Reviews of professor Alicia Ellis

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Hello all, I took professor Ellis's class last semester for POS 364 - National Security, Intelligence, and Terrorism. The class was advanced, it contained a lot of reading which you need to pay attention to the books handed and read them well. The quizzes are based on the notes so be persistent, write everything. And she is extremely helpful.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Very interesting, and has an incredible perspective you're not going to find elsewhere. Texts are not typical (one is a memoir). Lectures should be broken up, slides should definitely be broken up. Did some Ask Me Anything sessions to help students, but with such heavy material and so many exams, was the final necessary?

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 2.0/5
Very reasonable amount of reading, mostly comes from Mead book. Assignments are short & very manageable (chapter, quiz, DB post). Only 2 short writing assignments (1 policy memo, 1 compare/contrast chart+essay). No real final, just another quiz on the readings. Very easy grader on written work. MC quizzes were the hardest part, some tricky q's.

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Great professor and her lectures are very interesting, though really really long. The material is almost all reading from books and the lectures. Lecture videos are long (sometimes over an hour per section) but if you watch at 1.5x speed its ok. One thing: she uses transphobic language in her lecture videos, which is offensive and distracting

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
If you are in a Masters program you should be ready for the reading.  Professor E is a great communicator.  Most module work is deliberately setup to be due on Sundays at midnight AZ time so it is as family/work friendly as it can be.  There are a LOT of readings materials but it is all relevant, current and presents multiple angles on topics.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
If your taking masters while having a full time job and family, find another professor. She gives too much materials to absorb that after trying to learning them all, I remember nothing after the class. I passed but I lost the desire to learn more. Killed my motivation.