Dr. Lancaster was a good professor and a good introduction to physics courses at UCLA. While his lectures were just taken from the textbook company and he went into extraneous topics that never appeared in exams, he was pretty easy to follow when lecturing. His tests were one of the best parts of the class, though - they rarely had conceptual questions like other physics classes and were very similar to the homework problems from Mastering Physics (your online HW). As a result, averages were high (two of the three tests had B averages), so don't expect that from this class again. The workload is definitely doable provided you pay attention during your labs and complete the online homework on time. I recommend taking this class with Dr. Lancaster if he teaches it again.

All this Lancaster slander is excessive. His exams have all been almost identical to the practice exams he gave us prior and went over multiple times. It's true that it would be nice if professors would be more forgiving during these hard times but Lancaster is not remotely as bad as what people are insinuating. I suspect that for many this may be their first quarter at ucla and they may be unfamiliar with the new level of difficulty. I'm sorry that they felt stressed. However, that doesn't mean it's ok to flood his reviews and absolutely bash him when he dedicates so much of his time to the students. Just look at the grades! The averages are literally so high, most people are getting As and Bs. I haven't been doing very well in this class but even I know that it's my fault not Lancaster's. I have no idea why everyone's so mad.

Despite a lot of disdain my classmates may have had with Professor Lancaster, I thought he was a good professor, and even chose him over other ones for 5B. His tests were different than traditional tests; he would tell you to make up values for certain variables, and you would get extra points by adding things to the problem that would make it more difficult. At first this seems stupid, but once you get the hang of it it is more doable. Also, before every test he posted a practice test that was essentially the same thing as the real test, and he would post his notes on it to ccle to see how he solved it correctly. Also, the weekly discussion questions were in the same format so you got a lot of practice with his format. The MasteringPhysics homework was braindead, a lot of times the questions did not make sense and we only had a set number of attempts for problems. This coupled with the braindead nature of the problems made it so you could lose some points due to homework, which kinda sucked. The lab portion was annoying but if you get a good Lab TA then it will be worth your time. Overall, Lancaster was a good professor and his tests are tricky at first but once you learn to use your resources and adapt to them, I don't think they're as hard as some of my friends' tests that they took with other professors.

I took Lancaster on a whim because I couldn’t get other profs I heard good things about. I don’t regret this decision at all. I was very bad at physics in high school, and this class wasn’t a ray of sunshine for me either, but it was refreshing having a prof who acknowledges that physics is hard and doesn’t expect everyone to be amazing at it right away. He worked with everyone and basically begged us to come to office hours. A lot of people complained because midterm 2 was really challenging, but he apologized and made the final VERY doable if you studied. He also allowed calculators and used real numbers on his tests which apparently is rare for a physics class at UCLA. I would recommend him if you want someone who’s straightforward and caring.

SO nice to finally have a professor that knows how to teach well! I recommend taking physics with lancaster, he assigns slightly more homework than other professors and gives no partial credit for late work but his lectures are very clear and his tests are very doable. Weekly homework due online, 2 midterms, and a final. I was really stressed about taking physics but I actually enjoyed this class!

Professor Lancaster is just dry as a lecturer, but he explains concepts adequately and the exams are fairly straightforward. This was the first quarter back in person, and reading the reviews from the online quarters he sounded terrible. In person he is not at all like he apparently was for online. You could tell he wanted us to succeed. Lecture attendance isn't mandatory (though I would recommend going because he sometimes adds important information that isn't on the slides). The homework system is fairly lenient (you get about 6 tries and only lose 3% on each problem that you get wrong after each try). The exams have one or two problems with about 10-15 intermediate problems that somewhat guide you through the overall problem.

I was just 1 point away from an A- and this guy decides not to curve the class like he promised.
Not to mention he doesn't give equation sheets for exams when all other professors do. Lancaster sucks, that's all. The fact that he's still teaching after all these bad reviews proves UCLA doesn't care about its students and god is dead.

This guy is not good.

Professor Lancaster is a very kind person. I'm really not a fan of the asynchronous learning structure, but the good thing is his lectures are so slow you can comfortably watch them on 2x speed so I watched all three lectures for the week in one sitting. Tests are 35 mins but he pretty much gives you an identical test for practice so that's all you need to study to do well. The class is not bad and Prof is very sweet. My main problem with it is that office hours often had 100+ students so it would be very hard to get any one on one help with the professor. Other than that, it's very doable.

This class was absolutely miserable. I believe Professor Lancaster failed to realize that this is an introductory class and completely ruined my perception of physics. Homework was annoying to complete due to the penalty and the large amount assigned. Exams were extremely difficult to retain. Time limit of 35 minutes was the worst ever. Office hours weren't even during the time stated in myucla. It failed to say that this is an asynchronous class but I think he's fixed that for next quarter. Although I passed this class, it did not come easy at all. I was stressed the entire time. Stay away from this professor's class if you can.