2.9
Quality3.4
Difficulty43%
Would Retake86
Reviews43%
Would Retake
86
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
5
15
4
20
3
18
2
18
1
15
What Students Say
“She is a nice lady but her tests are so confusing”
PSYCH102 - 1.0 rating“Worst psych class I've had”
PSYC102 - 1.0 ratingClass Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
69%
Textbook Required
50%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A-
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Stable
-0.02 avg changeRatings by Course
PSY10INDEPEN
5.0
(1)PSYCH194
5.0
(1)INTRDEVPSY
4.0
(1)DEVAGING
4.0
(1)ADOPSYCH
4.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
PSYC10ETC
4.0
DEVAGING
4.0
AGINGDEVELOP
4.0
PSYC100V
4.0
PSYCH110
4.0
Reviews (86)
she has a very high pitched voice, and you can tell when she wants you to know something because she would tilt her head back and raise her voice even higher. it was very hard to go to class because i couldnt stand to look at her. not a good lecturer/test
Great teacher. can be really funny
shes not real easy, but she teaches pretty well and i learned a lot from her class.
Great speaker. Very clear. Always answers questions during class just don't approach her for personal questions; she won't give feedback and her demeanor changes to evil.
I loved this class. I thought she was a great teacher and i really enjoyed going to class.
I thought she was great. She took a little getting used to, like at first I didn't understand why she always closed her eyes and whispered, but then I just thought it was funny whenever she did it. The tests were reasonable because you had to study, but there weren't any surprises.
She was my teacher for Introduction to Developmental Psychology. Her lectures are really interesting and she can be very helpful, but her exams are written somewhat poorly and you have to be fairly prepared for them. Don't take this class just for leisure.
her lecturing style takes some getting used to. i think its because she is kind of shy so she doesnt look at the class so much as she looks at her shoes. tests were kind of tricky sometimes. be prepared to work a bit and try to ignore the annoying lecturing style.
Great class
She presents study after study (she's research-oriented), which is informative but very, very boring. The class discussion is lame and narrow-minded, and EVERYTHING is "an excellent question!" or "ah, an excellent point." Like someone else said, VERY unfriendly when you actually approach her.
Most obnoxious teacher I've had at UCSC. Very irritating to observe on several levels. Do not recommend.
I found Margarita difficult to understand sometimes, and often repetitive. It seemed as though her goal for the class was to have as few people do well as she possibly could. I think she made the material and tests way more difficult than they should be, i still got a B+ but i worked really hard.
I really enjoyed her lectures. I thought they were really interesting and i looked forward to attending them. When i went to her office hours though she wasn't very helpful and even came off as a little cold, like she didn't want me to be there.
No Comments
yea, i basically thought nothing of her course. it helps define psychology as the intellectually devoid, closed-minded "science" it has the POTENTIAL to be. "cross-cultural" a facade. obnoxious lecturer. feels like high school.
No Comments
Elusively difficult tests. Smart and always welcoming of questions in class. Very cold demeanor towards after class questions. Always vague about grading for tests and papers. Always seemed to be less open to guys.
Margarita was great!
It wasn't that the class was extremely hard, it was that the tests were impossible to decipher. Every time I took a test I felt like I had not been instructed on the proper way to prepare. Her study guides were no help because they simply covered everyth
great teacher, she knows what she is talking about.
I took a bunch of classes with her and was an RA with her.... she's amazing. Really knows her stuff....
I felt like her lectures were a little redundant, especially when I kept on the reading. She knows what she's talking about and does her best to explain it, but has to stop and refocus herself a lot.
not a fan. not a fan at all. totally boring, totally ****y. do not be late, do not think about exercising your independence, be prepared to return to high school. she likes to monitor pretty much everything you do.
This was the worst class and professor I have ever encountered in all my education and I say this objectively. Margarita will spend twenty minutes on a tangent that has nothing to do with the tests, people audit the class and play footsie with their girlfriend/boyfriend, and others simply show up just to get the study guide then divide the chapters
She is a great asset to UCSC! She is very helpful and cares for her students. She is very straightforward on what expected in her class and what needs to be done in order to gain a good grade. Is an expert in her area and is good communicating theories clearly. Overall Professor Azmitia is a great professor!
This is the second time I've had a class with Azmita, and it will be my last. I guess I had forgotten how terrible it was the first time. She's arrogant, goes off topic, and isn't a good teacher. Keep track of your grade, because at least in my case she gave me the wrong grade. I had to send her about 20 emails before she changed it.
She's extremely patient with questions, which can be bad since she'll run out of time for what she wanted to teach... But she'll definitely answer your questions without making you feel stupid. She's a bit hard to reason with for projects though; if you for some reason can't do something, she'll pretty much tell you too bad.
