Taking Psych 116 with Grisham might have been the worst decision I made at UCLA.

Grisham seemed like a nice guy and I enjoyed some of his lectures. Things were all well and good until every single time we received any sort of feedback or grade.

I don't know how anyone passed this class. It seemed like everyone getting grades back with an anxiety attack and the question: "why isn't one of the most difficult labs at UCLA curved?" Very, very good question.

As for Grisham himself, I found him to be blunt, rude, and utterly unconcerned with issues form his students.

If you're a neuroscience major, and your life aspiration is to become a neurosurgeon or do clinical work with the brain – then sure, take this class.

If you're a psychology or a cognitive science major, and you haven't taken LS2 or LS3 (these very crucial prerequisites somehow are not communicated before enrolling in the class) – run and hide. There is no way this class, and Grisham, could possibly be worth your time, effort, and misery.

I just took 116 with Grisham this past spring (2014) and I would ignore most of the older reviews here on Bruinwalk. Grisham is an all around nice guy, and while he can be a bit abrupt sometimes when answering questions (which is probably why earlier people thought he was rude), the dude's a nice and honest guy. He's a solid teacher and while the class certainly wasn't a cake-walk, it was quite enjoyable. Grisham really knows his stuff, so study and work hard and you'll do well in his class.

I just finished taking 116 with Professor Grisham and it has been my favorite upper div psychobio class so far. I don't even know what I got in the class yet, so this evaluation is pretty unbiased.

Dr. Grisham knows his stuff and does his best to cover it all in lecture, but sometimes it was hard to get all the information because lecture was only 50 minutes.

As for difficulty level, every student's opinion is different, so I will give you a bit of a frame of reference as to what kind of student I am: I am an A student and I can count on one hand the number of B's I've gotten at UCLA. That being said, I thought the class was totally fair. He does have a policy that late assignments will loose points. I showed up 15 minutes late to lab the day an assignment was due (b/c of printing problems) and got marked down 10% for it. It sucked, but you gotta take responsibility for your mistakes and that's the way it is.

Moral of the story show up on time, listen, and study and you'll do well.

let me start off by saying this class is not easy. You have to memorize and learn alot.

but Grisham is a legend. best i've ever gotten along with a professor, he is funny and makes the dull learning enjoyable

Professor Grisham is a completely incompetent professor. He lacks charisma and his lectures are dry and unexciting. As a person, he cares more about penalization than actual learning, and derives gratification from marking students late to class or taking off a point from homework. While I happened to have earned a high mark in his class (A), I still feel that I did not learn much at all from his class. He does not regularly hold office hours and does not like answering questions from students related to the course material.

NS101L could be a very interesting course since it encompasses fascinating subjects like bioinformatics and molecular neurobiology, but Dr. Grisham makes it extremely uninteresting and dull. You will have a better learning experience if you take another instructor.

Dr. Grisham is one of my favorite professors at UCLA. He cares so much about his students, he really wants you to learn, and he is very funny. He's very dedicated and puts in the effort to help his students. With that said, this class is still challenging. But this is the kind of class that I am PROUD of taking as a UCLA student (challenging course with a caring professor and you actually learn).

I could not have asked for a better and more caring professor to take one of my last classes with. This class was engaging, particularly because Dr. Grisham tried his very hardest to help everyone. There is no way you can do poorly in this class because he gives you so many study aids and tips. You really just need to put in the time. The TAs were AWESOME! Thank you Caroline, Tiffany, and Jared. I worked with these TAs the most and they were SOOOO helpful and approachable.

Just study hard, don't procrastinate, and listen to Dr. Grisham! Out of all the psych classes I took, this was one of the most interesting, rewarding, and fair classes.

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I felt obligated to post because Grisham is the best professor i had. I wish he taught all my classes. His lectures are very organized and clear. He always helps review things so you can understand. He is super friendly and funny. He grades on a straight scale so you only have yourself to blame for a bad grade. The first module is a lot of memorizing, the second might be hard because its APA format writing, and the third is a breeze. He is not as hard as the bruinwalk shows.

I had this professor and I ended up with C+. Some tips on how not to get a C+: Stay one step ahead and it doesn't hurt to ask other people who've taken his class to see their lab reports and what mistakes they did so that you can avoid them. The first module was anatomy and that was pretty straightforward. Come to class prepared and study hard b/c it's really straightforward. The Swimmy module was so confusing to me! I spent a couple of days trying to understand what to do in class. It really helps if you pay attention and go to class and come to lab prepared b/c if I did that I would have been a lot better off. The last module was uber easy and I felt that I did really well. The extra credit didn't help me much b/c I still ended up with a C. Overall, don't procrastinate and keep up with the work! With Swimmy, don't make stupid mistakes..seriously...that's what got me a C in the first place. Ask to borrow old reports and see what people did wrong. Hope this helps! :)

All in all, this class was never boring cuz Grisham was a really good lecturer.