I don't have a particular interest in science, but this class was an easy GE that fills the lab requirement. Lectures were Bruin-casted and the textbook reading was short and pretty straight forward. Drake co-lectured for half the quarter and I really liked her. The labs were long but easy if you remember to cram last weeks material a few minutes before class. Schauble gives 2% extra credit, which bumped my grade up from A- to an A. The final is easier than the midterms, and you can do well on tests simply from paying attention in lectures and/or reviewing the textbook, but I found lectures more helpful than reading. You only really will do bad if you get lazy: all you have to do is spend a little time to understand the concepts

I don't come from a STEM background nor am I smart, but I still managed to get an A- in this class largely because Professor Schauble is very generous with the grading of this class. First of all, an A- in this class is 88%. He also offers a maximum of 2% extra credit by watching and writing a short report on episodes of Planet Earth or Blue Planet, making an A- in this class basically an 86%. I got a C+ and a B- on the midterms and a B on the final and still got an A- in this class because of how the class was set up. The largest grade booster in this class is the lab section. Lab is a grueling two hours, but it was a necessary evil because the quizzes were really easy and made up a large portion of the grade. Showing up and doing the long worksheet made up another large portion of the grade, further diluting the weight of the exams. There is also a lab final, which is essentially a glorified lab quiz which makes up 10% of the grade. If you study for 15 minutes right before the quizzes, you'll get a 10/10. Therefore, if you study the quizzes that are handed back for about an hour, you should get 100+% (there is extra credit) on the lab final. As for the exams, they're actually somewhat difficult: the multiple choice is easy but the short answers actually require some deeper knowledge of the topics. Other reviewers have mentioned that you should read the textbook and you'll be fine. Although I'm sure it worked for some, but for me, it didn't help too much. The main reason why I did so much better on the final than on the midterms was because I stopped looking at the textbook as my predecessors have recommended and instead focused on the lecture material. All in all, it's a pretty decent class and you don't even need to show up to lecture. The content can be really boring at times, but for a relatively easy A, I'd say its worth it.

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This class was super cool. I have a total of 3 brain cells, but all this class takes is a bit of reading of the textbook. He bruin casts all the lectures, so it's usually empty. I went to lecture because I can't get myself to stay on top of any work, but I found this class engaging. Professor Drake co-taught the class and she's cool.
Lab is the absolute easiest thing ever. You have a quick quiz at the start based off the last lab, so glance over the slides for like 15 minutes and you'll ace all the quizzes. Then you just get a cool activity packet that you can collaborate on, and you just get participation credit. TA can let you out once you finish, so lab is often times about an hour. It's fun and I looked forward to it.
The midterms and finals were really easy. Mostly multiple choice, some free response. It's all straight forward and not necessarily conceptual. If memorization is your thing, this will be quite easy.
This is an easy GE if you know how to skim a bit and pay attention to lecture.

I fell asleep a lot in this class... If you are looking for a super easy GE, do not take it. It requires a lot of memorization.

For the quarter I took this class, it was taught by both Professor Schauble and Drake. I learned a lot from this class, but during Schauble's lectures it felt kind of boring. Nevertheless he was a helpful professor! Throughout the quarter we had 3 Q&A-style review sessions right before each of the 2 midterms and the final. You can watch ocean-related documentaries and/or attend science seminars for extra credit . Lab-wise, we basically just worked on some paper handouts and only sometimes had hands-on experiments; there was a quiz in the beginning of each lab but as long as you study the previous lab's info you will be fine.

Not as interesting of a GE as I thought it was going to be. I deceived myself by reading Blue Planet in the course title and mistakenly believing that I would be studying material that was covered in the documentary series. Had I paid attention to the rest of the title, I would have realized that the word Oceanography should have tipped me off.

Summary: Easy science GE that comes with lab credit (lab is even more of a joke than the class). Get an A by reading the textbook, spending a day studying for the final (by memorizing some of the stuff from the book), and going to the labs (they take attendance). There's not as much about ocean life as you would hope, and a lot more about seafloor sediment than you knew existed. At least Schauble is funny sometimes.

This is an effort class. If you try, you will get an A. It's not like you'll be struggling to learn the material, it'll just be about whether you're willing to do it.

Professor Schauble gives extra credit for attending related seminars. Do them early since your available free time suddenly goes away very quickly when the end of the quarter approaches, plus there won't be many seminars left by that point.

This class is certainly not an easy GE. The topics could be interesting, but the lectures are just not that engaging. Lectures are online, so it's basically not worth going to class. Reading the textbook is CRUCIAL though. The lab quizzes are harder than they should be, but the lab packets don't take the full period, so that's nice.

This was a very interesting class! Teacher was fine and pretty helpful, but nothing special. Most of the work is in the lab for this class. The tests are very easy!

Can't stress this enough: read the book. During the first half of the quarter, I'd read the chapters before lecture and take notes, so the lectures were like review sessions. I found this to be very effective. The second half of the quarter, however, was a crash course because the professor was falling behind with the lectures. That is probably the only bad thing I have to say about this class. Tests are really easy as long as you READ THE BOOK. As for the labs... I didn't like the exercises and found them somewhat pointless. Study the lab slides/readings and you'll do great on the weekly quizzes (take these seriously).

As for the professor himself, he's funny and very knowledgeable. I'm sure everyone in my class liked him. He can be boring at times, though (I nearly fell asleep a couple of times).