe his ratings are low because his sarcasm can come across as condescending, but I don't feel this is his intent. Unfortunately, he does not provide practice tests.
Dr. Zastre is a great professor, who pushes you to do well. Assignments were tough and time-consuming, but I learned a LOT. Slides are extremely thorough and can seem confusing at first, but once you start to put the pieces together, are incredible and full of information. I enjoyed lectures and appreciated his sense of humor! 10/10
He's a great prof! Assignments were great, midterms were a little challenging and the final was fair. Zastre's slides were the only aspect of this course that I didn't enjoy - they were overloaded with text, making it difficult to extract the crucial details. Don't feel bad if you made some stupid mistakes at the start, you'll still be fine!
Dr. Zastre is very knowledgeable and willing to help but can come off as condescending with his sarcastic attitude. His slides and lectures and very dense and can sometimes be hard to follow/understand. The assignments are very difficult, but you do learn a lot. There are no supplementary exercises/practice material so you go into midterms blind
His lectures and slides are very long and information-dense, which makes them hard to go through, but they are loaded with useful information. The assignments are challenging because you have to impress him with your program, and two, it takes (A LOT) of time to code the solution. At first, the class is confusing, but after a while, it gets better.
The class was tough and the assignments took a very long time but I learned so much. I am thankful to have had Zastre as my prof for 265 because if you want to get through it you will have to become comfortable with the material. And because the assignments take so long you will become comfortable with the material.
Zastre does so many small and annoying things that drive me crazy (please stop using ellipses I'm going to die...). His four assignments were all variations of the same program. He has no midterm study material besides his info-dense slides. And the assignments seemed very difficult for second year. The only good part was a clear grading criteria.
Tough but fair. He's a harsh marker, but he makes his expectations very clear. If you eat shit in one of his courses (like me), you walk away knowing it was mostly your fault. The keys to success in a Zastre-taught course are paying attention during lecture, and doing the assignments.
Contrary to most people I talk to, I really enjoyed Dr. Zastre. He is witty and fun during lectures, and the depth of his knowledge on the subject really shows. His slides are dense, yes, but very well put together. I learned a lot from him and had a great experience in CSC230. I think the only thing that could use work is the exams
Zastre is okay. I found his explanations were often more complex than they needed to be. His slides are too info dense and hard to follow. He does not give any study material for exams at all. This makes it difficult to test your own knowledge and to study for exams. He's knowledgeable but his teaching methods make this course pretty difficult
not sure why zastre's ratings are so controversial, I thought he was a fantastic prof. Brings a great attitude to the classroom and has very detailed slides that he discusses. I was engaged in this class throughout the semester. Really enjoyed the system of asking questions thru the phone during class and overall would 100% reccomend
i loved Zastre he is such a gem. This class is HARD his lectures were very dense but if you attend lectures and ACTIVELY LISTEN he is excellent at explaining concepts. His exams were very fair and focused a lot on the "why" behind material. I honestly learned so much from him, not only the material but how to break down and solve problems
Lectures are pure gold, though sometimes he had a flippant attitude towards students who asked questions that he deemed to be too basic. I learned a lot more in SENG265 with Zastre than my friends did who took it with Hausi. Go to lectures and start the assignments early. Midterms and finals are reused for the most part.
Zastre's lectures are very engaging, and you will learn a lot with him as your prof. I would highly recommend taking Zastre for any course you have, as long as you're ready for difficult assignments and very difficult exams. Overall, if you want to learn and understand a class, take Zastre. If you want a good grade, don't.
A king, his lecture slides were super helpful and informal and he is a funny guy. Definitely still have to work hard to do well in his classes but he makes things a lot less easier!
althought he is the most prepared and organized prof at uvic, he is my least favorite so far bc his lectures are him trying to sound smart and making things 10x more complicated than they actually are
Talks in proverbs half the time, but other than that really cares/respects students.
Overrated. Lectures are just him talking over dense slides trying to sound smart - he works through very few live examples. He is difficult to understand because of his verbose and roundabout answers to simple questions. He can also be quite rude.
His teaching is quite poor, I had to learn the through significant help from outside the course. His midterms and finals are very similar to the years before but, the course is rather difficult for first year course and very strangely laid out. I would not reccomend taking classes with him.
idk why everyone left bad reviews. I recommend to go his office hour!
Zastre's class is tough but rewarding. His lectures are dense, but engage with them and you'll learn a ton. Assignments are challenging, but unstuck ai helps prep for exams. Overall, a great professor who pushes you to excel.
He exaggerates the difficulty of fairly easy concepts then overcomplicates them to the point they become difficult. He seems to know what he is talking about but doesn't react well to what he considers stupid questions. He isn't the worst prof, but I don't get much from his lectures.
He is very knowledgable on the subjects he is teaching, however in my experience extremely difficult to follow what he is trying to explain during lecture. I ended up learning it all on my own because I didn't get much from lectures.
For an introductory Python class I don't know what more you could ask for. Can come off as dry but he's a genuinely nice person. He does have a kind of wordy, convoluted way of talking about even the most basic things. Difficulty depends highly on prior coding experience. Well-organized. Labs are available ahead of time so you can leave right away.
He is good at teaching.
Zastre was genuinely a great professor, hed go over concepts along with practical examples. The pre lecture quizzes and videos were great. some found the quizzes and midterms difficult, but if you understand the concepts they're easy. How you do in the course is determined by how much you put in, everything is there, you just have to use it.
The class is hard in the sense that it is CSC, but I believe he did an amazing job teaching the concepts. Dr Zastre was also great at giving a little extra feedback as long as you're nice! I also loved the little Star Wars references :) Plus he has a great sense of humour which is definitely needed for a CSC degree lmao
it was okay, but i didn't enjoy the course. if you skip a class, there's no clear way to catch up because there isn't a single resource for information like a textbook or notes, which is really annoying. he does q&a every class but he's not good at answering questions. lectures just seemed like a joke to me, the final was poorly organized too.
spends wayyy too much time on the jokes in the menti slides. zastre, answer the questions during lecture and the jokes when you go through and post later. also unhelpful during office hours, and will make you feel stupid if you answer his in-lecture questions wrong. supposed to be able to go into it with no experience but it didn't feel that way
Funny & caring, but makes you look stupid when you ask questions and not very helpful during office hours
Zastre's lectures were for the most part completely useless, I ended up skipping every lecture and teaching myself the entire course. He is very knowledgable on the topics, but overcomplicates the vast majority of the material. The assignments were very time intensive but not overly difficult and the exams were simple if you studied properly.
I understood that he wanted us to use AI tools wisely to help our learning. I found it a really big nuisance and micro-managing that we had to prove our understanding to the TAs via informal lab setups for each assignment. Requiring additional prep time for the informal interviews, and if you fumble youd get a grade less than what you worked for.
I've taken multiple courses with Zastre, and as usual he taught the material effectively and with a good attitude. However, new to this course, he made using AI "mandatory" for assignments to learn how to use it as a tool. Frankly, this idea caused headaches, made assignments trivial, and overall resulted in me not learning as much as I wanted.
Ended up having to basically teach myself the entire course, the lectures were scary and unhelpful and easy to get lost - them saying it is for people completely new to coding is a scam... spent way too long making jokes about the menti questions and making kids feel stupid just for asking questions during class
Zastre is a really strong lecturer. His lectures are interesting and he seems passionate about the content, and he's got good ironic humour to lighten it up. That being said, his class was pretty hard, and the midterm and final definitely require you to have prepared on the all the content.
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