Richard Barnhart

read the previous review for the details but he is a good professor. The material for the course maybe a little out dated. He also stated that the business department is requiring him to only allow a certain number a A's for the class so even though you may have points for an A, you may not receive it. I did 90% of the work for the group project and was 2 points away from an A, but didn;t get it cause of the "curve." good professor for an unnecessary class.

Barnhart is a nice guy. However, perhaps he's getting up there in age, he can be forgetful or may seem confused at times.

The course basically consists of two individual speeches (informative & persuasive), a few writing assignments, and a group project (research paper + presentation + website). As mentioned in some previous posts, 1) he does get excited talking about gadgets; 2) it's IMPORTANT to have good teammates, especially at least one who knows how to design a cool website.

Again, maybe it's the age thing. He can lose his patience sometimes. He also has certain expectations of students for this junior-level communications class, so don't beg for anything if you don't deserve it. Nevertheless, He gave constructive criticism on the speeches/writing/powerpoint format. I did learn quite a few things.

At this point in my career, I'm wondering if this class is really necessary anymore as a business degree requirement. Most of the things covered in this class are required in many other business classes. You'll have to give two speeches, 3 writing assignments and one group project which includes a group presentation, research document and a web-site. Mr. Barnhardt is a very likeable, easy going teacher. The text is very current and full of good examples. Pay attention to what the professor stresses in class, these will be the things he looks for on the assignments. I highly recommend this teacher.

Prof. Barnhart is a decent instructor. You can learn a lot from his class if you are patient.

He gives several assignments as homeworks as well as individual presentations and a group term project which you have to split into 3 sections:

Group presentation = 20% Business Report = 10% Web Page = 15%

Something to that extend. He loves to talk about handheld devices such as Palm or Pocket PC.

You can always schedule to see him during his office hours. He is very supportive when you have questions outside or after class.

Most of the skills you learn in his class (writing a memo or business letter or preparing a business report) you can take with you in your future career.

I don't know other BUS 360 teacher, but he is an okay teacher for me. It is very important to find the good group members because the group project is about 50%. You have to find someone who can do the web page portion of the project, and find someone who is good on the presentation. I think he really not a fair teacher. He likes man more than woman, but I believe if you really do well on the individual presentations and the project, you will get a good grade. He is not hard. There is no FINAL for the spring 2002 semester. The written assignments are fairly easy and short (only a page). I recommand people to take him.

Other reviewers obviously have had a bad experience and are biased. My theory is that he grades on results, not effort. This can be frustrating for some (especially ESL students) when you put a lot of effort into it, and only get a modest grade. I wouldn't expect to get a good grade if I went to, say, France and took a communications course and spoke only broken French.

My thoughts are that he provides great guidance for real world communication encounters. In the real world what matters is clearly communicating, especially to those who are time constrained an may only give cursory attention to what you have to say.

I've biased my grades upwards by 1/3 of a grade point to compensate for previous biased reviews in the opposite direction.

Mr. Barnhart is understandably impatient with students who can't write or speak well. After all, the purpose of BUS360 is not to learn English, but rather to take good English skills and apply them in a business context. I notice that many of the negative comments about him are written in broken English. Mr. Barnhart is very friendly and approachable, but if your language skills do not meet the requirements, it's going to be a long, despairing semester.

His grading scale is also pretty tough. You need a score of 93% for an A, but I think that most people who stuck it out got at least a D+ or C-. I don't think anyone actually flunked.

Here's how the grading works:

Five-minute personal speech 15 pts. Three writing assignments 15 pts. Group project 50 pts. In-class final 20 pts. Total 100 pts.

The group project requires groups of between 3 and 5 students to create and deliver a formal business presentation. It's rather involved. You will need Power Point slides for the presentation itself, and additionally, you will need to build a website and write a formal business report. All three things (the presentation, the website, and the report) together must make a comprehensive package. Grading for the group project breaks down like this:

Presentation 25 pts. Report 10 pts. Website 15 pts.

The project is challenging and fun but requires ongoing meetings between group members. The group is graded as a whole, regardless of each individual's effort. If you have slackers in your group, it can drag everybody's grade down.

I enjoyed the class and learned from it. I think Barnhart did a good job keeping the material interesting and pointing out its relavence to communications in the current workplace. He did arrive late several times. I liked the way the projects were organized. He graded fairly. He seemed concerned that we learn. The final exam took too much time to finish, but it required lot of writting and was a good test of how I could do in my job.

Mr. Barnhart always came to class late, from 15 to 30 minutes. This was viewed by many students as unprofessional, especially since the class was held during Winter 2000. Also, I found the teacher to be uncharismatic and boring. His lectures contributed very little beyond what was written in the text.

Richard Barnhart's class was very helpful for me on my job. As a night student, I work full time during the day. He understands the difficulties night students face and makes the course particularly relevant for us. The speaking assignments and the group presentation met immediate needs for me at my job. He is very approachable, answers all E-mail from students, and my particular class and group had fun while learning. Sometimes the writing assignments were slow in being returned, but I always knew how I was progressing. If you are a night student, Barnhart is the only teacher working the night shift for Business 360. In my case, I was glad to have him for this course.

Professor always late to class, lecture is useless, read from textbook, don't learn anything from this course. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------