This was Prof. Montoya's first time teaching so I understood that there would be a learning curve. Even though there were mistakes on the slides and on the quizzes/midterms, she was still a very sweet professor. Someone else mentioned that it was like a student teaching other students and I definitely feel that that was true, she could be a bit awkward at times. I still think she was a pleasant lecturer who clearly knows a lot about stats, just didn't always teach it perfectly. I did progressively worse and worse on the quizzes, my lowest being a 75% and an 80% on the midterm (lowest quiz is dropped thankfully), but the final absolutely saved me. The questions were basically copied and pasted from the past quizzes/midterm and I studied those so much that I ended up acing it, plus she offered one EC point for completing the course evals. So, I would say don't be discouraged, do all of the online homework (which is only graded on completion), take good notes on the online textbook, do all of the in-class participation points with Poll Everywhere (you don't even have to be in the physical class room to get the credit), and the super simple EC assignment and you'll be fine. I think she'll only get better as she teaches more.

Your perspective on this class will probably be influence by your major

Psychobiology - this wlll probably be one of your easier pre req classes. The coding in LS30A is harder than what you do with R in Psych. 100A.

Cog Sci - probably going to be one of your easier pre req classes. The difficulty of PIC or CS classes does not compare to what you do with R in this class, not even close.

Psych - probably going to be one of your tougher pre req classes if you are not specializing in computing.

I am only the third person reviewing Montoya and I am surprised to see the low reviews for her. I’m not sure my grade yet, but I do think that Amanda was a really great professor. I am by no means the smartest student or amazing at stats. On bruinwalk, I usually look for the reviews from the B and C students because Ive been really struggling in my classes at UCLA.
However, I was really happy with this professor.
These are the reasons I liked her:
-She was extremely knowledgeable about the material
-She was very welcoming to students in office hours
-She is really helpful one on one and in small group settings.
-She encouraged us to ask questions,
-She never came off impatient or annoyed. It’s evident she cares about her students
-She was energetic
-She uses slides which she would post online before.(She does take attendance in lecture thru poll everywhere, but the slides are still very helpful)
-She is very open to feedback,.
-She uses a thing called ask for me where you can submit questions anonymously totheTAs and they will ask them during lecture to the professor. I absolutely loved this.
-You get a CHEAT SHEET for EVERY SINGLE QUIZ, MDTERM, and FINAL. It is written on a regular piece of paper one sided. You will also get an additional cheat sheet of R codes given by the professor, so you don’t need to memorize codes.

Anyways, you do have weekly homework which is reading in an interactive textbook. I did like this though because it will force you to stay caught up in the class and it’s based on completion so it definitely helps your grade. You get a week to do it, you just cannot hold it off until the hours before it’s due because you will not finish and that would not help your understanding anyways. I usually would break it up by sections over a couple days, it’s reallynot daunting at all.

There were quizzes in discussion every other two weeks. I never did that great on these, but I changed how I studied for the final and I did the best I had on a test in the class. So I do think my poor quiz scores lied in my inefficient studying. I should’ve used notes from the professors slides on my cheat sheet more than my own notes.

BE GRATEUL FOR HW and POLL EVERYWERE questions.. they are both based on completion and easy points that will help your grade.

DONT BE SCARED OF R, it’s not that bad at all and I suck at programming

Go to her office hours. Hardly anyone is there and she is really helpful. It helps to explain he concepts you learn in this class out loud and discuss them.

This class will also definitely enhance your LinkedIn and resume. R is one of the most desired skills in employees for jobs right now and after taking this class you will get to put several skills on your resume relating to R which will give you an edge in internships and jobs.

The class covered a lot of concepts in stats 10 except instead of doing the math by hand you are using R. You are learning a lot more about the meaning behind your calculations s opposed to learning to find the calculations themselves.

Yes, concepts can be difficult but you are not being set up to fail. This class if fair. I do recommend this professor