Professor Goebel is one of the most knowledgeable professors in the aerospace industry, so taking a class from him is a must for anyone interested in the field. MAE 161C is a great way to get a sense for how to do a first-order concept development design, with missions relevant to current space exploration. The lectures are generally guest speakers from Professor Goebel's friends in the industry that cover topics such as systems engineering, ion propulsion and mission planning. As long as you keep up with the deadlines and ask the professor or TA for help as needed to stay on schedule, and put reasonable effort into the project and report, I think everyone is guaranteed an A- or A. No midterm or final exams is also a plus.

This class was super cool, basically just take everything you've learned in 161 A and B and build your own spacecraft & mission. Classes are just guest lecturers from JPL or Goebel talking about his work at JPL, and while they're pretty interesting I ended up not going to most. The class is graded entirely on a quarter-long, 11-person-team project. Goebel is a cool professor, super knowledgeable and a great resource if you're going into aerospace.