Before 'rona Heather wasn't the most popular 153C professor (as you can tell by previous reviews) but luckily she made the class a whole lot easier to pass online. Her lectures are rather tedious (fun drinking game: take a shot every time she says "uhmmm" and wipes her nose) but it is probably a good idea to watch them (preferably at 2x speed) to cover exam material. Exams (three midterms, no final) are written and graded rather poorly: short-answer questions are often vague and open-ended with extremely specific answers required for full points. The upside to this is that the exams were only 20% of our grade, with a hefty 40% of our grade being the group project (this will likely change in the future since many people got A's). Another plus is that she gives a rather generous amount of extra credit, and discussion sections are not mandatory. Basically, Tienson online: easy, ok. Tienson irl: maybe hard, idk.

yes good

Dr. Tienson changed up how she runs this course. When I took it, it was graded as such:
-4 "quizzes," worst is dropped
-final exam
-group protein brochure project
-clicker questions

Let's start with the "quizzes." These are not quizzes. They are cumulative midterms that she calls quizzes, because they are half as long as the (from what I've read) god awful midterms she used to give in previous quarters. Did I mention they're cumulative? That means that not 1, not 2, not 3, not 4, but 5 times...5 fucking times during the quarter, you have to study everything you've ever learned in this class. It sucks.

The final exam was actually less difficult than the quizzes, IMO. I remember in 153A the final was a big shock to some people. Not so in 153C. The graded exams are terrible all quarter long.

The clicker policy is a bit nicer than in 153A. Participation and accuracy both count; you get 1 point for answering and 2 points for answering correctly. You need to get like 70% of the points up for grabs, so you can miss a couple days of class no problem. This is nice. However, the class was podcasts, not videocasted, it's better to just go to lecture.

The protein brochure project was fine, but I would have preferred not to have any portion of my grade depend on other people. My group solely communicated via google docs and fb messenger. You don't really have to worry about this until week 3, and there are checkpoint assignments throughout the quarter, so the project is never a huge burden.

A few tips: find a way to distill the core idea of each lecture onto one page, and study those pages multiple times a week. If you can make a diagram of something, it'll probably be on the exam. You need to know how all the pathways are regulated. Seriously, regulation, regulation, regulation. She will test you relentlessly on regulation.

All in all, it's a tough class, but I learned a lot of information that I value.

Tienson taught 153C well but the midterms/final were quite bad. Prepare to memorize EVERYTHING: structures, enzymes, every step of regulatory pathways, how to chop down or synthesize any amino acid, and the ATP cost of everything. Also you have to memorize the study question answers verbatim to get the "key words".

Despite this, exams were a very poor assessment of knowledge. Averages were all around 50. If you memorized everything, you'll still be thrown for a loop by horrendously vague questions ("What is the overall effect...", "What is a possible problem that arises...") or pathways she never went over. And if you DIDNT memorize everything it will be even worse. Time-management on midterms is critical because nobody will finish (final is more reasonable in this aspect).

Otherwise, I think she is good at lecturing and teaching the material, it was much the same style as 153A. Except to clarify some bad slides, you dont need the textbook. Prepare to feel fuqqed by tests. She says she curves the average to a B which is pretty generous.