[BIOL 0145]
Cell Biology and Genetics

Rate This Class

Professor: DeSimone S

Value of Course / Overall Score

Not Much (13.3%
Average (40%)
Valuable (46.7%)

Material

Friendly (26.7%)
Average (40%)
Competitive (33.3%)

Class Atmosphere

Boring (46.7%)
Average (46.7%)
Fascinating (6.7%)

Prep Time Needed

1-2hr (6.7%)
3-5hr (40%)
6-8hr (33.3%)
9-11hr (20%)
12+ hr (0%)

Grade Weighting

Harder (93.3%)
Average (0%)
Easier (6.7%)

Adequate Assistance

Yes (80%)
No (20%)

Would Recommend Class

Yes (46.7%)
No (53.3%)

Evaluation Comments for DeSimone S

  1. DeSimonne is absolutely awful. She did not grade the majority of our assignments until the very end of the semester, which probably results in students repeating similar errors on all of their assignments. Finals week is over and I still have not received any grades for the last three assignments, one of which was completed in early April. DeSimonne is the most meticulous and anal grader I have ever encountered. Students are NOT graded on the quality of their scientific insight or analysis; almost all of the points are formatting based. Take this course if you want to learn the nuances of some arbitrary formatting style -- oh wait, you won't because there isn't any feedback. Just cryptic, very low grades. STAY AWAY if you are interested in maintaining a reasonable GPA. Biology and NSCI majors must take this course, unfortunately.
  2. Don't take this class. DeSimone meticulously grades every assignment according to a rubric that she refuses to reveal and nobody understands. Getting to design (sort of) your own experiments is just not going to be worth hours blindly fumbling with excell assignments that don't make any sense.
  3. DeSimone definitely knows what she's talking about but expects a lot from her students. Be prepared to use the TAs extensively if you have never taken a formal lab class before.
  4. No Comment
  5. No Comment
  6. No Comment
  7. DeSimone is nice if you come to her for help but be warned that she is an incredibly harsh grader. One of the things that makes this lab hard is that the standards of evaluation for lab reports is given to you when you are getting your lab reports handed back, not before you are supposed to do your assignment. This makes fulfilling the standards nearly impossible. I'm not going to lie, this lab practically feels like an additional class at times.
  8. Desimone is the type of professor that will make you feel stupid fro asking a question. Also, we only received half of our lab report grades throughout the semester because she took too long to grade the rest.
  9. grades very very harshly
  10. This class is great while in the lab. Professor DeSimone is really good at clarifying things while in lab, and usually provides information to make the experiments you do more engaging. However, out-of-class assignments are tedious to say the least. The combination of post-lab writeups and mandatory prelabs before every class can definitely pile up if you don't stay on top of it. For a subset of BIOL 0145, this sometimes feels more like a separate class, especially since there's usually more work for the lab than there is for the lecture portion of the class.
  11. DeSimone is a very hard grader, does not make her standards clear, and is very slow to return work making it difficult to modify your studying techniques. She is friendly in class but introduces material in a way that only serves to over complicate the concepts.
  12. I personally really liked Prof Desimone and would recommend taking 145 lab with her. She was always available to answer questions when I needed help with assignments and was always friendly. She clearly loves what she does and it makes lab a pleasant place to be. I didn't think labs were graded nearly as harshly as most people said and was happy with pretty much all of my grades. I had already taken Bio140 so had some background writing labs but still wouldn't consider that extensive practice. Labs write ups really ranged with respect to how many hours you had to put in. I had some that took me like 5 hours and one that I swear I worked out for at least 24 hours (I really mean 24 hours of work, not just a day). I really think this class was valuable with Prof Desimone, and it dramatically improved my science writing.
  13. Professor DeSimone is amazing. She is enthusiastic about the lab material and is willing and able to explain everything at a 100 level. There are weekly quizzes and assignments due weekly as well. The lab reports though are very manageable and are broken up into smaller sections- only one full lab report all semester. She is a fair but challenging grader, she doesn't let anything slide! However, she definitely provides a good basic knowledge of labs and procedure so that any student coming out of her class could successfully continue in an upper level lab.
  14. DeSimone was a really nice person, she explained things very well in lab, and I feel like I learned SO much in this lab. However, she is a VERY difficult grader. Spending hours on pre- and post-lab assignments will do you no good - DeSimone will find errors and will take off many points. Her standards of evaluation were not clear, so don't expect your grades to improve over the course of the semester.
  15. DeSimone was incredibly helpful and nice, but a VERY hard grader.

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