Alright, let me get this straight. This man is so mad that students at UCLA are doing better on his weekly quizzes than the other community college he teaches at that he PURPOSEFULLY makes the midterm exam more difficult. (BTW, he changed his midterm the night before giving it out, so there were numerous typos that made it difficult to understand questions, and had a few questions that had multiple answers that were correct when only 1 was marked as the correct answer). Also, he REFUSES to accommodate other students when we simply asked for a little bit more time than 5 minutes on weekly quizzes (he eventually FINALLY caved halfway through the quarter and gave us 1 extra minute to answer even more vague questions he puts on his quizzes). He instructed his TAs to grade our final paper on a strict grading rubric that was EXTREMELY vague since the beginning as it was supposed to give us "creative freedom," yet he enforces a strict grading policy???

Let's talk about the final I just took. He claims that due to his fears of students cheating during online teaching, that he puts in place sequential testing (where you can't go back to check answers after you click to go to the next question, and you can't skip ahead to another question). This was an okay policy, personally; I can deal with that. Yet while he says he's afraid of students cheating, he puts a question on the final that requires you to look at your notes for the graph or just straight up guess because it's such a random detail from one of his lectures. There is also no graph to go alongside the question to help you answer it, so you either guess, or quickly look through your notes on a closed-book exam. I guessed and probably got it wrong.

The interesting topics that this course goes over were completely ruined by this professor's weird test-taking policies and strange stubbornness to accommodate students DURING A PANDEMIC. I actually really like sociology, but it is not my major and I took this class as a GE. DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS FOR A GE. It's not worth it unless you take P/NP.

I would actually rather write 5 papers like the other sociology professor does than take this class again with Villarreal. This class was STUPIDLY hard for no reason when the topics were actually interesting. I know the core concepts for this course (as stated by the learning objectives in the rubric), yet what is actually tested are random, fleeting details from lecture. Awful all around.

Class grade breakdown:
Midterm: 25%
Final: 25%
Weekly quizzes (lowest 2 dropped): 20%
Essay: 20%
Participation: 10%

This class was definitely really stressful but it's kind of offset by the fact that the workload is so light. Lectures were asynchronous (about an hour and a half total for each week) and were based straight off the textbook with a little extra information thrown in. Weekly textbook reading is recommended and it is helpful to skim just because not all the vocab makes it into the lecture. There's a weekly discussion question that's due every Friday and sometimes a discussion memo written in a breakout room during discussion (I believe we had a total of 4-5 memos throughout the quarter, so it's not every week). Quizzes (5 questions; 6 minutes total given; no going back) worth 20% of our grade (lowest two scores dropped) were also due Friday and were quite simple MC based on the lecture material.

Midterm and final (each 25% of your grade) were both 35 minutes for 25 MC questions, with no going back after moving to the next question. Essay (20% of your grade) was due later on in the quarter.

Quizzes were simple reading comprehension (if you watched the lecture and took good notes then you're totally good to go) and you get full points on the memos if you just take the time to analyze the topic + write a full paragraph. The discussion questions were graded on participation, so that was an easy 30% of your grade secured right there.

I do agree that the midterm was overly punitive given the scope of the class + the format of the midterm. The exam was closed notes/book and we didn't have the option of going back to check your answer, which sucked majorly since the exam was timed. I ended up making the mistake of rushing and didn't do so well. The prof ended up giving back points for some of the questions with ambiguous wording (I think 3-4 questions total), so the average did go up to 85 according to one of the TAs. As someone else mentioned, apparently the midterm was made to be easier but was then changed because of how high our quiz averages were. There were definitely confusing wording/questions, but he did give back points so I believe it evens out.

My TA mentioned that the prof asked them to grade the essay down to a B average, so if you take this class, try to organize an office hour with your TA or the prof to discuss the prompt and the direction of your essay. A lot of the comments/feedback I got were extra topics I could have discussed (not really covered by the prompt). I wasn't too happy with my score but it ended up curved up by two points at the very end.

The final was a lot, lot better. I rewatched all of the lecture videos and redid all the readings (final wasn't cumulative so it was only about five weeks of lectures) and scored really well. While we still weren't allowed to go back and check answers (Prof said this was the alternative to Respondus), none of the questions had ambiguous wording and they were all answerable based on what we learned in the class. Average was around 85 again (no adjustments).

All in all, I don't actually think this was a bad class to take at all. There isn't a lot of cushioning if you screw up on one of the big portions of your grade (midterm/essay/final) and there isn't extra credit, but I think it's definitely doable if you really work to understand the details and themes of the course. Prof. Villarreal did try to accommodate us based on our feedback (increased quiz times by one minute; final was less confusing) but I understand why people are a little frustrated with this class. Taking it in-person would probably be better as you wouldn't have to deal with the no going back policy on quizzes/exams, but if you put a little more time in, I think this was definitely manageable as an online class.

Past reviews are very outdated, Villarreal does not run his class the same way that the scary reviews from 2020 make it seem. This man is incredibly down to earth and wholesome, as well as very passionate and knowledgeable about sociology. Would highly recommend taking if you're even slightly interested in sociology as I was. A lot of people I talked to said it all just sounded like common sense, which it does, but it's very interesting common sense. I also recommend taking this along with the honors seminar! It's such a small class that it gives you a much better outlet for getting to know him.

You could've easily made it through this class just by reading the slides Villarreal presents during lecture, which are a condensed and useful summary of the textbook. Lecture itself is just him reading off the slides, but he sometimes adds his own commentary and jokes. You'll be bored in lecture if you read the book, so my advice is to not read and get everything you need from lecture. No final, just two midterms week 5 and 10 and a 5 page essay week 7. Discussion is mandatory and we also had weekly embedded questions that are answered in the form of discussions on BruinLearn. He randomly decided to give everyone two additional points on the first midterm to boost everyone's grades and then gave extra credit for filling out the course evals, which was super helpful and nice of him to do.