Horrible class. Lectures were pointless to go to except for the rare two notes that would be on the test each 2 hour lecture. Ex:"Depression is when people are sad," and then talked about it in these terms for 45 minutes. Does she think were idiots or does she just not know her material? Although she is nice, I wouldn't take. Group project sucked
This class bored me, unfortunately. Going to class was a bit painful but some material for tests came out of it so I went anyway. Hard midterms, but study enough and you can get an A.
I took the class only to fulfill a requirement but Margarita was great--interesting lectures, very helpful, fair tests if you study and go to class. Glad she stopped using powerpoint.
This is my second class with Margarita. Her lectures were clear and organized and she encouraged questions. I did poorly in the first exam and she really helped me study for the final and I did much better. She also took time to read a draft of my paper and gave me helpful advice
Despite tons of notes, major studying, & high grades on other work, got C+ since exams want details you barely heard her gloss over before she spent 30 min describing how sadness = depression (felt like high school again). The real challenge is finding those minute details when the tangents are driving you nuts. Note the studies--will be on tests.
I was really frustrated with her teaching style. In lecture the important facts were usually glossed over in favor of long unrelated tangents. Her tests are really hard and call for remembering very minute details. After 2, 10+ hours of studying per exam in a group of 6 (all of whom attended class and read) the highest score was still a C-.
Where to begin... oh yes... DO NOT TAKE DEV'T PSYCH WITH HER! WORST PROFESSOR EVER! Margarita is a very nice woman, but her lectures are awful. She scrawls words on the board and then talks about her kids. There is no structure whatsoever. Sections were horrendous. TAs had no idea what was going on. TAKE PYSCH 10 WITH SOMEONE ELSE!!! PLEASE.
WORST PROFESSOR EVER!!!!!!!!!!!! lectures are extremely disorganized and often about her personal life. when she does talk about the material she is impossible to understand. she switches concepts so frequently that you have no idea what she is talking about. tests are difficult because questions are ambiguous. the class is extremely frustrating.
Nice lady but terrible lecturer. Her lectures are VERY unorganized like everyone one else had said. Important detailed are not stressed enough and much of the class time was wasted on personal stories thats completely irrelevant. Her tests are really detailed which would be fine if she put that much emphasis on the materials in class she doesn't
I should have listened to ratemyprof before signing up for her class-like everyone said, nice lady, but that doesn't make her a good lecturer. I am LITERALLY a straight-a student, but I am probably getting a low B or high C after putting a lot of work into this class.
Azmitia was a horrible professor! She was rude during office hours, Her exams were awful since she would try to trick you by actually putting two right answers and you would have to choose one of them knowing that both are right.. and you would still get it wrong. No review sections were given for exams!! Don't take it with her!!!!
an overall nice person with a real interest in developmental psychology. She had knowledge of specific important studies in the field,but her lecturing skills were atrocious. Very unorganized, unrelated examples and stories... be prepared to TEACH YOURSELF. Tests are very easy if you read the chapter CLOSELY.
She has a bad rap, but I think she is a good teacher. I enjoyed her class a lot and I learned a lot. If you go to her office hours she will help you. She really does care about you and wants you to pass the class. Study by reading the book and talking to her and you'll be fine.
Not a very good lecturer. Uses old school projector slides as notes. For the majority of the time she is scribbling her chicken scratch on the board and that was suppose to suffice as the notes for the day.... Didn't learn anything from her and had to heavily rely on the textbook to learn the material. Very unorganized.
She uses a lot studies in her lecture. She teaches this class as if it a research class. Her exams are hard... she always has similar chooses to pick from. She makes section mandatory. Stay away from her if possible.
You will want to go to class for the slides, bc she doesn't post them anywhere, but for me it was hard to go to class because her lecturing style is so jumbled and inefficient. She is knowledgeable but she tended to go off into her stories without addressing more of the actual material. Not a hard class but the book teaches you more than she does
Margarita is one of the most disorganized teachers I have ever had. She had good intentions with her lectures, but she would so often get off topic. I went to talk with her during office hours about my exams, and she was very impatient and didnt listen to what I had to say. I do not recommend taking a class with her.
she goes off topic a lot. didnt really learn much.
I took her adolescent development class. I found that she was disorganized as far as going off topic during lectures. She did not seem excited to be teaching the course at all.
She does seem to go off topic in lectures but you must go to lectures to get the information and sometimes they're enjoyable. The tests are very reasonable and she is willing to hear you out about points you missed on tests. It's a fair class she definitely knows what she's talking about. Textbook is highly required and very helpful!
