4.1
Quality2.8
Difficulty71%
Would Retake88
Reviews71%
Would Retake
88
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
5
51
4
19
3
7
2
4
1
7
What Students Say
“Interesting stuff, but way too much busy work”
SCHMGMT632 - 4.0 rating“She knows the subject matter well and offers multiple ways students can achieve an A”
SCHMGMT632 - 4.0 ratingClass Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
59%
Textbook Required
7%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A+
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.71 avg changeRatings by Course
410
5.0
(1)MGMT625
5.0
(1)MGTIT
5.0
(1)SCH797O
5.0
(1)MGT630
5.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
320
3.4
OIM310
3.1
OIM320
3.1
MGMT625
3.0
SCHM632
3.0
Reviews (88)
Fair, taught clearly, seemed to care about students' progress. Very knowledgeable. Only knock is she's such an easy grader. Not that that's a huge issue, but I like to have jump a little higher for the grade so that I'm motivated to push harder. Took class in grad program, though, so that might be why she was such an easy grader.
One of the hardest working profs at this school. Provides a lot of information, very helpful, really wants students to learn and very concerned with having students learn. An excellent experience.
No Comments
i agree she graded a graduate online course sort of easy, or maybe i was just naturally gifted.
I took Information Mgmt online and was very impressed with how Shirley managed such a large class. She was constantly on-line and providing feedback to everyone. It was a very fair and well run class on her part. She was an easy grader on the homework and discussions (do not be shocked if you get all 100s for your grades).
Shirley was great - I often wondered if she ever slept, since she always answered questions within about an hour! It was a little ridiculous though that she seemed to give everyone 100 on everything in an MBA course. Now I'm spoiled for the rest of my classes.....
This class was fantastic. I was only marginally interested in this subject to begin with, and she made it extremely interesting and engaging. Her projects really got students involved and made you learn. Her grading was fair. She was very organized and made all requirements clear. I wish all professors were like her!
Super easy. No need to study, just log on once in a while and post to discussions. Fortunately, they kept the class interesting. Good class.
Prof Shmerling is extremely enthusiastic and passionate about IT, and that is evident in her class. She does a good job of explaining how IT fits into the business world, and does it clear enough so non-IT folks can learn easily. One of the best professors in the school.
Took online. Class is well prepared & well structured. Book was helpful, but added articles, papers & case studies = lots of reading, but much is optional. Not much "lecturing" by the prof, but you learn by reading and discussing online. Choice of quizzes or essay HW. Easy A if you log in often, work on team proj, participate & take unit quizzes.
Great professor. Helps students. Answers all questions in time. Lots of reading materials but you can handle it. Does not get involved in discussion much but the topics are interesting enough to raise discussions between students. Very good prof, recommended
Took this course online. She really wants students to do well and is always willing to help. My biggest complaint is that she posts course infomation in so many different places that it can be overwhelming.
Explained the subject fairly well, tests were online and very fair multiple choice questions. The class project was a nightmare. She gave very little guidance on what she wanted, leaving it to the students to guess. Was very good at responding quickly to questions.
great prof - makes it SO easy to do well. she gives you a million ways to get credit for assignments and makes expectations crystal clear. as long as you do the minimum she requires and participate in discussions (twice a week - not more) you'll do well.
She is truly amazing professor, who makes you learn the subject at the same time give you good credit for your hard work. The quizzes in the class is only thing you have to make sure you do carefully to earn the grade. She also holds couple of Q&A sessions, where she uses WebEx and dial-in conference to make things clear.
awesome teacher - kept me interested and involved in an online course. weekly case studies with mandatory discussions lead by one class group at a time. easy if you stay involved, but tough if you fall behind. Shirley was super supportive of students working full time and course work was completely relevant
Ms. Shirley Shmerling is a very good instructor. She utilizes PowerPoint presentations, videos on Youtube, Harvad Business cases, and useful links to provide different learning tools. Her response time to e-mails was always less than 12hr; it almost seemed she is just waiting in front of her PC. The course was designed very interesting.
