Second time taking her. She knows what she's talking about and has a clear rubric. Makes it easy to get an A.Section is a big chunk of your grade, and 5 commentaries that are graded for completion help balance out your grade against the paper and midterm/final...I don't understand why the ratings are so low! She always comes to class with a smile

Prof Freeman gets a bad rap for being a bit disorganized at times, but she is super passionate about her work in Japanese politics and the topic at hand. I highly recommend taking this class here. I heard her lower division classes weren't so great, but I loved her Japanese politics class. It wasn't hard or that time consuming.

She is not mean or anything like that. She's just not very good at teaching. Her lectures are unorganized and all over the place. She had us turn in two "mandatory-not graded" commentary which expressed how we felt about the class. She sort of copies concepts from the documentaries she shows. Attendance to section are mandatory but not to class.

Professor's very knowledgeable and knows what she's talking about. The lecture slides are hard to follow, so I mostly listened to her talking (which was helpful). She's super fair in her grading. I remembered the average for the paper was 27 out of 30 points. She let me turned in an assignment late and didn't mark off points. Class was interesting

She is well informed on the material but the lectures are hard to follow. She gets easily distracted and off topic. It is also unclear what is expected to be studied.

Kind but super disorganized which obviously impacts the organization and structure of the course.

Professor Freeman is a sweet, knowledgeable, and passionate teacher who loves her subject and does her best to teach her class. She is not tech savvy and often has trouble when it comes to canvas and lectures. The homework is light & the worst part of the class is the readings and the exams/essays. But I would take her class again in a heart beat!

She's very kind but sometimes disorganized. Overall the class content is easy to follow if you pay attention and are willing to engage.

Lectures were very bland but had a lot of information packed in them. She made the final take home and said it was possible to complete in 3 hours--writing 1250 words for one big essay and then 1200 for 3 small essays is not it.

Freeman is a nice lady. Attendance was not mandatory. Because of this, most people didn't show up to lecture. Her lectures were very dry and weren't engaging. She told the TA to grade harshly on the final due to lack of attendance when it wasn't even required. TA Sterling was a chill guy but a very harsh grader. Review the syllabus frequently.

Im not gonna lie this is one of the worst professors, I've ever come across throughout my time in UCSB, and Ive seen some pretty bad ones. (e.g. Nall, Moosebreiger, and Felicity Stone-Richards. Don't take this class, and also don't take any class with Laffy Taffy.

Professor Freeman has very disorganized lectures, and we were oftentimes behind in content by several days. She seems like a lovely woman but I could not get with her teaching style. Also puts zero effort into pronouncing ethnic names. You could honestly pass the class just by reading the textbook -- which you have to pay for.

I am shocked at the bad reviews for Prof Freeman - her class was by far easier than other poly sci courses and was packed with relevant information. 10+ readings a week but you do not need to do them. Take home midterm/final was essay format with 2-4 days to complete. She's nice but lectures are copied Wikipedia and grading criteria super unclear.

Prof Freeman is such a sweet lady who cares about her students. She does put a lot of info on her slides, but she posts the slides on gs so you can copy/paste them into your notes. I never did the reading! Midterm & Final were take home short identifications and a small essay. A pretty easy class TBH. As long as you have notes you'll be fine.

Professor Freeman was my first Poli Sci professor and she was great. Very caring and did her very best to accommodate for COVID-19 remote instruction. Lectures were a bit long and tedious but interesting nonetheless. She did a good job of keeping the information fun, current, and captivating. Lots of essays (mini and long). Take POL S 6!

She posts lectures anywhere from 3-6 days late. She has not posted a single one on time. Her lectures are regularly an hour (or more!) over the allotted class time. How is this legal

I took this class during the covid-19 pandemic so it was online. her lectures were basically going over what the book said. They were boring and tough to get through. She often is disorganized and lectures weren't going up until the end of the week. I would go back to my cheating ex before taking a class with her again.

Freeman is a fair and nice professor. Many people say she is overwhelmingly disorganized, but if you pay attention in lecture and keep up with the reading, you will have no problem. I would recommend taking her! She is incredibly passionate about teaching.

This class was a nightmare. She is incredibly unorganized, and while you may think her lack of presence results in less work for you, it doesn't. She can't stick to her lesson plan, which put my class 4 weeks behind schedule at the end of the quarter. If you must take this class with her, don't bother with the lectures. She just rewrites the book.

Professor Freeman is very educated in her field of work. Her lectures can get a bit dry but it's worth going to if you don't want to read the textbook. Her midterm and finals are directly from the textbooks. 1/4 of the class showed up to lecture once and she gave us extra credit points on the final. GO TO LECTURES.

Though it is true she tends to go on tangents, and its true we ended up being behind on the lectures, she is incredibly sweet and smart which to me more than made up for the fact that she is disorganized. She is clearly passionate about the subject and cares about her students, not sure why everyone is so hard on her! she's a sweetheart.

Sweet lady but terrible professor. Wastes a lot of time talking about worthless details and has to rush to get to the important stuff. Her notes are taken verbatim from the textbook so you don't really have to read. Even though the books are long, they are quite interesting.

Professor Freeman is a really nice person, if you go to office hours and talk to her it is clear she cares about her students. However, she isn't the best professor. She is very disorganized and seemed lost at times. Her lectures can also be very dry and repeats everything from the book but lectures are mandatory due to her use of iclicker.

Terrible class. Lectures were slow and boring, but mandatory because of the iclicker. She pulled lecture slides right out of the book. Lots of reading, especially in the second half of the course. This class and how Freeman taught it made me not want to be a political science major. Wait for another professor if you can!!