Professor
Jay Phelan
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Most Helpful Review
Winter 2017 - This review is for LS 7B, which has the same content as LS 2. Dr. Phelan's class is hard. I highly recommend taking another professor's class, simply because his exam are harder than other LS professors. He is an excellent lecturer and understands what he is talking about, but his exams are on a how other level. As for how to get an A, do the following: --make sure you do EVERYTHING in launchpad to the best of your abilities; you want to get 50/50 for all 3 caterogries of launchpad --get full credit for your lab assigments, which will come out to a huge portion of your grade --make sure you get your clicker points in --at all review sessions, record what he is saying so you can copy it down again and look up the answers. This will be a huge help, especially on the final --do the objectives on all the pre-class worksheets This class is doable, but I would highly recommend you go for another professor.
Winter 2017 - This review is for LS 7B, which has the same content as LS 2. Dr. Phelan's class is hard. I highly recommend taking another professor's class, simply because his exam are harder than other LS professors. He is an excellent lecturer and understands what he is talking about, but his exams are on a how other level. As for how to get an A, do the following: --make sure you do EVERYTHING in launchpad to the best of your abilities; you want to get 50/50 for all 3 caterogries of launchpad --get full credit for your lab assigments, which will come out to a huge portion of your grade --make sure you get your clicker points in --at all review sessions, record what he is saying so you can copy it down again and look up the answers. This will be a huge help, especially on the final --do the objectives on all the pre-class worksheets This class is doable, but I would highly recommend you go for another professor.
Most Helpful Review
Professor Phelan is one of the best professors that I've had during my two years at UCLA. At first the amount of material that will be covered seems extremely daunting but he simplifies so much of the material that it is not very hard to upkeep with it. His lectures are quite entertaining and not dry at all. Make sure to write down some of his side stories pertaining to the biology he is covering along with the questions and answers he posts during his lectures. These stories and questions are the ones that he will be using for his midterms and final exam. His exams are not very difficult but they do need some studying. The book is very helpful in explaining the material further but questions do not come directly from it most of the times. Make sure to buy Prep-U because it is very instrumental for the multiple choice portion of the test. Overall he's a great professor and makes LS 2 a great class to take.
Professor Phelan is one of the best professors that I've had during my two years at UCLA. At first the amount of material that will be covered seems extremely daunting but he simplifies so much of the material that it is not very hard to upkeep with it. His lectures are quite entertaining and not dry at all. Make sure to write down some of his side stories pertaining to the biology he is covering along with the questions and answers he posts during his lectures. These stories and questions are the ones that he will be using for his midterms and final exam. His exams are not very difficult but they do need some studying. The book is very helpful in explaining the material further but questions do not come directly from it most of the times. Make sure to buy Prep-U because it is very instrumental for the multiple choice portion of the test. Overall he's a great professor and makes LS 2 a great class to take.
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2021 - ***I took this class during the COVID-19 pandemic in an online format. -- OVERVIEW: Maybe I had an individual bad experience, but I'm not sure why this professor's reviews for this class were so raving. Perhaps the online format is a little different, but I did not feel like Phelan lived up to the other reviews. "Going above and beyond" and "explaining concepts thoroughly" are phrases I would not attribute to Phelan. He seemed very reluctant to answer questions and help out, ignoring questions in Zoom chat and being unresponsive to emails. Lectures would often go on tangents about his personal life, which isn't productive when LS7B is so information dense and every minute is valuable. Dr. Pham was much better in LS7A, at least. Even considering that the LS series is just horrible, I still think Phelan wasn't the best choice. -- GRADING: Grading is pretty straightforward. There's mandatory lectures, enforced with clicker questions, of which you can miss about a week. LaunchPad practice questions and exams were the same, you could miss a week's worth and get full credit. Same goes for the labs. The two midterms and final were worth a lot more points, not curved, but there were extra credit opportunities if you did a "mini-final" and reflection assignment afterwards. Other EC opportunities were available for completing surveys about LAs. The class isn't curved, so you need to earn every point yourself. -- HOMEWORK: This section isn't really relevant to Dr. Phelan. I don't think he really controls the format of the homework and labs. But my god, if you thought LS7A was bad, LS7B makes 7A look like a cakewalk. The amount of LaunchPad material is crushing, even if you just skip the material and do the questions. I can't imagine how much time it would take to actually do all the material as they intended. Lots of stuff isn't gone over in lectures because of the sheer material density, and the practice exams make it feel like there's a full on test every