She was one of the worst lecturers I have ever had. Made me dislike physics more than I thought possible. Tries to do the flipped classroom style and utilize group work in a 300 person lecture with apathetic TAs. 0/10 would not take again

Terrible lecturer, clearly tries to do as little actual teaching as possible. If you don't read every word of the textbook, you will not pass because you won't learn anything from her. Assigns a handful of problems each class, she will walk around and complain about people not working but will not offer any help when you ask questions. Just bad.

This class is a joke already, and she conducted every class by discussing something she thought was interesting that had nothing to do with the class material. Tests are copied and pasted from the textbook. She thinks group work is effective in a 100 person lecture and we fill out a silly worksheet every class. Easy A, but you don't learn anything.

Get ready to read the textbook word-for-word and learn everything on your own (that's what she requires you to do)... What's the point of paying thousands of dollars just to do this? Tragic waste of time, money, and what could have been a really interesting course.

I did not enjoy this class at all. It is a flipped classroom, but it is in this awkward middle phase and not effective. I feel I learned nothing in this class because I was overloaded with too many things to learn and the tests were very specific and unfair. Almost every engineer hated this class and wanted a better teacher. Do NOT recommend it.

This course is the worst course I have taken at KU. There were no recorded/zoom lectures that covered concepts. You will never hear from this professor. The amount of homework assignments and readings was overwhelming. The grading system was very confusing. Worst of all, I had no idea what my grade was until the end of the course.

This class was a complete waste of time, there was absolutely no instruction. In every email sent by the professor, she said to email with questions but never gave any valuable feedback. Your grade depends on 6 tests each worth 10 points and there is no partial credit, your answer has to match hers exactly or else it is wrong. Good luck.

overall the structure of the physics classes at KU do not work, I learned nothing and I do not like her tone when she speaks to students.

My experience with Professor Rush was awful, and it felt painfully obvious she was not interested in actually teaching. The only lectures we have access to are ones she recorded multiple years ago, that don't account for changes in curriculum and are never reflected in the homework assignments or quizzes.

TAKE AT COMMUNITY COLLEGE AND TRANSFER THE CREDIT. Weekly quizzes: 5 complex questions, each 20% of the grade. There is no partial credit. Lectures do not cover concepts used on homework, just walkthroughs of vaguely similar physics problems. I should have listened to my brother and all my friends. You will regret taking this class. Be warned.

Avoid at all costs

Professor Rush is not very good at teaching. Her style is horrendous and (in my opinion) doesn't contribute to a very good learning environment. Although attendance is optional, the big idea is to do all of your classwork at home. This class is a gross version of an introduction-to-physics course because of how unthorough her teaching is.

Her class is set up so that she has to do no actual lecturing or grading. Test are online and have 5 questions with no partial credit; if you miss 2 questions off minor mistakes, that's a 60%. It's easy to cheat and get an A, but if you actually want to learn the material, avoid her class at all costs. Take at JCCC or another community college.

Didn't learn

if i could redo it i would take physics over the summer

Sarah doesn't understand not knowing things. Most people don't go to lectures because they accomplish nothing but being confused. The lectures do no help. Weekly quizzes make up most of your grade. You can redo them at least but they get harder as you go.

Physics at KU is one of the worst classes I will ever have the displeasure of experiencing. Grading criteria is unclear and unnecessarily complicated. Told the class that there are "errors" on the formula sheet so how do you expect us to use the formula sheet? Lectures get you nowhere and quizzes are all in person. Don't take this at KU. Please.

the physics department here is horrible and you'll find out why. lectures are always empty except on quiz days because they don't help in the slightest. you're expected to do the majority of learning on your own if you can even figure out what's going on. either take this class somewhere else or switch majors. they need to get their act together.

Rush started in the math department at KU which she will state at least a few times through the semester. In short, she can explain the math part of physics fine, but is very ill suited at explaining the concepts behind the problems. The class just ends up being how to plug numbers into a formula sheet, but the quizzes require knowing the concepts.

Be ready to teach yourself physics. She will teach you absolutely nothing. The "lectures" are just her giving you problems to solve on your own. You have to read the lessons outside of class, and the homework has 3 more layers of complexity than the example problems. There are weekly quizzes that make up your entire grade, and they often have typos

There were errors in one of the exam keys that we brought to her attention, but she told us we were wrong and refused to fix it. We even checked with another physics professor to verify the error. Extremely unhelpful during office hours, got offended when I asked for help on a lecture concept claiming she had taught it sufficiently in the lecture.

This class is awful. When the professors mess up, they just make excuses instead of taking responsibility. This class is easy to fail if you have a couple of bad days on quizzes. It makes no sense why a class is set up to not learn anything.

Rush uses a geometric grading system. To put simply, instead of the average of your assignments being the grade you receive, your unit grades get multiplied and then taken to the nth root. There is no partial credit on anything, and it is all based on quiz grades which can be up to 2 a week in a 50 minute class period.

