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Joseph Esdin
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Esdin is a great professor, and explains the material with clarity. However, you're probably familiar with the LS7 series, and how vague the exam questions can be. To study, I recommend watching videos that explain difficult concepts, reviewing peqs and clicker questions, and sometimes reading and taking notes on LaunchPad. Also, do ALL the extra credit if you can!!
This class is really not that fun online. I think most of the lifestyle analysis that's actually fun and interesting would occur during in-person labs. But since we couldn't access any of that over Zoom, we just had a lot more lectures about physiology. Not the worst thing ever and the class still wasn't hard. There were 2 major exams and 4 quizzes, which were a bit hard at times, but I think most of the class still ended up getting As. The most annoying part that a lot of people lost points on were required "participation quizzes" which were 3-question quizzes due on the day of each asynchronous lecture. But if you remembered to do them, they were pretty much free points. Also, you don't really HAVE to buy the $100+ course reader if you just pay really close attention and take good notes during lecture, because almost none of the exam questions are exclusive to the textbook.
He is really nice and funny and genuinely cares that we understand the material which is decently rare for a professor. It is a core bio class so it isn't going to be super easy, but I think esdin made it interesting and not painful. Although I do like bio a lot and always have so I might be slightly biased.
I highly recommend this class as a GE to all students. Professor Esdin was amazing! His lectures were incredibly interesting yet very clear and easy to follow along. The diet/fitness evaluation project was really interesting and fun to do as I felt like I learned a lot about my eating and fitness habits that I will remember for the rest of my life. The labs were excellent as we got to work on our final project in the sessions which allowed for ample time to complete everything. All in all, this was an excellent class and I highly recommend it to all UCLA students!
TAKE THIS CLASS!!! This has by far been my favorite class at UCLA. Professor Esdin is so informative and teaches you information about nutrition and exercise you can actually apply to your life. He teaches very complex ideas in simple terms that make it easy to digest. The class is overall really straightforward and the bulk of your grade comes from 1 midterm, final, and project.
My one piece of advice for the class is to start the project early! The project entails logging your nutritional intake for a week then analyzing your data in a lab report that is quite tedious but overall simple.
This class content seemed easy until we took the tests. It proved to be a lot more difficult to execute the concepts. Practice practice practice. Don’t memorize.
If you are taking LS 7C, you are already familiar with the LS 7 series as a whole. I will add that I found this class to be much more difficult than 7A or 7B. The discussion worksheets were also graded more harshly than the labs/discussions in 7A/7B. Be sure to study the diagrams/feedback loops carefully.
As a more physical science major, I hated bio before this class but Esdin really taught me how to enjoy the content! I've also started watching my health quite a bit more LMAO so take that as a bonus to this class. Class is free if you put a smidge of effort into it (especially if you've taken AP Bio or whatever, lots of review.) Only annoying thing is daily participation quizzes (online) but honestly it kept me more engaged and they were easy.
I strongly disliked this class. Esdin is a great person and funny professor, but at the end of the day, he has no control over the structure of the class, which is main issue of LS 7C. The TA's were extremely unhelpful and took many many many points off for discussion each week. Discussions were on new topics not closely related to class, but graded on correctness. The tests were worded ridiculously strange and had questions on topics we very briefly went over in class. Many students failed the midterms. Lectures don't really prepare you for the tests, and neither do clicker questions or discussion worksheets. Also, check the pdf of the clicker questions for the slides because the lecture slides are missing a lot of important pages. There really wasn't any useful guidance on how and what to study, leading many students to do poorly on the test. This class was just very frustrating because of the lack of straightforwardness and helpfulness. And to top it off, we were constantly told it was our faults for not doing well when clearly there are issues with the structure of the class.
*SELLING COURSE READER
One of the easiest GE's I've taken. Includes lab credit and makes you a better, healthier person overall. The only thing is that he requires you to buy a $100 course reader/iprofile that you can only get from a particular shop in Westwood. I have the updated course reader that it is in brand new condition and am selling it for cheaper: text me at **********. The only reason I got a B+ in this class was because I would forget to watch the lectures and take the quizzes LMAO. They were literally not even hard.
