Content is interesting, workload is very reasonable, and extra credit opportunities abound (up to 10%). Prof Arroyo and the TA were excellent, fair graders, engaging, and listened to our feedback. Highly recommend this class as a GE.

I would highly recommend this class. Professor Calderon is kind and thoughtful. She really cares and about her students. Both her and my TA were very understanding of the impacts of online learning on students. While going to her office hours didn't help me content-wise, she was very knowledgeable and a fun person to have a conversation with. The grading is VERY fair (many many extra credit opportunities) and no money drop required for any materials (all provided in pdfs).

Overall a very chill class. Would take again.

For Fall 2021 this class was asynchronous, except for the discussion sections which were in person. I never met the professor in person, but from the narrated lectures she seemed extremely nice and very passionate about the content. The slides were sometimes long, but I would sometimes skim them. I had Madison F. as my TA, and I honestly loved and enjoyed going to section. She was very helpful and very knowledgable about the content. She graded very fairly. The final grade was composed of discussion forums, weekly worksheets, and a final project (there was no midterm or final exam). For the discussion forums and worksheets we only had to complete 7 which was pretty nice. I enjoyed taking this class and would take it again with the same professor, I totally recommend. Going to discussion section was NOT mandatory, but it was EXTREMELY helpful to go since they went over the content and most of the times my TA answered questions that were on the worksheets. There was no textbook required for this class since the professor provided all the readings online, so no need to spend money :)

this class was a SUPER easy GE, minimal weekly worksheets that you can basically get the answers for from the PowerPoints, no tests, no essays, no finals or midterms, just do your work, go to discussions , and do well on the final project and you will get an A. I found that the source material that we need to review, especially the films the professor chose were very interesting and I liked discussing them in class. GET TA LEANDRO, he is an AMAZING TA and I wish I had him for a longer time, he was so helpful and genuinely wanted you to succeed in his class. he was so dedicated to the course material and really knew his stuff. he also is so welcoming and accommodating and really funny lol. this class was a breeze and I would 100% take it again if I had the chance. the only bad side is that the narrated powerpoint made by the professor were reallllyyyy long, like 4+ hours long sometimes so you had to pick and choose what to listen to. other than that, a great class

I took this class as a first year Spanish major, but most people in my class took it for gen eds and an easy A. The class is easy and relatively low stress but I still feel like I learned and remembered a lot. The course is easy to do well in as long as you finish all your work and make a clear effort. She even gives extra credit for attending lectures. The only thing that was a bit overwhelming was there is a worksheet writing assignment you have to complete every 2 weeks, but this kinda takes the place of a final exam and there are a couple extra credit questions so it’s worth it imo. I loved this professor and hope I can take a class from her again for some of my upper divs in the future.

This class does require a bit of outside research for the material on class, however, I would recommend this course to everyone.

Participation not required so I only showed up to class the first week. Very very easy I actually barely did any of the readings. I just attended my discussions and was able to understand everything. EASIEST GE.

I'm a STEM major and took this class because I might want to do a Spanish minor, but it's also a fairly easy GE if that's what you're looking for. I'd been exposed a little bit to Latin American cultures from high school Spanish, but I learned a lot from this course and found it really interesting. Prof Calderon is a good lecturer and has really detailed slides; lectures weren't recorded, but the content on the slides covered perhaps 80% of it. Admittedly, there was a not insignificant number of times I was falling asleep in class, but I'd attribute that to the class being in the evening time. Attendance to lectures is optional but gets you extra credit, and attendance is required and taken at discussion section, as well as participation (and there are plenty of opportunities to participate in discussion as long as you're familiar with the week's content). There are also optional events she promotes throughout the quarter that I didn't go to, but they provide you with generous amounts of extra credit if you need it.

There are readings to do before each class, which she provides on BruinLearn so you don't need to purchase anything, and some of them can be kinda long but nothing too insane. I sometimes missed the readings before each lecture, but as long as you catch up before discussion everything is good. There are people who straight-up don't do the readings and probably get by, though I dunno how their discussion participation grade is impacted (but regardless, don't take this class if you're not interested in putting a good faith effort to engage with the content cos that'd be pretty rude of you). Other than that, the things you get graded on are a weekly discussion board post which is pretty open-ended and completion-based, and five bi-weekly worksheets that go into the content of the past two weeks. The worksheets can get kinda long and require some paragraph responses, but everything draws from lecture, and the stuff you go over in discussion is really, really helpful. It's quite manageable to finish in a day or two if you already know your stuff, but if you go back and read through the slides you'll be able to do it regardless. I think I put a reasonable amount of effort into my responses and got full score on all the worksheets.

There are no tests, but there is a final project worth 40% of your grade for which you submit a proposal around halfway through the quarter. Your TA will provide you with the expectations and guidelines more specifically, but it's overall very open-ended, can be any format/medium of your choice kind of thing that just has to engage with Latin American cultures in some way. It obviously depends on your project, but I think it's a reasonable goal to at least start working on it before Thanksgiving so that it doesn't pile up with your other work. I did not start mine until the beginning of Week 10, a week before it was due, so that was kind of just looming over my head for the entire second half of the quarter, but I was at least was comfortable enough in my other classes such that I could spend the majority of week 10 working on that project. I chose to do something creative which was probably why I put it off for so long, but I was never worried about my grade while making it, had fun with it, and ended up with something I'm pretty happy with.

Overall, I really enjoyed this course.

the easiest A i have ever gotten. there's no exams at all and the 'final' is a project that you can do by yourself or with a group. there's weekly worksheets, but you can miss up to 4 LIKE???? you don't need to attend lecture since the professor posts the slides, so definitely take this class if you need a GPA booster