Highly engaged, friendly and helpful prof. 3 attempts given on quizes, 2 for final exam. One 6-8 page paper. Easy short discussion posts. Lots of opportunity for extra-credit. Only negative: term project instructions are confusing: too many different iterations posted in varying places require frequent cross-referencing to know what the prof wants.
Interesting stuff, but way too much busy work. Ended up working harder than expected to learn very little new info (outside of how to set-up and work with a wiki). Required discussion list postings a colossal time suck and overall waste of time (learned very little). Very nice person and quite responsive though. Fair tests offered and fair grader.
A good professor who knows the material and class very well. She prepares detailed presentations and demonstrations for her classes. Tests can be difficult but are a reasonable portion of the grade. Definitely consider any of her classes. Attendance is not mandatory but you should show up to do well.
This woman is amazing! Incredibly intelligent and really cares about her students a lot. Wants everyone to do well. You're going to have to work for it on some of the homeworks but you learn a ton. She's awesome!
Shirley is a great professor because she really cares about her students and that they are learning. She moves quickly through the material so spending time on the long homework assignments is key to passing.
Shirley is a delightful professor that shows a genuine interest in seeing you succeed in the course material. She knows the subject matter well and offers multiple ways students can achieve an A. Don't be fooled, the course requires a lot of work but she is flexible with how material is presented, discussed and reviewed. Helpful feedback too!
Shirley is by far the best teacher I have ever had. She cares so much about helping students learn and succeed. If you go to class and show you care, it will be an easy A. I would definitely take any class she offers!
Course can be difficult at times but Shirley is always willing to help and wants everyone to succeed. Show up and pay attention in class if you want her respect. Easily one of the greatest teachers you will ever come across.
Go to class, pay attention (she talks fast), and you'll be able to do well and actually learn a lot. Good course, fast-paced, really easy to focus on the lecture she cares so much about the students actually learning rather than memorizing formulas etc. Highly recommend taking a course by Shmerling during your time at ISOM. Make use of office hours
I really enjoyed this class. Shirley is very clear and provides lots of direction and feedback. She is very accessible for questions and concerns. Lots of reading and a bit of "busy" work, but stay on top of it and get an A.
Prof Shmerling was an excellent professor. Taught relevant information and made the topic interesting.
She is a gem and a very caring personality. What I like about her course, is clarity in everything she does or sends. Instructions are crisp, grading criteria is detailed, and her response is always prompt. There would be lots of homework and she will keep you busy. I lived in IT for 16 years, but I learnt a lot from her class and so will you.
Course is not difficult. Tons of busy work for an online class but ended up learning a great deal.
Prof Shmerling is an amazing person and a fantastic teacher. She takes the time to learn everyone's name, and cares about you. 310 is a bit of a dry topic but she made it as interesting as possible. The course can be hard but if you can do the homework you should be fine. 10 homework assignments over the semester, under 2 hours each. 2 exams.
Professor Shmerling genuinely cares about her students. Her courses are challenging, but if you put the work and effort in, you will walk away having learned a great amount. I took both of her courses, OIM 310 and OIM 320 in the same semester and Professor Shmerling was always available to help. She even brings in candy for exams! Would take again.
Professor Shmerling is an absolute gem. She makes her clases applicable to college students and the projects (while may take some time), can be fun! I really recommend Prof Shmerling and am looking forward to taking 310 with her.
Loved the format of this class. Clear objectives on assignments and the tutorials were easy to follow. Multiple attempts on quizzes and tests. One project/paper. Discussion board and a group project. Limited hard deadlines with flexibility for the student in mind. Good feedback and Prof was very accessible. Wish more classes were like this.
Good teacher, but lots of work. There is a lot of info spread out over many different areas so it's sometimes hard to make sure you have everything you need. Discussions, long-term project, and lots of reading.
She did a wonderful job of making a completely new subject understandable and manageable. Strongly recommend.
