Fun and useful class. Vet your group members as well as possible.

I have the reader and When Politicians Attack for sale. Bought new in fall 2020. Some annotation in reader, willing to erase if desired.
**********

Cool dude. Do the readings. Memorize the readings. Easy A.

The material of this course is super interesting and a treat to learn about. However, Prof. Groeling can be unfair and go off on personal tangents during lectures. There would be days where I would think this guy isn’t that bad, but a lot of days where I thought why are you torturing us. I really worked for my grade, and I’m surprised it showed at the end of this quarter. If you plan on taking this class, you need to do the readings, be on time for iclicker quizzes, and the exams are easy because the students create the questions. Overall, a lot of unecessary work and lots of hard times, but the material is super engaging and the exams won’t kill you.

Professor Groeling is horrible. He assigns up to 12 readings per class and he randomly quiz you to see if you completed them. We meet 3 times per week which makes it impossible for you to catch up with the readings. The material he covers is super interesting, but he wants to cover way too much of it in a very short period of time. Many students love him and I seriously don't understand why...during lectures he keeps reading the slides he is a horrible public speaker that believes he is funny when he is not. His jokes are NOT FUN AT ALL! He loves to make fun of his students and you can't barely remember what he said in lecture because he simply doesn't communicate well. If you want to take him go, but you will realize the work load you have to do for his class is simply crazy!

This class has an exuberant amount of reading which, honestly, for the material covered in class is fairly ridiculous. I would not recommend taking this class if you are opposed to doing 150 pages of reading three times a week. According to my arithmetic that is 450 pages a week. A bit of an exaggeration, but, nonetheless the amount of reading Groeling assigns for simple topics, such as opposition research, is so unnecessary.

Tim Groeling is pretty well known research wise and he's worked with amazing people including Anderson Cooper! His lectures are very interesting. There is a group project that requires making a video but he makes sure you have all the tools necessary to complete it and offers a group peer evaluation!!

This class has a big group project so get in a good group! A huge portion of your grade depends on it. The tests are incredibly easy and the subject is interesting!

The clicker questions given each lecture will destroy your grade! huge down side to taking his classes. Otherwise, he's a good lecturer, and the material is quite interesting.

This class is HARD. It's a lot of work (outside group work, reading, writing) but personally I found the material really interesting. Professor Groeling is funny, super organized and communicates frequently with students. He's also very tech-savvy, which is refreshing compared to a lot of professors who freak out when their technology stops working for a moment. The downside is--he expects you to be pretty tech-savvy yourself too. Here's a quick breakdown:

1. You have readings to complete before every lecture, and it's generally a good idea to read them because a. you can fall behind really fast and then you'll have a crapload of catching up to do and you'll be miserable b. he will have one-question quizzes on them almost every lecture that count towards participation and give you some free points.

2. For this quarter he used a different system for midterms that included three short take home essays you write yourself, then you have to get together with a group to combine the three together. Then that same week you have an in-class short answer section, so you have to write and study simultaneously during the week. He might change the format and I hope he does because every week you have an exam for this class, you can pretty much forget about any other classes you're taking. He has a discussion forum in which you can post and read suggested questions from other students and he WILL use them, so study off of that--it makes the process a lot easier.

3. The political ad project. You do this with the same group as you do your essays with, and even though he requires you to complete an iMovie training during the first couple weeks...man. He helps the process by giving you deadlines for having your ideas complete (storyboarding) so you're not freaking out the week before it's due trying to think up the whole thing from scratch. If you are already familiar with iMovie in some capacity, you have an advantage. This means that Mac users probably have an advantage. My group met outside of class at least five times for about 2-3 hours each just for this project. It was really rewarding though in the end, but I strongly advise you consider the workload of your other classes first before adding this one to it because it is a LOT of outside work.

Professor Groeling is great though. His investment in this class and his students is apparent, he's interesting and engaging with good material and he uses really good examples to illustrate his points. After taking this class I'm very interested in political communication, especially campaign strategies. Take him if you think you can handle the time demands.

I have now taken two courses with Professor Groeling and both have been a pleasure. The format is very similar in both 160 and 162. There are three exams that are scheduled in a way that you don't have to worry about your other midterms at the same time. There is a 20% participation component to each of the classes and this involves going to class and participating in various other small projects/surveys throughout the rest of the quarter. Groeling is super funny, very good at appropriate self-deprecating humor and is a total geek at heart. With that said, he is extremely concerned with student learning and is very down-to-earth and approachable. Groeling presents the material in an interesting way, takes questions, and is interactive and excited about what he is doing. The material is interesting and you will not regret taking the course.

The video project (162) and the research project (160) can be a bit of work but are both fun, interesting and good practice. I would definitely suggest these classes and professor Groeling in general.