She is definitely a good teacher and an amazing writer. Her class will be tough (wait! don't run away yet..) but it is easy to get an A in her class if

1. YOU GO TO OFFICE HOURS
2. YOU ARE A TALKER!!!

If you are shy, forget about getting a good grade in her class. 30 percent of the grade was participation and 10 percent was presentation. If you get a B average on all 3 essays, you can get an A- in the class.
You will work hard and sometimes feel frustrated because of the re-writing but she gives SO MUCH feedback. She will read your essays, WORD PER WORD! She will help you and she will give you a good grade if she sees that you work hard.

I got an A- in her class but I worked for it.

P.S. Most of the time, she scared me.

Professor Mattenson is definitely a tough grader but she was less tight on my papers than on my friends’. You definitely should go to office hours if you take her class. She was very open on paper topics which can be confusing but can also be helpful for you to shape your own course of action. She is very enthusiastic about teaching and my writing did significantly improve over the course of the class. It does require a lot of writing and improving papers. I would recommend her class but be aware that it requires a lot of time (including attending office hours) and effort.

She's a great person! She was really concerned with how my writing was improving and she gave me a lot of hints and details on what i should change.

Overall the course was confusing to me as an engineer. She gave a lot of freedom with her papers, so i kinda got lost. But i went in to get her help and she really gave me good advice.

I ended up with an A in the class. I think if you really listen to her advice you'll get an A no matter what.

Definitely a tough grader, and over analyzes papers, but i can say she improved my writing SO much. GO TO OFFICE HOURS! 3 papers, 3 one pg film responses and a 2 minute film presentation, class wasn't too bad. readings and essay topics weren't that bad, get more difficult but i'd definitely recommend her if you actually want to learn and don't focus so much on your grade. if you do all the work you should pass.

I don't know why many of the critiques on here are so harsh, but Lauri is not a "terrible" teacher at all. Yes, she will be honest when it comes to your writings and you have to work for the A, but in the end it was a very gratifying experience. Papers were not boring to write; she actually wanted you to put emotion and feeling into them which made the writing time go by much faster. Each topic we wrote about was very interesting and she utilized film in order to help us be more emotionally involved in what we were doing. She isn't like other enlgish teachers that hand you back your papers and don't tell you what you did wrong. As a class we critique samples of writing or other students papers in order to see what they did wrong and learn what Mattenson is looking for. It never hurts to go to office hours.
Also, notice how a lot of the bad reviews have the worst grammar... :)

Overall: good, rewarding course that will require you to work for that A.

There's not that much work in this class, just three essays that aren't too bad and a few readings. I would definitely recommend going to office hours because she will help you with your essays and it seems like she basically expects you to go if you want a good grade. Overall I would recommend the class.

Professor Mattenson is enthusiastic, intellectual, and personable. However, as the course went on, her class became my least favorite. Sure, she improves your writing, but she displays favoritism in the class and EXPECTS you to attend office hours or else your grade shall be in jeopardy.

There are three essays in this class. The second one is worth less than the first, but the last essay can really have an impression on your final grade!

She is a nice professor. She will definitely help you a lot. The only problem is that it's kind of hard to get an A in her class. She is a pretty fair professor, which means unlike some of the EC3 professors who teach you nothing but easily give you an A, she really requires you to meet a certain standard to gain a good grade.
Her class's workload is fine but every essay you need to revise several times. If you really wanna get something and don't really care about GPA, take her class. She is always pushing you to a higher level.

I wasn't sure if I should take this professor because the first review I saw on her was AVOID!!! But I did and it ended up working out really well.

She helped me improve my writing a lot. We wrote three essays over the quarter and I am pretty sure a big part of your grade is if your writing improves. It wasn't like I was a bad writer before, I was just stuck in a rut and she helped me move to the next level.

She's always very enthusiastic and that helps when you have her early in the morning. You most likely will because she only teaches 8am and 9:30am sections. It was mainly discussing the reading with some in class short writing assignments. There's not too much reading at all. And they're interesting for the most part. Sometimes there's some weird, philosophical stuff that's really hard to understand, but discussions in class really helped. She clarifies a lot.

I've heard people says he's intimidating, but I didn't think she was. I'm pretty soft spoken too, so if I think she's approachable she most likely is. I went to her office hours twice to discuss papers and she went out of her way to help me. She also emailed everyone in the class feedback on their second essays. She really makes time for everyone who wants to meet with her.

Overall, I'd highly recommend her. She's always available, willing to help, and I learned a lot.

A pretty difficult class. People say that she is difficult, but good, but I didn't see my writing improve that much. I went to many office hours within the quarter, and they didn't seem to help much. I happened to have the bad luck of taking the class with a lot of athletes, and it really seemed like she favored them. Participation was a big part of the grade, which I hated because I had the class at 8 AM. All in all, I didn't really enjoy this class as much as other people did, but then again, I'm south campus so I hate writing anyway. Good luck.