Overall, I really enjoyed Poli Sci 40 with Dan Thompson. I just finished up my first quarter at UCLA so my review is not relative to a bunch of other classes, but nonetheless I wanted to contribute to the Bruinwalk community.

39% of the grading is based on 3 "Paper Explainers" (13% each) which are basically 1-2 pages double spaced breaking down any paper he covered in class. The assignment only requires a very surface level understanding of the paper which is often done already in lecture so these are pretty easy. I definitely recommend going to your TA a few days before these are due just to have them look over it, as they are the ones grading them.

50% is midterm and final (25% each). Both of these exams were take home and we were given about a week to complete it. The format was also the same for both, 8-9 short answer questions covering material from the readings, and lecture. The exams were moderately difficult, but fair for the most part. My only complaint is that the questions were sometimes worded weird, but it was achievable for sure.

The last 11% is participation in discussion, and while attendance in lecture is not mandatory, discussion is. You get one free absence and after that they dock points from your final grade unless you make it up. Participating wasn't difficult as long as you listen to the assigned podcast ahead of time, as my TA (Graham Straus) opened the conversation to topics from the podcast.

I would recommend this class to Poli Sci majors as well as anyone who wants to take it as a GE. Not a lot of work but very interesting content! Also don't buy a textbook, he says on the first day that it's unnecessary!

TLDR; Class is a toss-up for your grade. Professor is incredibly egalitarian (and not in a good way). However, very interesting material. Uses his own research. Incredibly confusing and difficult exams. Would not take again, and would avoid if possible-- but if you have to take him, you'll enjoy some parts of it.

In all honesty, this class' content is incredibly interesting. I loved learning about all the different subjects and being able to apply them to my greater understanding of Poli Sci. However, the exams and Professor Thompson absolutely ruined the experience for me. The midterm is 30% and the final is 35%, and both are incredibly short-- meaning any one question wrong tanks your overall grade by around 3% each. To make matters worse, a lot of questions have conflicting answers (where we're presented with research in class that someone can make a viable argument either way) so it's very easy to think you have the right answer only to have the door slammed in your face once you hit submit. For this quarter, the midterm had several ambiguity errors within it (and some rubric issues) leading the class median on the midterm to be 70%. He tried to help the students by offering extra credit, but adding 3% to a faulty exam worth 30% doesn't really fix the problem.

As for Dan, he's incredibly intelligent and a pleasure to learn from. However, he is not a pleasure to work with when it comes to supporting students. I ended with an 89.75%-- that's 1 question away from an A-. I wanted to argue for some of my answers but he did not want to hear it (again, a lot of answers have ambiguity in them).

I loved this class. Lectures are recorded, the homework is super easy, and I got 100% on the midterm and the final with no studying. I <3 professor thompson.

This class was interesting and I really liked the professor but it felt like the grading on midterms/final really depended on your TA.

Easy GE/poli sci major requirement. Content was interesting but nothing necessarily entertaining. Like previous reviews mentioned, attendance in lecture wasn't technically mandatory but you had to go like 75% of the time to complete random in-class assignments. Extremely light workload.
My one grievance with this class is how our grade was essentially just the midterm and final, which was most multiple choice questions. Yes, this made it a logistically simple test, but made it easier to answer incorrectly and harm your grade. I went to majority of the lectures and got 100 on every assignment, yet ended up with an A- because of the midterm and final. I didn't score poorly on them, but I just missed the mark despite doing well on everything else.
Ultimately, I'd definitely recommend taking it but just take diligent notes on any examples of graphs or models and anything not mentioned directly on the lecture slides. Ask questions and attend office hours, and it should be an easy A.
TAs were all known for being pretty nice and helpful. I liked having Clayton.

This class was super easy, especially taking it right after AP Gov. If you have even the most basic knowledge of American politics this class is a breeze. Chase was a really good and helpful TA. Just basic weekly reading assignments with a slide you had to complete. Midterm and final were both take-home and online.

As a freshman, seeing the relatively high-rated reviews for Dan and PS40 reassured me that it would be an easy class for a new college student. For the most part, it was an easy and enjoyable class. Sometimes you'd have to attend lectures because there would be handouts that would be graded for the participation section of grading and also discussions would take attendance. The homework is easy, no need to read entire papers just skim through the preamble and ending results or read through it after he goes over the basic findings of said paper during the lecture because the assigned readings are usually talked about in the slides/lecture. Dan is passionate about the subject and can convey his thoughts fairly well. Utilize office hours when it comes to the paper explainer so you can get an A on the first and second drafts. The exams are taken home with no time limit and usually just focus on what the readings and lectures discussed. People say its like AP US government and it pretty much was, but was enjoyable nonetheless.

I would 100% recommend this class to anyone who wants to take an easy GE. This class is super chill and easy. The midterm and final are both take-home, open note, and you have more than a day to take them, so they are super easy to get done and you can easily do well on both of them. There are sometimes podcasts and readings to do, but I never did a single one and there is no need for anyone to do any non-graded work in this class. You'll have reading summary slides, but you can just read the abstract of the readings and complete them just fine. There's also a one-page essay that is really easy. Lectures are super boring, but they sometimes hand out worksheets as attendance, so you have to go to them, otherwise I would've skipped every single lecture. This class is so light and so free, I would take it every quarter and get a free A if I could. Took it my first quarter at the school and it was great. Couldn't recommend it more. My TA was Fred DeVeaux, and I recommend taking his section because he is super nice and understanding of everything and my experience with him was great.

I would not recommend this class for anyone. I came into this as a Political Science major and at the end I changed my major. So, this should tell you how much this class sucks. Thompson is very opinion based and gives an authoritarian style to teaching. I would just recommend to take this class with another professor.

This professor and his subjects taught were very interesting to me coming from a stem major. We only had to write 1, one page essay, and the tests weren’t super hard. We had weekly slides to do based on reading articles, sometimes the articles were long but we only had to do one slide per article. Outside of lecture I found myself explaining the concepts I found interesting to people around me because it intrigued me that much. He was very clear during lecture and I would definitely take another class with him!