Professor

Alexandr Sherstov

AD
5.0
Overall Ratings
Based on 28 Users
Easiness 3.4 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Workload 3.6 / 5 How light the workload is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Clarity 4.9 / 5 How clear the professor is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Helpfulness 4.8 / 5 How helpful the professor is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

Reviews (28)

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March 13, 2020
Quarter: Winter 2020
Grade: A-

Sherstov is hands down the greatest lecturer I've taken at UCLA, not just UCLA CS. Be warned, the course is hard, the material is abstract, there are 4 exams (one every other week almost). But it's all worth it and satisfying at the end when you sit back, reflect and marvel at Sherstov's care, clarity, enthusiasm and brilliance. The final lecture is so profound it almost got me 🥺 An absolute legend, the 🐐 for sure.

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Jan. 27, 2016
Quarter: Fall 2015
Grade: C+

Sherstov is the best professor I've had at UCLA. He is: brilliant.

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June 12, 2015
Quarter: Spring 2015
Grade: N/A

Ok let me start off by saying that I hardly ever write reviews on BruinWalk - I only write for those who are exceptionally bad or exceptionally good, and I think for the very first time I've had the opportunity to take a course with someone of the latter category. Sherstov deserves this review - those extremely high ratings you see up there are accurate.

I think one thing he told me in our last office hour meeting really stuck with me (paraphrased) - "I firmly believe that research and teaching are completely disjoint skills. A lot of times students, faculty, and administration believe that those who conduct important and compelling research can naturally teach subjects well, but this really is not true. A teacher must really keep the students' best interest and understanding in mind, but in many cases professors do not necessarily care about this since their first and foremost interest is their research. Even textbooks are often written from a researcher's perspective rather than a student's perspective, and thus again the student loses."

When it comes to teaching, Sherstov really does teach with the student's perspective in mind. He explains his material VERY clearly with a good number of examples to back up every single new concept he introduces. Furthermore, every concept builds upon what has already been learned, and thus the flow of his lectures is very smooth and....I'm not quite sure if this is the right way to phrase this....but natural. He truly loves his material as well, and that passion is clearly evident in his delivery of the material. He always encourages students to ask and answer questions and always responds with "brilliant!" when a student arrives at a correct conclusion in class. I was honestly eager to go to lecture every day and learn something new - I feel that love for learning and teaching is something that really is being slowly lost among students and faculty alike. I'm glad Sherstov was able to bring it back, even if only temporarily.

The HW's for this class are graded based on effort. I do believe is a great way to encourage students to work towards actually understanding material. Above all, it is ok to make mistakes! Once the solutions are released (did I mention that the prof went out of his way to make the publishers release solutions?), I appreciated being able to correct my mistakes and improve my understanding without paying a penalty for it, which seems to be the case in A LOT of other classes I've taken at this university. Yes I'm sure people also do it at the last minute because of this, but ultimately that decision is up to you.

There are actually 4 exams for this class - each exam is for a different part of the course, and they are not cumulative. I never found myself cramming for any of the exams because I already seemed to have a decent understanding of the material from the hw's and the lectures, which I found to be very comforting. His latter exams do have slightly more difficult questions, but it never seemed overwhelming. To be honest, I actually rather liked taking some of these exams since the problems were just interesting to tackle! BE PRECISE IN YOUR ANSWERS THOUGH!! Otherwise, you'll find yourself arguing with David Felber all the time....you will get the points back eventually, but it honestly is just really annoying arguing with Felber since he follows a fairly rigid grading criteria.

If you are not happy with the way your exam and regrade requests were evaluated, you have the right to approach Sherstov directly and ask him to re-evalute it! He is the only professor I have ever seen in my entire career as a student who actually encouraged students to do so if they were dissatisfied - like I said, thinking from the students' perspective. He will hear every bit of your argument before making his decision, and in many cases it will be successful if you have a compelling argument! Again, very different than many other departments and individuals I've approached (yes Econ department, you guys are the worst of the lot).