You are expected to watch lectures before class and in class you go through 2 problems the entire time...then expected to do 10 problems in the same time period for a test. There's 18 multiple choice tests and sometimes the answer isn't even one of the choices. One time the answer key was printed on the test. She should not be a teacher

This is probably the worst professor you will ever have during your college experience. Maybe the worst professor in the midwest. Does terrible job teaching the content of the class. Your grade is determined from the weekly quizzes you have to take. They frequently make mistakes on the quizzes that harm you and they don't own up to their mistakes

She was genuinely the worst professor I have ev

Homework very annoying to do, since its on Canvas and randomized. Its supposed to teach how to do the problem algebraically, but some of the answers are wrong and plugging in all the numbers takes so long that you might as well do the entire problem again. In general, this teacher has no common sense.

This was a nightmare of a class to endure. There were multiple mistakes per lecture it was a flipped classroom. The professor should theoretically help with assignments in class. Whenever questions would be asked, the professor regarded them as if they were ridiculous or illogical questions to be asked. She also would never clarify questions.

Hands down the worst professor I've ever had. Doesn't actually teach physics she just throws equations and concepts at you with no context and then drowns you in homework assignments. Nobody in the class knows what's going on we all just plug and chug.

The worst teacher at KU so far. Doesn't know how to teach at all. Shows a bunch of complicated math to make herself sound smart instead of teaching simple equations that do exist. Doesn't actually teach principles but instead does easy practice problems that are hardly similar to the homework or tests. SHE NEEDS TO BE FIRED ASAP

Terrible

The worst

Terrible teacher

100% the worst experience I've had in my academic career. I've taught Diff EQ to myself and took calc 1&2 during the pandemic and had a much better experience. Dr. Rush's way of "teaching", if you can even call it that, is terrible and the class structure sets you up to fail. Do not take this class at KU if she is the only option.

This professor puts the needs and wellbeing of students last. It seems that teaching the material for this class is not a priority to Sarah, mostly due to the fact that her lectures seem unprepared and are hard to follow. The quizzes cover content we haven't fully covered in class, and require formulas that we are not provided on the formula sheet.

Professor Rush's failed attempt to change the physics department at KU has been an embarrassing failure. This class lacked any form of understandable structure and has set up a class of engineers for failure in the rest of their time at school. She is horribly unprepared and unknowledgeable of the lecture content and shows no understanding at all.

This is the worst professor I have had ever. Her lectures do not use any examples, she just throws up equations and talks about them. Then when it comes to homework you just have to teach yourself everything. We take weekly quizzes that are worth 100 points yet no partial credit is given. So if you miss one question you get a C on the quiz.

I wouldn't wear my seatbelt on my way to this class, in hopes that I would get in a car accident.

Very poor teacher.

She did a really bad job of helping understand the content and this class becomes extremely difficult with this type of teaching.

i really did not enjoy this teacher

It was hard to understand the lectures and the assignments were misleading.

She does a bad job of teaching the class and it is extremely difficult

I had a terrible expirience and I wouldn't want anyone to ever have to go through what I did. Not exagerating, it was the worst professor I have ever had who made an average class seem like I was in Harvard.

This is by far the worst class I have ever taken. I have had to essentially teach myself all the content to take the hardest tests I have ever had the displeasure of taking. I would not recommend this course to anyone.

Terrible!

This professor ruined me, so disappointed in the KU staff.

She is such a tough grader and assigns so much busy work.

This is by far the worst professor I have ever had. She never teaches us the informations and constantly rambles on about random things. She is an unfair grader and is not at all understanding

Poor teaching habits

Taking physics with this teacher was a complete waste of time. Their teaching style was incredibly dry and uninspiring. It felt like they had no patience for questions and dismissed them with a condescending attitude. This teacher made a challenging subject even more difficult to learn, and I wouldn't recommend their class to anyone

This professor is such a bad teacher. All she does is give homework and test. She is terrible at her job and should not be at KU.

had unrealistic expectations. Was very disrespectful and gave students zero respect to students like we we're kindergartners. Very very rude and spiteful personality.

Didn't teach concepts well enough, doesn't care about the students, and is ridiculously harsh on the students as she has no respect for the students and won't listen to them.

She is disrespectful to her students and gets defensive whenever you ask a basic question for understanding.

Get defensive when get asked questions when we are just trying to learn. Very hard to keep up in lectures she bounces all over the place.

Sarah Rush single handily screwed my GPA. As if her lectures weren't long enough her "handwritten" book is long enough to also screw me. Rush was extremely disrespectful to me and my fellow classmates becoming intensely aggravated whenever a question was asked. Do not recommend taking her course or the professor.

Professor Rush is an awful choice for a physics professor, let alone a professor for any course. She does not ensure that students understand the material at all, and she is so defensive when asked questions. She treats her students like they are kindergarteners and has no respect for us. My grade was much lower than it should be because of her.

She gets offended by simple questions. She is the worst teacher I have ever had and has made my expiernce terrible.

Sarah was a very defensive and rude person when asked a question. I always felt unwanted and hated in this class. This professor if you even consider her one, is the worst I've had here at KU and should be dealt with.