Shirley is the best professor I've ever had in Isenberg- and that's saying a lot. She truly cares about her students, wants them to succeed, and make the material enjoyable. She really inspired my love for OIM and made me remember why I declared this major in the first place. Material is tough, but doable if you go to class and pay attention. 10/10
Great class! Gives Extra credit on last exam and throughout semester. Shirley cares less about grades and more about students. You get a cheat sheet on the tests . Homework is a large percentage , if you work hard and show you care you'll probably get an A.
Very involved course with discussions and case studies. Quite a bit of reading and a final paper. Overall a great overview of Info Systems Mgmt.
The homework and quizzes make up a majority of your grade so if you're not a good test taker you should still be fine. There is about 10 homework assignments, 4 quizzes, 1 or 2 in class assignments, TopHat, and two exams that make up your grade.
Shirley is easily one of my favorite professors. She teaches 310 and 320 for the same OIM requirement. If you can, take both, but if you have to choose definitely take 310. The content for 310 was more interesting; there was HW, TopHat, quizzes, 2 exams, no final. OIM 320 repeated a lot of OIM 240; there was HW/CW, quizzes, group projects, 1 final.
Took several weeks to understand how to work with the very many pieces of content. Seems overwhelming at first, but you can get the hang of things as time goes on. Shirley cares deeply about her students and what they learned. Stay on track, do what is asked, and you will do fine. I very much enjoyed working with her.
I love her! I took OIM310 with her last semester, and I am now signing up for her OIM320 class for my senior year even though it's not required. I always felt like I was learning in her class. I never go to office hours, but I went to her many times throughout the year, and she helped with everything from homework to job searching. She truly cares!
Shirley is the best
She cares about students and goes around for questions. The homework is not that hard but will take you lots of time and effort (around 1.5 to 2hrs). Also, I don't know why she sent out a big group project shared folder at the last minute (5 days to due date) besides the final project one. Lots of group project work to do, but overall it's great
Enjoyed the content of the course (textbook readings & business cases were interesting). The professor put a lot of effort into the class, but it just came off as very disorganized. Assignments & announcements were on way too many diff platforms (blackboard, pbworks, umass drive, youtube). I always had to spend time looking for things.
The best lecturer ever--she's super sweet with clear and organized expectations. Homework is typically pretty easy though it takes an above-average amount of time, so just put in the effort and show you care. Cons: The many platforms can get unnecessarily confusing at times, and the class moves slowly if you consider yourself decent at math.
lots of homework and group work. The amount of work is unreal but she's so nice and helpful that it makes up for it. Do the work and get an A.
Do not take this class online. Professor struggles with using Zoom and her lectures are perfect to fall asleep to. Only half the class is taught by her as the other half of the class is a teach yourself situation through her tutorials that take numerous hours to complete.
This professor is super nice but clearly hasn't adapted well to teaching online. Her blackboard is confusing because she only made one section for both her online and in-person classes. You really have to dig sometimes to find which assignments apply to your section. Her assignments take forever, but are helpful in learning the material.
DO NOT take her courses online. She does not set blackboard up well, everything is all over the place and her online and in person sections are combined for some reason? Tutorials take 5 hours to complete (no joke) with HW assignments that are almost identical. It's not hard, just super time consuming for no reason.
Shirley is a super nice person and I appreciate how passionate she is about information systems. I liked the actual subject of the course, but I found the act of doing assignments very tedious as there were so many pieces to complete in so many different places. Needless to say, I did learn quite a bit, but wish it wasn't so time-consuming.
Probably the best teacher in Isenberg. Very well respected and often recommended by old students. She is super caring and wants every student to get an A. Lot of work but most of it is reinforcement to help you understand more. Would definitely take if you have the time available to.
Shirley wants you succeed. She loses a point because her online set-up is a bit bizarre and her tutorials and HW are sometimes very tedious. Overall, it's a very good class as long as you put in the work.
Great professor and an even better person; she truly cares about your success and wellbeing. TONS of extra credit, should be an easy A as long as you do well on the homework's and group projects.