week. Again, Phelan doesn't control this, so it's not his fault the homework is so bad. Labs aren't much better, they're very time consuming and I didn't find them very helpful, though that may vary with students. They seemed very poorly designed, like the entire LS7 series. Not much to say other than you just have to sit through them. -- EXAMS: Most in this section also isn't really Phelan's fault. LS7 exams are just horrible, and it doesn't get better in 7A. The actual length of the exams isn't bad, but the questions are consistently confusing, poorly-worded, ambiguous, or just straight-up wrong. No amount of studying will prepare you for a question you have no idea what it's asking. The main gripe I have with Phelan is that he seemed to be just as unaware as students of how to go about regrade requests. His policy is that regrades are not processed unless it affects our final grade, which puts the stress on students trying to determine if we will get the grade we need, when it was a mistake made on the instructor's part. Trying to reach out to him via email or during class won't result in anything, and the only saving grace is that tests are graded really fast because they are online and multiple choice. Just don't expect your grading to actually be right. -- TIPS: This class is the definition of grind. There's so much you're expected to do yourself, and while the LaunchPad makes it difficult to fall behind, they're also not comprehensive enough to truly prepare yourself. This class is 5 units, but it's probably about 6-7 units worth of work. It's much harder than 7A in my opinion, but this varies between students so take it with a grain of salt. I have quite a negative review here, but it seems that many other students had good experiences, and I'm just one view. To be honest, the class time is probably the most important factor for LS, since professor matters less for such a standardized series.
Spring 2021 - ***I took this class during the COVID-19 pandemic in an online format. -- OVERVIEW: Maybe I had an individual bad experience, but I'm not sure why this professor's reviews for this class were so raving. Perhaps the online format is a little different, but I did not feel like Phelan lived up to the other reviews. "Going above and beyond" and "explaining concepts thoroughly" are phrases I would not attribute to Phelan. He seemed very reluctant to answer questions and help out, ignoring questions in Zoom chat and being unresponsive to emails. Lectures would often go on tangents about his personal life, which isn't productive when LS7B is so information dense and every minute is valuable. Dr. Pham was much better in LS7A, at least. Even considering that the LS series is just horrible, I still think Phelan wasn't the best choice. -- GRADING: Grading is pretty straightforward. There's mandatory lectures, enforced with clicker questions, of which you can miss about a week. LaunchPad practice questions and exams were the same, you could miss a week's worth and get full credit. Same goes for the labs. The two midterms and final were worth a lot more points, not curved, but there were extra credit opportunities if you did a "mini-final" and reflection assignment afterwards. Other EC opportunities were available for completing surveys about LAs. The class isn't curved, so you need to earn every point yourself. -- HOMEWORK: This section isn't really relevant to Dr. Phelan. I don't think he really controls the format of the homework and labs. But my god, if you thought LS7A was bad, LS7B makes 7A look like a cakewalk. The amount of LaunchPad material is crushing, even if you just skip the material and do the questions. I can't imagine how much time it would take to actually do all the material as they intended. Lots of stuff isn't gone over in lectures because of the sheer material density, and the practice exams make it feel like there's a full on test every week. Again, Phelan doesn't control this, so it's not his fault the homework is so bad. Labs aren't much better, they're very time consuming and I didn't find them very helpful, though that may vary with students. They seemed very poorly designed, like the entire LS7 series. Not much to say other than you just have to sit through them. -- EXAMS: Most in this section also isn't really Phelan's fault. LS7 exams are just horrible, and it doesn't get better in 7A. The actual length of the exams isn't bad, but the questions are consistently confusing, poorly-worded, ambiguous, or just straight-up wrong. No amount of studying will prepare you for a question you have no idea what it's asking. The main gripe I have with Phelan is that he seemed to be just as unaware as students of how to go about regrade requests. His policy is that regrades are not processed unless it affects our final grade, which puts the stress on students trying to determine if we will get the grade we need, when it was a mistake made on the instructor's part. Trying to reach out to him via email or during class won't result in anything, and the only saving grace is that tests are graded really fast because they are online and multiple choice. Just don't expect your grading to actually be right. -- TIPS: This class is the definition of grind. There's so much you're expected to do yourself, and while the LaunchPad makes it difficult to fall behind, they're also not comprehensive enough to truly prepare yourself. This class is 5 units, but it's probably about 6-7 units worth of work. It's much harder than 7A in my opinion, but this varies between students so take it with a grain of salt. I have quite a negative review here, but it seems that many other students had good experiences, and I'm just one view. To be honest, the class time is probably the most important factor for LS, since professor matters less for such a standardized series.
