PUB AFF 70
Information, Evidence, and Persuasion
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Examination of sources and varieties of knowledge produced in social sciences. Evaluation of types of evidence, arguments, and persuasion on social problems and public issues. Examination of public life of evidence and arguments by different actors in social policy-making, persuasion, and propaganda process. Letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2022 - The class material was not connected to the assignments at all. While the lectures themselves were interesting and the professor did an okay job with that, the assignments were very poorly designed and arbitrarily graded. All of the assignments were graded by the TA (as per usual for most lower divs), but the TAs, at least for my section, did not provide any sort of rubric or information on how grading would occur. Rather, they just assigned grades without any explanation. I heard from several other students in the course that they spoke with their TAs at length about assignments, trying to perfect them before submitting only to receive a B with no explanation. Something similar happened to me as well in a few of these assignments. The class just seemed to be badly organized in my opinion and the professor was not really open or available to making the class more accessible. Would not recommend the course to anyone with this professor, or especially the TA Niamh.
Spring 2022 - The class material was not connected to the assignments at all. While the lectures themselves were interesting and the professor did an okay job with that, the assignments were very poorly designed and arbitrarily graded. All of the assignments were graded by the TA (as per usual for most lower divs), but the TAs, at least for my section, did not provide any sort of rubric or information on how grading would occur. Rather, they just assigned grades without any explanation. I heard from several other students in the course that they spoke with their TAs at length about assignments, trying to perfect them before submitting only to receive a B with no explanation. Something similar happened to me as well in a few of these assignments. The class just seemed to be badly organized in my opinion and the professor was not really open or available to making the class more accessible. Would not recommend the course to anyone with this professor, or especially the TA Niamh.
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2025 - i swear this man saw the bruinwalk reviews and decided to make it harder for fun. you get 4-5 pop quizzes on the readings randomly throughout the quarter at the beginning of class. you dont know when they will be, so you have to show up on time every class in case he does. he wont let you take it even if you show up late. although the quizzes were pretty easy if you just read, the readings were a lot. writing assignments kicked my ass. no clarity on expectations for our first big assignment and they were graded SO harshly for no reason. we were not given a rubric beforehand so we didnt know what the expectations were for this paper. so many people did so poorly they offered a revise and regrade which was nice. they didnt give us feedback on our first paper before the second one so i couldnt make the appropriate changes on the second paper because i still didnt know what they were looking for. you would think they would be more understanding of this fact but no. maybe it was just my ta but it literally feels like im gambling on my grade in this class and the ta's just grade off vibes which is so frustrating. but this class was so stressful for no reason and it discouraged me from doubling in pub aff. if youre willing to put the work in then go for it--lectures were very interesting but the stress was just not worth it
Spring 2025 - i swear this man saw the bruinwalk reviews and decided to make it harder for fun. you get 4-5 pop quizzes on the readings randomly throughout the quarter at the beginning of class. you dont know when they will be, so you have to show up on time every class in case he does. he wont let you take it even if you show up late. although the quizzes were pretty easy if you just read, the readings were a lot. writing assignments kicked my ass. no clarity on expectations for our first big assignment and they were graded SO harshly for no reason. we were not given a rubric beforehand so we didnt know what the expectations were for this paper. so many people did so poorly they offered a revise and regrade which was nice. they didnt give us feedback on our first paper before the second one so i couldnt make the appropriate changes on the second paper because i still didnt know what they were looking for. you would think they would be more understanding of this fact but no. maybe it was just my ta but it literally feels like im gambling on my grade in this class and the ta's just grade off vibes which is so frustrating. but this class was so stressful for no reason and it discouraged me from doubling in pub aff. if youre willing to put the work in then go for it--lectures were very interesting but the stress was just not worth it
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