Esdin is a great professor, and explains the material with clarity. However, you're probably familiar with the LS7 series, and how vague the exam questions can be. To study, I recommend watching videos that explain difficult concepts, reviewing peqs and clicker questions, and sometimes reading and taking notes on LaunchPad. Also, do ALL the extra credit if you can!!
This class is really not that fun online. I think most of the lifestyle analysis that's actually fun and interesting would occur during in-person labs. But since we couldn't access any of that over Zoom, we just had a lot more lectures about physiology. Not the worst thing ever and the class still wasn't hard. There were 2 major exams and 4 quizzes, which were a bit hard at times, but I think most of the class still ended up getting As. The most annoying part that a lot of people lost points on were required "participation quizzes" which were 3-question quizzes due on the day of each asynchronous lecture. But if you remembered to do them, they were pretty much free points. Also, you don't really HAVE to buy the $100+ course reader if you just pay really close attention and take good notes during lecture, because almost none of the exam questions are exclusive to the textbook.
He is really nice and funny and genuinely cares that we understand the material which is decently rare for a professor. It is a core bio class so it isn't going to be super easy, but I think esdin made it interesting and not painful. Although I do like bio a lot and always have so I might be slightly biased.
I highly recommend this class as a GE to all students. Professor Esdin was amazing! His lectures were incredibly interesting yet very clear and easy to follow along. The diet/fitness evaluation project was really interesting and fun to do as I felt like I learned a lot about my eating and fitness habits that I will remember for the rest of my life. The labs were excellent as we got to work on our final project in the sessions which allowed for ample time to complete everything. All in all, this was an excellent class and I highly recommend it to all UCLA students!
TAKE THIS CLASS!!! This has by far been my favorite class at UCLA. Professor Esdin is so informative and teaches you information about nutrition and exercise you can actually apply to your life. He teaches very complex ideas in simple terms that make it easy to digest. The class is overall really straightforward and the bulk of your grade comes from 1 midterm, final, and project.
My one piece of advice for the class is to start the project early! The project entails logging your nutritional intake for a week then analyzing your data in a lab report that is quite tedious but overall simple.
This class content seemed easy until we took the tests. It proved to be a lot more difficult to execute the concepts. Practice practice practice. Don’t memorize.
If you are taking LS 7C, you are already familiar with the LS 7 series as a whole. I will add that I found this class to be much more difficult than 7A or 7B. The discussion worksheets were also graded more harshly than the labs/discussions in 7A/7B. Be sure to study the diagrams/feedback loops carefully.
As a more physical science major, I hated bio before this class but Esdin really taught me how to enjoy the content! I've also started watching my health quite a bit more LMAO so take that as a bonus to this class. Class is free if you put a smidge of effort into it (especially if you've taken AP Bio or whatever, lots of review.) Only annoying thing is daily participation quizzes (online) but honestly it kept me more engaged and they were easy.
I strongly disliked this class. Esdin is a great person and funny professor, but at the end of the day, he has no control over the structure of the class, which is main issue of LS 7C. The TA's were extremely unhelpful and took many many many points off for discussion each week. Discussions were on new topics not closely related to class, but graded on correctness. The tests were worded ridiculously strange and had questions on topics we very briefly went over in class. Many students failed the midterms. Lectures don't really prepare you for the tests, and neither do clicker questions or discussion worksheets. Also, check the pdf of the clicker questions for the slides because the lecture slides are missing a lot of important pages. There really wasn't any useful guidance on how and what to study, leading many students to do poorly on the test. This class was just very frustrating because of the lack of straightforwardness and helpfulness. And to top it off, we were constantly told it was our faults for not doing well when clearly there are issues with the structure of the class.
*SELLING COURSE READER
One of the easiest GE's I've taken. Includes lab credit and makes you a better, healthier person overall. The only thing is that he requires you to buy a $100 course reader/iprofile that you can only get from a particular shop in Westwood. I have the updated course reader that it is in brand new condition and am selling it for cheaper: text me at **********. The only reason I got a B+ in this class was because I would forget to watch the lectures and take the quizzes LMAO. They were literally not even hard.