Comm 1 with Professor Feramisco was okay overall. The class is comprised of four speeches, a debate, and one paper. The workload is pretty light and there is no discussion. You basically have to give a speech every other week, and sometimes there's an outline due before the speech. The speech topics are pretty interesting; the first speech is you introducing yourself to the class, the second is an informative speech, then a persuasive speech, and the final is a ceremonial speech. The paper is very easy, it's just a speech analysis of a TedTalk.

Participation is very important to Professor Feramisco. Don't take this class if you don't plan on showing up. You lose points every time you miss a class, arrive late, or leave early. I noticed that the people who seemed to struggle most in the class were those with attendance issues.

Another thing: DON'T BUY THE TEXTBOOK. It should not be a required text. I rented it and never opened it once. There are no reading quizzes, and she covers the exact same material in class on her powerpoint slides. I don't think anyone in the class ever used the book. Seriously, do not waste your money.

Overall, this class was fine. I think some of my peers enjoyed it more than me. I didn't love the fact that the lectures were two hours a week, and during the weeks where we didn't have speech presentations, we were listening to Professor Feramisco's lectures on what makes a good speech, which was often unhelpful and could sometimes be boring, even though she tries to keep it interesting using class participation. The only good thing about the class is that since its pretty small (around 30 people) you do become friends with the people in the class and it's interesting to hear about peoples lives through the speeches they give. Professor Feramisco is probably as good of a professor as any to take Comm 1 with. Sometimes I felt like she graded me very subjectively and unfairly marked me down on some small things, but overall, if you show up and do the work, its an easy A.

Feramisco is a wonderful professor, and the workload is light. If you do the assignments, you're basically guaranteed a good grade. Show up to class and you'll do fine. Easiest A I've ever earned.

Really great class to improve your public speaking skills. Go to the professor's office hours and ask what you can improve on.

SELLING TEXTBOOKS:
1) The Essential Guide to Rhetoric $5.00
2) Communication: A Critical/Cultural Introduction $10.00
424-365-0927

This class is really fun and it's not a lot of workload. The only hard part about it is that you have to deliver a speech every other week. For every speech you need a TAF and an outline. The stuff you learn in the lecture isn't very helpful for when you give your speech. Also, it feels like it will be an easy A class but her grading on the speeches is actually a little harsh.

I took this class during Fall 2015. Professor Feramisco was incredibly understanding of my mistakes early on and helped me to improve them for the later speeches. She was a great teacher and I hope that I get to take another one of her classes.

I took this class as a pre-req for the COMM major and absolutely loved it! It was the teacher's first quarter teaching at UCLA so I think that made it easier than most COMM 1 classes. Going into this class I was an okay public speaker and I finished this class extremely confident in my speaking abilities. The homework was reading from a textbook, but a lot of people got by just fine in the class without ever buying the textbook because we went over slideshows of the reading in class. There was no written tests. We were only graded on 4 different speeches and out final was a fake awards ceremony that was very fun. I would highly recommend taking this class wether you are thinking about being a comm major or not.

This class is really fun and easy. Professor Feramisco gives interesting, engaging, and interactive lectures. The class environment is fun and comfortable, and your public speaking and communicating skills are improved without you even noticing. Highly recommend this class.

She is so nice! The trick is to memorize your speeches so she doesn't dock you for losing track of the audience or looking at your notes too much. Don't start your speeches with "um" or "so" and participate in class. She spends a lot of time showing us videos of other speeches. There are three main speeches, one midterm debate, and one final ceremonial speech where you present and accept and award. She strictly follows her rubric and gives you the rubric beforehand. So it's really easy to tailor everything to the rubric. I learned a lot from this class, and this class is super useful and super fun. I know other professors just make you listen to them, but in this class, you have impromptu speeches with classmates so it's very engaging and interactive