Maryam Ghadessi

Basically you are on your own in this class because her lectures are a waste of time and do not help you on exams. The only way you are able to succeed in her class is studying the study guide because the problems on the study guide are similar / same as the exam questions.

There are 3 Exams 20 questions each (15 multiple choice and 5 concepts). She assigns a set of homework problems before each exam; however, exams problems are almost completely different from homework and much more difficult. Good luck!

Finance 350 is a very hard class, but Prof Ghadessi's class is not that hard, the final is not comprehensive. If you work on the study guide before the test, and do all the homework she assigns, you will definitley pass her class. She is very approachable and very helpful.

I took this teacher for Summer '03, and i just want to REITERATE what a horrible teacher this woman is. I know Finance is hard, but she made it much worse by complicating her lectures. She didn't make any sense half the time. She wasn't easy to talk to, she didn't return phone calls, and I really didn't learn anything from her. I was better off just reading the book alone then taking the test. DO NOT TAKE HER!!!!

I took Ms. Ghadessi for the Spring 2003 semster at night. The rumor about Finance 350 being the hardest class at state is certainly true, as eveidenced in her class. I opted for CR instead of a grade once I knew my 3.8 would be in jeopardy after the first test - There were only 3A's in a class full of 45-50 & everyone else sqweeked by(what does that tell you?) I'd just like to say that there was more cheating going in this class than Ive ever seen before, simply because her tests were impossible. I know for a fact that the people who received A's had either taken her class before or had the old tests from lots of different semesters. The smell of boredom and restlessness consumed the entire classroom let me tell you. Her lectures consisted of rehashing the chapters paragraph by paragraph, with no other examples than what is in the chapter Advice: Take her if you must due to time constraints and overbooked classes, but avoid her at all cost. Advice: Read the book but don't obssess over it, just enough to be able to understand the chapter assignments. Study the study guides (memorize the answers and understand how to work out the problems)...they are the ONLY closest thing to the exams. But don't think that all the questions on the study guide will be on the test, you will fail if you assume this. Also have study buddies to commisserate and study with. Positives: Ms. Ghadessi is really a nice person and is very intelligent and able to answer questions of her field. Good luck to all who are taking her class, I hope that her teaching style changes for you.

Ghadessi is an interesting teacher. I took her class during her 2nd semester teaching as she was nervous and had a whole binder of handwritten notes for her lectures. Her 1st test was so difficult that she gave us study material for the next test which was pretty close to the actual exams. She is very detail oriented person and there is a lot of material to cover but she does a very good job. The book itself is very usefull as it is part of the required reading for CFA Level I exam. So kick back, listen to her lectures, program formulas into TI-83/85 and you'll get through it.

Fin 350 is a very difficult course. If you don't do homework and just rely on her lecture, you will get a little/ almost nothing from the course. She just goes over very quickly what the textbook said. In my humble opinion,I think almost nobody would get A if she didn't provide the studyguides-- the exam typed questions. These studyguide questions are very difficult. Fortunately, each question comes with the correct answer and its explanations.Most of the her exam questions come from her studyguides. I should say the questions are identical from the studyguides. If you can memorize the studyguides, you can easily get B or B+. If you put a little hardwork on course, you can get A. Take my advice, first memorize all studyguides first and then study the text and homeworks. I can assure that there is no reason you will not get a good grade. If you are majoring in finance and want to understand the whole material, you may want to take with an another instructor. By the way, her exams are multipal choice questions, which is very hard. She counts fist exam 25%, second 25%,and final 50%. I don't like multipal choice exam although it is very easy for instructor to grade students.

Horribly boring lectures with exams that are much too difficult for the quality of her teaching. If you read the entire book and understand it inside and out you're fine, otherwise be prepared for hell. I couldn't, no matter how hard I tried, stay until the end of class, it was just too boring and tedious. She lectures straight from the book, making her classes almost useless. She doesn't relate the material to anything we know and really shouldn't be teaching. She seems like a nice person, but one that really should improve her teaching skills.

FIN 350 is a tough course, but with Ghadessi i found it to be understandable because she goes thorough each chapter in detail. sure she will give a little chalenging questions on exam to see who outperforms. overall she is very good teacher

Ghadessi is a very nice and knowledgeable instructor, but she needs work on how to teach. I would recommend not taking her class because her exams are very tricky. I was shocked to hear her review new material on the day of the exam (which was on the exam). Keep in mind, this was a summer class, and she had very little time to instruct. She does go exactly by the book, which i did not like. She also does not speak very loud. As a result of her teaching skills combined with the short summer semester most of the class failed her exam, but she was nice enough to give us a second chance. I've benefited much from this site, and thought I'd help my fellow students in return to say, steer clear of this instructor.

*I'm gonna give her the same grade as she gave me =)*

I can't argue against the other person who gave her an "F', because he took ECON 300. But as for me, ECON 100 is fairly simple. (All basic crap). I agree with the other person that she teaches you what's in the book. But in my opinion, I like teachers who goes by the book, because you won't have to worry if you miss some of her class (except on review days where she go over problems at the end of each chapter from the book). One main thing I hate about her teaching, is she talks very very low, and sometimes it pisses me off when her mic doesn't work, and you end up missing what she had said.

She has 2 midterms (25%) each and one final %50 of your grade. The comprehensive part is fairly easy, but the multiple choice take a lot to think of. Mainly common sense problems. The final is just sooo damn easy, because most of the comprehensive questions is right from the book (that she had already gone over as review). Her grading policy is very easy, for a midterm, it's a total of 25 points. Each 5 points is a letter grade, meaning 5-D, 10-C, 15-B, 20-A, so if you get a 16 out of 25, you got a B-. I dunno about the final test though.

So if your looking for a GE (Econ) class to get by and not have to worry about attending class everyday, you'll do fine in her class.