Don't do pharm emphasis. I tried really hard just to survive. You have to compete with those genius pre- med students. If i can get back to my first year, i will definitely change my major. Hard work never pays off. Im so glad that I finished everything

This course is extremely hard for me. Tons of materials to memorize for final. It's like a combination of 111physio + 126A.

Listen, she's tough. I can tell she genuinely cares about what she teaches if you ask her questions, but you definitely put the work in for a 5-unit course. The case study groups were already assigned, so idk why she sticks with it. Start that list of drugs to memorize :^)

Her review sheet is completely misleading. Do NOT rely on it. The final focused on obscure drug names and minutiae instead of core concepts. There was an entire section on a drug mentioned ONCE on a slide. It feels like she tries to trick students. Hard work doesn't pay off because the testing is random and unfair. Avoid if possible.

Class was largely determined by two midterms (4/10 difficulty, 85 average) and a final (6/10 difficulty, 80 average). Your grade will be your ability to memorize/apply; memorize everything starting from day 1 including idiosyncratic one-line details on slides, USE ANKI!! The group project was unclear and based on others' efforts.

Notice how all her good reviews are from MCDB 6? That says everything about how bad 126 actually is. This class is a total mess. Don't let those intro-class ratings trick you. Stay away from this course and the Pharmacology major entirely. It's just not worth it. Save yourself!

I get it's a hard class, but the patient case study is a mess. 20 pts depend on peer reviews with zero transparency on the grading mechanism. What if our peers are malicious? This was added last minute, probably to curve since Case 1 was bad, but it's totally unfair. Grades should reflect work, not others' random opinions. Unfair.

Hardest class ever. Mentally destructive for my anxiety. Memorizing 200+ drugs/MOAs/side effects is insane. MCDB 111 is hard but at least it's not all memorizing! Studied 2 weeks + all-nighter and still tanked the final. If you aren't pre-med, I'd skip this class and major. Doubt the prof knows it all by heart. Total academic torture.

Do NOT take as an upper div bio elective. Impossibly hard to memorize all MOAs, side effects, and drugs. Grades hard, lectures heavy, tests even harder. Final was unnecessarily difficult and required in-depth knowledge of every single drug/process learned this quarter. Unless its required for your major, do not take this course for an elective

This course ruined me. The final was EXTREMELY hard with a lot of drug names to remember. I don't know how the other genius could have memorized these things. Probably I'm just a du//mb guy.

a huge amount of drugs(MOAs, side effects) to memorize with no cheat sheet allowed. That's definitely impossible for a short quarter!! Hope me and you guys all can pass

she never replied my email. NEVER!!!

Horrible experience. She is rude and creates a hostile learning environment. She is very condescending; she made inappropriate jokes about me personally when I simply forgot my ID for an exam. Her lectures are confusing and she offers zero support. You are basically on your own teaching yourself while dealing with her disrespect. JUST AVOID HER！！！！

Dr. Azarenko is a really bad lecturer. Her lecture is poorly organized so self study matters. She asked us to memorize a lot of things but she just randomly picked some very specific terms in the exams, which means that your exam scores depend on luck ( I did bad at the 1st one but got a super high score for the 2nd one). Avoid.

3/10 difficulty midterm (average was 85+), 4/10 final combined with 20 points of extra credit for just showing up to class (class was out of 300 total). Not a super clear lecturer but material is straightforward and unconfusing so it didn't matter. Almost all exam questions were dumbed down compared to lecture/textbook so youll be overpreppared.

Great engaging lecturer who taught and explained topics very well. Her 126A/B exams could be challenging but being an upper div course, they were doable if you took the time ahead to study. Going to office hours was helpful to get to know her and materials needed to succeed in the class. Definitely recommend studying at least a week before exams!

Professor Azarenko was a solid lecturer and explained the course material really well. Lectures were recorded and attendance was optional but would be counted as extra credit. A majority of the course was memorizing drugs and their mechanisms, which was challenging, but doable if you spent a little time studying each week and went to class.

Olga is a great professor and is super engaging even at 8am. I enjoyed the class content and found to be interesting to learn, but being an upper div major class it is obviously not the easiest. It is memorization heavy but not challenging to understand overall. Stay on track with the material every week and attend lectures, you will be fine

A great professor with great lectures, but the amount of stuff you have to know is insane. You will enjoy lectures but you will hate finals week. Your mental well-being will depend on how nice the professor is feeling the day of making the exam, but besides that the class is exciting, and the topics are interesting.

She has gotten a lot of bad reviews, but since I have had her in person vs online, she seems great with her lectures and she does know a lot about the subject material. She may have changed drastically but so far she seems very nice. I also do not have trouble following her lectures, but her accent can make it tricky at times.

If you're a Pharm major, my condolences. The hardest class I've ever taken and the worst professor I've ever had. You need to know physio before taking the class or else you won't be able to tell when she misspeaks. She's also impossible to understand, highly disorganized, and expects you to memorize the cause, diseases, side effects of 100+ drugs.

In response to questions in the Q&A forum there were instances in which she just copy and pasted background information from the internet that vaguely related to the question without any citation. She frequently misspeaks when describing important concepts but never corrects herself, causing frequent confusion. Get ready to teach yourself.

Avoid at all costs. So much ego, so little knowledge. It felt like she made her slides directly from wikipedia/webmd, with no professional background knowledge and no course organization. She was just as lost as all of her students. I'm surprised UCSB thought she was qualified to teach. If she doesn't curve heavily, most of the class will fail.

One of the most frustrating and unfair upper div bio classes Ive ever taken. She was just not a good teacher, and her tests asked about the most random details of the class instead of big picture stuff like popular drugs and mechanisms. I feel like I actually learned a lot (by teaching myself ofc) but my final grade wont reflect that at all :(