I loved this class. This quarter, she created her own curriculum that was focused on wellness.

Though it was challenging due to the fact that homework was due before each day of class, I actually learned so much about how to write at a professional level. This is definitely not the type of class that you was to procrastinate in, however, and it does require a lot of your time.

Things I loved about her class:
* She had us start our final project super early, and all of the material we learned in class was for the purpose of preparing us for our final project (scholarly essay and public facing project).
* She taught us how to write and use our own voices, while ensuring that we were being critical thinkers.
* She allowed us to create our own rubric for our final project.
* She actually cares about you as an individual.

Things I found challenging:
* The workload was gnarly, but definitely manageable. The readings were minimal, and all of the material we had to read and watch were actually super interesting. It's definitely not busywork, which I love.
* She grades heavily on participation, but I loved the fact that it wasn't about "Who can talk the most?" or "Who sounds the smartest?" She encouraged everyone to not only speak and voice their response, but to actively listen to other colleagues. It was great.

A heavy workload will have you writing 4-5 pages for homework due one day later. The topic is wellness, which is incredibly boring in the context you are learning. The final project is more manageable than the homework.

Easy A as long as you do what she tells you to do in the SPECIFIC ways that she tells you to do. As long as you do you homework (like 3h/wk) and not procrastinate (IMPOSSIBLE) you will be basically guarenteed an A. She has an extra credit thing at the end that gives you like 3 extra points on your final essay (out of 20).

One thing I liked about her lectures were how engaging they were BUT THAT WAS IT! It was clear she had favorites and spoke to people differently for odd reasons. She would dock points off on your assignments and never leave comments on why. She assigns long assignments and says to answer them thoughtfully, but when you do it's apparently not enough. I honestly was pissed about my grade because I believe I deserved an A but due to her randomly docking off points I received a B-. Like for example, on an Community Engagements doc where everyone was supposed to write down one thing they would like to see in the class regarding how we would like our class to be structured she docked off like 5 points off the assignment even though I completed it. She docks off how much she wants then never gives an explanation on why even when you come up to her and ask. She also has her email set to an automated message where you rarely get a response back. I wouldn't recommend taking her please choose someone else!!!!!

Dr. Mehdizadeh is an excellent professor! Going into this class, I thought that english was an inherently subjective subject and there was no way to actually get better at writing. Dr. Mehdizadeh completely changed that whole narrative. The difference between this class and other classes in the past is that Dr. Mehdizadeh explains why we write the way that we do. This class is a lot more engaging, and it is clear that the most important thing for Dr. Mehdizadeh is that her students are learning. After every segment of class, she gives an abundance of time for questions. If you are able to be engaged and take advantage of this, you will thrive in this class, and learn a ton about writing. For me, this was the most helpful writing course that I have ever taken, because I utilized the time she gave for asking questions. Also, this class is generally so wholesome because the whole premise of the class is about combatting mental health issues and academic overwhelm. That being said... It's a little bit ironic because this class had the highest workload of any class I took winter quarter. The workload is pretty extreme, but it leaves you extremely prepared to be successful on the final project. Overall, I highly recommend taking this class with Dr. Mehdizadeh. As long as you are proactive in your learning and allow yourself to pay attention in class and ask questions, you will learn a lot!

The guy below describes the class pretty clearly. I couldn't get an A without the extra credit, so that's pretty much a good thing. But overall, I feel very agonized throughout this quarter. She scared me from the first assignment till the end. And I literally don't know what's the meaning of her lecture. But she's very nice person during conference, though she never offers concrete suggestions to my essays.

The workload is tremendous and will force you to devote a lot of time to her assignments. Her many assignments are sometimes tedious and you can expect to write 2 writing assignments per week, which can get quite annoying and difficult to finish especially when you must complete other class assignments. Not a lot of reading though.
I feel that her grading of these assignments are quite lenient though so I guess that's nice.

The lectures are engaging and informative, but there is not much organization to these lectures. Attendance is mandatory and she'll fail you if you're absent multiple times w/o a valid excuse. Participation is also an exceptional chunk of your grade.

To get an A in the class, make sure you devote time into her assignments and approach them with an open mind. Often times, for her assignments, she'll allow you to explore different perspectives and encourage you to go outside your bubble.

Neat class overall if you don't care about grades or workload. Workload wise, the class is killer.

I really liked this class, Dr Mehdizadeh is really friendly, engaging and a great lecturer. I took English Comp 3D with her, and so all the material was focused on diversity, and she really knows what she's talking about. She also takes a genuine interest in her students. I would recommend going to office hours. Her assignments required a reasonable amount of work, but they were interesting and very open ended. Overall this was a great class.

I took this class for English Comp 3D (which counted for the diversity requirement) and I really enjoyed it. My friends who only took comp 3 said they had at least 4 essays and it had a lot of reading, but Mehdizadeh didn't work that way. She assigned readings for us to annotate and small research assignments, but I wouldn't complain about the HW load. Also she only had 2 essays for the whole quarter, none of which revolved around reading a book beforehand. It revolved around diversity of course. Anyways she is really willing to help you and if you can, take this with her! (especially 3D).

As someone who typically doesn't like English she made the class as painless as possible. There is a decent amount of reading with a decent amount of writing but that is to be expected.