Current instructor

John Pfotenhauer

/5Adjusted rating
/5RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 4.30/5 from 10 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

ME 561
Quality 5/5Difficulty 4/5
What a great class with a great professor. I highly recommend him for any thermo class. He really makes sure you understand the material and some of his lectures will blow your mind. The only downside is he grades kinda tough, but don't let that discourage you from signing up for his class.
Rate My Professors ↗
ME 361
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
He is a good professor and he explained the materials in an easy way to understand. HW is a lot but that is just how this course is constructed. The amount of HW is the same if you pick different lecturers. Accessible during office hour and reply emails pretty quickly if you have any questions about materials.
Rate My Professors ↗
ME 561
Quality 3/5Difficulty 4/5
He's very competent, but often comes to class semi-prepared. So his lectures can be derailed by math errors in his notes that are very hard to locate. But he's available outside class and will take the time to make sure you get it. His homework grading is often frustrating as he docks points for insignificant things, but his exam grading is lenient
Rate My Professors ↗
ME 361
Quality 3/5Difficulty 3/5
Prof. P really knows his stuff, but I think he is one of those guys who is so smart that he has trouble communicating his point sometimes. I really relied on the video lectures to supplement some mistakes and confusing points in lecture. The textbook was a must. Lots of homework, very nice professor. I learned a lot but it was a lot of work.
Rate My Professors ↗
ME 361
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
John was a great professor for Thermo. I have a lot of respect for him and he is a great teacher.
Rate My Professors ↗
ME 601
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
He is one awesome instructor. What I love about John is that he is extremely humble, yet very knowledgable. He is super polite to everyone and just one lovely person in general and in my opinion!
Rate My Professors ↗

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

Classes with John Pfotenhauer

ME 491 involves individual lab projects conducted under staff supervision.

Offering recorded · Fall 2026

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2022: 4.00 GPA, 100.0% A/AB (n=2 letter grades).

historical GPA · grades

Spring 2022–Spring 2026 · limited sample

Recorded teaching history

Explore courses taught by this instructor →
Browse recorded courses
TermCourseTitle
Fall 2026ME 491Mechanical Engineering Projects I

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

Instructor identity & provenance
{
  "instructor_uid": "instructor_9ced102c7f9e07e57d78bdfe",
  "source": "enrollment",
  "source_instructor_id": "jmpfoten",
  "identity_basis": "netid",
  "identity_status": "source_identified",
  "name": "John Pfotenhauer",
  "email": "PFOT@ENGR.WISC.EDU",
  "first_observed_at": "2026-09-07 15:55:43.033547+00:00",
  "last_observed_at": "2026-09-07 15:55:43.033547+00:00",
  "ratings": {
    "review_count": 10,
    "quality": 4.3,
    "difficulty": 3.4,
    "quality_count": 10,
    "difficulty_count": 10,
    "profile_id": "rmp:927521",
    "source_url": "https://www.ratemyprofessors.com/professor/927521",
    "match_basis": "exact_name",
    "observed_at": "2026-09-07 16:31:13.179076+00:00",
    "courses": {
      "course_abbca94d282e1b033b9fcce7": {
        "review_count": 2,
        "quality": 4,
        "difficulty": 4,
        "quality_count": 2,
        "difficulty_count": 2
      },
      "course_c30972f318c82dcee2e70be3": {
        "review_count": 5,
        "quality": 4.4,
        "difficulty": 3,
        "quality_count": 5,
        "difficulty_count": 5
      },
      "course_49f4cc81838176c2180ea21f": {
        "review_count": 1,
        "quality": 5,
        "difficulty": 3,
        "quality_count": 1,
        "difficulty_count": 1
      },
      "course_b295a028aee788daadbfb445": {
        "review_count": 1,
        "quality": 4,
        "difficulty": 4,
        "quality_count": 1,
        "difficulty_count": 1
      },
      "course_e943bbcb154c20d2c16a6792": {
        "review_count": 1,
        "quality": 4,
        "difficulty": 4,
        "quality_count": 1,
        "difficulty_count": 1
      }
    },
    "bayesian_quality": 3.87312385569773,
    "prior_mean": 3.6596857835465957,
    "prior_weight": 20
  },
  "current": true,
  "courses": [
    {
      "course_uid": "course_0dbf61c3f423477ec4826251",
      "course_id": "ME 491",
      "title": "MECHANICAL ENGINEERING PROJECTS I",
      "credits_min": 1,
      "credits_max": 3,
      "gpa": 3.89
    }
  ],
  "revision": "e243353dcb7d79b7247ced91d69443ef4c2a6349",
  "instructor_url": "/instructors/JOHN_PFOTENHAUER"
}