BIOL 3000

Reads off the slides, very smart and interested in the subject. However, his tests are extremely difficult and tricky and you have to know ALL the details of the subject material to get a good grade on the test. He does not curve (so he says), so a lot of the grades are lower than the normal distribution. Very difficult, I wish I studied more for each test and you will too.

6% of the class got A's this semester. 14% got D's and F's. this course is not for the faint of heart. study study study the powerpoints and type down everything he says in lecture. don't bother reading the text, it's useless except for the figures he puts in the powerpoints. this got me a B in the course. kozminski himself is a pretty cool guy who is super knowledgeable! and rich is adorbs :)

Very poorly taught course

I do not recommend taking this course with Kozminski (for those of us who have to take this class for our major). He is an adorable professor who loves cells, but is a terrible test writer who will draw from vague concepts sometimes only touched on briefly in the discussion section (not even his own lectures or the book!). Although I found some of the material interesting, the tests were atrocious and required far more work to prepare for than they should have (and I have taken some very hard courses I loved).

Some people didn't like Kozminski, but I thought his lectures were fine. You do have to make sure you take scrupulous notes on the lectures for his exams, which are pretty specific, but it was very doable. There isn't much of a need to read the textbook if you can take quick notes during lecture, because all of his questions came straight from the lectures. I enjoyed his dry humor, and he seemed like a nice person outside of class. Exams are pretty nit-picky and emphasize memorization, but that's expected of Cell Biology. I thought he was pretty fair.

I took this class the spring of my first year and i definitely wasn't ready for it. Taking this class with Kozminski is rumored to be hard, but I found the time commitment and curriculum to be the more challenging aspects of the course. Test are based of the lecture and are uncurved. The textbook served as a good supplement, but I seriously recommend going to class every day.

Honestly the class was a class. It is cell biology, and it is supposed to be hard, so it is. Also, even though he does not "curve," he sets the point brackets for an "A" lower than a ninety (actually its around an 86 for an A- for him). Therefore, yes, it is hard; just study and you should be fine.

This is one of the most difficult courses I have ever taken. Your grade is based entirely on four multiple choice exams, on a point system (i.e. no class curve). I attended every lecture, took notes, read all the reading, listened to recordings, and studied in groups, and I still felt like some of the test questions came out of nowhere. There are a lot of pathways that you need to outright memorize. Overall, I would recommend taking this class with another professor if possible. If not, attend the review sessions because those questions often show up on tests.

I personally found this class served as a good foundation for upper-level biology courses. Yes, it is difficult, but not impossibly hard if you attend class every day and take detailed notes. Review sessions are also helpful to go over practice problems that may come up in the test. It is a good class for those who like strictly lecture-based exams. Overall it was a worthwhile class and rewarding of your efforts.

I actually really enjoyed this class! This came as a surprise. I’d heard absolutely terrible things about Wormington’s cell bio and I was terrified going into Kosminski’s, especially considering his sections’ lower gpa.

However, cell ended up being one of my favorite upper levels. The material was really interesting to me and super applicable to research. Lectures were generally interesting, pretty straight-forward, and generally tied in to the textbook quite well. I got to know Kozminski during office hours and found that he’s passionate on the subject and was more than happy to answer the same stupid questions over and over. I’d definitely recommend taking the class with him over Wormington.

As a word of caution, you’re going to be completely screwed if you don’t stay on top of material and go to office hours very regularly. I went to Kosminski’s office hours every single week with pre-prepared questions from the lectures and readings. I got an A pretty easily just by doing that. :)