I've completely lost respect of this person. I don't care how infamous or intelligent she is. She is not a nice person at all. When I first tried to enroll in her course back in Winter during my first pass, I enrolled in this course and another MIMG class. But for some damn reason, this class suddenly rescheduled the final exam date without any notifications. It wasn't until freakin week 6 of this quarter when I actually found out that I had an exam conflict. I talked to my MIMG department if I can reschedule my final exam to another date, but of course they said no. Perfectly reasonable because it was the freakin biochemistry department that somehow screwed up and changed the exam date to conflict with my MIMG class. So I talked to Tienson about it during week 6, but she didn't even seem surprised. She said she will take care of it and promised to let me know when the conflict is resolved. Three days passed...no e-mail. I e-mailed her back, asking whether the conflict was resolved..No response. So I proceeded to talk to her after lecture, but there were a lot of people asking questions that day, and she had to take off for the next class, so I just decided to send her another e-mail..No response. Next day I sat in front to make sure I take care of the problems asap. When I approached her and asked her about my problems, she FLAT OUT DENIED THAT SHE MADE A PROMISE TO HAVE MY EXAM CONFLICT RESOLVED. LIKE WTF. I HAD TO DROP THIS COURSE AT WEEK 7 BECAUSE OF AN EXAM CONFLICT THAT I WAS NEVER NOTIFIED. Thanks bitch, for giving me a notification in my transcription for the dumbest reason ever. I even did pretty well on the first midterm, but thanks to this prick, all my efforts during the first 6 weeks were wasted. I can't believe how brazen some people can be. I don't care how much A's you give in your class. You are by far the worst human I've encountered in my life. For those who will think how it's completely my fault for not checking the dates earlier...well I didn't freakin know that UCLA study list apparently lets me keep my classes even with a final exam conflict. And plus, if the class final exam is rescheduled, shouldn't Tienson at least send out a massive e-mail to everyone in the class that there was a change in the exam date so that there won't be a person like me who had to forcefully drop the class? I'm glad I didn't drop it after week 8 because that bitch will probably like to screw people over and refuse to sign the form that allows students to drop the class. I know this review has nothing to do with biochem, but the world should at least know about this uncouth pothead.

I really think this class is not that bad as a lot of people make it out to be. Take a look at the grade distribution. 30% almost getting As is pretty high.

Anyways I would say I learned quite a bit in this class. Like others are saying do all the practice problems and you will be fine. Going to discussion also helps and the forum on CCLE helps to clear up any questions you have. If you are interested in biochemistry that definitely helps

This class was by far the most difficult class I've taken at UCLA. The concepts are not that hard, but the amount of material you have to learn and be able to apply is immense. I did under average on both midterms, and studied my ass off and did relatively well compared to the rest of the class on the final to make an A. That being said the average on the final was 120/200 so it was really hard. Tension though is one of the best teacher's i've had at UCLA. I can definitely say that i've learned more in this class than I have in any other at UCLA. Tienson is really clear in lecture and is helpful at office hours. TLDR: this class is a huge workload, probably one of the more challenging in the life sciences, but she is a good teacher and if you dedicate a ton of time to the class you can do well

Name one person who says Biochem is easy. That person doesn't exist. I was terrified about this class, before it started. To my surprise, however, it wasn't that bad. Dr. Tienson made the class very enjoyable! It amazes me just how she is able to remember to teach so much material in so little time. She is the best lecturer I have ever had and a very kind person who cares about her students.
Her midterms are not difficult. It solely depends on you spending time on those study questions. First, be able to understand and solve all of the questions. Next, note the questions she asks multiple times in the study questions and MEMORIZE the points she makes. She WILL ask you those questions again on the midterms and you HAVE to mention all those points to get full credit. DON'T be lazy and memorize them! Don't worry so much about counting number of words you used for questions with word limits. Just estimate and your fine (5 words over the limit is fine). No matter how much you know of the material, if you don't use the points she makes in the study questions then you wont get credit. 50 minutes will be enough time, don't stress over it. Try not to mess up on the first midterm as it is the easier one. If you do, it's not the end of the world.
Quizzes are freebies. Spend time studying for it as you know exactly what she's going to ask you.
Perusall is a waste of time. Get your points and never go back to that reading assignment.
Re-listen to her lectures, if you find the time. It is almost impossible to get everything down in lecture cause she talks extremely fast. The more you get down from those lectures, the faster you are able to complete and understand those study questions.
Come to lecture and get your clicker points.
Do the extra credit surveys and assignments.
For the Pymol protein assignment, spend some time on it. It's worth a lot points and it can really help your grade. Check answers with other people.
Okay, that doesn't seem so bad right. Okay now for the harder part of the class: The final is unpredictable. You have to study everything and I mean everything. The study guide she gives is only useful for things to specifically pay attention to, but you should know everything. There is a lot of material to review, so start early. About 15 pages long and 3 hours long. Yeah.
But amount should never bother you in this class. Its the quality of your answers on the exams (or better yet the quality of your knowledge of the material) that matters.
Overall, stay on top of the material, do the study questions many times (first understand then memorize the answers), and get those freebie points.
Good Luck!

I enjoyed Dr. Tienson's class. It was tough but she grades on a curve which helps a lot. The best advice I can give is to do the study questions. Do every single one and know them well. If you do that you can get an A in the class!

I hate chem with a passion and am a slacker so those often don't go well together but overall, Tienson is actually pretty good. I don't know about other people, but for me she seems to be very nice and understanding. If you let her know about problems with your grades (through email) she'll take forever to get back to you (3+ days!) but she WILL get back to you. My class was based on: Project (30pnts), participation (20), quizzes (100), MT1 (100), MT 2 (100), and Final (200) making it out of 550 for the whole class. She lets you miss quite a few days of participation while still getting full credit and the project has a couple of extra credit points tagged on at the end. Same for the midterms and final. There's extra credit offered throughout the course. Overall she curves to a B (I got slightly below the class average and still got a B!) Extremely generous curves but don't let that have you slack off. Do her study questions and try not to procrastinate (like I did). As a lecturer she lectures really fast so the podcasts saved my life. She speaks clearly though and puts up a lot of resources that she finds may help you on the website. There are forums where you can ask questions (more convenient than office hours in my opinion) and reviews by the UAs (which in my opinion were useless). Her tests are really hard so the averages were generally in the 60s for us but that doesn't really matter since there's the curve. Study hard for this class and you should at least be able to pull off at least the average. Good luck!

she is not a bad professor, you can do great in the class if you study the study questions and her slides

Warriors blew a 3-1 lead against the Cavaliers.

Dr. Tienson is actually a good professor. Do the study questions and do her past midterms then you will get an A.

This class is a lot of work, but it's rewarding. The workload is ass. Thankfully, Dr. Tienson is a very good professor, and she's also nice. 10/10 would recommend.