Be careful of this class; the exams are incredibly difficult and the professor doesn't post slides or help much with exam prep at all. In fact, the whole class is her textbook, and you shouldn't bother coming to class since she doesn't even cover all of the book she means to and you'll have to read anyways. It was interesting, but not worth the stress in my opinion.

Professor Johns has really mixed reviews on here but to be honest, I would not recommend this course simply because she is so out of touch with students. I know she reads these too so as a student, please consider the following feedback, Professor - Censoring conversations about current events (Israel - Palestine) does not protect you from scrutiny. This is international law, refusing to answer questions does not make you professional, it makes you complicit. Your dismissal of transfer students and implying that they cannot handle your course is off-putting and really troubling, we are equal students and deserve the same respect as anyone else. In terms of your test policies, your reviews will not improve until you start writing manageable exams based on the textbook that you conveniently make us all purchase. From TAs to students, everyone is frustrated with your so-called "teaching philosophies". Post grades on canvas, write reasonable tests, and stop harassing the undergrads with your course.

*IMPORTANT IF YOURE A TRANSFER*
Please, and I beg you, do not drop the class. There may be some things said in the beginning that may discourage you from keeping the class, but I promise you will be okay. As a transfer, I did get intimidated by the things I heard but do not let it get to you. Make a study group, read the book religiously, take notes.
The class is very textbook-based. You CAN get away with only reading the book but I would go to office hours and get clarification on any points of confusion if you go that route.

Always take these reviews with a grain of salt, but I absolutely hated this class. The exams are absolutely in nearly no correlation with the lectures provided in class. The exams were based on the smallest little details from the textbook you needed to remember. Quizzes were held every discussion section which was easy if you studied the cases provided. However, the lectures or the discussion do not help with the exams in any way whatsoever. She does provide a generous curve though, knowing that her exams are incredibly difficult. Personally, I spent 3 all-nighters in preparation for that test, and felt like I had to memorize a couple chapters with every single being I had just to get an average score on the exam. I had a great TA though, who tried their absolute best to thoroughly prep us for the test. My best advice: take this course at your risk. It was an incredibly interesting course that I don't regret taking...but be prepared for the amount of work that will be thrown at you. This class feels like a law class and not an undergraduate class.

I honestly could have tried a lot harder if it wasn't for other circumstances I experienced during spring quarter. I will say this prof did have the most random and extremely specific questions on the test that some people were literally forced to leave blank because they wouldn't have possibly guessed it would be on the exam. I admire professors who allow students to apply broad concepts to demonstrate their knowledge, however, sometimes it feels like a lot of these questions the professors adds were trap questions, where a good amount of students literally cannot answer effectively enough to receive full credit. I think thats lame. As for the TA's, they were all amazing.

This class was pretty tough, probably one of the more challenging PS classes I've taken so far as a third year. Like everyone says the midterm/final was difficult. I know though, for this quarter, she made the midterm a bit easier than her previous years. But then she made the final pretty hard. As difficult as the class was though, Prof Johns did tell everyone that she designed the difficulty of this class to be kinda like a law school class, which is good to experience bc a lot of ppl in this class are planning on going to law school (myself included).

I feel like this is one of the most rewarding classes I've taken, and because I knew the tests were gonna be hard, I studied my butt off. By studying a lot, you can for sure get an A but I think a greater benefit from studying so much was that I actually learned a ton and took away a lot from this class. It's definitely one of those classes that you can say you actually retained stuff from.

Prof Johns was also super cool to talk to during OH, very approachable. My TA was Abby, she was super great and her sections really helped with my understanding of the course, like she had tables we could fill out and stuff.

All in all, don't take if u want an easy A but if you plan on going to law school, this class is a must!

Let me go over the class structure first before delving into my thoughts. The class has a midterm and final (30% and 40% respectively of the grade) and weekly sections with quizzes that go over the weekly case study on whatever you covering that week. Those case studies can range anywhere from ~10-25 pages and the quizzes are simple (think dates, parties involved, which courts ruled, etc.). The lowest 2 section attendance and quiz scores are dropped. The textbooks is a must since the exams do draw heavily upon it, but you can scrape an A on the midterm we took without reading, but certainly not the final.

