Historical instructor

JAMES LAWLER

Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 2.00/5 from 6 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

What students say

Original student reviews · all captured dates

PHYS307 · course not matched
Quality 1/5Difficulty 5/5
Worst professor Ive ever had in all of college, high school, middle school, even my elementary school teachers were better at teaching. If you attend the lectures I promise you will leave more confused and have less iq. But attendance is mandatory so youre screwed. In the first lecture he went over Lab 1, and then proceeded to assign lab 7 for hw
Rate My Professors ↗
PHYS307 · course not matched
Quality 1/5Difficulty 3/5
If you have Lawler for 307, prepare yourself to be confused for the semester. His lecture notes are basically just essays and are unhelpful. He gives his lectures before the lab session, which doesn't help because nobody know what he is talking about. The lab instructions are incredibly vague and unhelpful. Hope for a helpful TA to explain the lab!
Rate My Professors ↗
PHYSICS308 · course not matched
Quality 4/5Difficulty 2/5
Professor Lawler's lectures may perhaps be less than exciting for some students, but he genuinely tries to pick subject material that he believes to be interesting. He is very nice and cares about the lectures he presents.
Rate My Professors ↗
PHY308 · course not matched
Quality 4/5Difficulty 3/5
Professor Lawler is one of my favorite professors I have taken a class with so far. His lectures are very interesting. He relates the lab work to research in the past or what he is currently doing. The actual labs are easy and TA's are usually helpful. Do not save labs for end of semester because there is little time to catch up.
Rate My Professors ↗
PHYS308 · course not matched
Quality 1/5Difficulty 1/5
Physics 308 with Lawler was easily the most pointless class I have ever taken at UW. He made attendance at all of his lectures required even though he described many of them as "enrichment lectures" which did not pertain to class material. When he did talk about class material he made things very unclear and was super boring. Would not recommend.
Rate My Professors ↗
PHYSI625 · course not matched
Quality 1/5Difficulty 5/5
He's easily the worst physics teacher I've ever had. It's obvious the entire class has no idea what's he saying when he's talking, and half the time he doesn't even address the class, he just mumbles to himself and writes on the board. DO NOT take a class with him unless you're desperate and willing to do a lot of work.
Rate My Professors ↗

Personal experiences, not a representative survey. Profile matching and captured coverage are shown in the source details.

Classes with JAMES LAWLER

No teaching recorded in Fall 2026.

No courses match this selection. Try the full catalog or another term.

Recorded teaching history

Explore courses taught by this instructor →
Browse recorded courses
TermCourseTitle

Teaching history may be incomplete. Course pages contain course-specific feedback and citations.

Instructor identity & provenance
{
  "instructor_uid": "instructor_912a1edf532c0d9c7db83034",
  "source": "legacy",
  "source_instructor_id": null,
  "identity_basis": "name_only",
  "identity_status": "unresolved",
  "name": "JAMES LAWLER",
  "email": null,
  "first_observed_at": "2025-04-16 05:20:33.104844+00:00",
  "last_observed_at": "2026-09-07 15:55:43.033547+00:00",
  "ratings": {
    "review_count": 6,
    "quality": 2,
    "difficulty": 3.17,
    "quality_count": 6,
    "difficulty_count": 6,
    "profile_id": "rmp:1263321",
    "source_url": "https://www.ratemyprofessors.com/professor/1263321",
    "match_basis": "exact_name",
    "observed_at": "2026-09-07 16:34:41.855166+00:00",
    "courses": {},
    "bayesian_quality": 3.2766813719589196,
    "prior_mean": 3.6596857835465957,
    "prior_weight": 20
  },
  "current": false,
  "courses": [],
  "revision": "e243353dcb7d79b7247ced91d69443ef4c2a6349",
  "instructor_url": "/instructors/JAMES_LAWLER"
}