I would definitely recommend his class and this professor! I found him to be a clear, concise lecturer and I really appreciated the many review sessions he held before midterms and finals. I would really, really advise people taking his class to take advantage of all the office hours and CLC sessions, both of which are super useful (way more useful than Launchpad) in understanding the material and preparing for the exams. Dr. Maloy offers a lot of these, so if I could go back and do this class all over again, I would probably go to more office hours!

However, like many other students, I found Launchpad and the whole idea of the flipped classroom to be pretty annoying, and oftentimes the material in Launchpad doesn't really correlate with what's being taught in lectures. Launchpad has a lot of extra information you don't really need, and although I took notes on Launchpad at first, it's not super helpful. I would recommend just skimming through Launchpad and only taking a few notes on the most important concepts or on the quizzes.

If you're taking this class with another professors other than Dr. Maloy, make sure to check out the other professor's reviews as well! I took the class with Dr. Lin and Dr. Maloy teaching together, and although I love Dr. Lin as a person, his teaching wasn't the most clear and I had to basically learn all of the second midterm's material on my own.

tl;dr Launchpad isn't important, take advantage of office hours/extra credit, and make sure to check out the second professor's reviews!

Maloy is a great professor! His lectures are engaging, informative, and helpful to review when preparing for his midterms and final. Moreover, he provides a lot of assistance during his office hours. For Maloy's exams, you don't need to memorize anything, just be able to apply the knowledge you've learned in class; you'll be asked many critical thinking type questions. Be prepared, as the LS 7 series courses are inverted classes with your grade based on a point system. Inverted means that you'll learn most of your material on your own through LaunchPad (which make up a significant amount of the points in the class), only coming to class to reinforce what you've read/learned. The points refer to how many points each part of the course is worth out of a total. Make sure to snag the easy points like LaunchPad and discussion participation. Be sure to manage your time and ask Maloy questions throughout the quarter.

I loved this class! The content was super interesting, challenging and I feel like I have learnt a lot from it. Dr. Maloy is an amazing professor. He cares so much about his students it’s crazy. He explains things so well and sparks a great interest in the subject. He also holds a lot of review sessions and office hours, which are super helpful.

While I did enjoy this class, I do have to acknowledge that LS 7A as a class has a lot of issues. To begin with, Launchpad is a horrible resource. While the idea of a flipped classroom is great, Launchpad is just not the resource for it. It gives you so much unnecessary information and is a waste of time. Secondly, I had half the class with Dr. Lin who I learnt nothing from. Thirdly, the exams for this class is quite tough and it can be difficult to know how to prepare for. Of course, you can succeed if you put a good amount of effort and work smart.

Overall, despite certain issues I highly recommend taking LS 7A with Maloy. You can succeed in this class if you focus on the lecture slides, clicker questions and go for office hours and review sessions.

Also shout out to my TA Jensen. This guy was the real MVP of the class. He helped us so much and was honestly even better than Maloy. He is the only reason I survived the Lin period.

Professor Maloy is definitely the best professor to take LS 7A with. He gives engaging lectures and knows the content like the back of his hand. The problem with the 7 series is that it’s in a flipped class style. So you’ll be taking online quizzes and doing homework before every lecture. Lecture is mostly participation and clicker questions. The exams are all true and false, MC and can be a bit difficult. I got a B- and then a B+ on the first and second midterm, respectively and then a straight B on the final and still managed to get an A (the reason is because Launchpad gives you a huge boost). Take this class with Dr. Maloy!

695 points total
90 midterm 1
120 midterm 2
200 final
remaining points from launchpad/clicker/other that should be free points
few EC points

Good professor, good class. It is not too difficult if you have taken a Chem class like 14A or 20A or have taken AP Biology. Then a good chunk of it is review. The exams are fair, though they always have a few questions that are confusing due to wording. This class is not about memorizing, and more about problem solving.

Professor Maloy is an excellent professor. His lectures were very clear and it was very easy to learn from hin. I would definitely reccomend attendinh as many of his office hours as possible. He helps prepare you for the midterms and gives you practice problems that are very similar to exam problems. This class stresses understanding concepts and applying them, rather than pure memorization, so don't bother wasting time memorizing steps or processes. The only thing I hated was using Launchpad (online textbook). The class is not an easy A, but with the right study strategies and effort, anyone could earn an A.

This class was tough, but Maloy is an excellent lecturer and really tried his best to make lectures engaging and clear. His office hours are also very helpful, so attend as often as possible to get an advantage in the class. Tests are tough, but not impossible. Would take this class again with Maloy, but check the reviews for Dr. Lin, who co-teaches the class, before enrolling. I wouldn't recommend taking the class if he continues to teach it with Maloy.

