The problem sets each week were manageable, and the lectures were ok although extremely fast paced. The tests, on the other hand, I found to be extremely difficult. Midterm 1 was fair, and the average was a C, midterm 2 was unbelievably difficult, and the average was around a 35%. The final I also thought was very challenging. Multiple choice questions are hard, and he gives out zero practice for them. The free response was ok, but its very tough to remember all of the information for each type of problem as most of it you need to teach yourself since his lectures are so fast-paced.

I think he is okay as an professor, maybe it's because his lack of experience with large group of students that led to problems. Also he only covered the basics in class, but in order to get a good score in tests I think a full understanding of problem sets and a good TA is necessary. My TA had his own notes which were helpful and supplemental to the professor's notes. As noted by others his mc questions are difficult and often involve options like "more than one is false" or " all the above " and " none of the above".

Econ 101 is in general a really hard class. Prof Smith seemed like a really nice guy, but his lectures were pretty hard to keep up with. He uses slides to cover proofs and concepts, while he generally uses the board for practice problems. It was hard to follow when he used slides because he would often flip back and forth between slides really quickly, not giving enough time to take notes- maybe printing the slides off before class would have helped? While the class was hard, I liked that his exams were fairly conceptual rather than pure math (a relief after econ 11 and 41). If you take the class with Smith, make sure to find a good study group and befriend your TA. Jingyi was really good.

The first midterm and final for this class were relatively easy if you studied extensively. I will not lie, this class took effort, but I don't think it was that challenging. People will complain about midterm 2, but the only reason I did poorly is due to my TA saying not to focus on a concept that was worth 35%. All in all, I would take this class again because I think all it takes is studying and understanding the concepts. If you want an easy class that will get you a C without worries, this isn't your class. If you want to study and be rewarded, this is your class.

I was super scared to take econ 101, but was so happy that I had Professor Smith. He was very relatable and genuinely wanted his students to succeed, which was refreshing. He even held a review session for the final and extra office hours. His lectures were good, he would transition from slides and doing problems on the board. He also used interactive examples in class and gave real life situations that made econ more relatable/ useful. I definitely recommend him as a professor. He's SO nice and willing to help!

The class was not as hard as I thought it would be. I struggled in ECON 11 and ECON 101 was much easier. Smith's exams are like 30% MC and 70% calculations. It's not as difficult if you attend his lectures, he usually gives you hints on which types of calculation problems will be on the exams. If you understand his problem sets and go through his slides a bit, you will definitely get a B in the class. In order to get an A, you have to know the conceptual part of the subject inside and out to ace the tricky MC questions.

Midterm 1's average was 74%.
Midterm 2's average was 35%.

I always procrastinated and stalled until 3 or 4 days before the test to do 3 weeks worth of problem sets and I still managed to get a B+. If you put effort in this class, you will be rewarded heavily.

Attend his lectures and do his problem sets accordingly and you will be fine.

i liked troy for the most part, and i felt that he did a decent enough job lecturing. i enjoyed how the lectures were not just 55 minute exercises in math, and that they showed some practical real-world applications of what we learned. however, the problem sets were not enough to prepare us for the exams, which were significantly hard. the first exam was doable, but the second was ridiculous enough that the distribution ended up becoming a meme. the final was ok. idk if i'd take this class with troy again, but i thought it was a decent enough experience, and it's not like the material is ever actually going to be easy.

I had pretty good notes, more than anyone, I swear. And I did pretty well for both exams, but not the top of the top. But for final, I felt bad, since the most important parts that we covered were not on the exam, but rather the last materials we covered after second midterm (which were instructed one week before the exam) took most of the parts.
His office hour was super helpful, but based on the premise that you DID TRY to solve the problems on your own BEFOREHAND. Then you pick out parts you are confused with and ask, and if you keep doing this, you will probably succeed in this class. However, during lecture time, I often thought he talked too fast, so it was hard to catch up.
Also, his office hour was disturbed easily by the noise from other parties of other class that shared the room with us. WTH? there are so many empty rooms in ucla and how can two different classes share office hour space? I hope the professor did something about it, but I guess he didn't have power.

Overally I recommend this professor, but you will make sure you are ready to work ahead and keep thinking about econ concepts for the whole quarter..... beyond the materials.

For those who prefer self-study or simply don't attend lectures regularly, you probably want to read this!!

Professor Smith is a nice guy. His teaching is clear and logic. However, you need to attend his lectures to survive this class. Most of the examples, key points, contents covered, and exam info are discussed only during the lectures. His slides are just a very brief summary of basic concepts and do not contain examples/concepts that will be covered in the exam. Meanwhile, he neither uses the textbook for teaching nor for designing the exams. What makes it even harder is that his lectures are extremely fast paced.

I personally prefer self-study over lectures, especially for courses like econ or math, and this strategy was working fine for me. (all A+s for Econ 1~41). However, I had a really hard time with this 101. I checked those slides and found them useless. Reading the textbook is useful, but most of the chapters either contain way too much information or too limited. And there were no comprehensive notes provided. For instance, I felt really confused when I frequently saw questions that would not be covered in the exam (but in the textbook) appear in suggested additional exercise.

That said, this class is not a difficult one, though the exams are a bit tricky and unpredictable. But you really need to attend those lectures to know what exactly is being taught.

I think that the class was not that hard overall. I messed up the final because I mainly focused on different parts of the course that were not covered in the exam. The pace of the class goes by fast and the student needs to put in some extra time out of the classroom. The main problem of this class was that I believe that the exams were poorly made by the TA's without too much reflexion of what material was taught in the classroom. For instance, both midterms 1 and 2 had multiple choices questions that were worth in total 30% of the grade, however, the remaining 70% of the grade was based on 2 problems of 35 points each. Are you kidding me? Out of 20+ different types of problems and variations that could be on the test they choose 2 and placed 35% on each, I think that was the major flaw of this class, they could have easily made 4-5 problems to dilute the weight of the questions. Another issue was that they took way too much time to post the problem sets and the solutions online. Other than that I enjoyed Troy, he is a nice guy and I believe he meant well (the exams questions could be improved - 35% weight on one problem is ridiculous). I ended up with a B+, I took McDevitt for 11 and thought that it was way harder than 101. I also work 25-30 hrs per week including weekends and I took 12 units this quarter which means that any UCLA student can get a good grade with him in this class. I would take him again.