Historical instructor

Russ Shafer-Landau

Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 4.52/5 from 52 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

PHIL241 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 1/5
Loved having Russ as a professor
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PHIL241 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
The greatest of all time
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241 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
AMAZING LECTURER! I loved this course, so engaging. Only critique is it is difficult to get an A, any receive ABs/Bs. I enjoyed the format of the exams; essay formats in-person, but giving ideas of what we would be writing about beforehand and was open to interpretation based on your opinions of different theories.
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PHIL241 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 1/5
Professor gave incredible lectures that made material very easy to understand. Didn't do a single reading and still got a high A. Super funny and very open to questions and discussions during and after class. The grade was decided mainly on our final exams (papers) but they were graded very leniently and weren't long at all (less than one page).
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PHIL241 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 2/5
outstanding passionate teacher
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241 · course not matched
Quality 4/5Difficulty 3/5
Russ is fantastic, he makes lecture fun and worth coming to. My two critiques are that there are so many readings (as expected but just a lot), and the fact that it's really easy to get a B but super difficult to get an A. The in-class quizzes were so hard, but the papers were always graded with some grace. Very sweet guy though.
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Personal experiences, not a representative survey. Profile matching and captured coverage are shown in the source details.

Classes with Russ Shafer-Landau

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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