Professor Shapley was awesome! She's an incredibly kind and passionate teacher, and I really learned a lot from her class. She made the subject interesting, and it was clear that she put significant effort in her organization. Her office hours every week were extremely helpful too! Lastly, when I e-mailed Professor Shapley with a simple units question, she responded with a very detailed and helpful explanation that must have taken her a good 15 minutes to write. She cares a lot about her students, and is probably one of the best professors here at UCLA.

The class itself: The homework is math based and challenging, but the midterm and final were conceptual. Pay attention in lecture, and the class will be no problem. Highly recommended!

Very very patient professor... She went through lectures with great detail and always repeats the important stuff from previous lectures. If you go to all her lectures and managed not to sleep through it, you'll be fine. This class in mostly about physics, you don't get to read about astronomy stuff till the last 3 or 4 weeks. Some of my friends couldn't stand it and dropped it halfway, missing out the good stuff at the end. Overall very interesting class if you want to know more about black holes or other great mysteries of the universe. If you hate math or physics, don't take it. Professor wise, she is the most kind, caring and friendly professor I've had. Exams are as easy as the homework, and homework is worth 20% of the final grade.

Everyone's pretty spot on with their reviews. Shapley is a joy just to be around, and she teaches some pretty awesome content!
I'm super north campus, but she made me understand Einstein's theory of relativity... Never thought that'd happen.

Just a quick warning, the course description says "essentially nonmathematical course," but that's pretty deceiving. That class is pretty math-based, but it's fairly simple algebra (equivalent to my high school physics class).

The homework was a bit challenging at times (if you're as bad at math as I am; I didn't even get a 600 on the SAT math section), but if you go to office hours, she's happy to basically guide you through it.

Like I said, put simply, I think there are some monkeys out there who are better at math than I am, and this class wasn't that challenging.

*Note: This class is almost the same as Astro 3 (probably 75% of the same content), just a touch more challenging with the math. If you're looking for another easy A and/or found astro 3 fun and interesting, definitely take this class.

I took this class concurrently with the ESS9: Solar System class, and they were also pretty similar and helped me get my Physical science GEs out of the way easily.

This professor made this GE very interesting. I would like to warn anyone considering this class that the first few weeks are learning easy physics. Overall she is very nice and is incredibly helpful.

Super easy class. I never paid attention in class but I did pretty good for both midterm and final. All you have to do for this class is know all the material for the study guide which would be handed out before the midterm and final. And one more thing, the HW is kinda hard sometime, but you could always go to the TA's office hour to get it done. the grade break down is 30% HW,30% midterm and 40% final. Great and easy GE class.

Professor Shapley was great. She was very caring and nice, and extremely clear in her explanations. She never seemed caught off guard by any questions, which was also great. As for the class, it was extremely easy. It will definitely be a lot harder if you don't go to class, because the lectures require a bit of explanation. But as it was, I went to every lecture, didn't sleep through them, studied 1hr for the midterm, and 1hr for the final and easily received A's on both. Homework is easy too. The class is mostly math/physics based, and the astronomy concepts are easy and actually interesting too.

The course was pretty easy. If you don't fall asleep during the lecture, then it's pretty much a guaranteed A. The concepts are basic physics (force, acceleration, velocity) and the stuff about astronomy is really easy to understand. The midterm and finals consist of short answer and true/false. If you're looking for an easy GE, definitely take this class. The homework counts as 30% of the grade which is just an excellent grade booster (hint: if you don't get the homework or want to make sure you get 100% on it, go to her office hours. She basically does the homework for it). The book isn't necessary though, she puts all her PowerPoint lectures online.

Shapley made this class great. She is passionate about the subject and very concerned about the students. She is extremely helpful during office hours and explains all of the concepts very clearly. The lectures are a little long but it isn't too hard to stay awake, the homework is ridiculously easy, and the midterm/final are simple if you follow the study guides. This is a great class to take if you are looking for an easy GE or if you just think black holes are awesome.

Though she knows the material extremely well and goes into extensive lectures that are extremely fascinating, she speaks in a monotonous voice, is not exciting, rushes through material expecting students to know it right as they see it, and doesn't make her tests easy at all.

Professor Shapley is super nice and her responses to email questions are very helpful/thorough.

Her lectures present the material very clearly. I got an A in the class, but I read every page in the textbook...so I'm not sure how well you'll do if you don't read lol. Definitely go to her review sessions for the exams because there are some questions on the exams that she'll mention during the reviews. You'll end up saving yourself from missing two or three questions. You don't really have to do all that well on the exams...as long as you're about 10-ish% above the average lol. I only got B's on the second midterm and the final.

The labs are pretty easy, but fast paced. Usually the TAs are nice, so I recommend just asking them if your answers are right for any of the answers you're unsure of. As long as you show that you put some thought into your answer, they'll explain the right answer to you if you're wrong.

Overall, an interesting class and a good GE with a nice professor.