Professor

Jessica Schwartz

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2.9
Overall Ratings
Based on 38 Users
Easiness 4.1 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Workload 3.7 / 5 How light the workload is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Clarity 2.3 / 5 How clear the professor is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Helpfulness 2.6 / 5 How helpful the professor is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

Reviews (38)

2 of 4
2 of 4
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March 14, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: B-

I didn't love Schwartz, but I didn't hate her either. She just tries really hard to be funny and it just gets really awkward. Her slides are also super unhelpful when you go back to study because its usually just a picture with the name of a song and the band that performed it. She also moves quickly so you can't always get all the info for a particular slide, so when you go back to study you're kinda screwed. The winter quarter is mostly her show because basically every other lecture is about a musical genre. She also writes the prompts for an essay thats 25% of your grade, and the prompts are super convoluted and confusing. She is also terrible at explaining musical sounds because she assumes we can all pick up on the nuances in the differences in sounds from an amplifier. The lectures she gave never lived up to my expectation of the topic. Some people liked her style, but it wasn't really my thing.

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March 18, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A

Schwartz is pretty cool and the material is interesting, but she's new to teaching and it kind of shows. The whole second half of the class was totally not planned ahead of time, which made it a lot more disorganized and more difficult to study for the final. Overall an easy A if you're into the topic.

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3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
March 24, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A

Schwartz is a really fun professor who loves punk and has a great personality. Lectures could be a bit disorganized sometimes but they were always engaging and interesting. Workload was super light and this class was an easy A (p.s. you don't need to do the readings). I'd highly recommend it if you're looking for a Visual & Performing Arts GE.

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March 29, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: B+

I thought I liked music, but apparently, I did not like it enough to really enjoy this class.
If you are not a true fan of punk or musical analysis, I would dissuade you from taking this class. Why? This class is mostly memory-based, so it will be a nightmare if you are not extremely interested in the class to begin with. I know that was the case for me.
As far as teaching goes, I don't think Professor Schwartz is a very good lecturer. Her powerpoints are filled with words(many copied directly from primary sources), and she does not speak very clearly. She has a way of making simple sentences very complicated.
All in all, though, I think Prof. Schwartz really do care about this class and her students. Her TAs tend to be very great too!

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Oct. 12, 2017
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A

The class overall was easy. However, the modules were very time consuming and rather odd. I rarely attending class because it was not really necessary. Our final paper required outside research and the discussion were centered around reading that did not always overlap with the lectures. The professor was highly entertaining, but I just was not as interested by the material than I thought I would be.

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0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
March 25, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: N/A

I thought this class was okay. I was actually pretty excited to take the class because of the topic but I felt a bit let down by it. Professor Schwartz was an okay professor. She was a bit disorganized at times, mainly during the last half of the quarter. She was very friendly and approachable though. The class consisted of a midterm, final paper, final exam, creative project and class discussion. Discussion did count towards the grade . All parts were pretty doable. You get the questions that will be on both exams before hand to study so that was helpful. There is a listening section on both exams in which she basically tests your memorization of the specific bands you hear in class. Apparently a lot of people missed the most points in that section so study up.

She also gives a decent amount of time to complete the project and the paper, the paper wasn't due until after finals week. There were also some guest speakers all of which were great. My personal favorite was the all female panel. My TA was Albert(strongly recommend); he was very cool and friendly. He even got us donuts the last day of discussion but the other TA(Scott) seemed pretty cool too.

Overall the class was okay. Also, it is not curved so you have to put in time/work for a good grade.

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0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
March 29, 2016
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A

I really enjoyed this class. I never really listened to punk music that much (Before this class I was only exposed to mainstream pop punk bands) so this class really introduced a lot of punk background and history to me.

Professor Schwartz gives engaging lectures and gets the material across decently with slides but the second half of the quarter we switched to another classroom and the screen was small as heck and her slides became unreadable. Other than that as long as you pay attention to lecture (or just have general knowledge of punk history already) and listen to the songs she plays during lecture you should do well in this class.

The readings weren't really necessary and the TAs are pretty chill about grading. I would definitely recommend this class if you're interested in punk.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
March 25, 2018
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: P

This is probably the easiest class I have ever taken at UCLA. I literally just showed up and breathed. We talked about Punk music, did a mini group project, and talked about our experiences with punk. The readings were optional, there was no paper, no final. We were suppose to go to this music festival, but you didn't even need to go that. Easiest Pass/No pass class I have taken at UCLA. 10/10 would recommend.