I came on here before taking this class and read a lot of bad reviews, but I really love Margarita. Her tests are a little hard because they're conceptual and there's a lot of reading (you HAVE to do the reading to get a decent grade), but she's an overall wonderful teacher and is always willing to listen to you and help out.
Very good at trying to help you. Handwriting is awful and difficult to read, might as well just go to her office hours. Does tend to tangent from subject to subject. Never read any of the books she assigned, however I did read the online articles.
She's a pretty nice prof, but her lectures were useless and the multiple choice tests were tricky. Section was mandatory even though it didn't help me at all.
Her lectures were useless. Terrible lecturer. Had to teach myself everything from the book. Unwilling to listen to students if TA's have screwed something up. TA lost emails of mine and therefore received assignments late as well as never gave feedback for final paper. Took TA's side without consulting thread of emails as evidence.
lecture, lecture, lecture, midterm, lecture, lecture, lecture, midterm, lecture, paper, lecture, lecture, final. That's all.
Not easy to say the least. Very dry lectures, not really motivating to learn, and tests are hard.
The subject matter was interesting but she was very confusing on what she wanted out of us. For the entire quarter no one really knew what their grade was. She means well but not my favorite.
I took PSYC 10, PSYC 102, and PSYC 103. She is a really nice professor and is really passionate about what she teaches. She incorporates youtube clips and includes stories that bring the ideas and theories we discuss to real life. Her tests are hard, but only if you don't do the readings. It's definitely possible to get a B, with average effort.
okay a few things. She's really clear in lecture. Her slides are based off the book. Only problem is that her tests are also not completely representative of the book. She doesn't post slides and she only held one office hour a week. She literally reads off the slides but the slides are so long it's hard to listen while writing down EVERYTHING.
Azmitia's lectures can be sloppy. She doesn't post the lecture slides online so going to lecture and taking notes is essential, but she loses track of time and ends up speeding through the lectures thus affecting us students terribly since the information on lecture slides are on the exams. On the bright side she is clear and grading is alright.
Margarita's lectures can get side tracked, no doubt, but she's an extremely kind person, happy to help, and will explain if you /ask/! She doesn't post grades: You have to email if you want a grade check. Also, if she asks for 2 examples on a test, and you give 5, but the extra ones are wrong, she /will/ mark you down - save yourself and do 2.
I got an internship at a senior nursing house, and Margarita is the only professor at UCSC teaches psychology of ageing so i had her as director. However! Margarita had not done any research in geriatric psychology nor was educated in that discipline. She does not care about your internship, bad at emailing. Very cold attitude. Bad Choice! Avoid!
Margarita was an amazing professor. I really appreciated her desire to see all her students succeed. She has a great life story and really wants to connect with students and is receptive to feedback. She clearly loves dev. psych and her children. I'm not that interested in dev psych but she made the class fun and engaging.
Great professor! She lectures kind of fast and doesn't post slides online so going to class is a must. Exams are okay, though multiple choice can be a little tricky and some are based on the textbook that's not covered in class. Other than that, she's a sweet lady and always willing to help if something isn't clear. Interesting topic as well!
She was so disorganized, I hated it. She posted 3 or 4 syllabus with different information and due dates online, she kind of went off topic a lot in lectures, and she doesn't post her slides. Her tests were based on stuff she's saying in lecture, but she doesnt put it in the slide. multiple test questions were also really redundant and too specific
Avoid taking a class with Margarita if you can. She goes on tangents about her kids and other redundant, unrelated topics. Her lectures lacked inspiration and tended to be dumbed down; didnt provide much info Id never heard before. Monitored every single step of our group projects, which made a lot of unnecessray busy work. Hated this class.
Her lectures were lackluster and I noticed she tends to waste a lot of lecture time by focusing too much on basic concepts. Though I initially enrolled because I was interested in the topic of the course, this class wasn't enriching at all. I would NOT recommend taking classes with this professor.
The worst psych professor I've had. Get ready for 40 question tests with trick questions, half of which involves knowing material never mentioned in lecture. It is obvious she is a sweet lady who loves research... her class is just so disorganized. I learned 100% of the course on my own, her lectures are literally meaningless.
She is a nice lady but her tests are so confusing. Don't expect high grades in this class.
Dr. Azmitia is the best! Shes so passionate and knowledgeable about teen and adult development. She brings in critical perspectives about race and gender that we dont often get in other psychology classes. Shes a memorable professor! I would take her class again and again.
Adult development and aging was HELLA INSIGHTFUL! I really enjoyed learning from professor Azmitia!