Shmerling is amazing if you can take her class AFTER COVID. Its April and shes only come to class once. She projects zoom on the board. She says she covid is a risk for her so she cant come (totally understandable) but it still impacts your learning. Topics can be really confusing at first but she does care. During Covid: take caution After: 100%
If there is ever a teacher whose assignments made me want to break my keyboard on my head, this is her. She is not a bad professor, but her assignments are ambiguous and take way longer than the time its 'designed' to be completed in. Also, work is definitely not weighed appropriately, especially considering the amount of time some hw takes.
I strongly recommend Dr. Shmerling. She cares so much about her students. Discussions, quizzes, final exam, final paper. She has a deep understanding of the material and truly wants her students to learn. She provides lots of extra information, but makes it clear that it is not mandatory. My experience in the class was extremely positive.
I greatly enjoyed Professor Shmerling's IS course. There is a lot of material but she makes it easy to find things that are most important. She is a fair grader and gives lots of opportunities to do well in this course. I learned a lot about Information Systems and the material was engaging. I highly recommend taking this course.
Great professor but way too much work. Homework, classwork and quizzes every week which were ok but tedious. Homework was graded too harshly, took points off for small mistakes. exams were very difficult.
Very kind and intelligent professor. The work is not very difficult, but you will spend a ton of your free time doing tedious assignments. A lot of what you need to know you are supposed to learn on your own (4+ hour-long tutorials, or additional video lectures) which made it hard to find the motivation to attend lectures.
As someone who's really slow at doing work, this class was like torture for me. I would spend several hrs/for ~2 days working on tutorials and HW. Every week there's several things due and it's often busy work. I would not take another course with this professor because I felt overwhelmed by the end of the semester (first two months were ok tho).
Shirley is a very nice teacher who cares about her students. This class just requires A LOT of homework and committed time to complete them. 5 HW's, 2 group assignments, and 5 tutorials. One final. I would spend 10-15 hours/week on this one class doing work. She grades fairly and does allow extensions. However, beware of how much work is required
Lots of homework. People I took this class with did not like it. Very disorganized and hard to keep track of all the work. The content that is taught is very confusing as well. Sometimes tests have nothing to do with the class. But she is very nice, easy to communicate with and there is a good amount of extra credit.
I learned a lot and enjoyed the class. You need to be very organized as there is a lot of different material on different platforms. With preplanning and keeping on track with where all the assignments are you can do well. She is enthusiastic about the course topic.There are a lot of reading and tasks to do.
Great professor, dense course, but learned a lot from Prof. Shmerling and classmates. I felt the group work and weekly discussions & reading enhanced the course. Would highly recommend.
My main takeaway here is that she truly cares about her students. The majority of my class seemed like they will miss her and her class when the semester ended. It's certainly not an easy course but she is very reasonable when it comes to extended deadlines and made up work. Plus, there are numerous opportunities for extra credit.
Prof. Shmerling cares about her students and communicates frequently. Tough to get used to the swing of class as more moving parts than others but it made me get more out of the class. Great use of outside of text articles. Slow on grading at times but may be the norm and just have been spoiled by fast graders in other classes.
Shirley was my favorite Isenberg professor. In both of the classes I took with her I appreciated that she taught us skills rather than just lecture material. She truly cares about her students and wants you to do well without being too tough on yourself. Highly recommend Shirely!
Pleasant professor. Motivated. Wants students to do well and learn. I gained a lot of insight into an area where I had a rudimentary understanding. Fair amount of work and hunting for info. Once you get used to her style, it works. It's the multiple places to find things that made me feel I was missing info. The paper is really an essay exam.
I really enjoyed Prof. Shmerling's class. There is a lot of reading, but it's good content. She really sets you up for success with her syllabus and her weekly messages with her expectations/assignments. Optional Zoom calls helped to clarify content and final paper asks. She really cares about her students and is very responsive if you need help.
This professor assigns an unmanageable amount of often long and very difficult homework. It was difficult to learn anything from the class because of this, and I was unable to focus on other classes the way I should have.
