I took this class online for the Fall 2021 quarter (Prof Desi wanted to keep the class online for safety reasons, as she has a little one who isn't able to be vaccinated yet.) I have really mixed feelings about this class, for multiple reasons.

For the positives, she's smart, well-spoken, and knowledgable about sociology, and comes off as such. Her slides are well organized, full of useful information, and were posted on the ccle site for students to follow along with (though, these were posted after the lecture, so less helpful than they could have been.) She was very nice, and encouraged but didn't require participation, and when there were issues with class processes she was generally flexible. For a couple examples, she mentioned how she was extending the testing window for students who contracted COVID (which I would assume was helpful) and when the fire alarm went off in our dorm during her midterm, she allowed us all to restart it with the full amount of time during the next class. And, I think this was only for this quarter, but she gave us the textbook for free, which was a plus!

For the negatives, however, her class planning made the class pretty unenjoyable. Her slot was at 9:30 am, and we would often get emails cancelling that morning's lecture at 9:27 or 9:28. Even though we weren't in person, it really threw off my planning (and other students' as well,) because not only did I wake up for that class and not get to attend it, I would also have to make time later to watch the posted lecture that she put up for class. I sometimes just didn't have time to, and would have to make do with copying down the slides. There was a week where we just didn't have lecture either day because she cancelled it, but the information was on the final, just in the form of mandatory research on a current events court case.

On that same vein, she would often not post the make-up lecture videos until days after, sometimes even after the next class (we had this class Tues Thurs, so sometimes we would have to do Tuesday's material after Thursday's class, which was also super irritating because I had the Wednesday discussion section, so we couldn't discuss what was happening in lecture.) After talking with other students, we all agreed that it was frustrating to have to work around inconsistent posting times when the lectures should have been a certain time every week. I get that life gets in the way, but it became expected for lecture to be cancelled or videos to be posted late for the *entire* quarter, and her class became a nuisance to accomodate.

Additionally, she didn't give enough time for the midterm at all, and many students failed because they were unable to finish. She did give more time for the final, but we had more short answer questions and they were way more loosely defined, so to me it kind of balanced out. I got a 90 on the midterm and a 94 on the final, but most of my classmates got anywhere from a 65-80 on the midterm (no idea what others got on the final) and she mentioned how the low scores surprised her. I finished with two to five minutes to spare on both tests (the midterm was an hour and a half and the final was three hours).

Finally, I was displeased with the timing of her extra credit––she had it due the day after Thanksgiving, which is one of the TWO DAYS that the university gives us off. I thought that sucked, and I didn't do it.

I probably wouldn't take a class with her again in an online format, but maybe if she was better at planning in person? I liked how she lectured, just not the rest of it.

How to get an A in her class was pretty simple: take good notes from the slides, and GO TO HER REVIEW SESSIONS. She basically told us what would be on the exam, though the midterm sessions was more helpful than the final. I didn't find that reading the textbook was helpful when it came to the vocabulary, but the case studies were on the tests, so I would read those.

I hope this was helpful! :)

Prof Desi is a great lecturer... when she actually shows up for lecture. She is EXTREMELY unreliable and unpredictable. For around 75% of lectures, she would cancel one minute before class started (literally one minute- not exaggerating here). This was ok, except it happened SO often and it was annoying how she expected us to make up hours of lecture in our own time. When she finally got to posting lectures she missed, they were posted days late or sometimes never posted. I stopped attending lectures at all after Week 2 because I hated waking up to see the canceled emails. However, she is a very clear and precise lecturer and good at getting the information across. She was very unwilling to give us information about the midterm exam- which ended up being VERY difficult (the class average was around an 80% if I remember correctly). However, she was very open to criticism and made the final exam easier and gave us more time.
As for actual classwork, the material is pretty easy. We would have around 50-75 pages of weekly reading from the textbook or outside reading (all of which she posted on ccle). The readings were long but very easy and manageable. There was a weekly discussion post due on Fridays, 2 essays, and 2 exams. Essays were graded very leniently- two pages in length with very clear prompts. If you can get Vince as a TA, do it, he's amazing!! Up to ten points (a whole 10% grade boost) were offered at the end of the quarter.
Overall this class was ok. The material is easy to grasp and it would've been a lot better if it wasn't for Prof Desi.

Professor Desi is an amazing lecturer, she is very unreliable. She cancels more classes than she holds (she will inform us one minute before the lecture - no exaggeration) and she will post the recording several days later. However, my biggest problem was that even though she canceled class frequently she was not apologetic about it and expected us to keep up with watching the lengthy lectures. She also is not very transparent with the format of the mid-term and gave us insufficient time to complete the lengthy multiple-choice and “short” answer questions. Furthermore, the mid-term had several important questions on a lecture that she had posted a day before the exam. DO NOT trust anything she says, she will post the lecture, essay prompt, grades, etc several days after promised and will not make any accommodations for those who were unable to catch up with the work she posted late. While I do agree that Professor Desi is very good at getting her point across during the lectures (which I personally found engaging and insightful) she is the most unreliable professor I have come across. BEWARE: the exams will be much harder than anticipated and content that our TAs confirmed will not be tested was tested (supplementary reading) which may be a result of her not being communicative with the TAs.

I have the same comments as everyone else in that Professor Desi cancelled class a LOT last minute and it was very annoying because she rarely gave us an explanation in her emails or during class. She procrastinated in posting things and grading exams, so I don't think she prioritized teaching this class.

But she posted lecture recordings and when she did lecture, her lectures were very clear and easy to understand. She's also a very nice person and considerate, giving us lots of extra credit opportunities and asking for our feedback on the midterm and extending the final to the full 3 hours instead of 1 hr 15 minutes, so for me that kinda makes up for her unreliableness. The midterm and final was super easy to me since they were open note. I didn't do any of the readings and I still did well because Professor Desi and my TA Vince went over the important concepts very well. At the end of the quarter we created a review sheet in our discussion section with a bunch of vocab and that was really helpful, so if anything I'd learn the vocab.

