This class is hard; no doubts about it.

Get a good team, give it your all, then just hold on.

David is a great professor and this class will make clear if accounting is for you.

Professor David Ravetch gives me a brand new learning experience in accounting . He has group project every week, and that is time-consuming. But because of those project, I can easily understand financial statements now and make friends with many great people. Even though people complain his test is hard, but too be honest, there is few tricky questions. With a full understanding of his notes( he will tell you which notes are included in midterm and final), it is easy to go above 90. I have friends who always get 99 or 100 percent. They tell me that they just focus on the notes and try to understand every detail in it.

Previously took 1B a year ago. Now I'm in my last quarter and have no choice but to take Ravetch again. I'll just say that I'm ready to be slaughtered.

I took 1A ( he teaches it in summer session), 1B, 120A, and 120B with Professor Ravetch. He is an absolutely amazing professor. For 1A and 1B, the workload was not heavy and the exams were not hard or tricky as the previous reviews said. You just need to memorize every single word on his lecture notes. He does not surprise you on the exam. I got A on 1A and A-on 1B. For 120A and 120B, the workload was really heavy cuz you basically live with your group members for the entire quarter. he made us to do the simulations, which are extremely helpful for understanding what happens in the real life. The simulations are hard and you need to do tons of research online in order to come up with the answers. MAKE SURE YOU ARE DOING THE SIMULATIONS WITH RESPONSIBLE GROUP MEMBERS OR YOU WILL BE DOING EVERYTHING AND GETTING A REALLY BAD GRADE. The exams were easier than 1A and 1B because he would tell us what were actually on the exam, no surprise. All in all, HE IS AMAZING.

Do not afraid of taking 120B with Ravetch. The grade distribution is much better than that of 1B, so A-range is definitely doable. The group simulations are not bad as long as all your members devote their effort. And the exams are not tough, because they usually are class examples or homework assigned. If you really want to learn, please take with Ravetch. You also got to meet your "clients" from the Big Four! How Cool is that!

These reviews are really dated. I have to say I wish I got something from him after taking both 1b and 120b, but all I know is that I was unlucky to get him twice. I got mostly A-s, B+s, some As and Bs in other accounting and econ courses. Not only did I suffer bad grades costing me bad grades in other courses, I'm also facing the full force of it when I'm applying now for jobs with my gpa. At times I do feel he is a good profess, but other times I feel he can be really awful. I tried to be unbias and not let these reviews affect me, but I find that the negative reviews (not the extreme ones), but what is typically common on here is upheld in the classroom. Now, as a graduate I can't even get people to glance at my resume, because of my poor grades from this class strangling my gpa. Unfortunately, I can't say hey I got a B- or C in Ravetch and it will get me a job, not even a chance at an interview. This isn't engineering where you can roll in with a 3.0 or 2.7 in CS or something engineering related like that and get 80k or more a year without an internship (yea i had friends who could). Trust me, if you want to sabotage your gpa, then this is it and future career prospects, this is how you do so.

With this I have to say that he can be very helpful, but he's not and will not go out of his way to help you. There's a reason people don't want to take him, because he is a lot of times unreasonable. Check enrollment data for past years, and see how many people enroll, its declining, and also see how many people take the class at beginning of quarter and how many people drop (do this for classes that aren't impacted). Maybe he once was a good professor, but maybe a little of that went to his head and even over it a million times over.

To make this seem not too negative, I've heard from grad students that he does teach decent to excellent mba courses. But you have to know that no cares about your gpa as an MBA, you have a that MBA dummy. Can't say the same about undergrad.

If you do take this, know that students know this class is hard and they'll make it hard for you not giving you any of the curve, you'll end with the bottom end of the curve. Oh and I like that comment about the Asian, give me tips brah

for 120a and 120b with him, i cannot stress how important it is to find a good group for the BAM simulation. find a group of people who understand the amount of effort and time needed to create uber financials. more importantly, find someone who really knows their accounting shit (YOU) and someone who owns at excel, formatting, and printing out hard copies to turn in, but contributes nothing to the accounting process (THE MINION)...have the 3rd guy just become an expert at making financial statement disclosure notes (OTHER GUY). then, to be safe and as an assurance/insurance, you will need someone who is dedicated enough to whip everyone into work and oversee the whole process (MASTER aka AUDIT PARTNER) other than the group work, you should be a good test-taker with much attention to detail. BAM 1 The Bigger Four. BAM 1 The Sharks. YEE ITS THAT INTENSE HOMIE

wow, you only need three things to survive this class.

1. bottle of vaseline
2. another bottle of vaseline
3. yet another bottle of vaseline.

3 might not be enough with all the financials on top of the exams. lube em up boys, this is worse than prison.

I've taken Ravetch for 1B and 120B. 1B isn't that bad but you have to be honest and do lots of practice problems. Unlike other management professors, his tests do NOT regurgitate homework examples, they test you in other more practical on-the-job ways AKA things you would need to think about in the real world. That being said, the accounting curve pretty much keeps anyone from failing his classes. For 120B, I put in the minimum effort all quarter and deservedly ended up with a C, however a "C" in Ravetch v. a "B" in Litt are looked at the same from a recruiting stand point. So my suggestion, if you plan on recruiting for an accounting internship/job with a big four or mid-tier that recruits at UCLA, go with Ravetch. The recruiters are all familiar with his curriculum and the difficulty, compare it to applying to college and taking an AP v. a CP course, taking Ravetch will be acknowledged later on, despite the grade you receive. You'll work your ass off, probably not get the grade you want, but you are better off getting the job...which is why you take the class in the first place.

I've taken Management 1B, 120A, 120B, and 180 with Professor Ravetch. In my opinion, he's the best teacher I've ever had at UCLA. His classes were definitely not a cake walk, but they made me really love accounting as well as give me an extremely solid accounting foundation. I considered 1B to be one of his tougher classes, because you are still getting used to the whole language of accounting. I recommend that you try to do all the assigned problems, if not more, in the textbook, study the lecture notes, and go to the TA sessions. Before the midterms, my friends and I would come up with problems that we would predict he would ask, which usually involved solving a problem done in class backwards, or adding some new stuff that we just learned.

With 120A and 120B, it is crucial that you do not overload yourself with other difficult classes, as these classes will take up most of your time, and remember to try and retain everything you learned in intro accounting. Reading before lecture is always great. Most of the time, he expects you to figure out assigned individual and group projects yourself and tell you how to do it after you turn it in. This is why it's important to find excellent group members, or become "excellent" yourself. If you want an A, expect to work long hours into the night, but you can also expect to feel rewarded when you find out that your answer to the assigned project was correct. Many say that taking his class ruins your GPA, but for me, I received my first A taking his class! You can judge for yourself, but with hard work and a love for accounting, I had my most enjoyable academic experiences in Ravetch's class.