Required for OIM majors. Lots of group work. Weekly homework and quizzes that take hours each week. "Prep" work assignments due before class as well. Assignments often overlap. Poorly explains and overcomplicates relatively simple topics. Will poorly answer questions in class. Absurd amount of work at the end of semester. Extremely disorganized.
An absurd amount of work. She makes you do weekly assignments to "demonstrate knowledge," tutorials, homework, quizzes, exams, and group work. There's no good way to manage the workload for this class, it is truly unorganized and a ridiculous amount of work for a statistics class. Shirley is a sweet lady but the work is just far too much.
As a person, Shirley is great. She cares about her students and wants to get to know them, and even gives an automatic 48-hour extension on all work (you can still ask for more if you need it). As a professor, her class can be very tedious, with multiple assignments due each with and most taking 2+ hours. Slammed us with work at the end.
Shmerling is the most understanding professors I've met on campus. Lenient with deadlines (communicated with her!) . Unfortunately, class involves a lot of assignments, forgot to do the 'demonstrate knowledge' assignments many times. She wants you to succeed! Don't take 320 while taking many classes, it can be time consuming
Its clear Shirley cares about her students but theres so many assignments that feel really pointless and not necessary for ANY future career but obviously still have to take this class as a requirement. Again, Shirley really means well but this class was A DRAG. TAs are so unhelpful and feedback is terrible and the way the lecture is set up sucks.
I enjoyed Professor Shmerling's class, I found the workload very managable. 3 tries on each quiz and 2 tries on the final exam. Threaded discussions on Harvard Business Cases. The paper (3-7 pages) is worth 25% of the overall grade and it doesn't get graded until the end of the semester.
Course was not challenging, however, the amount of work/submissions/fine print assignments was frustrating. For an information systems class, it was poorly laid out and difficult to navigate. Overly complicated course with no meaningful information presented.
Great professor but I was not a fan of the class. The semester consisted of 5 HWs, 5 tutorials, 2 group projects, 3 online quizzes, an online final, and weekly prep quizzes. The class started slow and manageable but towards the middle and end, she slammed us with work that felt like it never ended.
Professor Shmerling's class is disorganized and overwhelming, with unmanageable workload including numerous weekly assignments, tutorials, and homework, many taking over 2+ hours each. TAs are unhelpful. The end of the semester is particularly stressful due to an absurd amount of work, making it challenging to focus on other classes.
Dr. Shmerling is a fantastic teacher. Gives you every opportunity to succeed in class. A good amount of work (reading, weekly quizzes, tests, paper) but not overly difficult material. I would absolute recommend her class and would sign up for another class with Shirley if possible.
I absolutely love Prof Shmerling! She's friendly, helpful, and makes sure we don't feel overwhelmed by the workload. I'm taking both her 310 and 320 classes, which have a heavy workload, but I enjoy applying what I learn to real-world problems. Team projects are manageable with good teammates, and attendance is important for classwork submission.
Professor Shmerling is awesome and cares for her students. The course is difficult and has a lot of work involved, but is mostly well broken down. Plenty of extra credit opportunities. Lectures are recorded and all materials are posted on Canvas every week for reference. She provided an online PDF of all the class slides will blanks to fill in.
Easily one of the best professors at UMass. The material can be difficult, but she gives a lot of time in class to work on assignments and ask questions. Relatively easy grader with plenty of extra credit opportunities. Definitely recommend!
She is truly one of the best and really cares about what she teaches. She builds in extra credit and 48hr grace period on assignments which are very helpful. Don't let yourself fall behind and rely on extensions since the work can pile on. THis course is a lot of work so make sure to account for that in your schedule.
great teacher, cares about you learning. material wasn't to easy but office hours are very helpful
GOAT professor at UMass
Class Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
59%
Textbook Required
7%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A+
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.71 avg changeRatings by Course
410
5.0
(1)MGMT625
5.0
(1)MGTIT
5.0
(1)SCH797O
5.0
(1)MGT630
5.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
320
3.4
OIM310
3.1
OIM320
3.1
MGMT625
3.0
SCHM632
3.0