I LOVE TINA. This class was structured so that Jean Luc Margot was the professor for the first half of the quarter and Truede took over after the midterm. I found Treude's sections to be much more interesting than Jean Luc's, and the homework was also way clearer. Jean Luc often put random stuff on his slides that had nothing to do with the homework, but Treude's homework assignments basically all came directly from her slides. You don't need to go to lecture to succeed in this class, but I would still recommend as the lectures can be interesting. They also gave a very generous Extra Credit assignment worth 9.1% of our grade which I thought was extremely nice. LOVEEEE

Prof Treude is such an intelligent, passionate, and warm-hearted human being. By the way she teaches, you can just tell that she is truly passionate about her research and loves to share it with her students. The structure of the class is extremely manageable and fair, as there is only one 6-10 question “quiz” a week and there are optional lab/textbook readings that can help further your understanding if you chose to do so. She also offers extra credit in multiple different formats. For my class, she offered a zodiac trip in which you would go out on a boat and take plankton samples!! Overall, this class was so fun and interesting and I would definitely take it again!!

Prof Truede is so sweet and really cares about her students and the subjects. I took the class as a GE and it was so unstressful. Lots of opportunities for extra credit and engaging labs, plus lectures are recorded.

Professors Treude and Margot are great and are very passionate about Astrobiology as a subject. The class is split in half, content-wise, with Margot teaching the astronomy side of things in the first half and Treude teaching the biology side things in the second half. Their slides are very concise, and I enjoyed how they integrated present-day research and practical information from the field into their/UCLA's work. However, the material is kind of complex, as someone who had a little background knowledge on the subject but didn't do any studying/review outside of lectures (lectures are recorded and slides are posted). The midterm (astronomy/physics/geology) and final (biology) are both online, with about 40 MCQs each (although the midterm had some calculation problems). Since the midterm and final are both open notes (and slides/recordings/textbook), and you have a 2 hour window of your choice anytime over the course of 3 days. What I found to be helpful was copying down everything from the lecture slides onto a Google doc, as well as downloading the textbook as a PDF and converting it to a txt to paste on another google doc. This way, I could efficiently answer test questions by just ctrl+F 'ing everything! And about the textbook, there's no need to read it before/after the lecture, as most of the important material is covered in the lecture anyway - as long as you have it ready to access during a test. There's extra credit as well which gives you a bit of a grade boost, where you visit one of a handful of museums/exhibits and submit evidence of your visit. Doing so guarantees a small portion of your grade 100% and the rest of the categories are weighted down a few percent each. If you don't do the extra credit, the grade weighting is as follows: 25% HW accuracy, 25% discussion participation (need to show up to just 5 to receive full points), 25% midterm, 25% final. Highly recommend taking this course!!

TL;DR - A very easy GE with basically 0 effort needed outside of lecture, interesting (but somewhat complex) topics, and fair midterm and final.

This class had by far the most manageable workload I've had in my four years. We had 1 art project and 3 homework assignments. The assignments each take a couple hours at most and she drops the lowest one. The project is full credit/no credit and quite easy to receive full credit. The lecture material is somewhat difficult and hard to follow, but Treude is exceptionally nice and helpful. The exams were more on the difficult side but not insane.

This class is quite a drag, but definitely worth to take if you need to get your lab credit done. Oceanography is not a subject that interests most and the lectures and labs can be painfully boring. Nevertheless, the class isn't at all difficult and getting an A shouldn't be too much of a challenge for most. It is important to be prepared for the weekly quizzes as they make up a pretty significant portion of the final grade and can at times be tricky, but still only require minimal studying for. For exams, it is just a simple game of memorizing facts from the lectures, they most certainly test on breadth not depth, and as long as you prepared well by rewatching lectures and going over slides, they are fairly easy. Overall, I wouldn't say this class should be anyone's first choice, however, it is certainly manageable and if you put in any amount of time studying it should be free.

Listen, take this GE please. I never went to class. Not one time apart from the first lecture with syllabus review and stuff. Never went again as she only reads the slides. Tina seems like a very nice woman. Definitely a good person. Not an engaging lecture in my opinion from first lecture but she's cool. She had one midterm ( a multiple choice) which is super easy if you read the lecture notes the night before and have a minimum of good sense. Just pay attention in labs which I definitely went to part from 2 as she drops 2 lab scores. The only annoying part in this class were the weekly quizzes which to be honest are literally free good grades as the Ta's (Which are amazing god bless them especially Catherine) gave the objectives for the next quiz and that was exactly what you were tested on. I was not interested in oceanography but did oceanography and groggy in high school which definitely helped me, bit still, as long as you listen in labs and read the lecture slides, you're good. If I could cram everything in one night, you can do it buddy. Also her final was not cumulative which was really nice and final multiple choice was really easy too. Also, please do the 10% extra credit she offers, this is so helpful and actually a good idea to go explore something new or get the opportunity to do a boat trip if you have the chance to get a spot for it. Overall would definitely recommend this super easy GE. Anybody who says otherwise, just don't listen and trust me on this one ;)

Took this as a science GE. Its a lot of memorization but one of the concepts are particularly hard to understand. Prof Trued did a great job explaining the material and I love when she would call out people talking during lecture. She's a queen

I took this class as a GE. The lectures are recorded, and there is no homework. Prof Treude offers a 10% pass/no pass extra credit that helps a lot. The midterm and final are each an hour, all multiple choice, and fairly simple. Treude is kind and funny, but often presents a lot of information in the lectures, which can be overwhelming. The first half of the quarter is more about plate tectonics and the composition of the Earth and the second half focuses on the animals and ecosystems of the ocean. The labs are not very fun, but my TA let us leave as soon as we finished, and they don't count toward your grade. The lab keys are posted so you can still have the info to study from. There was a lab quiz every week, but your 2 lowest grades are dropped. Treude requires 2 textbooks, but you dont necessarily need them/ need to read them. Overall, light workload class with fairly interesting content.

This was a relatively easy and manageable GE in my opinion, especially for a lab credit. The lectures were pretty boring but the class was recorded and she also posted the slides online. There was also never any homework. For the labs, there would be a quiz on the previous lab, then a powerpoint presentation about the current lab, and then we had the rest of the time to complete the lab. We could work on them in groups and they weren't graded. She drops 2 out of the 8 lab quizzes. The lab final was worth 10% of our grade and was open note. I got good grades on the midterm and final by just rewriting my notes from the lectures a few days before the exams. The midterm covered the first half of the quarter and the final covered the second half. They were multiple choice and only an hour long but most people finished pretty quickly. The textbook honestly isn't necessary as she puts very few questions based off the textbook on the exams. She also offers 10% extra credit by visiting an aquarium, doing a beach clean-up, or attending a zodiac trip. I enjoyed taking this class and definitely recommend if you need a science GE!