Such a fun class! Ignore the haters, Dr. Phelan is a great prof and I found all of his TAs to be fantastic! Other reviews have already outlined how the class is set up (attendance not required, point based, 4 quizzes with lowest dropped, 1 midterm & final, 4 discussion posts), so I'll just drop my advice for the class:
- Do the extra credit! It's a music video/movie trailer that can get you 10, 20, or 30 points (only the top 5 videos get 30), but trust it's very chill and the lowest you can get is 10 points unless you put literally zero effort. I did mine in 2 hours with my phone, capcut, and a dream and I still got a 20 :)
- Quizzes: These are questions pulled straight from the problem sets given each week and you will know which weeks you are having a quiz, just not which specific question is being asked. These vary by TA, so my biggest tip is to answer all the questions yourself, then look for a quizlet (there's tons) to supplement your information and commit it to memory. They also release the answers to the problems the week after, so if you have a friend or can find those somehow, it might help, but you'll be fine without.
- Exams: Exams will have multiple choice questions and then some short answer. The trickiest part of this class is the Phelan wording. He does a review session for both the midterm and final which pretty much tells you what concepts to focus on. The most helpful thing for me was finding as many editions of the "What is Life" textbook and answering the end of chapter practice questions. Many of these questions were used verbatim on the midterm, but less so on the final. For both tests it was a great way to get used to his phrasing while testing your knowledge. For free response, you can count on there being one big question per topic that he'll give you in the review sessions. Make sure to format your answers in a very organized way-- Dr. Phelan explicitly said that bullet points are a great way to show that you actually know what you're talking about.
- Office Hours: Go! I wish I would've gone to more of Dr. Phelan's, he is kind of a yapper but it's really interesting to see him talk about biology in a real life context. I would also recommend going to the TAs', they have good advice for what to expect on the exams + can help guide your answers for the problem sets. (Special shoutout to Tanner for being a great TA!! Take him if he's still TA-ing)

Anyway, take this class! Especially if it's between this or LS 7A. It's very fun and covers biology in a cool and often silly way.

Jay phelan the goat. go to office hours. Embarassed I didn’t do as well as I could have, the discussion quizzes were kinda hard but the exams were much worse. My suggestion: Don’t use quizlet to study for either of the exams or workbook quizzes, the answers are often misleading and you won’t get full credit if you just study based on that. Go to office hours and ask for tips and suggestions on what to know and how to best study that information. Lectures are recorded but you won’t want to miss going to them anyways. Take this class!!!

Is this class an easy GE? No. Will it be one of the most useful and interesting classes you take during your college career? Absolutely yes. You will learn so many important bits of information about life, interacting with other people, improving your health, etc. This class will genuinely make you wonder, "Why don't they teach this sooner in school?"
With that said, this is not an easy A class. I am a social sciences major who never took any advanced level chem or bio classes so my struggles came from being exposed to this content for the first time. My biggest tip would be go to office hours every week. Not only is Dr. Phelan an incredible lecturer, he is a phenomenal person. He's a legend in the academia world but he is so down-to-earth and funny. He made me feel like he genuinely cared about my success both inside of his class and beyond. He will also give you special insights into the exams or future lectures just by regularly attending OH.
Though I really struggled on the exams in this class and they tanked my grade, I walked away with so many lessons that I still find myself applying to my everyday life and shifted my perspective on the world. Take this class but don't expect it to be easy.

I took this class as prep for Psych instead of LS7A and I’m so glad I did! This class is much easier and more manageable than LS7A (from what I’ve heard). Jay Phelan is a really engaging professor and he’s super nice to talk to. Fair warning: he is a YAPPER. You can ask him the simplest question and he’ll go off on a tangent about it. It’s lowkey nice for when you don’t understand stuff that well but expect to be in his office hours for a while if you come in a little late.
Okay, real shit: As for grading, he uses points rather than weighing categories. There are 4 quizzes and the TAs handpick a question from problem sets that you receive the week prior. As long as you understand the concepts and go to office hours for help, you’ll perform well on them. Each quiz is worth 15 points and the lowest grade is dropped, so the max points you can get is 45. Other than that, there are 4 discussions you have to do and they’re all worth 30 points. As long as you submit it on time and take the time to think about what you wrote, you’ll get full points. Procrastination lowkey bit me in the ass, so I didn’t get full points on two of them but it wasn’t enough to tank my grade. You also have to reply to people’s discussion posts for 15 points. Discussion sections are every week unless they get canceled (he’ll let you know) and participation is 36 points. Everyone has to partake in a debate in discussion section and they’re fairly simple. I was apart of the first group to do theirs in my section since my TA said she’d grade easy. As long as you put in effort AND fill time, you’ll get full points. Try to not read off paper for the debate as you do get points docked for that - prior public speaking experience helps a lot. The debate is 40 points - 36 are performance-based and the other 4 are just how well you participate in other people’s debate (aka fill the time during QnA). These will be the bulk of your grade until the midterm (150 points - 20 MCQ, 4 FRQs). I won’t lie, the midterm HUMBLED me. I went in and out of the test room confident just to get a C+. It was also my very first college midterm so it should be expected. I would suggest doing past practice exams and FRQs (he repeats questions from past exams a lot even if TAs say he doesn’t) but I think it’s also important to really understand the concepts to do well, which is what I think I struggled with during the midterm. I also didn’t really know how to study so there’s that. I performed much better on the final (250 points - 30 MCQ, 6 FRQs), getting an A-, but I do believe it’s because I was able to understand the post-midterm stuff better as it was more interesting and easier to digest for me. Also my TA, Natalie (my absolute goat) gave us extra credit on FRQs for drawing monkeys. I read a Bruinwalk review on here that said to do the FRQs before the MCQs, but I think it really just depends on the person because I performed better when I did the MCQ first 🤷. There’s a big extra credit opportunity where you make a music video or movie trailer including topics you learn in class. The top 5 videos get 30 points, and the remaining get either 20 or 10. I was fortunate to be one of the top 5. I recommend just having fun with it and putting in effort. There are other tiny extra credit opportunities but that’s the biggest one. That’s pretty much it. All scores are posted on MyUCLA instead of Canvas. Textbook is NOT necessary to do well in class, the lectures are highkey all you need but textbook helps you understand beyond what he really requires (I went to his office hours and his advice for studying for the final was to focus on lectures and not worry about textbook as it was meant for a general audience). I stopped reading it like Week 4 😅. I will say that being apart of the AAP PLF helped a lot (Shoutout to Marola 🙏🙏). If you’re able to take advantage of AAP, do it! It’s so worth. Okay, that’s all! The class is genuinely interesting when you pay attention. Goodluck to everyone taking this class in the future 😊!!
TLDR: Pay attention in class, do your work on time, understand the concepts, ask for help when you need it and you’ll get a good grade. 👍

