This class was very enlightening for me, it covered issues of inequities in STEM and the basics of research. The class itself was pretty dense workload-wise. There was a quiz every lecture, but the professor said she might change it to once a week in the future, and there were assignments called problem sets. In terms of quizzes, they are multiple choice and sometimes are worded pretty vaguely and it can be difficult to know what Dr. Turlo is asking, but for the questions that affect the majority of the class, she usually takes them off/gives everyone the points for it. In terms of the problem sets, they are written assignments. Depending on the TA, the problem sets may be graded very rigorously. The problem sets themselves took the place of midterms and the Final was pretty similarly structured to those problem sets. I would recommend taking advantage of the office hours, Dr. Turlo and the TAs will clarify what they are looking for in the problem sets if you ask. I would also recommend having a basic understanding of biology, as learning key biological concepts all at once can be a bit jarring, but the TAs try to fill the students in on the bio context during discussion. I would not consider this class to be an easy A, but if you're interested in the topics I would highly recommend, this class was very enlightening regarding research and diversity in STEM.

Dr. Turlo is very passionate and the material itself is interesting though lectures sometimes get tedious. Nice easy life science GE.

As a north campus major, I was scared before taking this class because I was not confident in science whatsoever. However, I absolutely loved this class! Dr. Turlo has a clear passion for what she does and was a super accommodating and lovely instructor. Lecture attendance is required since you fill out and turn in worksheets after every class. As another review mentioned, you can skip up to 2 lectures since there are 2 extra credit points. Worksheets were easy to fill out as she essentially guided you through them on the whiteboard. There are two problem sets, a midterm, and a final paper, which all should be relatively simple if you spread the work out AND follow the rubric checklist very closely. Don't be intimidated by the name of this class. I highly recommend taking this class as a Life Science GE and if you're interested in biomedical research in general.