Honestly Carey is not a bad teacher, he is exceptionally prepared and you will definitely learn a lot in this class. That said, I really did not like how he runs lectures. He tries incredibly hard to make the lectures funny, which seemed to work for a lot of the class but I personally really disliked it. Class is constantly interrupted with joke slides or breaks or games or some other time-wasting activity that Carey had planned. I understand that students can get bored and need a break, but I legitimately think that the class time could be cut in half if he omitted all the unnecessary gimmicks.

I did not find Careys activities fun or amusing, but rather wished that I could have left the class 45 minutes earlier had we not taken so many pauses for games. His jokes are corny and outdated, and frustrated me every time we took a 10 minute break to hear him tell another story.

The worst part of class is when carey says "Ok its looking like we are a little tired. Who wants to hear a story?". I do not want to hear a story. I am tired because I want to leave class. I never want to hear a story.

Best lecturer ever! Learned a ton! Definitely the best choice ever to take CS32 with Carey!

CS 32 is hard, but Carey makes the class worth it. He is such an engaging and active lecturer. He is excellent in explaining the material and make the class very fun. I would always choose Carey over Smallberg. He often had encouraging and motivational talks with us which made life worth living again.

I often was stuck on projects to the point that no TA was able to help me. During those times, I emailed Carey my problem and he was always more than happy to help me.

One downside is that he does not take extensive questions about past materials or current projects during lecture time. He directs you to ask him during his office hours.

Overall, CS32 is a CS weeder class and has a very heavy workload. I recommend to take it with easier classes. Carey is one of the best professors out there, and he will help you through this difficult time in your life.

I took this class in Winter 2022. Because of the Omicron variant, the class started off online and later went in person. I never really attended lectures because Nachenberg's slides were really clear and were all I needed to learn the material. The projects did take a significant portion of time but if you understand the subject the projects are not hard. I would recommend this class regardless of the professor, but Nachenberg definitely has more engaging lectures.

Carey is a holy man that will enrich your experience. What can be said that hasn't been already?

He'll honestly strengthen your perspective on CS and sense of belonging heavily. He's genuinely just good, both as a professor and as a person. Take his class.

Definitely one of the most memorable classes I have ever taken. Each lecture he has a mystery prize that he gives out to a student who correctly answers one of the more difficult questions he gives in class. One of them was ice cream with sardines in them. The course material itself isn't necessarily difficult to understand, but the projects to apply them can take a lot of time. Project 3 can take between 20-30 hours to complete with only 2 weeks to work on it. Project 4 takes about 10-30 hours to complete with only 1 week. There are also homeworks, which are not as hard as the projects but can still be somewhat lengthy. The final two weeks were fairly work-heavy, with Project 4 being assigned alongside a homework and the final exam coming up immediately after. The projects aren't really hard, but since they're time-consuming make sure to start early. The exams were not difficult.

I am a little biased, but I really enjoyed his class. He is always trying his best to make the subject fun and comprehensible for students. He is also one of the few instructors I encountered that really cares about me. Although he is not perfect, I would still say that he is as best as you could get for a college professor.

As an EE major with little programming experience, I struggled in this class. Carey is a great professor. His lectures are engaging, fun, and really helpful in gaining a better understanding of the material in the simplest way possible. Every week there is one or more deadlines for homework or projects. The first two projects are fairly simple and straightforward requiring only a few hours of work. Projects 3 and 4, on the other hand, require an insane amount of work and will probably take up most of your time. I would suggest avoiding taking this class in the winter of your freshman year simply because the knowledge and experience some of the people in the class have is almost impossible to catch up with. Given that most CS majors have to take the class at that time, the difficulty of the course is much higher than it would be in other quarters of the academic year. Regardless of your programming experience, the constant deadlines and assignments are exhausting especially heading towards the end of the quarter. Once again, Carey is a great professor and a wonderful person so if you are going to take this class I would recommend taking it with him.

If you didn't take CS 32 with Nachenburg, you missed out.

This is probably the single best class any UCLA CS student could take. Carey is incredibly smart and qualified since he worked as a lead engineer at several companies like Google and Lyft, and on top of that, his lectures are super entertaining, fun, and relaxed. His slides are also amazing and many students continue to use them for job interview prep years after finishing CS32. No student will ever regret signing up for a class with Carey.

Carey and David Smallberg together put together one of the best data structures and algorithm classes in the country. Would 200% recommend Carey and this class to anyone.