Take Sherstov's class, and you will absolutely not regret it. You may or may not be that interested about the material coming into the class, but I guarantee that your perspective will be different when you leave. As Sherstov put it, you can call yourself a programmer simply by writing code, but you cannot call yourself a computer scientist without having a more fundamental understanding about the theoretical principles that form the core of computation. And of course, do not accept what I have written in this eval as accurate. Take the class and find out for yourself if you choose to believe these words or not.

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March 31, 2020
Quarter: Fall 2019
Grade: B

Sherstov is a great guy, and his lectures are truly some of the best I've ever had in the department (I still love my man Smallberg, and Eggert's always a party). He really, really, really tries to make this topic interesting, and to present it in an engaging way. I think he succeeds in being engaging in his presentation, and helping you understand the concepts.

However, nothing can shake the sheer boredom the overall topic introduces. It's basically a giant deluge of theory, with little practical use in sight (don't get me wrong, this stuff's important - I just wish the class was arranged so that we did more practical stuff alongside the theoretical). I just was not interested in the stuff. By the time we got to the more-interesting material on turing machines, my senioritis had kicked in and I'd started to calculate what I needed to do to just grab my B and go home. This is genuinely one of the classes where I loved the professor, yet hated the material.

The class itself is challenging, as it's spread into 4 exams that happen essentially every other week. Homework is worth 10%, and is graded entirely on effort. Getting a B is relatively easy: I did all the homework, and got progressively worse scores on each exam - going from a 100% on exam 1 to a ~55% on exam 3. I pulled it up and got above an 80% on exam 4, but my B was pretty much set in stone by then.

In all, I'd say Sherstov is the man to take 181 with. If you're not inclined to like the material, it's going to be a slog no matter who you take it with - but Sherstov is the one who will grab your hand, and gently guide you through it all. Truly a legend.

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Oct. 31, 2019
Quarter: Fall 2019
Grade: N/A

Probably the best CS professor I've had so far. He works extra hard so students don't have to. His exams are not cumulative, he uploads all his past exams along with solutions, and the homework is only graded on effort. He encourages students to ask questions in his lectures which are very engaging and well paced. I've never found myself lost in lecture.

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March 30, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A

Sherstov is probably one of the best professors you could have here at UCLA. His has great passion for the material and explains them clearly. The grading is based on three components only: midterm, final and a scribe note, where you typeset a chosen lecture in Latex. Took it as undergrad without much math background (it's basically a math class full of proofs!), not hard as long as you don't fall behind.

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Jan. 31, 2016
Quarter: Fall 2015
Grade: A

Most organized class ever! Every lecture was so well-thought out, and Sherstov is a fantastic lecturer. There's an exam pretty much every other Friday starting 4th week, which kind of sucked, but there's no cumulative final and it actually reduced the amount of stress, because you would only ever be tested on a few week's worth of material at a time. I really enjoyed this class.

You are really missing out if you don't take 181 with Sherstov!

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Dec. 5, 2017
Quarter: Fall 2017
Grade: NR

My favorite professor at UCLA so far. He does a great job of explaining the material. Although the subject is rather dry, he makes it engaging. The class is organized very well.

I wish all CS classes were taught this well!

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Dec. 2, 2019
Quarter: Fall 2019
Grade: B

Professor Sherstov is an amazing professor. He is energetic, lively, and great at explaining material. He makes the concepts seem easy and does many examples. His breakdown of material is logical and he also is quick to understand where a student's misunderstandings come from. Professor Sherstov's anecdotes also add a very personable touch to the course and are super inspiring! I wish I could have had more professors like him at UCLA. He also hosts office hours all throughout the week the entire quarter for his students and takes so much time out of his schedule to provide such a good class experience. Perhaps the only weakness of the course is that I wish we could have had the lectures placed on bruincast to watch later, and also for classes that I could not make it. They are definitely lectures worth watching again.

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March 14, 2020
Quarter: Winter 2020
Grade: A

I'm a sub 3.0 GPA student, and I got an A in this class. His passion for teaching and the subject matter is contagious (I couldn't care less about automation before this class and now I'm hooke). Quite frankly the best professor I've had the pleasure to listen to. I believe every student believes that the grade they get in the class is perfectly justified. The class is designed for you to succeed as long as you put in effort.

