This class was hands down my favorite class at UCLA. Smoak is an engaging lecturer and the material synthesizes different subjects (space and religion) in a way I hadn't seen before. I have never felt like I learned more than in this class. That said, if you have no interest in the material, this class might not be worth it for you. Lastly, if you notice your TA is a hard grader, switch sections. My TA would take-off points and not elaborate why, so I never got the opportunity to improve on later papers. I would suggest if you have this issue, go to Smoak's office hours because Smoak was more helpful than my TA for paper revisions.

Professor Smoak is amazing. He is kind, sweet, helpful, and humorous. I really enjoyed his class and he was so helpful in explaining the material. There were five vocab quizzes and two midterms; one in the middle of the quarter and one at the end. He also had homework assignments from a textbook. His class could get a little boring but he is amazing and makes the class enjoyable.

I would recommend taking this class. The topics discussed are very interesting if you have any remote interest in Jerusalem or its history - however, it does not dive into its modern day dilemmas. Smoak keeps lectures interesting and going to class is not miserable at all. The workload is a lot - a one page "essay" every week, 2 6-8 page essays, a midterm and a final. Its doable - you do not need to read the assigned reading to get a good grade. Grading depends a lot on your TA, I had Bryan and I liked him.

Course: Jerusalem 10W Spring 2011

I have not even finished the quarter with Professor Smoak but I have to say that he is one of the most pragmatic professors I have had. The class becomes extremely simple with his lecture style, he is very transparent of what he expects and does a great job at lecturing main points and not trivial info. I don't know why he has not gotten many more positive reviews but if you have a chance to take his GE Jerusalem 10W you should it is a very straightforward class in which you will actually learn something but not be super pressured.

Professor Smoak was a great lecturer but his slides weren't the most helpful. It is also rather hard to take notes that will be comprehensible later when studying for the midterm/final. You should also go to every lecture and pay close attention if you don't have time for all the readings assigned every week. I went into this class with little to no knowledge of Jerusalem and I was too busy to do the readings, but I found that the information he goes over in class was super helpful when writing my papers.
There are two papers for this class, one with a pretty strict topic and a second where you can work more freely. The grading for these papers depends on your TA, but in my case, they weren't too bad. The papers are graded pretty fairly, but a lot of people do end up scoring in the low B to high C range.
Overall, the class is very interesting but if you do not consider yourself to be a strong writer and you are looking to score an A, I would reconsider taking it.

I actually took AN N EA 10W with Professor Smoak.

Professor Smoak is a really good teacher. Although the course may seem like it could be boring, Smoak makes the material interesting and he's a really good lecturer. If you pay attention and take good notes during the lectures, then you really don't have to do the readings. Good notes will also really help you with the 2 essays. The midterm was straight forward and easy based off of the study guide. The 2 essays are basically graded off of the fact that you turn in a draft and your TA tells you to change what you need to change in order to get a good grade. Listen to your TA because they are the ones who are grading your work.

If you're looking for an easy GE that also fulfills your writing 2 requirement, then I highly recommend this class!

He is such a good lecturer. He is so organized and so easy to understand. He also makes it very easy to take notes. No regrets if you have a chance to take this class DO IT NOW.

Great class, but grades mainly revolve around TAs. That may be an issue to some of you. Selling all course textbooks for cheaper, email me at johnjpl110@gmail.com.

Sorry for the spam. This was for ANE 10W.

Great class, but grades mainly revolve around TAs. That may be an issue to some of you.

Selling all course textbooks for cheaper, email me at johnjpl110@gmail.com.

I adored professor smoak. the lecture material was interesting, and he worked to make it even more engaging. Easy midterm and final, and a fun (surprisingly not terrible) group project. Smoak is very approachable and amiable. I would take any class again with Smoak.