Verdict - Professor Johns just isn't good at her job. She's an unreasonable professor who expects you to come to every class, which means that she won't post slides or post lecture recordings - not very good if you have a trip for a club, if you are a commuter student, or a late sleeper trying to make a class that was at 9:30 am. It's ok if you don't make lecture for the most part if you read the book, but the Professor does occasionally give test hints and answers in lecture to incentivize attendance.

That's not really the biggest gripe I have with the professor though, since there are 2 more major grievances. First, as mentioned on every other review on here, she does not tolerate any excuse for missing a midterm or final, which really blows if you have COVID or another illness on that level. Second, her tests are completely unreasonable, they force you to recall things with an absurd amount of specificity and to memorize all the definitions mentioned in her book almost verbatim from the glossary. Moreover, the bulk of the questions are so difficult in the sense that they don't really test you understanding of the concept, but if you can remember minor snippets from the book that don't even enhance your understanding of the concepts being tested. This may seem like idle complaining on the surface, but the tests are heavily curved, which does reflect how poorly designed they are. They are designed to make you fail and curving is supposed to fix everything in post by making the average about a B (there is no deflationary in this class though, which is good). I do want to be clear about the fact that even though I got an A+, it was more because of luck and the fact that I worked much harder for this class than any other class I've taken in PS.

I will say though, TAs can make this class significantly easier or harder. I was lucky and I had Natalie, who is an amazing TA. so if you sign up for this course and if she's around, try to select her for your section.

I was apprehensive about taking this class because of all of the reviews saying it was really hard. But in reality, the class was a lot easier than I expected and I actually enjoyed taking it more than I thought I would. I found the material to be really interesting and the lectures to be engaging. The exams are primarily based on memorization rather than analysis, so if that's not your speed I would suggest another class. The grade is made up of a midterm and final exam, along with weekly section quizzes and participation in section discussions. Both the miderm and final are generously curved, and they drop the two lowest quiz and participation grades. The section quizzes were very straightforward (most people get 100% every week) based on the case for that week and the professor often highlighted some of the important parts of the cases in lecture which was helpful. We covered about one chapter from the textbook each week and the lectures directly covered textbook material. She is really adamant about not posting the lecture slides on the class website which is pretty annoying, but they are not super detailed anyway and just outline information from the textbook. While the professor stressed that all textbook material was fair game for the exams, the midterm was focused almost entirely on the topics highlighted in lecture and I think most of the class found it to be easier than they expected. The final exam was a little trickier because there were a few questions that she didn't cover in lecture, but I still found attending lecture to be a useful tool in learning what material was important. The midterm and the final both had the same general format: multiple choice, definitions, short responses, and extra credit. For the definitions, my TA emphasized that we would be graded based on the glossary definition in the textbook and suggested that we memorize them word for word. It was really tedious and time-consuming, but memorizing the terms was a good way to get easy points on the exam. I recommend starting to memorize the terms from the glossary sheet well ahead of the exam because there were over 100 terms for the midterm alone. Other than that, the professor has a website for the textbook with worksheets for every chapter. They are pretty long and I wouldn't say it's necessary to complete all of them (or any of them), but they definitely helped guide my note-taking. All in all, this class has a lot of material and is by no means an easy A. But, it's interesting and definitely doable if you are willing to dedicate a little more time to studying and going to lectures.

This is known to be one of the most challenging classes you can take in the PS department. Professor does not record nor post slides as she doesn't believe in them so going to class is crucial. The average on midterm is 60% curved to 85%, tests are designed for you to fail and then use the curve to bring you up. NOT AN EASY A!!! TA's are excellent (shoutout abbey you're the sweetest :) but you have to speak A LOT in discussion to get full credit. Interesting material just challenging class.

Professor Johns is a good and engaging lecturer, the content is interesting, and generally the TA's were well prepared to help out. Do not take this class if you enjoy getting good grades on midterms and finals, Professor Johns is a pretty rough grader, but does curve her tests. The big problem with her is that she's a self-described hard-ass. If you are sick or need other accomodations, she doesn't really care. She made people with covid come in to take tests in-person. If you don't mind that, she's fine and the class isn't too hard to get a B in without a ton of effort.