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COM SCI 181
Quarter: Winter 2020
Grade: A-
March 13, 2020

Sherstov is hands down the greatest lecturer I've taken at UCLA, not just UCLA CS. Be warned, the course is hard, the material is abstract, there are 4 exams (one every other week almost). But it's all worth it and satisfying at the end when you sit back, reflect and marvel at Sherstov's care, clarity, enthusiasm and brilliance. The final lecture is so profound it almost got me 🥺 An absolute legend, the 🐐 for sure.

Helpful?

2 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Fall 2015
Grade: C+
Jan. 27, 2016

Sherstov is the best professor I've had at UCLA. He is: brilliant.

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COM SCI 181
Quarter: Spring 2015
Grade: N/A
June 12, 2015

Ok let me start off by saying that I hardly ever write reviews on BruinWalk - I only write for those who are exceptionally bad or exceptionally good, and I think for the very first time I've had the opportunity to take a course with someone of the latter category. Sherstov deserves this review - those extremely high ratings you see up there are accurate.

I think one thing he told me in our last office hour meeting really stuck with me (paraphrased) - "I firmly believe that research and teaching are completely disjoint skills. A lot of times students, faculty, and administration believe that those who conduct important and compelling research can naturally teach subjects well, but this really is not true. A teacher must really keep the students' best interest and understanding in mind, but in many cases professors do not necessarily care about this since their first and foremost interest is their research. Even textbooks are often written from a researcher's perspective rather than a student's perspective, and thus again the student loses."

When it comes to teaching, Sherstov really does teach with the student's perspective in mind. He explains his material VERY clearly with a good number of examples to back up every single new concept he introduces. Furthermore, every concept builds upon what has already been learned, and thus the flow of his lectures is very smooth and....I'm not quite sure if this is the right way to phrase this....but natural. He truly loves his material as well, and that passion is clearly evident in his delivery of the material. He always encourages students to ask and answer questions and always responds with "brilliant!" when a student arrives at a correct conclusion in class. I was honestly eager to go to lecture every day and learn something new - I feel that love for learning and teaching is something that really is being slowly lost among students and faculty alike. I'm glad Sherstov was able to bring it back, even if only temporarily.

The HW's for this class are graded based on effort. I do believe is a great way to encourage students to work towards actually understanding material. Above all, it is ok to make mistakes! Once the solutions are released (did I mention that the prof went out of his way to make the publishers release solutions?), I appreciated being able to correct my mistakes and improve my understanding without paying a penalty for it, which seems to be the case in A LOT of other classes I've taken at this university. Yes I'm sure people also do it at the last minute because of this, but ultimately that decision is up to you.

There are actually 4 exams for this class - each exam is for a different part of the course, and they are not cumulative. I never found myself cramming for any of the exams because I already seemed to have a decent understanding of the material from the hw's and the lectures, which I found to be very comforting. His latter exams do have slightly more difficult questions, but it never seemed overwhelming. To be honest, I actually rather liked taking some of these exams since the problems were just interesting to tackle! BE PRECISE IN YOUR ANSWERS THOUGH!! Otherwise, you'll find yourself arguing with David Felber all the time....you will get the points back eventually, but it honestly is just really annoying arguing with Felber since he follows a fairly rigid grading criteria.

If you are not happy with the way your exam and regrade requests were evaluated, you have the right to approach Sherstov directly and ask him to re-evalute it! He is the only professor I have ever seen in my entire career as a student who actually encouraged students to do so if they were dissatisfied - like I said, thinking from the students' perspective. He will hear every bit of your argument before making his decision, and in many cases it will be successful if you have a compelling argument! Again, very different than many other departments and individuals I've approached (yes Econ department, you guys are the worst of the lot).

