THIS CLASS IS NOT AN EASY GE!!!! This was probably one of the most time-consuming and confusing classes I have taken here. Now, the class is very interesting if you enjoy learning about the environment but the professor doesnt use a textbook, does not write words on the slides, and constantly mentions her other classes and opinions during the lectures. Although it is pretty funny, I took this class online but it has an in person discussion which often involves fieldwork at ucla and attendance is mandatory. If you have a good TA it is so much more helpful but if you have a bad TA you are on your own. The final is cumulative and there is no study guide or mention of what you should study besides to watch the lectures so you really have to put in the work in order to get a good grade on the midterm and final which are 60 percent of your grade. Literally everything she says in the lectures are up for grabs including the mention of any numbers and the videos she includes in the lectures. The workload itself ranges anywhere from 1-6 hours of lectures and I would never recommend unless you have to take this class for your major.

I can't say how much I disliked this class. First off three weeks after our midterm was graded, a point was randomly taken off my test grade dropping it from a B- to C+ and then when I asked Professor Illes why that happened she said she would get back to me with an answer and never did. Next she gave us a "study guide" to help us out which literally consisted of ALL the topics we had gone over as if that helped at all. Would not recommend if you're looking for any easy GPA boosting class.

the exams in this class are hard. however all the lectures are recordings. my ta was really nice and the labs themselves are easy. you just need to study hard for the exams.

I don’t know if I can necessarily recommend this class. This class is an online class with a required in person lab once a week. The labs and homework assignments are so easy and you will likely get 100% on all of them. The tests, however, are pretty difficult. A lot of people did really badly on the midterm because we were given no information on what to study and what content would be on the exam. To do well on the tests, you basically need to memorize everything the prof says in all the lecture videos. Every stat, fact, and random statement is fair game to be on the exam. Overall, this class is definitely not the easiest GE you could take, but is doable.

Do NOT take geog 5 with Lilia Illes. I enrolled in this class with the hubris of a cs major having survived being egged. Surely the only professor with such terrible bruinwalk scores on a renowned easy GE is not that much of a red flag?

That are demanding professors with ridiculous workload. There are professors who give tough exams. There are disorganized professors. Like the powerpuff girls Illes is the combination of all of the above.

To start off with the class structure: all lectures are on bruinlearn with a 2 hour lab a week. Grades are initially 30% lab, 30% midterms, 30% finals and 10% weekly assignments. I say initially as after the midterm grades came out, where the average was around a c-, rather than curving it or even giving extra credit like a normal human being, she gave everyone the option of converting to a scheme where their finals count double. Not the best of the 2 schemes, you either stick with your terrible midterm grade or risk it all with the finals. I pass/failed the class right after.

Here are some highlights of this class:

No textbook: Sounds great, until you realized that she recorded the lectures and created the exams in previous quarters when there was a textbook.

Disorganized lectures: the lectures are highly disorganized with little in structure. She seems to think herself as one of those ted talk people and refuse to have detailed slides. Except she is not one of those ted talk people. And she still expects you to know the details (oh, and there is no textbook!). It makes you realize that those lecturers who just read off the words words words on their slides are not all that bad. Of course she does not give out lecture notes either.

Heavy workload: about 4 hours worth of those lectures a week. Sounds easy? Well if you want scrape by with even a b you have to take down every minute detail of the lecture because of the exams. The weekly assignments is a strange affair asking us to craft "university level questions" for full credit, "good questions" only gets 2/3 of the marks. It is really unnecessarily stressful.

Ridiculous exams: the exams are multiple choice and short answers. This seems easy until you see the content of the questions. For example, one of the question asked for the exact number of plastic bottles consumed by the average American each year, a number that came out once in the lectures as an offhand comment. This is some extreme level of rote memorization. However, you can argue that that's fair game. What is not fair is that some of the questions tested on content that was not on the lecture (and she specifically said that only content in the lecture will be tested). She probably recycled those questions from years ago without caring that the lectures have changed.

Finally, a personal point: she gives off the air of an extremely condescending and arrogant person. This would be fine if she knows what she is talking about, but comes off quite bad when she doesn't. Just recently she insisted that the common cold has been the most deadly strain of corona virus. This would have been pretty funny had she been a politician.

This class would have been more unbearable had it not been for our amazing TAs seemingly reining in the worst of this class. The nonsense with "university level questions" was struck down to full credit as long as we showed effort in our work, and the labs were graded really leniently.

Why did I write this review before the class has even ended? Well, it is because right as I am about to go home for Thanksgiving, i saw an amazing 5 hours worth of lectures on bruinwalk waiting for me. This is on top of assigning labwork OVER the Thanksgiving break. What an amazing person. This is my first written bruinwalk review after all this time in ucla. Learn from my mistake. Do not take this class.