So much persual work/discussion posting. Constant need to comment on presentations and provide sources for comments (some required 8+ comments with 3 or more that also required you to cite sources, which means you are then reading papers/abstracts just to reply to someones comment). It just felt like a TON of busy work and not really learning much content-wise. This seemed like more of a journal club-ish/seminar class than a content driven one. It was very hard to keep up with the constant changing windows of persual and what was due when and how many comments were due when on top of the other assignments. I didn't understand the need to have 8 plus comments on every discussion/presentation on top of having quizzes and written assignments often due right around the same time. This is not r...read more

The professor seemed very nice and responsive to students. This wasn't intended as a reflection of her or the others. I just did not like the course structure AT ALL.

Don't take this class unless you like being extremely social. Be prepared to have to socially interact a LOT (via commenting) on top of doing presentations, writing posts, taking quizzes, watching lectures, etc. Not a good class for anyone introverted or with time commitments outside of class. This class is extremely busy-work heavy with discussion posts, random short writing assignments, presentations, quizzes, etc on top of the course material.

Really interesting course if your are interested in microbiome research. It's overwhelming at first because of how much information and work you have to do but its manageable once you get used to the schedule. The only bad part of the course is that they open the assignments for the week on Tuesdays which I found inconvenient but that might be with my schedule.

This class has lots of required reading and short lectures each week along with 2 presentations. They spend time on many different categories of microbiome research but you are allowed to focus on what you are most interested in for your big projects. There is lots of interaction required with the course (post on discussion boards over many days, engage with content while being timed)

Dr. Ahrens is the professor who gives the most feedback and lectures however there are two other professors involved in the course. The professors all give interesting lectures and do a good job of breaking them up so they are easy to digest. Feedback and email response is usually very quick and detailed. Professors are kind and understanding.

Read and annotate articles on a different day than you decide to write about them. Set reminders two comment on journal club and discussion posts on multiple days. If you are taking or have taken BSC4936 there is overlap that is helpful for finding articles!