TAKE THIS CLASS. IGNORE EVERYONE ELSE AND JUST TAKE IT. ITS SOOOOO GOOD. Jay Phelan is probably the best professor at UCLA. Lectures are recorded, so attendance isn't required, but you won't want to miss class because it is so good. Each lecture is like a fun TED talk, plus sometimes he gives out cookies and money. Even the TAs are all great, everyone I talked to claimed they had "the best" TA, because each one is so good. I had Natalie (Finnegan) and liked her a lot (she gave extra points for drawing monkeys!) but I also went to review sections by Matthew and Tanner and they were great too! The workload isn't that bad, you can do yikes on the tests and still get an A because 1. there's plenty of extra credit and 2. it's curved (he won't tell you that though). You definitely don't need to worry about failing, only about 5 (out of 400) fail a quarter. I cannot recommend this class and professor highly enough. Also, some other people are saying you need to do lots of reading which IMO isn't true, I barely read the textbook (stopped entirely after the midterm) and still did good. So please, please, take this class. Also go to office hours with him, you don't need a question to ask. Just show up and you can talk about literally anything—he once showed me some cool photos of chalk he took? I promise it was fun. Don't let other people's reviews discourage you, it is probably the best class UCLA has to offer and you should take it.

If you are looking to take a class for an easy GE, this is not your class. This class is interesting, it is engaging, the concepts are genuinely fun to learn about. The professor is beyond amazing, and the TAs offer great support in discussions and office hours. The only critique I have for this class is the exams. Both the midterm and final are extremely difficult exams. They are heavy on memorization, and it is hard to predict the type of questions on the exam. For example, on my final, we had to draw the structure of proteins, which was covered in one slide in one lecture. The professor does offer review sessions for both, which are very helpful. This class might be a little tricky, but I cannot stress how excellent Phelan is as a professor. I managed to scrape by with an A-, getting a D+ on the midterm & a B- on the final, both of which I studied rigorously for. He does offer a slight curve at the end of the course, which gives you a little boost. Plenty of extra credit is offered, and all the lectures are recorded. I would 100% take this class again if I could and recommend it to anyone, but I would not call it a walk-in-the-park course.
TLDR: Amazing Professor, Hard Exams, Interesting Class, Curved+Extra credit offered

Phelan is a great professor, obvious that he likes to teach and that he enjoys the topics in his class. The best way I can describe what I learned in this class is that it's biology that matters to you. The topics covered were enjoyable. I personally don't like biology, but this class was not too bad. He gives out a lot of extra credit opportunities, so it's easy to pass.

I took Professor Phelan's class during spring quarter of 2024. He is an extremely engaging professor who is passionate about his job. His love for teaching and class content is extremely contagious. I was genuinely excited to attend his lectures because I knew I'd learn something new each time. This is a great class for students with a limited background in biology.

In terms of workload, it was very manageable as long as you keep up with the readings. The final exam is cumulative, so if you aren't up to date with the readings then you'll have a really hard time cramming everything a few nights before. I definitely would recommend this class to everyone. Everyone I know that took this class with me walked away with a lot of important and interesting life lessons!

If you can take this course I think it is so worth taking. Prof. Phelan is my favorite professor I have had at UCLA so far. He is so smart and makes science (which I didn't think I was that interested in) SO ENGAGING. I highly recommend this course I could not imagine not enjoying it. Also, go to office hours and get to know him, he cares about his students and will give his valuable time in helping you understand anything.

If you are not a STEM person and thinking about taking this class as a science GE, TAKE THIS CLASS!!! I usually HATE biology, but I found myself looking forward to every Phelan lecture and leaving feeling like I really learned a lot. His midterm and final are not easy, but after I got an average score on the midterm, I learned that you really just have to study all the material and practice being asked about a random topic. Professor Phelan offered an extra credit music video opportunity, and you should definitely take advantage because I'm pretty sure that my EC is what got me to the A. Overall, Professor Phelan is super engaging, entertaining, and charismatic. Highly recommend this class