So far I have taken 5 courses with Professor Illes. I could study for 2 weeks for her exams but I will never ace them. I'm not sure what it is, but sometimes I believe that my brain just doesn't fully comprehend her wording. Nevertheless, she is one of my favorite professors at UCLA. I retain so much valuable information from her lectures, she's so attentive and effective in her office hours, and it amazes me how broad of a spectrum she teaches.

I could not disagree more with the recent reviews of 168 and the bitter souls who wrote those reviews will certainly struggle even further with 170 and further GIS courses.

I have to agree that Geog 168 with Prof. Illes is misery. I have not encountered another instructor so rude, dismissive, and unhelpful on this entire campus. Very little instruction is provided. She takes a strange pleasure in kicking people out of the computer lab as some form of public humiliation; unfortunately half of them so far have been her enrolled students that she doesn't recognize. Requests for assistance with software glitches and problems uploading/sharing files are returned with bizarre tirades about how we will never be able to function professionally. She has implemented a mandatory 2 day cooling off period between assignments that nicely overlaps with her office hours. The TA struggles to respond to everyone's questions while she leaves early. I think this is outrageous. If she hates teaching so much why is she here?

Geog 116

This class was so fun and interesting! Im always using the information I learned in this class in other classes and in the real world. I wish I could retake this class just for fun. There was reading and lecture was long (3hrs) but the time goes by fast and the powerpoint are very interesting.

Geog 167

I was dreading taking this class but it turned out so great! Professor Illes was more than helpful when I didn't understand the material and took extra time in office hours to help me with assignments. She was such a lifesaver for me!

She is an awesome lecturer. The material is not hard at all. She has a great sense of humor and a knack for helping students in anyway she can. Take any of her classes if possible.

She is an awesome lecturer. The material is not hard at all. She has a great sense of humor and a knack for helping students in anyway she can. Take any of her classes if possible.

Professor Illes was alright. Just another average GE, nothing special. I thought she was really funny but I just wasn't all that interested in the topics. The labs were kind of intensive and there was some group work that was a pain.

Professor Illes has a very different teaching method, especially when compared to other UCLA staff. She is eccentric, which you need in the multi-disciplinary field that is geography: never have I ever had a professor that can give me the complete history of California and then tell me about field work in Zimbabwe and Nicaragua. A truly fascinating person.

If you are looking for a checked out prof, she is the exact opposite. Having a professor ACTUALLY care about your performance in class is rare. She isn't an "easy" professor, its that the work is just so straightforward that if you do it, you'll be graded accordingly. If you don't do the work, you won't succeed.

Professor Illes is an excellent resource. Go to her office hours.

This class is ridiculously easy. It's almost stupid easy.
Take the participation seriously though, especially if you have Ford as your TA. He uses some stupid ass formula to grade your participation.

But yeah seriously this class is a joke.

Her class are easy, but it requires some work. To get A, you have to go to her class every time; there are some questions in exams that textbook doesn't cover. Also, you need to memorize tiny details in textbook because that's what she focuses much in exams and that determines who gets As and who gets Bs. If you fail to do only those things above and still do other works, you would end up B or B+.

Conclusion: Getting B is really easy. Getting As requires much work that could frustrate you time to time. This class is definitely not a piece of cake as those folks described in botttom.