I wouldn't call this an easy A but it's a manageable A. The grade is broken down into 35% for the midterm and 65% for the final paper, nothing else.

The midterm is blue book but if you study it's not hard at all- she gives you a couple of questions and you just need to answer 3.

For the final paper, she'll give you a few articles to choose from (you need to pick one from the Middle East and one from a western democracy) and you pretty much analyze the media sources and the portrayal of America from the different perspectives (she gives a list of criteria for what to hit on the paper). It's 1.5 spacing, but it's honestly not that bad at all, just make sure you explain everything you bring up. The portrayals of America in the articles are not exactly straightforward, so you'll probably need to read each of the articles a few times before you have enough to start writing. The most important thing for the paper is that you can relate the content to concepts from class and that you can relate your own opinions and perceptions of America based on the articles. Make sure you go to the classes after the midterm, because she goes through example articles to show you how to analyze the articles for the paper and how to insert your own perspective in your analysis.

Also, you NEED to go through the readings that she posts. Most of them are incredibly long and they're not always straightforward and easy to understand (especially from the first two weeks), but they ultimately apply to both the midterm and the final paper and are where you'll get a lot of detail on the concepts from class.

While I felt like I didn't know what was going on half the time in class, the first few classes are crucial in regards to themes and whatnot. Midterm wasn't terrible, you choose 3 questions to answer out of about 8. Crammed the night before and got an A-. Other than that is the 10-12 page final paper. As long as you incorporate the things from the lectures pre midterm you will do fine. Ended the class with an A. Only skimmed a few readings, pretty much stopped showing up after the midterm.

I am a third year STEM major and this was my first time taking any comm class in my entire life, as I needed upper div units and this class fit my schedule nicely. I also didn't know a single person in the class nor was I ever able to go to the professor's office hours because I had class during that time. Your entire grade is just one midterm and one final paper that is 1.5 spacing 12 pages, which turns out to really be around 15 pages double spaced. This sounds pretty daunting because messing up on either of the assignments can really lower your grade. On the other hand, the midterm was very fair. The professor herself posts all the lecture slides after each week. At the end of each lecture slides there are "Test yourself" questions and basically if you can answer all of these, and the answers are all straight from her slides, then her midterm is extremely fair because her midterm questions are very similar, if not almost the same as the "Test yourself" questions in the slides. For our final paper, the professor took 6 quotes online from peoples' views on terrorism and we had to verify how accurate it was using the material we learned from lecture, 2 pages per quote. I was never able to go to the professor's office hours and the one time I tried to go to the TA for help, there was a long ass line for people wanting a regrade on their midterm. So I just went to the professor a few minutes before class started and she was more than happy to answer any questions you were uncertain about for the final prompts. As for the professor herself, she is extremely passionate and her lectures are very organized, and also incredibly nice. Lastly, besides the midterm which you really only need to start studying 5-7 days before at the most, and the final paper that isn't assigned until end of week 8, you really don't have to do anything else in between, along with not having to buy any books, unlike a lot of other north campus classes.

Nushin is the best. Her class is very straightforward and there are no textbooks/anything required for this class. This is my second class with her and her classes are all formatted the same: one blue-book midterm week 6 and a 1.5-spaced 10-12 page paper for the final, due at the end of finals week. The midterm is very easy if you went to the review session and took notes on what types of questions she was going to ask and going over the slides she posts to answer those questions. The readings posted are not necessary, but familiarize yourself with certain authors and their ideas because those will come in handy when answering midterm/final prompts. The final paper is long, but doesn't require much outside research; you just have to apply the lectures (posted online) and name-drop some authors/scholars and their concepts. There is only the midterm and final - you don't have to do anything else for the class. It is very easy and Nushin is great; she is excited about her work and will answer any questions you have.

I took this class because I had taken comm 106 with professor Arbabzadab and loved it, however, this class turned out to be miserable. The final paper which is worth 65% of your grade is so hard with no clear instructions. The professor decided to assign a new type of final which she hasn’t used before and her new style final ruined many peoples grades (my friend got a C and another an F). I am so disappointed I took this class because it messed up my gpa. The feedback I got on my paper was worded very rudely and didn’t even explain why I lost so many points when I did everything properly. I highly suggest not taking this class.

I can only say that this class was worst class that I've ever taken in UCLA!! Most of all the TA for this class is horrible. She doesn't like students to ask any questions during office hours and she always seems angry when I asked some questions. Also, the slides are so ambiguous that it is very hard to understand what are the materials saying. Even I believe that TA don't understand what is going on for class contents. I don't recommend this class unless if you want to challenge yourself

Nushin is a very fair grader, and the material she presents is super interesting. You have one in class midterm, where you have a choice of 6 questions to pick 3 from. ALL the questions are from the discussion questions at the end of the lecture slides. What I did was make a study guide, answering all questions for the lecture each week, with copying and pasting relevant information from the slides. This helped a lot for the midterm as I had a paper due a couple days before. I studied and reviewed in advance for it, studied hardcore right before the exam for 2 hours and got an A-. The final is a little tricky, we had to answer all 5 questions that were asked based on these mini-articles, and write out mini-essays. 1.5 spacing, 10-12 pages. I got an A on that. The good thing to remember about this class is that if you don't do well on the midterm it's okay because the final is worth 75%. I would still try to do well on it though because a lot of the information on the final is based off stuff pre-midterm. I honestly did a lot of the readings at the beginning for the class for the midterm, but when I found out that the exam was basically the discussion questions I gave up. For the final I didn't incorporate any of the readings as nothing was specified, but basically if you do for both the midterm and final you are for sure going to get an A+ - so keep that in mind! Anyway, overall a very interesting class. Do the work in advance and you will do well!

I feel like this class could have been interesting if explained well. it was so boring and the professor just lectures in a way where it just sounds like words but you understand nothing. also the midterm was just dumb because she expects you to show what you've learned but the questions are really specific and she says just answering the questions won't give you full credit.. like you have to write a bunch of irrelevant stuff just to show that you've learned something. anyways, would not recommend. sorry hope this helps :)

The class is pretty interesting and was an easy A in my opinion, you just have to make sure you put a lot of effort for the midterm and the final paper (due online during finals week). I read through most of the readings so that helped me out a lot, but I know a lot of people who didn't and just relied on the slides and did fine, so use your best judgment on whether or not you do them (most of them are really long but I felt like they helped me because I was able to use information from them to make my answers on the exam super detailed, which is key to doing well on it). Exam is 6 questions, you only answer 3- the first one was required and the other 2 you pick. Group relevant information together (hallmarks of a conspiracy theory, historical origins of conspiracy theories, scholarly perspectives on conspiracy theories, etc.) when you study and you should be fine, the questions were all pretty easy. Format for the final paper in Nushin's classes has changed since I took this class, but regardless you'll need to know the material well enough so that you can apply it in your writing (basically you're getting relatively recent news articles and you're discussing them by applying information from the class).

The class has only two grades: an in-class essay-based midterm and a LONG final paper. Fit perfectly for people like me that like to write papers rather than to take exams. Plus she is one of the most caring comm professor I've ever met. Her slides are super clear and she always asks if or not she needs to clarify anything. She is super nice when you come to ask questions. Giving her personal background and experience, I often feel so moved in her class as I know she is teaching with her full energy. She weighs her life on the class, and I can feel it. Thank you.