SOC 3820

I feel like how a professor has modified their course during the coronavirus crisis says a lot about them as a person and I feel like compared to all my professors, Slez was among the most lenient (being understanding about due dates, making the final optional, asynchronous lectures). Overall, I learned a lot in this class which is a blend of history and theory. You have two book reviews due throughout the semester which you are meant to read on your own time, but other than that the only readings for each week were a textbook that goes over theory. Slez did say on the first class that past students were able to learn the content without the textbook and relied on the lecture which I found to be true. In other words, I didn't open the textbook much except while studying for the midterm and final and I was able to get by perfectly fine with extensive lecture notes. Honestly, really manageable class and I really enjoyed the two books that I read which were about black protest and the LGBTQ movement or Environmental movement, depending on what book he assigned you. Only advice is to take good lecture notes and do not procrastinate on the book review. Slez is a lenient grader but still, the reviews take an extensive amount of time.

This content of this class isn't necessarily hard, but his style of teaching is very boring. He lectures for 75 minutes every class. Outside of class he also wasn't very welcoming to needing help.

Slez is an awesome man and I liked him, but this class feels more like a history class than a sociology class, which I didn't sign up for. His exams are written kind of poorly, and it's hard to study for them. If you don't mind memorizing history facts and sitting through history lectures, this is a fine class. I highly recommend the Gay Rights Movement book too, it taught me a lot.

You MUST take this class! I have learned so much. It's equal parts history and current events. The class atmosphere is very casual and the class discussions are generally good (which is partly due to my classmates, not just Slez). Im not a Sociology major, but this class has inspired me to look for internships and research opportunities dealing in the social sciences. No outside work, except for the book reviews. I tried to finish the book a week before the reports were due, just bc it's a lot of info to fit in 2 pages and Im a slow writer. I thought I did a terrible job the 1st time, but got a 100%. The tests are increeeeedibly easy. His study guides make it seem like a lot of info, but as long as you can do name recognition and know simple definitions, you're good.

Slez has made a lot of changes since the last review was made. The class is largely lecture based with 3 big class discussions on an assigned book throughout the semester. The class is incredibly easy. Even if you come in with no background in sociology the content is not at all difficult to grasp. The first 3 weeks are a bit boring because we review a lot of social movement theory but it's all necessary for the rest of the course. After that, we just study the history of apply those theories to major social movements like the Civil Rights era, LGBT movement, Womens' Right/Feminism, Right-wing movements, and global justice. That being said, if this topic isn't your thing you won't enjoy that is a promise. I'm a history major and I really enjoyed studying the history of these movements and gained a perspective on all social movements by the end of the course. This is one of the few classes at UVA where I can say I really gained a better perspective of the world.

He has you buy four books but I didn't open the main "textbook" once this semester because he just puts the book on the slides. You will write three 1-2 page, single spaced book reviews on the other books. The book reviews are not all that bad because all he has you do is recount the history of the movement and then apply the theories to the movement. You can fill up a page with just history in no time. Plus the books are pretty interesting and if you spread the readings out properly you can get away with about 8-10 page a day with more than enough time to write the review. And on the day you turn in your review you have a class discussion where he breaks you into groups and then bring the entire class together.
Overall Slez is a really great guy and 75 minutes goes by like nothing with him. Even if you are just interested in the history part of the course, I highly recommend this taking this class.

Eh, I was not a fan of this class. Slez is a nice guy, but the class was not at all what I expected. It's a lot of dense, boring case study readings and then every single class you break into the same groups and answer a discussion question on the reading. But it is pretty easy to get an A cuz there's no exams so you can just tune out during class and skim the readings to write your one paragraph journal entries(which you can BS). There is a 10 single spaced paper which is a pain to write, but you break it up throughout the semester and he grades it pretty leniently and is good practice for writing a real academic paper. I think Slez was going to try to change the class more since this was his first time teaching it, but if he doesn't do some serious restructuring then I wouldn't recommend it unless you're looking for an easy A/high B.