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2020 - I had Phelan for LS 15 and loved his lectures so I decided to take this class with him. I really enjoyed his book (the one he is cowriting with his friend) and I found that it gave me a lot of helpful tips that I could utilize in the future. A lot of this class was based on participation. Some classes were more boring than others, but it was still doable. Also, there are homework assignments (reflections) and a final presentation, but it was very low stress. If you're curious about a UCLA "hacks" type class, I would definitely recommend Phelan because he is very knowledgeable and has a lot to share.
Winter 2020 - I had Phelan for LS 15 and loved his lectures so I decided to take this class with him. I really enjoyed his book (the one he is cowriting with his friend) and I found that it gave me a lot of helpful tips that I could utilize in the future. A lot of this class was based on participation. Some classes were more boring than others, but it was still doable. Also, there are homework assignments (reflections) and a final presentation, but it was very low stress. If you're curious about a UCLA "hacks" type class, I would definitely recommend Phelan because he is very knowledgeable and has a lot to share.
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2021 - I took this class because I thought it would be an easy A. However, I was wrong, and a lot of people took the class because of the same reason and were proven wrong too. So first things first: this class isn't an easy A. You're going to have to put in some work. The class is on a point based system. You've got a couple of quizzes related to the topic of the week, discussion posts, a debate, a problem set presentation, LOTS of reading, a midterm, and a final. The lowest score you get on the quiz is dropped. I got pretty good scores on everything like the quizzes and discussion posts and my group even won the debate, but I did pretty bad on the midterm so it hurt my grade. PROTIP: Do the short responses for midterm/final first and then work on the multiple choice. I didn't do that for the midterm and I did bad and then I did better on the final because I did the free response first. ALSO: the multiple choice questions were pretty tricky for me, too. So be aware of that and read the questions carefully. I got below the class average on both the midterm and the final and I was able to get a B+, so not too bad I guess. I underestimated how much I'd have to study for this class, so remember to review! I never read Mean Genes, but I hear it was interesting and helpful. You'll be fine without it. The actual textbook that he requires is vital, however, so make sure to read that. I made the awful mistake of procrastinating on the week readings and had to cram a lot of the chapters near midterm/finals week. Professor Phelan is a great professor and makes his lectures interesting and fun to watch. He offers extra credit, which is great and you should be taking advantage of these extra credit opportunities. He also has review sessions before the midterm and final. As long as you can answer all the 30ish questions he gives in the review session, you'll be fine on the exam. In conclusion: Read the readings for What is Life?, do the questions from the review session, watch the lectures, study, and remember: this is not an easy A.
Winter 2021 - I took this class because I thought it would be an easy A. However, I was wrong, and a lot of people took the class because of the same reason and were proven wrong too. So first things first: this class isn't an easy A. You're going to have to put in some work. The class is on a point based system. You've got a couple of quizzes related to the topic of the week, discussion posts, a debate, a problem set presentation, LOTS of reading, a midterm, and a final. The lowest score you get on the quiz is dropped. I got pretty good scores on everything like the quizzes and discussion posts and my group even won the debate, but I did pretty bad on the midterm so it hurt my grade. PROTIP: Do the short responses for midterm/final first and then work on the multiple choice. I didn't do that for the midterm and I did bad and then I did better on the final because I did the free response first. ALSO: the multiple choice questions were pretty tricky for me, too. So be aware of that and read the questions carefully. I got below the class average on both the midterm and the final and I was able to get a B+, so not too bad I guess. I underestimated how much I'd have to study for this class, so remember to review! I never read Mean Genes, but I hear it was interesting and helpful. You'll be fine without it. The actual textbook that he requires is vital, however, so make sure to read that. I made the awful mistake of procrastinating on the week readings and had to cram a lot of the chapters near midterm/finals week. Professor Phelan is a great professor and makes his lectures interesting and fun to watch. He offers extra credit, which is great and you should be taking advantage of these extra credit opportunities. He also has review sessions before the midterm and final. As long as you can answer all the 30ish questions he gives in the review session, you'll be fine on the exam. In conclusion: Read the readings for What is Life?, do the questions from the review session, watch the lectures, study, and remember: this is not an easy A.