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0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Feb. 8, 2020
Quarter: Winter 2018
Grade: A

This class was a mess when I took it at least. Lectures were sparsely attended, the professor would get into arguments with students at times, and the grading of the class was changed throughout the quarter. Ultimately, the entire grade for the class was based off of a final video project. I didn't feel like this class was well organized, but hopefully it has gotten better since.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
July 9, 2018
Quarter: Winter 2018
Grade: A

By all means read all the negative reviews of this class ('bruh this is the worst class ever' etc) which are posted below but I would suggest that before you jump to any conclusions, ask yourself- how does one teach 'punk'? Professor Schwartz introduced this question and made us answer it for ourselves, prompting us to question our assumptions about the genre and investigate why punk music exists. THAT is punk. If you want a typical survey style music history course in which you are fed information to regurgitate on tests, don't take this class. If you like punk music and culture and want to think about what it stands for, you will probably love this class.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
CLUSTER 60B
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: B-
March 14, 2016

I didn't love Schwartz, but I didn't hate her either. She just tries really hard to be funny and it just gets really awkward. Her slides are also super unhelpful when you go back to study because its usually just a picture with the name of a song and the band that performed it. She also moves quickly so you can't always get all the info for a particular slide, so when you go back to study you're kinda screwed. The winter quarter is mostly her show because basically every other lecture is about a musical genre. She also writes the prompts for an essay thats 25% of your grade, and the prompts are super convoluted and confusing. She is also terrible at explaining musical sounds because she assumes we can all pick up on the nuances in the differences in sounds from an amplifier. The lectures she gave never lived up to my expectation of the topic. Some people liked her style, but it wasn't really my thing.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A
March 18, 2016

Schwartz is pretty cool and the material is interesting, but she's new to teaching and it kind of shows. The whole second half of the class was totally not planned ahead of time, which made it a lot more disorganized and more difficult to study for the final. Overall an easy A if you're into the topic.

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A
March 24, 2016

Schwartz is a really fun professor who loves punk and has a great personality. Lectures could be a bit disorganized sometimes but they were always engaging and interesting. Workload was super light and this class was an easy A (p.s. you don't need to do the readings). I'd highly recommend it if you're looking for a Visual & Performing Arts GE.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: B+
March 29, 2016

I thought I liked music, but apparently, I did not like it enough to really enjoy this class.
If you are not a true fan of punk or musical analysis, I would dissuade you from taking this class. Why? This class is mostly memory-based, so it will be a nightmare if you are not extremely interested in the class to begin with. I know that was the case for me.
As far as teaching goes, I don't think Professor Schwartz is a very good lecturer. Her powerpoints are filled with words(many copied directly from primary sources), and she does not speak very clearly. She has a way of making simple sentences very complicated.
All in all, though, I think Prof. Schwartz really do care about this class and her students. Her TAs tend to be very great too!

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
Oct. 12, 2017

The class overall was easy. However, the modules were very time consuming and rather odd. I rarely attending class because it was not really necessary. Our final paper required outside research and the discussion were centered around reading that did not always overlap with the lectures. The professor was highly entertaining, but I just was not as interested by the material than I thought I would be.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: N/A
March 25, 2016

I thought this class was okay. I was actually pretty excited to take the class because of the topic but I felt a bit let down by it. Professor Schwartz was an okay professor. She was a bit disorganized at times, mainly during the last half of the quarter. She was very friendly and approachable though. The class consisted of a midterm, final paper, final exam, creative project and class discussion. Discussion did count towards the grade . All parts were pretty doable. You get the questions that will be on both exams before hand to study so that was helpful. There is a listening section on both exams in which she basically tests your memorization of the specific bands you hear in class. Apparently a lot of people missed the most points in that section so study up.

She also gives a decent amount of time to complete the project and the paper, the paper wasn't due until after finals week. There were also some guest speakers all of which were great. My personal favorite was the all female panel. My TA was Albert(strongly recommend); he was very cool and friendly. He even got us donuts the last day of discussion but the other TA(Scott) seemed pretty cool too.

Overall the class was okay. Also, it is not curved so you have to put in time/work for a good grade.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2016
Grade: A
March 29, 2016

I really enjoyed this class. I never really listened to punk music that much (Before this class I was only exposed to mainstream pop punk bands) so this class really introduced a lot of punk background and history to me.

Professor Schwartz gives engaging lectures and gets the material across decently with slides but the second half of the quarter we switched to another classroom and the screen was small as heck and her slides became unreadable. Other than that as long as you pay attention to lecture (or just have general knowledge of punk history already) and listen to the songs she plays during lecture you should do well in this class.

The readings weren't really necessary and the TAs are pretty chill about grading. I would definitely recommend this class if you're interested in punk.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 19
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: P
March 25, 2018

This is probably the easiest class I have ever taken at UCLA. I literally just showed up and breathed. We talked about Punk music, did a mini group project, and talked about our experiences with punk. The readings were optional, there was no paper, no final. We were suppose to go to this music festival, but you didn't even need to go that. Easiest Pass/No pass class I have taken at UCLA. 10/10 would recommend.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
MSC HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2018
Grade: A
Feb. 8, 2020

This class was a mess when I took it at least. Lectures were sparsely attended, the professor would get into arguments with students at times, and the grading of the class was changed throughout the quarter. Ultimately, the entire grade for the class was based off of a final video project. I didn't feel like this class was well organized, but hopefully it has gotten better since.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
MUS HST 13
Quarter: Winter 2018
Grade: A
July 9, 2018

By all means read all the negative reviews of this class ('bruh this is the worst class ever' etc) which are posted below but I would suggest that before you jump to any conclusions, ask yourself- how does one teach 'punk'? Professor Schwartz introduced this question and made us answer it for ourselves, prompting us to question our assumptions about the genre and investigate why punk music exists. THAT is punk. If you want a typical survey style music history course in which you are fed information to regurgitate on tests, don't take this class. If you like punk music and culture and want to think about what it stands for, you will probably love this class.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
2 of 4
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