Historical instructor

James Tinjum

Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 1.89/5 from 9 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

CEE330 · course not matched
Quality 4/5Difficulty 2/5
Professor Tinjums slides are unorganized, there is a lot of homework and a lab and gives you more work then a 3 credit class should take. That being said, if you do the work, go to exam prep sessions it isnt that bad. He tells you essentially what will be on the exam so you know what to prep for. he even gives you part of the exam ahead of time.
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CEE330 · course not matched
Quality 4/5Difficulty 3/5
James does not deserve the rating that he gets. He is a good professor and makes this class not that bad. He shows you basically everything that is on the exams, and grades pretty easy on some harder exams. He also likes his dad jokes. Go to lecture. You get extra time on the homework if you guess the correct score of one of his favorite teams
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CIVENGR/GLE 532
Quality 1/5Difficulty 5/5
This class was beyond difficult. No homework was graded before the first in person exam, the lectures packed with information, and for the first 2 months of class he would not do math examples as they "would take too long in class". Don't take this class unless you already know all the information. Last exam is online & open note so that is good.
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CEE330 · course not matched
Quality 2/5Difficulty 3/5
He is a fine professor but his slides are unorganized and hard to study from.
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CIVENGR/GLE 532
Quality 1/5Difficulty 5/5
I'm in my 7th semester of engineering here at Madison and Tinjum is one of the hardest professors I've had yet. His lectures are impossible to follow and his hw has absolutely no directions or expectations stated. I spend about 20 hours per hw assignment and still am barely passing this class. Do NOT take his class unless you absolutely have to.
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CEE330 · course not matched
Quality 1/5Difficulty 3/5
Nice guy but unorganized and terrible at teaching, The HW is basically a head first dive into the unknown. Studying for exams is tough cuz his lectures are all over the place and u never know exactly what ur supposed to learn. Ive never rated a prof before but i had to for him. Don't take this guy unless you want to teach yourself and waste time.
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Personal experiences, not a representative survey. Profile matching and captured coverage are shown in the source details.

Classes with James Tinjum

No teaching recorded in Fall 2026.

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Recorded teaching history

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

Instructor identity & provenance
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