Not sure why there are so many bad reviews... she is truly a great professor. Super passionate about bio and it shows through her lectures. Even at 8am shes enthusiastic and professional. Attending lectures is extra credit, 2 midterms, 1 final, weekly quizzes that are easy and very similar to contents on exams. Definitely would take again!
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.
A bit of a language barrier, but Olga is super cool. She said there would be no curve on the first day of lecture, but proceeded to implement a curve after everyone failed the final. Do extra credit, and try to do well on the weekly quizzes (quizzes are free). Material heavy, but she did well teaching. Just don't go into this class thinking its ez.
I don't know what all these bad reviews are about. Even though class content is challenging, she made the grading criteria super clear and had detailed PowerPoint and abundant study resources, even weekly compiled notes. She set up Zoom calls outside of office hours to help students with their questions. She is so patient and caring, LOVE her.
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.
She's decent. I took her as a summer class, and she was kind and respectful towards other students. All of her quiz answers can be found on quizlet or online. She has extra credit. Do that, get good grades on the homework assignments, and you'll be fine.
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
Very unclear and didn't make expectations for participation points known. Also changed the grading criteria without telling the class. She disregarded evidence that students watched lecture videos and sent a several unkind/unprofessional emails when questioned. Read the book on your own to pass. Only positive is that she offered extra credit.