I took this class with Roth-Johnson and Cooper. Although she seemed to care and tried to be helpful, this class was frustrating and pretty hard. Even if you felt like you understood the concepts, the test questions were hard and pretty tricky. This course also just crams too much material into one quarter. This class also had about 60-75 minutes of videos to watch before lecture, pre-class assignments, a pre-class quiz (which was 4 questions so if you missed one you already had a C), then lecture, and then homework. The homework was online and honestly pretty challenging. I don't know if the other LS2 professors are better or not. I don't necessarily regret taking her, but this class was hard and a lot of work.

Although Professor Roth-Johnson was a good professor overall (and definitely better than Cooper), I found the workload of the class to be too much- especially in comparison to the workloads of the other LS2 classes- and the tests to be particularly difficult. My roommate (who had Esdin) had a way lighter workload and seemed to have easier tests as well. I prepared extensively for this class- took notes and drew diagrams before each class, attended every lecture, reviewed clicker questions before tests, reviewed with my peers, and mastered all of the class material. Despite all of this, I will most likely get a B or B- in the class because the tests had many unfair questions that were not within the scope of the class. There were practice midterms/finals posted before each test, but the answers were not posted, which I found to be particularly irritating. Overall, I would not recommend taking this class with Roth-Johnson/Cooper and would recommend taking this class with another professor.

I took this class with Roth-Johnson and Cooper. This was one of the hardest and most stressful classes I've taken at UCLA. I watched all of the pre-recorded lectures and attended every lecture in person. I also read the textbook, actively participated in discussion, and attended office hours. However, I just don't think Dr. Roth-Johnson and Dr. Cooper's teaching methods worked for me. Too many concepts were crammed into one lecture and it was hard to keep up. We were given one practice test for each of the exams, but the answer key was never posted. Instead, we were told to post our questions on the CCLE discussion forum. When we asked a question, the professor and learning assistants would reply with even more questions, not giving a definite answer and leaving me more confused than I was before. The professors also don't allow us to have Peer Learning Facilitators, who would have made the class easier to understand. Instead, the class has its own Learning Assistants, which isn't as effective since they have select office hours which aren't as structured as PLF sessions. I wouldn't recommend this class because it makes the material more difficult than it needs to be, and taking it with Esdin would be a better choice.

This class was great. We had to do activities online and pre-class quizzes but the point was to reinforce the material, which it did. An average day for this class would be: watch the 60 minutes ish of video lectures, then do the pre-class activities, then take the pre-class quiz, then go to lecture, then do the post-class homework. You end up really knowing all of the material. Her tests were all puzzle-type questions EXACTLY like her clicker questions. If you studied the clickers and knew the rest of the material, you would have done great on the tests. I loved this class a lot and Roth-Johnson was great, but Cooper was shit avoid him like the plague.

This review is for LIFESCI 7A. Roth-Johnson doesn't require much commitment for this course. Tests and midterms are easy as long as you have read the textbook (which you will have to do anyways because that's part of the homework). She gives extra credit, but it does not affect your overall grade much. Have a friend alert you when a clicker question goes up if you have a tendency to zone out, because they count toward your grade (correctness is not counted, only participation). Overall an easy course.

Edit (6/7/2018): LS 7A is now a course taught by Professor Roth-Johnson. I have edited this review to be on the correct course (was formerly on LS 2).

