TAKE YOUR SPRING SEMINAR WITH DEGUZMAN IF YOU CAN!!!
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Deguzman's class was definitely the highlight of my spring quarter!
He is extremely upbeat during class and keeps students very engaged. He made the three hour long seminar feel like it was a breeze. He also was very receptive to feedbacks as he gave us long breaks in our meetings.
I cannot say enough good things about the positive energy he brings to the class.
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GRADING
I know y'all are reading this to know about grading, and I would say that you can definitely get an A in his class even if you think you are bad at writing. He only has 1 big writing assignment, which is a paper you work on throughout the quarter. He sets deadlines for parts of it so you don't get behind which was helpful because I never felt stressed about the writing ever during this class (I also heard that other spring seminars had writing every week/every other week, so if you are looking to avoid that, take this class).
With that being said, he also still greatly improves your writing. He gives detailed feedback on issues he sees with your writing, and if you appropriately address those issues and listen to his comments you will get an A. I attended his office hours for extra feedback and he would let you know what needed to be altered and he also went above and beyond and found sources for us to use in our papers which I thought was really nice and helpful.
25% Class engagement
25% Class presentation
5% List of Sources
10% Thesis and Outline
10% Rough Draft
25% Final Draft
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I wish I was able to take him in previous quarters of this seminar, so if you get the chance definitely take this seminar.

JP is THE sweetest professor you'll meet at UCLA. It's a shame that he wasn't a lecturer earlier in the cluster. His courseload was extremely reasonable. There was readings each week that were manageable, and as long as you skim them, you should be fine during class.

He did an excellent job transitioning to zoom. He would often start the class by asking if we wanted to share about anything going on in our lives (while respecting the times when we didn't want to share), discussing current events, and he genuinely treated his students like adults. He never talked down to us once, and was so sad that he didn't get to meet us in person.

He said that he had planned a field trip and/or dining hall visit/potluck if we had been in person, and it's a shame that we didn't get to go through with that :,(

After the first few weeks, we then transitioned into the second half of the seminar being taught by a group of 1-3 students, where we'd take turns presenting slides about the topics of the reading. Just a warning for those who may not be comfortable speaking in public, it was required that we each took turns presenting, but he made the environment feel very comfortable.

He did a great job working through the silent moments when we were unsure how to answer his questions during a discussion, and never scolded us for not answering.

His seminar always ended early, so that was nice. There was no midterm for this class, and due to the circumstances, he also made the final essay optional !

JP is truly a gem of a professor, and I would highly recommend that you take his class.