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 :(

First of all, aside from the terrible teaching skills and random additional 1 hour lecture on top of the regular lectures, she said NO EXTRA CREDIT. And literally the second week she gave everyone who showed up to that one lecture 3 extra points. Be aware the whole class is 140 points! Also the test is so memorization heavy. Who's gonna remember 30

unclear, learn yourself

To be blunt, she is not a good teacher. Our class average for the final was 58%, she does not curve at all and there's no extra credit. Barely any assignments so your grade relies on the exams which are really hard. She is dismissive and rude-I can't even ask her a questions without her having an attitude.

I think Professor Azarenko is overqualified for this job!! She is very educated about this subject and she does a great job of explaining the material. This class does take a lot of effort outside of class, such as reading the textbook, but her quizzes and midterms were pretty straightforward and can get a pretty decent grade from simple effort.

She doesn't care about her students and is disrespectful, she will call students out for being late to class or for having to leave early. This is college not high school.

Prof Azarenko is not accommodating or caring whatsoever. The lecture times are horrible, geolocation iClicker is mandatory, and she will call you out in front of the whole lecture if you, for whatever reason, need to leave early. Exams make up almost 80% of your final grade. Lots of dense readings that are essential to doing well on said exams.

Not sure why there are so many negative comments! She's sassy, but in a lighthearted way. It's a biology course- material is dense regardless of professor. She provides a lot of resources like practice quizzes, wkly study guides, a quizlet, review sessions I did well on midterm by reading pgs before class & using flashcards, u'll be fine.

A lot of students hated her for her blunt personality, and while she may definitely be a bit blunt it honestly didn't hinder my learning at all. Lectures are mandotory but helpful and make sure you read the textbook. You'll definitely have to put the work in but the class shouldn't be impossible, especially if you already have some background

everyone i knew in the class rly seemed to hate it but it honestly wasnt that bad, biology is just hard. i wouldnt say theres anything about this prof specifically that made the class harder than it needed to be. to be fair, i did take AP bio which is basically the exact same class, and i can imagine it would be much harder if i hadnt

DO NOT BE INTIMIDATED BY THE POOR REVIEWS. Language barrier led to misunderstandings sometimes, but they were always resolved. Overall the class is fair. Made a Quizlet for each recorded lecture to memorize all of the info & that worked well for me. Used the TB to understand information that wasn't thoroughly explained in lecture.

everyone is bashing on Azarenko because she can be a bit rude at times like blaming us for tech issues, but she is really passionate about the subject and curved even tho the avg was 80% for the class. You can do well, just read textbook, pay attention during lecture, and know iclicker questions well

She's a great professor if you can get past her blunt personality. Her lectures are straightforward, and she explains topics well. Exams are based solely on lectures, and she offers extra credit for attending lectures. The course was also curved even though the average was 80. She makes a tough course manageable if you study the lecture material.

Unprofessional with blaming students for technological issues they are not responsible for with iClicker, and purposely made the second midterm more difficult after seeing students did "too well" on the first one. proceeded to put a couple questions on the second exam we had never encountered before. she is clearly passionate but wouldnt recommend

This is by far the worst professor I've had at UCSB. The material is taught entirely out of order, she makes everything extremely difficult to understand, and she overall doesn't care for students in general. She is also extremely inaccessible no matter how many times you try to email her. Dont take her do everything you can to avoid her class