Awesome professor. Arisaka truly is passionate about astronomy, particulary particle physics which is his main field. He is very concerned with student learning, and tries his best for students to understand the concept. His lectures are animated and interesting (although they can lull you to sleep because the subject on the whole isn't very interesting to most people). Arisaka always start every lecture with a brief review from the last lecture, so the students can relearn and grasp the concepts much clearly. Grading of the class is extremely lenient, with the curve/mean being set at a B+/A-. There are 2 midterms, weekly homework assignments, special assignment and a final. The midterms were EXTREMELY easy, because he gives you a practice midterm to study off from, in which about 95% of the questions are in the real exam. There are some questions that you need to study the lectures for, but just use the practice exam as a guide and the exam will be cake. The two midterms were multiple choice. The final, however had an essay section and multiple choice (80% of the grade based on the mc and 20% on the essay). The HW can be difficult, but Arisaka places which slide to get the answer from on the hw questions, which makes it EXTREMELY easy as well. Of course, you have to be in class and take some notes to get the HW. The special assignments consisted of choosing from 2 of the four lists of things (going to Griffith observatory, Paloma observatory, planetarium show, or reading some cosmology/astronomy related books) and then writing about what we learned and our thoughts. It was an easy 3 page report. Arisaka is mainly interested in the student's thoughts and what they learned. Overall, this is an awesome professor; one of the best! He truly is one of the best professors at UCLA and all these bruinwalk reviews got it on the mark! TAKE HIM IF YOU CAN!!!

Professor Ariasaka is simply amazing, he knows the science behind the marvels of our universe, how they in turn affect you. You walk away from this class, with a new found respect for Astronomy.

Professor Ariasaka is one of UCLA's best professors. He tests you on material that is covered in material and homework assignments, so there are no suprises on the mid-terms and finals.

Professor Ariasaka you are simply amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

professor arisaka is the biggest pimp here. i mean, just look at his picture! what you see is what you get. he's a true gangster, i have seen him rolling on the streets. take his class; and he win's the prize for coolest pronunciation of the word "earth".

arisaka is a great professor. just read what all these dudes below said.

Professor Arisaka has a rather heavy accent, which made his lectures fairly difficult to understand for the first couple of days; however, like he said, we soon got used to it and understood most of his lectures. What I like about him is that he seems to listen to his students; for example, for the first couple of meetings he lectured from the overhead. He went really fast, not giving us enough time to copy down all his notes. When some students complained, he decided to make copies of all the transparencies in a thick packet to be passed out in the beginning of every lecture. That's like 30 pages + per packet and per lecture! It probably isn't completely necessary to go to every lecture, but be warned: on the tests he throws in a few questions to which you would only know the answers if you had been in class to listen (he didn't put them in the assembled packet of notes). The textbook was called "The Big Bang"; I don't think many of us actually read the book at all. All you have to do is study the lecture notes. He didn't pass out practice tests for or class until the final came around, but if you get them, definitely study them (most of the answers are on them). If things don't make sense in the beginning or the middle of the class, they will by the final. Arisaka is good at tying things up (or, as he calls it, showing "the big picture"). If you can, get Mark McGovern as your TA. He answers every e-mail in-depth and is very helpful in office hours.

Professor Arisaka is difficult to understand and, at least as far as my Astro 6 course was concerned, made things way more difficult than they had to be. I felt lost and confused throughout the quarter. However, as I reviewed for the final (which was VERY easy), I realized that all of his seemingly incoherent lectures actually made a whole lot of sense in the end. I felt like I learned something that was, if not practical, interesting to say the least. In sum, take Arisaka's classes and don't get too worried if he loses you in some (or all) of the lectures along the way. The tests are extremely easy, and eventaully it all makes sense.