Let me just preface this by stating this class does have a hefty amount of memorization required for both the exams and practicals. However, I adored Dr. Gorlitsky. She knew that her lectures were very content-heavy and would include videos. From time to time, she would have participation-based assignments in class. There is a textbook, which is useful for the vocabulary and supplementary material. However, if you know that you won't be reading it/can get the vocabulary from someone else, definitely opt out and save money. If you know the definitions off the study guides Dr. G provides, along with the key concepts she highlights on them + in her pre-exam office hours, you should be good! What kept me from getting a higher grade was the lab practicals, so definitely look at the lab handouts and anything your TA brings up during lab. A key point is to note the traits of the animals she brings up, how they evolved these, and why they evolved in the first place. All in all, I recommend this class!!

Professor Gorlitsky is a great professor but the quality of the course strongly depends on whether you get a good TA or not. Mine was meh, so lab sections were meh, and lab practicals were pretty tough.

The lectures were asynchronous and we had meetings once a week that you would either attend and get credit for attending, or submit a summary instead of attending. Labs were in person. You basically handle/study either taxidermied animals or animals preserved in isopropyl alcohol; these would be fair game for lab practicals. There were also some animals not in the lab that we were expected to know. It was kind of a mess.

There are 3 essays, 1-2 pages each on one of 3ish prompts they release. It sounds super easy but my TA graded it pretty ridiculously sometimes making it hard to figure out what they were looking for. It's not not doable, I got over 90% on all three, but it can feel like a lot.

There is an extra credit field trip to the Natural History Museum of LA. This is probably the most pandemic-dependant aspect, since in October/November 2021 there was no particular variant to freak out about, and people felt relatively safe. It's super easy if you're local and totally worth it just because that museum is awesome. If you went with the class on the field trip (again, covid related), all you had to do was show up. If you went on your own, you had to draw a specimen or do paleoart. It's nothing unreasonable. It's actually pretty fun.

Overall, amazing class if you love vertebrates. If you're pre-med idk why you would take this if you didn't absolutely have to.

I enrolled in this course because I had the professor before for other EEB classes, and she was awesome (still is!). However, even having a good professor was not enough to make up for how difficult/stressful this class was. There were 2 lab practicals that required an unrealistic amount of memorization, and then 3 research essays that were not as bad in comparison (but still a lot of work). This class burned me out more than any other class had at UCLA, and I probably wouldn't recommend it unless you really love animals.

The lecture component of this class wasn't bad. Online, we just had to show up to a lecture once a week (the other lecture was designated office hours). The exams are just three 1-2 page papers that can pretty much be on a topic of your choice, you just have to use peer reviewed sources. So the workload for the lecture part wasn't bad. The labs however, you dont really need to even show up (if you plan to get pictures from other people), but in the labs you're basically just taking pictures of specimens to memorize for the lab practical. The lab practicals (two of them) require multiple days of studying hard to get an A. This was the worst part of the class. You have to memorize a TON of random info for like 100 species. Definitely stressful, but it's doable. I would take this class again just because the weekly workload is so light, and the only bad part about the course are the 2 practicals.

Class consisted of three noncumulative lecture exams and two noncumulative lab practicals. There was quite a bit of extra credit offered. A lot of this class is memorizing the slides, and reading the textbook is very helpful. This class seemed to require the same effort as some lower divs but it was actually very fun. The material is fun and the professor tries her best to keep the class from being boring. Lots of videos during class so thats a plus.