Chloe Bulinski

I am writing to confirm what other students have already detailed... the lack of organization, the grading... The mean of the first midterm (Fall 2019) was a 62.7 (out of 100) and the lowest grade was a 29. I cannot deny that the material covered in this class is interesting but the grading is not generous, so I guess keep that in mind as you consider your options.

Heavy. 4 exams and you can drop one of them.

4 exams, with the lowest dropped. Tends to favor experiments rather than memorization. About 4 paper discussions that are evenly spaced out throughout the semester. Material from each paper will show up in the exams.

The reviews from 2014 are still valid and mostly true for the current iteration of the class. Since the previous reviews have pretty much nailed the strengths and weaknesses, here are some things that I would emphasize: 1) Every lecture is a PowerPoint presentation that seemed to be haphazardly put together without much organization. There is a lot of information presented in each lecture, so it is important to pay attention through the whole class (and maybe even record the lecture). The slides alone are not very good study tools as they often have random pictures and phrases that won't make sense weeks after you attend the lecture, so it is important to review the material the day of or soon after the lecture while it is still fresh in your mind. The textbook is excellent as a resource, and oftentimes specifics on the exam may show up exam verbatim. 2) The curve is extremely unforgiving. The raw averages for each exam hover anywhere from 60 to 75 depending on the difficulty of the exam, but the overall averages are curved to a B- or a low B at best. This means that few people will be getting A- or higher - in my year, only 17% of the class received an A- or higher (this is much lower than Mowshowitz bio, on top of the fact that the students who take this course tend to be much more advanced). If you need a decent grade and are not confident in yourself, I would highly recomm…

4 exams (some parts of which you may not get back). 3 article writeups (a short paragraph for undergraduates, which you will probably not get back). I'm not sure how the curve works, but I scored in the low-mid eighties on most of my tests and got an A overall.

Dr. Bulinski, in many ways, is the quintessential absentminded professor. Avoid this course: -If you want a class that's highly structured -If your background in molecular/cellular biology is weak. Although she is very approachable and helpful one-on-one, Dr. Bulinski is not going to spoonfeed and babysit you Let me state the obvious: Organization isn't Dr. Bulinski's forte. -Expect opaque grading. The class is supposedly curved to a B-/C+, but Dr. Bulinski never made it clear how she grades. (She once emailed us to say that she wants "everyone" to get at least a B, which makes no sense in light of her curve.) -In a class of 30-40 people (with 3 TAs), exams take >2 weeks to get graded and come back in multiple pieces. The staples in your exams get taken apart, but they don't get put back together. -Practice exams are riddled with typos. Dr. Bulinski once said that she made it "intentionally" vague to promote critical thinking. -Don't expect to get your graded article writeups back. Despite its disorganization, Bulinski's Cell Biology is a class well worth taking. In fact, this may have been one of my favorite biology classes at Columbia, particularly because the subject matter is so incredibly integral to a career in medicine. Cell biology offers a very intricate glimpse at the molecular mechanisms underlying cell motility, transport, and growth (and how disease processes-most…

3 Midterms & 1 Final weighted equally, one of which you can drop. One-page-long short papers done in class after research paper discussion led TAs. (three papers are discussed over the semester) Long paper which counts as a fourth midterm if you are taking the course as a grad student.

There's some truth in the previous comments about the lecture content, I wouldn't say they were completely fair either. Prof. Bulinski is actually a very patient, nice, and funny instructor. I think if you're too sensitive she can come off as brusque because she doesn't go out of her way to baby students. She teaches as if she were still lecturing at a public school, which is to say she doesn't go out of her way to make students feel fluffy by inflating grades. But if you actually take time to learn the stuff she's trying to teach you her course is actually very rewarding and pretty interesting. Yes, you need to show up to every class, because she covers lots of stuff in class that's not in the textbooks. Also, if you don't show up to class, the slides that shes posts will most likely look like gobbledygoop to you. No, you cannot zone out in class because the slides include only about half of the information she is teaching. Bring a tape recorder. Yes, you should probably do the readings. But there is a new textbook since the old reviews and the readings are no longer entire chapters. All in all, this class isn't awful. There was a previous review about Prof. Bulinski being mean and condescending. I have no idea what that was about. She's actually one of the nicest, most available professors I've met at Columbia. Her TAs are also super pleasant and responsive over email. Final…

4 midterms ( noncumulative but extremely long and wordy, choose 8/10 problems to answer) lowest one dropped, + 3 x 1 paragraph future experiments on scientific articles discussed in class

I took Professor Bulinski's Cell Bio class last semester and it was by far the worst class I have taken at Columbia (including all Core and Biology department classes). As a senior I had no choice but to take this class and I would not wish it onto anyone. As mentioned in previous reviews, Bulinski's lectures are fragmented and difficult to follow as she refers to dozens of experiments as well as molecular biology and bio-chemistry assuming students already have prior in-depth knowledge of the material. After the second midterm I wised up and brought in my own recording device to every class, but after listening and re-listening to every lecture I still couldn't piece apart relevant information for the tests. Dr. Millers lectures were soooo much more put together and engaging. One of the biggest problems of the course is that there isn't any way to practice the information that Bulinsky gives you. No homework, and even typos and missing questions in the practice exams. All but one of the TAs were completely useless in teaching, and it took forever to get the entire test and grade returned (3 weeks after taking the midterm, the same was true for the final). Some graders would give partial credit for correct answers that are not specific while some would give no credit. I got about the mean for every midterm and ended up with a solid B. I'm just glad to be done with the class