Most Helpful Review
Fall 2016 - I did enjoy class lectures very much. I honestly struggle to understand biology but heck it was a really good class. I got a B was because I felt like I did pretty poorly in the midterm, but if you do good in the quizzes, nail the midterm and final, you'll do fine. Just re-watch the lectures, try to understand the topics well enough that you can teach them to other people. You don't have a lot of work but you have a lot of study time and reading to do, but you CAN do it! :)
Fall 2016 - I did enjoy class lectures very much. I honestly struggle to understand biology but heck it was a really good class. I got a B was because I felt like I did pretty poorly in the midterm, but if you do good in the quizzes, nail the midterm and final, you'll do fine. Just re-watch the lectures, try to understand the topics well enough that you can teach them to other people. You don't have a lot of work but you have a lot of study time and reading to do, but you CAN do it! :)
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- Life Science 15 - Best professor at UCLA. He is so enthusiastic about the material and really knows how to teach it. His book "Mean Genes" is great! Not only do you learn about science and fulfill a requirement, but his teachings are applied to REAL LIFE. He is amazing and taught me so much. Loved it. The textbook was great too ("What is Life?"), but it's identical to lectures so I'd recommend you go to lectures and listen rather than read. Very easy class and highly enjoyable. HIGHLY recommended teacher! :)
- Life Science 15 - Best professor at UCLA. He is so enthusiastic about the material and really knows how to teach it. His book "Mean Genes" is great! Not only do you learn about science and fulfill a requirement, but his teachings are applied to REAL LIFE. He is amazing and taught me so much. Loved it. The textbook was great too ("What is Life?"), but it's identical to lectures so I'd recommend you go to lectures and listen rather than read. Very easy class and highly enjoyable. HIGHLY recommended teacher! :)
Most Helpful Review
I had Professor Phelan for LS2 and ABOLUTELY loved the class! Lectures: Professor Phelan is absolutely hilarious during lectures and incorporates funny stories from his own life to lighten the mood. However, he does cover a LOT of material in each lecture and you have to make sure to take as many notes as possible (laptop is recommended). Write down the slightest details as sometimes he may include them in multiple choice or even short answer questions. On average though, I really looked forward to going to lecture which is saying something. Bruincast: I would really recommend using bruincast so that in class you don't have to be frantically writing down every word. If you miss something, don't worry about it, but go back and re-watch the lecture to catch anything you missed. Re-watching the lectures also really helps to study for the exams. Lab: Go to discussions, talk as much as you can and ask questions. Do your best on the lab reports so you can gather up as many points as possible in case you do badly on an exam. Book: I would recommend reading the chapters he assigns, however, if he doesn't mention something in class that IS mentioned in lecture, it's probably safe to skip it. Exams: I was a little crunched for time on the midterms. Write quickly and don't spend too much time on the multiple choice. Write as clearly as possible and try and add in as many facts as possible because you gain points for mentioning specific things. Don't worry too much if the exam seemed hard because Professor Phelan is a very generous grader. On the second midterm, he made a 39% a passing grade. Anyways, I would HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend Professor Phelan as this was one of my favorite classes I've taken so far at UCLA
I had Professor Phelan for LS2 and ABOLUTELY loved the class! Lectures: Professor Phelan is absolutely hilarious during lectures and incorporates funny stories from his own life to lighten the mood. However, he does cover a LOT of material in each lecture and you have to make sure to take as many notes as possible (laptop is recommended). Write down the slightest details as sometimes he may include them in multiple choice or even short answer questions. On average though, I really looked forward to going to lecture which is saying something. Bruincast: I would really recommend using bruincast so that in class you don't have to be frantically writing down every word. If you miss something, don't worry about it, but go back and re-watch the lecture to catch anything you missed. Re-watching the lectures also really helps to study for the exams. Lab: Go to discussions, talk as much as you can and ask questions. Do your best on the lab reports so you can gather up as many points as possible in case you do badly on an exam. Book: I would recommend reading the chapters he assigns, however, if he doesn't mention something in class that IS mentioned in lecture, it's probably safe to skip it. Exams: I was a little crunched for time on the midterms. Write quickly and don't spend too much time on the multiple choice. Write as clearly as possible and try and add in as many facts as possible because you gain points for mentioning specific things. Don't worry too much if the exam seemed hard because Professor Phelan is a very generous grader. On the second midterm, he made a 39% a passing grade. Anyways, I would HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend Professor Phelan as this was one of my favorite classes I've taken so far at UCLA
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