Although I have nothing bad to say about Professor Ko, I have much to say about the 7 series. To start, the series is set up in an inverted classroom style, where you do pre-class assignments on your own, and the lectures are there to provide further explanations. However, the PowerPoint slides, although applicable to the clicker questions, did not contribute effectively to my learning. This is not the professor's fault since all the professors are given the same materials for the class. Your success depends on your TA and how well they can explain and reiterate concepts. Thankfully, I had an excellent TA. The group portions of the exams were a helpful way to discuss complex topics. If you get a good group, the group portion should go smoothly. However, all the exam questions are set up as trick questions so make sure you pay attention to that and read everything carefully. The PALs, although tricky, set you up for the exams, so do not skip those. Overall, I loathe the 7 series, but it is not the fault of Professor Ko. Her lectures were as engaging as she could make them.

Dr. Ko is a very knowledgeable and determined person, but I think she is an average professor. I didn't find myself engaged with lectures and often rewatched lectures from other professors to get a better understanding of the material. But, it's not the end of the world if you take her class. This class isn't meant to be a weeder class and will probably be one of the easiest STEM courses you take here due to how the grading scheme is.

Try not to miss an assignment and stay on top of your work to get easy points. Like many people say, this class isn't a typical environment because you learn the material yourself first and then review it during the lecture.

Pre-class readings are basically when you read from the textbook and fill out a reading guide for the particular lesson. Afterwards, you do questions on Launchpad. Readings are due Monday and Wednesday morning. Content isn't too hard, but I recommend you study concepts and lecture slides, rather than just memorizing what's in the book.

Then you go to lecture. Attendance is mandatory, but you can miss up to three lectures for full points in the category. During lecture, you do iClicker questions and at the end, you complete a pod assignment with your group assigned at first discussion. You basically sit with your podmates for all lectures, discussions, and take tests with them.

During discussions, you review content and fill out an assignment on Gradescope. You can miss up to one discussion for full points in that category.

Lastly, at the end of each week, there is a PALs or practice test that assesses you with questions that will model what the test is like. Worth 1% of your grade and you can miss one PALS for full credit.

There are two midterms and one final. The two midterms for fall 2024 were 50 questions each. You have to do an individual phase first/take the test alone first (which fortunately doesn't count for your score). During the "group phase", you collaborate with your podmates and discuss plausible solutions to the test. If you made corrections, you have a chance to earn points through a lengthy grade scope assignment. (Group phase is worth 100% of your midterm score)

The final is individual based. I recommend prepping for this by reviewing iClicker questions, lecture slides, PALS, and concepts that they post for the AOLs.

Grades are calculated on a point system out of 747. As long as you get around a 100 on class participation and homework assignments, you'll probably end up with an A or B in the class. This class is meant to set you up for success. There is also a ton of extra credit opportunities, so make sure to do them and you'll be fine!!

Dr. Ko was fire, good at answering questions. Learning goals were standardized and easy to see. I like clicker questions and the work was fair, but take with a grain of salt because I did well in my 2 years of bio and 2 years of chem in high school so most of everything was easy.

For me the most helpful resource in this class was pre-class videos and assignments. This was extremely helping because I would go into lecture already having an idea of what the professor would be talking about.

The start of each lecture included a list of learning goals for this course, thus this was communicated clearly. Not all of the course activities were structured in helpful ways for learning, as lecture questions were almost always harder than the pre-class assignments. The required work did enable me to demonstrate my learning.

I think, overall, that your professor for 7A is not important. However, from my experience, Ko is an average professor. Some things clicked, others didn’t. She is also fairly new to teaching. 7A is a very independent course so as long you stay on top of everything you will be fine!

Professor Ko is very kind and understanding. She extended assignment due dates for the first two weeks because she recognized that we were adjusting to the course style. She also extended due dates for coursework due to the protests, recognizing that it was an emotional time for many students. Professor Ko is very compassionate towards her students and extended all extra credit deadlines (all 12 points) to the end of the quarter so more people could complete it. This class has a lot of cushioning, I did very badly on the second AoL and I was still able to get an A in the class. It does require a lot of time for studying and completing coursework. Overall, I enjoyed Professor Ko as a lecturer, she answered questions and cracked jokes. She is also very helpful during office hours and if you ask for a reasonable extension for an assignment you will most likely receive it.

I think Ko is a new professor, so take my review with a grain of salt.

Overall, this class is pretty easy, and it shouldn't really matter what professor you have, since they're all structured the same way.

I'll begin with Ko: She's enthusiastic and pretty funny, and she deeply cares about you. I never used CampusWire, which is the method she offered to communicate with her and the TAs, but I've heard she was responsive and helpful. Her lectures are purely slideshow, but she does a good job of interspersing the slides with clicker questions and she takes enough time such that it should be easy to understand. My only real problem with her was that she never offered us solutions to the tests after they were completed, and there were some pretty confusing wrong answers that my group would've loved to have cleared up. I also think that sometimes she didn't really understand herself why a concept was the way that it was, although I can't confirm that. But overall, she's a great professor and explains things clearly and engagingly.

The class itself, as I said, is fairly easy. It requires some work, but nothing outrageous. You'll have to complete questions based on textbook reading each week, and there's some fairly difficulty "practice AOLs" that you complete each week. There's also these pointless mental health modules every other week that really don't help with stress and just pissed most people off. The AOLs (basically just midterms and finals) are online, so take from that piece of information what you will. If you do your work and put in at least some effort to actually understand the material, there's a very small chance you walk away with a grade worse than a B+. If you struggle to do the textbook readings each week, or completely bomb an AOL or two, you might fare worse, but not too much worse. If you put more effort into this class than your other classes, then I'm sure you'll find yourself on top of the curve, with an A or A+.

This class has an inverted classroom setup, where you'll be doing pre-class readings and quizzes to get familiar with the material and then go into lecture to review certain aspects and work on applications. Professor Ko did try to make the lectures engaging, but I feel like the majority of the learning is done out of class. She's also very receptive to student feedback and helpful if you ask questions. The homework in pretty straight forward, but there are quite a few daily assignments. Some of these you can miss or not get full credit on until the end of the quarter, where points are given back (there's a system where a set # of points for each type of assignment will be given to you for free up to 100% credit). The exams are all online, which you take alone and then convene with your group to retake, with both parts being worth 50% of that respective exam's grade. The exam questions often try to trick you or psych you out, so it's helpful to read carefully. There was also a lot of extra credit so as long as you work with your group and stay on top of assignments, getting a good grade should be pretty easy.

I do not dislike Julie by any metric, but I do dislike the way the LS7 series is styled. I find the flipped classroom style ineffective and very much a pain. The PALs and PCRQs are kind of annoying to do and the points you lose do add up over time. However due to the maximum points set by the professors, you can mis up to 5 points on the PALs and PCRQs. The AOLs were all generally fair. However please make sure to study for AOL3. Many people neglected to do any form of studying and it very much reflected on their score at the end. Also I do not know how long the online style exams will continue, so if they convert to in person exams I do not know how much they would change the overall material of the AOLs.