This class is one of the best economics classes I've ever taken and would highly recommend. Not only does the variety of assessment formats (quizzes, a group presentation, discussion forum posts) benefit most students in allowing us to demonstrate our understanding of the subject beyond traditional exams, the exams and quizzes are super fair. Practice exercises reflect the kind of math and problem-solving that we see in the exams so it's not one of those classes where the exams are ridiculously harder. And she's really responsive on email, available during office hours as promised, and works hard to make sure that the way she communicates class materials is clear. The class itself covers content that is applicable to real world contexts and is engaging, containing a blend of intuitive principles (e.g. that rent is higher per sqft closer to the city center) and case studies that are less intuitively obvious but are challenging and interesting all the same.

TAKEN IN WINTER 2020 - ONLINE

40% quizzes - 4 quizzes @ 10% each
40% group project
20% final exam

BEWARE of this grading scheme. Also beware of a grade distribution if one is posted. She ended up giving us all 3% to our grade since she messed up wording on one of our quizzes. I doubt she will do this again, and in future classes you practically will have to do perfectly on quizzes to earn an A since you won't have the extra 3% cushion like us. 3% is one whole letter grade practically, so all the A-'s you see would probably be B+ if not for the cushion. Looks generous because of the 20% final but I actually think the final was okay content-wise. The quizzes will pull you down fast. You can't afford to make many mistakes on them or you will quickly tank your grade.

This professor provided the class a lot of grief. She was practically impossible to reach, which was made worse due to the online format. She was only reached through office hours. She held 2 a week on the same day, so if you had a question the day after, tough luck. I think she was also late often and did not show up to office hours on FINALS WEEK. You had to email her to attend her night office hours and I heard she wouldn't email you back confirming she'd be there. How had is it to reply? 3 keystrokes - O, K, send. Pretty sure because of this she wouldn't even hold her 2nd office hour, so if you have class in the morning, tough luck. We meme "sent from iPhone" but she couldn't even do that. She specifically told us NOT to email her and to come to office hours if we had questions. However, you could easily wait the entire office hours and not get your questions answered since other people were there as well. Honestly, all of this grief was unnecessary since the class material is relatively interesting and easy. However, she worded the questions really questionably and provided 0 practice. It was easy to see where she gave up since she gave practice week 1 and 2 and never again. So you literally go in to quizzes blind. Lecture is all easy, teaching stuff a lot of people know intuitively (Wow, building heights rise in the center since land rent is higher there... Most people know this vaguely.) and then with our 0 practice she's like ok apply all the knowledge together and also it's not really clear what I'm asking you and also I'm going to assume you know things about Los Angeles, New York, and Europe even though I didn't go over it. The final was better since you go in less blind after taking the quizzes, but quizzes are actually a lot more important. Part of taking the exam is you trying to figure out what she's asking and then getting it wrong because she emphasized something in lecture, so you assume it is that, but it's something else. Also, a lot of questions are dependent on each other (especially the tough ones) so expect to not get 9s and 10s consistently, if you mess up your score can take down easily.

For the final she gave us 2 hours instead of 3. I think a lot of people, including me, had a huge time crunch because of this. I think 3 hours would not be too much time so I have no idea why she did this to us, in fact, it might have been perfect. A good example of her lack of compassion is that she emailed us saying she could not offer a 3rd exam time since it would take too long. Just to be clear, I did not feel entitled to a 3rd exam time and wasn't expecting it to happen or anything, but I could admit it sucked for international students. The reason it seems so tone deaf is because she cut our exam time to 2 hours so if we had a 3rd exam time she'd only proctor it for the same time as other professors who provided 2 exam slots: 6 hours. I realize she has to make another exam, but I just think she should not have cut our final time. Was 2 hours of her time really that valuable that she couldn't sit and watch us?

I think another review for another one of her classes said that she expects you to already know about a region. In this case, she expects you to be pretty familiar with LA. This is unfair to international/out-of-state students. She does go over some stuff about LA, but not enough to cover what she expects.

The professor does not care for the students of the class nor our learning. She was impossible to reach and did not give much elaborate or give much outside information (no practice or lenience). So the workload was not bad, you just watched youtube videos basically, but why pay so much tuition to learn stuff you intuitively know? It's not even an easy A either. I would not take this class again, it gave me and my classmates more grief than we expected. It's too bad, because a lot of it is interesting. Do not underestimate how wonky quizzes can be going in blind and with her weird phrasing, especially because you need to get practically perfect scores to get an A.

Mid-class. She didn’t provide a practice midterm or even tell us how many questions would be on the test, which was frustrating. That said, her tests were reasonable, and the course content was interesting. This class is just okay. I don’t recommend it, but I don’t have strong negative feelings either.

My review of other professors: https://www.reddit.com/r/ucla/comments/1gmshzu/review_of_econ_professors_as_a_transfer_student/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

This was one of the easiest economics electives. One group project and two exams. The exams are easy if you look over her practice problems and past exam material. The group project is actually quite interesting and engaging. Would recommend this class, although material can be a little boring sometimes.

40% quizzes (there are 4 of them throughout the quarter, so 10% each)
40% group project
20% final

This class was super interesting and I feel like I learned a lot! The quizzes weren't too bad, but some the questions were poorly worded and tricky, so I missed a few points (they were also open note). The group project was graded pretty leniently, but it allowed you to research a topic of your choice. The final was a little difficult because we only had 2 hours to do it, and most people I talked to afterwards were pretty time crunched. Olivia is very friendly and willing to explain anything during office hours! I would take this class again