Dr. Roth-Johnson is a wonderful teacher, I feel like she could teach any class from kindergarten to graduate school, she never condescends and she explains succinctly. There was a straight scale for grading but both midterms happened to get curved by 2 or 4 points.
Point Breakdown: Total Points : 716
Midterm 1 : 90 Midterm 2 : 120 Final Exam : 200
Discussion : 80 Participation : 76
LaunchPad activities : 50 Pre-class review questions : 50 Practice exam questions : 50

I'm getting A- instead of A because I ditched half the classes (it was an 8am and I was weak :'")
Her TAs and LAs are fun and wonderful (I had Cathy Gibson), they actually love biology and check papers bf ppl turn them in to try to keep ppl from losing points. We do and turn in a worksheet every discussion so missing any means you lost 8 points.
Study for exams by going through the posted clicker question slides, making sure you understand the diagrams she gives and explains in class, and reviewing the preclass worksheets(they are optional extra credit (9 points) but I highly recommend actually doing them so reviewing is faster and easier). Plus the 9 points could cover 2 class absences. I found the 2nd midterm harder than the 1st or the final. I studied for 3 to 6 hours for each exam and got 93%, 90%, and hoooopefully above 95%.
Launchpad was due before every class: activities you click through (fill the preclass worksheets as you go!), and review quizzes where you get 3 tries and highest score counts. After the week's last class there are practice exam questions you get 1 try on that can be extremely hard, so google each one and make sure bf submitting. I forgot to do some of these and got like half credit on some others, which is the other part of my very low A.

I took Roth-Johnson for LS7A. She is a very good lecturer and gives a lot of information during lectures that is on the test that is not on Launchpad or on the slides, so it's important to go to class. You need to go to class anyway because of the clicker questions which are worth 76 out of the total 716 points. They're not based on correctness so these are easy points.

Launchpad- Launchpad questions can be fairly difficult so be sure to prepare yourself thoroughly before taking the practice exam questions. The pre-class quizzes are easy because they're more definition-based and you can take them 3 times. The activities are an easy 50 points.

Discussion- Discussion sections were not super helpful (at least with my TA), and the points are based off worksheets which are actually graded and not based on attendance, so know the material before going to section.

Exams- The exams have some tricky questions and are application-based and not straight memorization. Overall they are pretty fair and if you go to class and study your notes of what she says, you'll be okay. Studying the lecture slides isn't very helpful, but she posts the clicker questions and the answers which are very similar to the test questions, so be familiar with those. I got an A on both midterms and the final by knowing all of the clicker questions and studying Launchpad quite a bit, though memorizing everything on Launchpad isn't necessary.

Overall I would recommend Roth-Johnson as a professor.

Honestly no complaints. I didn't try too hard and managed to get an A. My class with her was lucky enough to be BruinCasted and I found that really helpful (especially to dip class occasionally).
I didn't need to take notes.
The tests are the one thing you have to worry about because some of the questions can be obscure, but its 100% multiple choice, so that's nice.
Super nice professor - she remembered me months later even though her class sizes are 300+.

Taking LS 7A with Roth-Johnson was enjoyable and informative. Having taken HL Bio before in high school, I expected not to learn much in this class. LS 7A was challenging in a good way however, and helped me to realize so much more about biology. In addition, the TA's and LA's were all extremely helpful and clarified any questions I had. I would definitely take LS again with Roth-Johnson!

LS 7A with Roth-Johnson was not a difficult class at all, but as someone who prefers learning more about macro topics, LS 7A is perhaps one of the most boring classes I've taken.

The class is structured such that you learn the material before going to lecture via LauchPad, which although is quite pricey, I found actually quite helpful in learning and "force feeding" the material. Furthermore, 72 points of your total grade comes from iClicker participation, so it's important to go lecture, but you have 2 "free days" which means you can miss up to 2 lectures without any participation point penalty .

The two midterms were straightforward - they were practically a regurgitation of LaunchPad Exam questions and in-class clicker questions. Each midterm has 60 questions, and sometimes the questions are phrased very awkwardly, but by just studying the LaunchPad questions and clicker questions mentioned above, you should be set.

The final, on the other hand, was rather difficult. It is cumulative, but with an emphasis on Weeks 7-10. There are 100 questions, and unlike the midterms, I personally felt the final had a lot more application-based questions (and hence the greater difficulty).

On the plus side, the class is graded on a straight scale, so there's no need to worry about competing with other people. Yuh.