Deren Eaton

Further understanding of natural selection, mutations, genetics and fundamental literature in evolution.

We talked about a wide variety of evolution topics, with an emphasis on genomic approaches.

This course teaches you topics related to evolutionary theory as well as other advanced topics in evolutionary biology. There is also a focus on reading and understanding academic papers and persuasive academic writing.

genetics, paleo-evolution, a little human evolution

I learned a lot about the mechanics of evolution and how to think synthetically to answer big and novel questions.

An impressively broad survey of current and historical topics in evolutionary biology. Founding principles of evolutionary biology, evolution as it relates to genetics, evolution as it relates to biological processes that are not strictly genetic, human evolution. Assignments emphasized developing expository writing skills.

Evolution was an entirely new subject for me, so each unit was a learning experience. Writing the essays was great practice for scientific writing as well.

I learned about major topics in Evolution like natural selection, genomes, and macroevolution. The discussions we had in class were based on topical papers and discourse that currently exist in the field, which gave me a good understanding of the perspectives that currently exist.

We didn't do as many small group discussions towards the end of the semester but I thought that they were really beneficial and wish we had. I would have liked for them to be more consistent.

It was just too much academia and not enough science. Dont take this class unless you have to or you like writing essays and being graded harshly. I really really wanted to like this class.