As I had both Dr. Braybrook and Dr. Maloy, I will be putting this review under both of their names. (TDLR; Do all (if not extra) prep work before lecture, study learning outcomes/previous classwork, read AOL questions carefully, and do extra credit. Also go to office hours/CLC if you can)

Personally, I found this course's content to be similar to what I learned in AP Biology, which I took junior year. The flipped classroom format just meant that I learned everything in the textbook beforehand and then reviewed it in class. Because of this, I found the homework very time consuming, but I was making my own notes in addition to the reading guides assigned. The lectures were relatively easy to understand because I did that extra work.

Dr. Braybrook and Dr. Maloy both clearly care about their students, and they are also excellent teachers. I can't say much about how they are in a smaller group setting like office hours since I never went (lol), but I do think that they would be willing and able to answer any question. In lecture, their explanation for iClicker questions and content in general always made sense. Clicker questions are quite easy compared to the AOLs, and they aren’t graded on correctness. Discussion sections are definitely helpful, especially if you are confused on something from the lecture, so I’d highly recommend going.

Each of the three AOLs had two parts, the individual score and the group score. In the tests themselves, there were quite a few questions that would be meant to trip you up, but theoretically, you could do horribly in the individual but somewhat well on the group portion. However, the improvement from the group score will definitely depend on who you're working with.

When I studied for tests, I usually started by reviewing iClicker and PALs. Afterwards, I would write out all the learning outcomes needed for the AOL, plus all the necessary concepts needed to answer that outcome. Then I would review the CLC worksheets, recorded review sessions specific to the particular AOL, and any new graphs we learned (this last part definitely helped out a lot). Going to CLC sessions and office hours (which I rarely did) throughout the quarter would probably be very beneficial, so I'd go to those as often as you can.

Grading in this class was a point system that was quite fair (mostly based on AOLs), but take advantage of extra credit so you have some buffer. Hope this was helpful, and don’t worry too much about this class if you need to take it, you’ll be just fine!

I took LS7A with Professor Maloy and Professor Braybrook, who switched off every week. HOWEVER, LS7A is extremely standardized, with every professor teaching the exact same material in an extremely similar way. Thus, the professor you have does not matter as much as other classes.

Maloy and Braybrook are great, they have an amazing chemistry and bounce off one another very well. Maloy also brings his dog Toby to lecture every day so don't take him if you get distracted by dogs easily cough* cough*. Anyways, they teach the material really clearly and help you understand how different processes relate (very important for 7A). Their office hours are REALLY helpful, as they answer your questions and reinforce your knowledge by going over practice problems. These two professors are also unique in that they offer non-content student hours; these can be very helpful if you're new to the university. During these hours, they find a really nice area on campus and talk about things completely separate from the course, including the learning assistant program and how to find research (as well as other things). Having these two professors was a blast, and I'd recommend taking 7A with either of them.

The coursework can be pretty tough if you're new to flipped classrooms. Essentially, you have to learn the material on your own (thus professors don't matter too much), and during lecture, your professor/s will give you practice problems and help connect the dots. It is important to keep on track with the weekly readings and try your best to attend lecture, but this can be difficult with the menace known as Achieve (the textbook). If you are behind, it is not worth it to attend lecture, because the professors do not review the reading in depth.

The course and grading rubric is honestly very fair. There were 2 MCQ midterms (the first worth 12% of your grade and the second worth 16%) and an MCQ final (28% of grade). Exams are asynchronous and you are given a day to take the individual phase of the exam. The next two days is the group phase of the exam, where you will meet up with your group, share answers, come up with the correct answers, and retake the test. The group phase is the exact same test as the individual phase, meaning your group phase score will almost certainly be higher than your individual phases. These exams were not memory based, instead testing our understanding and application, and I think they did a fair job.

Finally, here are my tips for doing well in this course:
1. Understand the content and be able to explain everything.
2. If you're behind on content, skip out on your professor's lecture and attend a different professor's lecture after you've read the material.
3. Do the extra credit! This class gave out 2.8% of extra credit which doesn't seem like much but because of it I went into the final with a grade over 100% and thus took it pretty easily.
4. Don't memorize, understand. Very few questions will ask you to recite a basic fact and most of those questions will provide a diagram that has the information. The exams are about understanding and application.
5. Consider changing lecture/discussion. Put simply, you want to be in a group where you're not the smartest one so someone else can carry you. Don't be afraid to change discussions in the first couple weeks to try and roll for better teammates.
6. Don't take this class during a TA strike because the professors may or may not flake out.

Key things to know:
- LS7A is standardized so if you don't get the professor you want it's not the end of the world. I will say that if I had to choose again I'd 100% go with Professor Maloy because he's good at lecturing and has a really cute dog that he brings to class.
- There are a lot of assignments that do not necessarily take a lot of time but are easy to forget about if you're not on top of things. The points add up, and even if the professors are generous with the grading system, it's good to learn how to manage your time.
- The exams are application based. Review clicker questions and discussion worksheets, attend CLC sessions, and go to office hours. My TA was so so helpful and gave the best advice.
- Do not take this class unless it's a major requirement or you really like Bio.