This class has a lot of different assignments, but it's fun and really set up for you to succeed. For sure, everyone can get an A in this class. There is lots of extra credit and the grading is lenient. The weekly pattern typically consists of watching a few videos and taking a quiz before each lecture, then completing a group activity during class, and occasionally we have different small assignments due, which are quite diverse - debates, videos, interviews, powerpoint, etc. The class culminates in a short research paper. Overall, I enjoyed the diversity of assignments, found the group activities during class to be engaging, the material we learned was pretty practical, and it was not too hard at all. There was nearly no reading required and the class generally only required like 30 minutes or less of outside work per week.

This class is going to be a heavy workload. You're going to have quizzes/videos before lecture, Google Forms & Group Activities during lecture, many assignments, group activities for discussion, a 4-part midterm, a final report, a final group presentation, 3-4 'Elective Assignments' throughout the quarter, a debate project, and other things that I'm probably missing. It really just seemed like too much by cramming a lot of assignments into one course; maybe to help us learn, maybe to make the grade distribution more balanced - but either way it got pretty stressful at times, especially when they would have multiple different assignments due the same day.

The professors were really sweet and caring, and the TA's were always willing to help. However, I think that there was some huge differences in grading between the multiple professors and TA's in the class. That was just my experience though! I had heard of a lot of people who got below D's on their midterm and final reports, so just be aware that you may get graded pretty harshly. Also, student participation was kind of a struggle because some students didn't do anything on the in-lecture/discussion activities, and other students would just end up doing all of it. This was addressed by the profs once, but I'm not sure if anything really came of it, at least it didn't feel like anything changed.

Dr. Wayne was really nice and always open to talk to any student! His lectures were pretty good, you could tell he loves what he does. Dr. Vedrenne was a really hard grader from what I heard, so just be prepared that you may need to work really hard to get passing grades on those midterm & final reports if you get her grading your assignments. Overall, this is just my own experience! Definitely possible to get an A in this class, but they'll really make you work and stress for it. It's pretty cool information and the topics were interesting, you're learning about a lot of modern and novel environmental science that is very progressive, so it's great to get a first look at it.

I don't know if I would recommend it, but if you're very interested in environmental science and biodiversity you'd love it!

Be aware of a heavy workload if you want to take this class. There are videos/readings to watch/read and a quiz before each lecture. The topics are pretty interesting and lectures are engaging, but the requirement for participation can become draining. The most tedious and difficult part of this class was writing the midterm and final papers. Directions were a bit unclear and it was extremely difficult trying to come up with topics that could be tested with the data available. Also, since the course was online this quarter, we didn't have any data to use for the final paper, which made everything pretty confusing. Overall, this was an interesting class, but it's probably a lot more work than you would expect.