Professor Rush takes simple clarifying personal and gets very defensive when all I want is help. What kind of professor doesn't want to help their students succeed? At first, I didn't want to judge her too hard but as the days went on, she got worse and worse. It's honestly surprising KU even hired her in the first place. Very disappointed.

was very confusing always did not answer my questions and told me she didn't like me please fire her before she does this to other students.

She's very mean to me and even though I give 100% effort, I can't receive a grade higher than a C.

This is my second class with this professor. Recently got rid of all support for in class quizzes. No cheat sheet, harder material, and no partial credit for quiz questions. Won't give class averages for quizzes. Avoid this professor at all costs and take this class at a community college. TAs do not know what they are doing either.

Rating a 1/5 would be very generous for Sarah. The majority of your grade will be from 4 question "all or nothing" quizzes in which the only highest grades besides 100 are 80, 75, then 65. That's right, you can get a 65% for one wrong question. She also lazily teaches about concepts that are not on the quiz that week and there are no ex. problems.

I have never had a worse professor. She expects us to be perfect on the exams and it feels impossible to get a fair grade in the course. I have never done bad in a course and am overall good student, but in this course I was failing every quiz and not retaining any knowledge. I believe this professor should not be allowed to teach another course.

I took Physics 1 last semester and I now am taking physics 2. This class has become 300% harder than last semester. I would suggest never taking physics at Kansas with the current state of the Physics department. This might be the most challenging class I've ever taken and my grade is not looking good. By the way, I have a 4.0 GPA to this point.

Weekly free-response quizzes with no partial credit. If you miss one question, the max score you can get is an 80%. No notes sheet for the quiz, terrible lecturing, and video lectures that are >10 min and do not do examples to be able to do the HW. HW questions change every attempt with no way to know what you did wrong. Don't take physics at KU!

An embarrassment to KU, and painfully incompetent. She is uncaring towards student's success, and only cares about "numbers" for her research (That is somehow in physics education??). Knowing math WAY above the course requirement is expected, and she offers no help other than saying "Its straight forward." You'd learn more physics from a rock.

Ruined my whole life. I dropped out of college because of her and returning to my home country.

I'm convinced that in my previous life, I have done something so diabolical, so egregious, so utterly heinous, to have been cursed with this God forsaken professor. Dr. Rush has absolutely crushed my hopes and dreams- robbed me of my pride and aspirations. Hopeful engineers, run while you still can. And KU, if you're reading this... Do better.

Dr. Rush does not teach at all; we are expected to spend time outside of class watching pre-recorded lectures and we have no chance to ask questions to advance our learning. Class time is wasted by doing 3-4 "practice problems" that you need to write down on a paper for credit. It incentivizes getting participation points over actual learning.

Rush's lectures are borderline useless, the content area quizzes are too harshly graded when there is no partial credit, and she spends more time talking about her grading scale and her research than physics. Even when incentivizing attending lecture through participation points, very few still attended, which shows the lack of quality within them.

The proffesor is not competent to teach at such level. The emotional immaturity dominates affects her teaching discipline.

i have never had a professor that doesn't know what they're talking about to this extent, she is so rude and on top of that can't even teach. please fire her, you likely won't pass this class if you take her, why are there no more teachers for physics i would rather have a rock teach me physics than her, i would probably learn more.

I think I've done terrible things in my past lives to have a class as terrible as this. I study for this class more than my actual engineering courses (which says a lot) and still am on the edge for an A. Quizzes do not have partial credit so if you mess up one step you will get 0 points on that question. DON'T TAKE THIS CLASS YOU"LL HATE YOURSELF.

I had multiple students warn me of this course before I took it. Naively I did not listen to their advice. I do not know how this professor came upon the idea that NO PARTIAL CREDIT was even remotely acceptable for a physics course. It is completely asinine that the class is set up this way. Avoid if at all possible

I would rather traverse the entirety of Omaha Beach instead of taking this class. The opening scene of Saving Private Ryan is considered "light work" compared to what EPSHX 210 has to offer. The teacher is rude, unenthusiastic, horrible at her job. Impossible curriculum. NO PARTIAL CREDIT. Poor study guides. Horrendous grade average. DO NOT TAKE.

I finished 0.2% away from an A in the class. I kindly emailed her asking her to round my grade up, since I had already completed all the extra credit and had so many participation points she didn't count them all. She told me "too bad, take the final" and subsequently LOWERED my grade to force me to take the final :)

I took this in spring 23, and everything I could say about this course has already been said. In the past, I've tried to give genuine feedback about why the calculus based approach is ineffective for this course, but Rush doesn't seem to care what students and other professors think. Despite what others say, however, it is not hard to get an A.

Week 3 of the Class I went to a tutor for homework help and still couldn't get through 1 problem. She goes far too fast and with far too little explaining assuming that you'll magically know the answer.

Goes off on tangents and blames low test class average on “not knowing how to study”

Quizzes are brutal, often leaving the class averages to be around 40%. She blamed all 200 students' studying habits for exam/quiz averages being low. Rarely had helpful lectures and went off on unnecessary tangents often. Refuses to round grades at all and only gives EC when the entire class fails astronomically.