He once said in class that there was a sociological experiment that showed better looking professors get better ratings in evaluations. (To which he said "If that's the case then I'm doomed"). Hopefully this is a good enough review to change the data a bit. I'm currently trying to figure out whether I should change my major to sociology now.

The seminar requires you to read a research paper or other source material each week and then write a reflection memo for it. The memo is due the morning of the Sunday before your seminar class. This has sometimes led to late last minute reading and writing for this 1 unit seminar. Be better than me. That said, if you're not familiar with reading academic papers, it might take you a while to get through the papers and understanding them. Some of these academic papers took me 3+ hours getting through them. But that could just be me.
Don't expect to get 100s easily from the memos. Professor Villarreal is very particular with the 100s he gives. So normally, the highest grade you'll get is 90. Don't worry if you don't get a 90 for each memo. I couldn't consistently get 90s but I still got an A. But sometimes, it got really stressful thinking about it, especially since the syllabus didn't include a numerical grade to alphabetical grading scale.
As for the seminar part of the class, it didn't really feel like a seminar. Most of the time, it was Professor Villarreal sharing an overview of the reading of the week then him talking with the occasional student who voluntarily shares. Professor Villarreal does try to encourage people to share their memos and thoughts, but most of the time people talk because Villarreal mentions their memo. I think if seminar participation was part of the grade, then more people would be motivated to speak during the seminars. I think this seminar could meet its full seminar-potential if people spoke more and if there were sources that would help understand the readings if you weren't familiar with comprehending research papers.

Sociology 1 with Professor Villarreal is straightforward. Homework is reading the assigned textbook sections and lecture is the professor taking the parts from the textbook that will be shown in the midterms. Professor Villarreal's lectures are him reading his presentation slides with him elaborating on the charts and graphs. His presentations are sufficient so much so that I had friends who did well on this class without doing the readings and just taking the notes during lecture. You will want to attend the lectures or make a friend who does because there are questions that he asks during lecture that are NOT on the presentations for your discussion posts. But half the time, he didn't remember to mention them during lectures and you can guess the question if you see the discussion posts of the other students who wrote their responses. Professor Villarreal's Sociology 1 isn't mind blowing but it's simple enough to get your GE/major credit with enough ease. When you talk to him, he is very eager to answer your questions, especially when the questions are about data and graphs. You can tell he is someone who is very passionate about the field.

This class is a solid, if basic, introductory course for sociology. Also consider taking the companion seminar (SOCIOL 89), if offered.

The format of this class is very traditional - two in-person lectures and a discussion section (attendance required). Professor Villarreal's lectures adhere very strictly to his slides, and the slides adhere very strictly to the textbook; as such, I know many found them pretty dry. Notably, the lecture slides and recordings from previous years were all posted on BruinLearn. Discussion sections typically went as follows: the TA would review/re-present parts of the lecture material in class for the first 30 minutes, and then have students write one-page reflections (graded for completion) on a provided question for the last 20 minutes of discussion.

In terms of homework, the only homework for the semester was responding to weekly discussion questions posted on Canvas (usually asking about lecture topics in a modern context). We also had one paper (5 pages max) due around week 8, asking students to write about an example of inequality they have experienced, witnessed, or read about. Due to *extraordinary circumstances*, our papers were ultimately never graded, so I can't speak to how they would be normally evaluated.

We had two exams for the quarter - a midterm during week 5, and a "midterm 2" during week 10. Both exams were multiple choice only, consisting of ~32 questions over 75 minutes, and midterm 2 was non-cumulative. The exam questions stuck pretty closely to the material taught in the textbook/lectures, and were generally very straightforward; few people used the full time.

PS: In addition to the primary SOCIOL 1 class, Professor Villarreal also had a companion seminar (SOCIOL 89) during the same quarter.

This class was super easy and the least of my worries. Just 2 midterms, no final on finals week, 2nd midterm not cumulative. Very easy to do well as long as you do the weekly textbook readings, which aren't unreasonably long and fairly interesting. 1 paper about 4-5 pages which was pretty easy as well. Discussion attendance is based on participation and a weekly question to answer. Professor Villarreal was sweet but mostly read off the slides that came from the textbook which was kind of annoying. Overall very easy to do well, just do the work.

I enjoyed this class a lot. The workload is very manageable (2 midterms, a 5-page essay, and brief weekly discussion posts). The midterms were very reasonable, especially if you already have an understanding of social issues and concepts. I studied off of the list of key terms that he gives you and managed to get a 92 on the first midterm and a 95 on the second. The lectures and textbook readings are very closely related to eachother and it is probably not necessary to read the textbook. Slides are uploaded online.

the slides and content were literally copy and pasted from the textbook, but for some reason the exams were harder than expected. He seems like a super cool dude, he's very passionate about sociology, but I wish that the midterms were easier to understand when it came to the question phrasing. My TA was phenomenal, Joseph Weigner, he was fantastic and super knowledgeable about the material. Sometimes I felt like the class was just him asking questions and I'd answer them which would be funny but participation is quite vital in this class, especially in the discussions. I was told this class would be easy, but then I ended up studying until 3am the night before the exam, if that tells you anything.

The professor is super genuine guy, he is just slightly boring when he lectures. I would definitely recommend this class, it is a super easy GE! No homework, tests are multiple choice, one essay that you can have your TA basically outline for you.