Take Sherstov's class, and you will absolutely not regret it. You may or may not be that interested about the material coming into the class, but I guarantee that your perspective will be different when you leave. As Sherstov put it, you can call yourself a programmer simply by writing code, but you cannot call yourself a computer scientist without having a more fundamental understanding about the theoretical principles that form the core of computation. And of course, do not accept what I have written in this eval as accurate. Take the class and find out for yourself if you choose to believe these words or not.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Fall 2019
Grade: B
March 31, 2020

Sherstov is a great guy, and his lectures are truly some of the best I've ever had in the department (I still love my man Smallberg, and Eggert's always a party). He really, really, really tries to make this topic interesting, and to present it in an engaging way. I think he succeeds in being engaging in his presentation, and helping you understand the concepts.

However, nothing can shake the sheer boredom the overall topic introduces. It's basically a giant deluge of theory, with little practical use in sight (don't get me wrong, this stuff's important - I just wish the class was arranged so that we did more practical stuff alongside the theoretical). I just was not interested in the stuff. By the time we got to the more-interesting material on turing machines, my senioritis had kicked in and I'd started to calculate what I needed to do to just grab my B and go home. This is genuinely one of the classes where I loved the professor, yet hated the material.

The class itself is challenging, as it's spread into 4 exams that happen essentially every other week. Homework is worth 10%, and is graded entirely on effort. Getting a B is relatively easy: I did all the homework, and got progressively worse scores on each exam - going from a 100% on exam 1 to a ~55% on exam 3. I pulled it up and got above an 80% on exam 4, but my B was pretty much set in stone by then.

In all, I'd say Sherstov is the man to take 181 with. If you're not inclined to like the material, it's going to be a slog no matter who you take it with - but Sherstov is the one who will grab your hand, and gently guide you through it all. Truly a legend.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Fall 2019
Grade: N/A
Oct. 31, 2019

Probably the best CS professor I've had so far. He works extra hard so students don't have to. His exams are not cumulative, he uploads all his past exams along with solutions, and the homework is only graded on effort. He encourages students to ask questions in his lectures which are very engaging and well paced. I've never found myself lost in lecture.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 281A
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A
March 30, 2016

Sherstov is probably one of the best professors you could have here at UCLA. His has great passion for the material and explains them clearly. The grading is based on three components only: midterm, final and a scribe note, where you typeset a chosen lecture in Latex. Took it as undergrad without much math background (it's basically a math class full of proofs!), not hard as long as you don't fall behind.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Fall 2015
Grade: A
Jan. 31, 2016

Most organized class ever! Every lecture was so well-thought out, and Sherstov is a fantastic lecturer. There's an exam pretty much every other Friday starting 4th week, which kind of sucked, but there's no cumulative final and it actually reduced the amount of stress, because you would only ever be tested on a few week's worth of material at a time. I really enjoyed this class.

You are really missing out if you don't take 181 with Sherstov!

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Fall 2017
Grade: NR
Dec. 5, 2017

My favorite professor at UCLA so far. He does a great job of explaining the material. Although the subject is rather dry, he makes it engaging. The class is organized very well.

I wish all CS classes were taught this well!

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Fall 2019
Grade: B
Dec. 2, 2019

Professor Sherstov is an amazing professor. He is energetic, lively, and great at explaining material. He makes the concepts seem easy and does many examples. His breakdown of material is logical and he also is quick to understand where a student's misunderstandings come from. Professor Sherstov's anecdotes also add a very personable touch to the course and are super inspiring! I wish I could have had more professors like him at UCLA. He also hosts office hours all throughout the week the entire quarter for his students and takes so much time out of his schedule to provide such a good class experience. Perhaps the only weakness of the course is that I wish we could have had the lectures placed on bruincast to watch later, and also for classes that I could not make it. They are definitely lectures worth watching again.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COM SCI 181
Quarter: Winter 2020
Grade: A
March 14, 2020

I'm a sub 3.0 GPA student, and I got an A in this class. His passion for teaching and the subject matter is contagious (I couldn't care less about automation before this class and now I'm hooke). Quite frankly the best professor I've had the pleasure to listen to. I believe every student believes that the grade they get in the class is perfectly justified. The class is designed for you to succeed as long as you put in effort.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
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