The material taught in this class was also very easy to understand and are probably topics you're already familiar with, going over race, gender, class, family, race, etc. Even though the professor was unreliable, I think this was a super easy class and I'd be fine with having Professor Desi teach it again.

Of all the professors I've had at UCLA this one was the least reliable. Lecture was supposed to happen live on Zoom twice a week and almost every single time, she would cancel it and say she was uploading the recorded lecture instead. And the recorded lecture, if it was ever posted, was uploaded days later (or she wouldn't even upload a recording, and would just upload slides).
I want to give her the benefit of the doubt because she was a very smart and kind person, but as a professor she was not reliable and I was not learning anything.
Extremely easy though, and I did the honors seminar too which was just an easy presentation with a group. Since my exams were online they were also very relaxed. So soc 1 is a very easy class if you need an easy GE

Professor Desi was awesome to have as a professor, she was understanding and very inclusive in her teaching practices. The class was simple to understand with weekly readings (that I honestly really didn't do). The midterm and final were a bit tough though, so just keeping thorough notes throughout and scan the readings. Professor made the class seem like an easy a, so I didn't really study for the midterm and got a low grade (my own fault though and if I just put in some effort, it would've went a long way), either way, I still ended up with an A. A lot of people were annoyed because she cancelled class a lot though and would post the lectures instead. anyways, I def recommend!

I agree with the other reviewers that Professor Desi is not the most responsible lecturer, since she always cancels last minute. However, I will admit this class is easy because of how much she inflates our grade. The midterm average was a B-, which she claimed was "abnormally low." So, she offered us numerous extra credit opportunities that would add up to 10% to our overall grade. That was a huge relief to me ahead of the final, considering I had gotten an A- on the midterm and worried about being borderline. As long as you know the key terms, understand the overall concepts, and skim the readings, you will be fine. Plus, there were only two 2-page essays we had to do, no huge research papers. So, take this class if you just want an easy GE.

Prof. Desi was a great lecturer... if we had lecture that day. Which only happened about 50% of the time. She cancelled or delayed class significantly for 9 out of the 20 lectures total with NO NOTICE WHATSOEVER. Like 1 minute until the start of class or even 10 minutes after class was supposed to start... and then wouldn't actually post the material/recorded video for DAYS after she would promise to have it uploaded by.

But still the class material was super interesting and grading was super easy. My TA was amazing and really made up for all of the lost material.

I would recommend the class anyways, just know that class might get cancelled an unreasonable amount.

I personally had a great experience in this class. Desi is an amazing lecturer and during class, it is clear she is incredibly knowledgeable about the subject. It is true that she would be kinda unpredictable, but I was consistently a week behind in lectures so I didn't really notice and I would never wake up on time anyways lmao. Also, with there being a lot of challenges this quarter Professor Desi was always willing to accommodate us in my experience.
As for the class, there were two essays that were graded really easily, and depending on the TA you should probably get full credit. As for the exams, they were pretty easy in concept, so if you basically knew all of the vocab words and the general concepts you should honestly be fine. A lot of us did not have enough time to complete the midterm exam and Professor Desi actually listened to our thoughts and gave us a lot more time for the final. There were also a lot of extra credit opportunities at the end of the quarter which definitely helped a lot of us out with our grades.
Overall I had a great experience and the class made me switch my major to sociology!

TLDR: No idea how the professor is, but decent class overall. Reading-intensive and weekly quizzes can be a bit irritating, but no major essays and good prep for the MCAT. Manageable exams and easy weekly assignments.

Since 271 people will be taking this class Fall 2021 and there are no reviews up yet, I’ll be the first to write one. I don’t really know what Prof. Desi is like because I didn’t attend any of her live "weekly wrap-up/kick-off sessions", nor did I go to her office hours or the review sessions. However, I can still review the class for you. Every week we had several (between 2-4) pre-recorded lectures to watch, which were given mostly by Prof. Jessica Collett (current Vice Chair and Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Sociology department), although there were also guest lectures given by other UCLA Sociology faculty. As of 8/10/21 MyUCLA indicates that Fall 2021 lectures for this class will be “Online – Recorded”, so I’d assume that Prof. Desi will still be using Prof. Collett’s pre-recorded lectures in the fall. The lectures were well-made and quite interesting overall, and they were relatively short (26 minutes on average, with the longest being 48 minutes). Besides the lectures, each week we also had 4-7 readings, 2 quizzes (one due Monday night and one due Wednesday night), and a discussion forum post due Friday night. Some weeks also included homework assignments, but they were easy As and usually took less than an hour to do. The discussion forum posts were fun and effectively graded on participation; we only needed to do 8/10 posts for full points. The readings were the most time-intensive part of this class, and the weekly quiz usually tested them (sometimes even minute, non-sociological details from them) in addition to the lecture material. However, Prof. Desi dropped our 3 lowest quiz scores and also dropped any quiz/exam questions that more than 50% of the class answered incorrectly.

Speaking of exams, the midterm for this class comprised of multiple-choice questions, short answer questions, and an essay question. While the content was fair, it was tough to complete in the allotted 75 minutes. The final exam was just multiple-choice questions and short answer questions. I’ve posted the grade breakdown below. Good luck!

Quizzes (17, worth 2.5 pts each): 42.5
Forum Contributions: 72
Homework (6, worth 10 pts each): 60
Section Engagement: 35
Group Effort: 10.5
Exams (2, worth 75 pts): 150
Total: 370 points, 93% minimum required for an A
(2 points of extra credit were offered for completing an early-term feedback form)