I highly recommend this class. First, Professor Arbabzadah is very knowledgeable about the subject and is very patient and thorough. All of her slides are well developed and she offers "test yourself" questions that clue you in on what will be tested on the exam and help you think back to understand the material.

Your grade is based solely on two midterms and a final take home paper. I would say they were all reasonable, based off both readings and presentations. They were multi-part short answer based on a scenario of sorts.

There were a lot of readings but you can get by by reading selectively and having a general grasp on the big ideas.

Her grading is overall pretty reasonable as long as you are specific in your responses and cite enough evidence.

I have no idea how well the difficulty of this class will translate to in-person, but online it was a cakewalk. Super straightforward class structure. Just attended lecture and understood the material and it was fine

At times, professor Arbabzadah was unclear, however, she was a relatively easy grader and the work required for the course was minimal. There were 2 midterms and 1 final- both were easy. The midterms consisted of 2-3 essay questions that were fairly easy to answer as long as you reviewed the material beforehand. The final was a paper that we were given the prompt for at least a week in advanced. As long as some effort is put in, it's pretty easy to do well in the class. She's also very kind and accommodating of students with special circumstances (like being sick, etc...). Overall, I'd take another course with her because even though she was confusing at times, she was helpful and it was easy to catch up by just going back and taking notes on her powerpoint slides. I definitely recommend taking a class with her!

I actually took Comm1 with Arbabzadah and she was amazing. Super funny, only graded on three speeches, and was a super kind grader. She offers a ton of help workshopping your speeches and this class really helps with public speaking. Highly recommend!

This is the second time I've taken her, but the first time in person. With that being said, I would prefer the online version of this class. Her lectures tend to be a bit long and difficult to follow at times, making it much more manageable virtually. However, she structures them in a very straightforward way, making sure students know the answers to the questions she is posing. Those questions are asked on the midterm and final, so make sure you take good notes when she talks about them. The midterm and final are essays and are not too bad if you start them early enough. She is pretty lenient with her grading and claims you have to do the readings, but I never did and just incorporated some quotes from random articles into my papers and got an A on both exams. The class can be a drag sometimes but is very doable overall, and if you're looking for a pretty easy filler class, I'd recommend.

Very knowledgeable and engaging professor! She truly cares about the course content and the students. As a non-traditional transfer student I was new to UCLA but Professor Arbabzadah was very responsive to my questions, offered excellent feedback on my midterm, and took the time to listen to my questions and concerns. I was so impressed with the depth of material relating to conspiracy theories that I also registered for another class she is teaching. I feel like I finished this class not only with a better understanding of what is going on in the world but a better writer as well. There are two essays in the class that are challenging but very doable if you listen to the lectures, take good notes, read the required readings and refer to the slides. The slides and even some of the readings are highlighted so if you put in effort and try to attend office hours for any questions or to go over your papers, you will do well in this class. I highly recommend this professor and any of the classes she teaches as the content is relevant and interesting.

I highly recommend this class.
Professor Arbabzadah is very passionate about what she teaches her students. This class was very engaging, and she is a very kind, understanding professor, but you can't just change your speech time unless you have a doctor's note. The class is made up of 3 speeches, a 30-second, 5-minute, and 8-minute speech, along with outlines and in-class participation. She will always start class talking about something she feels is important and doesn't care so much for grading, and says, "it's just a comms 1 class." She cares about you learning how to communicate effectively. Overall, I recommend this class as a way to learn to public speak with more confidence, and as long as you put in some effort, you should be fine getting an A. Last thing I'll say: trying to remember a 5- or even 8-minute speech is actually very, very difficult, so please don't procrastinate on practicing.

This was one of the chillest classes I've taken at UCLA, your entire grade is 2 speeches and 10% participation. The professor however has a very unique and out there personality and can be a lot sometimes.

I really enjoyed Professor Arbabzadah's class, her ability as a professor goes way beyong the realm of merely educating students but her compassionate and caring nature make her an ideal leader in the Communications Department. She is a wonderful person to be around and a wonderful instructor to learn from. I would rate her class higher if I could

Very easy class. Didn't show up for many of the lectures and the exams were very easy. Not sure how I received an A-, and when I asked about it to the professor she was unclear about the reasoning. Overall, the class didn't require much effort at all.