I put hilarious bc its a joke. Poses questions on tests that cant be found in her lecture slide, articles, or textbook. You should read the textbook but the questions are going to be horrendously vague and the 'correct' answer won't be supported. She also doesn't to help students with slides or accessibility such as cc. Worst psych class I've had.
Seems like a nice person but does not know how to do class online. Constantly had issues with zoom and canvas simply because she did not know how to work them. Tests had questions that were not on the study guide, in the book, or in the lecture so it was impossible to answer. Or had weirdly worded questions. Went too fast in lecture. Just very hard
Her lectures are a bit all over the place and confusing, but she actually really does care and knows a lot. I did not learn a ton from lecture but instead from readings, office hours and the assignments. Adult dev was interesting ONLY if you put in the work -- do the readings and work hard on the final paper and you'll enjoy!
The class is pretty average overall. A few quizzes, midterm, paper, final. The only thing I did not like is that the tests were kind of difficult.
I took PSYC 119M (Identity Development in Social and Cultural Contexts) which is a Senior Seminar class during the summer with her. She's a tough lil lady. Very cute but no bs. You have to talk a lot about woke topics, so don't say anything controversial. Also if you have anxiety this class might be a challenge but she's p nice about that.
Course material itself wasn't difficult, but Ms. Azmitia made lectures very difficult to understand. Slides were chaotic and often did not cover everything we needed to know. She relied heavily on students reading the book along with remembering minute details presented in lectures, leading to exams having questions with material never discussed.
Exam questions were often tough to understand, and lectures were disorganized. She strayed too far from the slides and told personal stories more than she taught content. She changed the criteria for our class project less than two weeks before it was due. She is unwilling to listen to student or TA feedback. I would not recommend her courses.
Pretty good class, a tad bit unstructured, but pretty good overall. Weekly quizzes, midterm exam, final exam. I took the class in summer, so things went by pretty fast so I had to stay on top of things. Teacher is definitely passionate and knowledgeable about the subject and I came out of the class with a solid understanding of the content.
Dr Azmitia is a great lecturer, she's super knowledgeable and explains concepts incredibly. However, the workload for this class was barely manageable. There were three large exams, quizzes, discussion posts, and a large research paper. Balancing this with two other upper divs was extremely difficult. Great professor, but beware of the workload.
Professor Azmitia is a super sweet woman and I am surprised she has so many negative reviews. I thought her class was pretty good but there are many tests. Also you have read the textbook throughout the semester.
Professor Azmitia is an AMAZING lecturer, but her tests are really difficult. The questions are hard and weird and everything is up for grabs for each test. There is a lot of reading but the context is very interesting and she is very knowledgable. I would take her but beware.
The structure of her class is so confusing and the weighting of exams and assignments doesn't make any sense. Despite so many people in the course expressing their frustrations she refused to adjust. I will never take a course with her again, she did not support my learning at all.
Never taking a class with this professor again if I can help it.
Everything about this class felt disorganized to me. The assigned papers lacked clarity about expectations, and were graded harshly. Midterm&Final had questions about something mentioned genuinely in one sentence in the reading. Avoid if you can help it, if you can't it's not the worst, just be ready to be frustrated.
She's sweet but personally might need to retire. Online classes, half of the class time she couldn't figure out audio or just was very slow with everything. She let us off early at 4PM tho. Assignments are super easy, paper grading criteria isn't very clear, but she tries her best. Boring, but she has a very sweet mother/grandmother vibe.
The amount of exams she gave was honestly inhumane. The class content and textbooks were relatively easy to understand but the tests would have one random niche question from maybe a page in the textbook. Also every single outline she gave was unclear, and there was not much grace she gave students. Honestly protect your gpa its not worth it.
Took Professor Azmitia this summer for PSYC 102 and PSYC 103. She is a great lecturer from start to finish. She made everything regarding adolescent development very interesting by discussing about various cultures and the fundamental theories. My only concern is that her tests can be tricky at times especially the multiple choice.
119i-got a (93%) yet got a B+, a grade not even in the syllabus, surprisingly enough. Only after filing grades did she say Canvas wasn't weighted (she hadn't set it up properly). Expect confusing rubrics with no corresponding points; expect harsh deductions for things not listed on the rubric.Grades unclearly & inconsistently. RUN,Protect your GPA.
Class Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
69%
Textbook Required
50%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A-
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Stable
-0.02 avg changeRatings by Course
PSY10INDEPEN
5.0
(1)PSYCH194
5.0
(1)INTRDEVPSY
4.0
(1)DEVAGING
4.0
(1)ADOPSYCH
4.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
PSYC10ETC
4.0
DEVAGING
4.0
AGINGDEVELOP
4.0
PSYC100V
4.0
PSYCH110
4.0