BIOE340 | PlanetTerp

Information	Review
Katharina Maisel BIOE340 Expecting an A Anonymous 07/29/2024	I am a dedicated student who is willing to work hard to master challenging content. I do not shy away from difficult classes, but I can confidently say this was the worst class I have experienced at UMD. I learned nothing from this class. At best, I can apply some of the modeling techniques to a very limited set of problems. We were not provided with an adequate amount of examples or practice. Our "practice" was 100 point graded, collaborative assignments. The entire class would spend 8-10 hours (I am not exaggerating) trying to solve these problems. The professor had assured us we could complete these pre-exams in 1-2 hours. The questions were poorly worded and there were frequent typos. On both pre-exams there were problems written about concepts we had yet to cover in class. After these exhausting assignments, we would get a discouraging 60% grade. Dr. Maisel would then directly insult us in class by saying things like, "did you guys even take 5 minutes to read the questions?" She refused to answer how to solve these problems and would always say we just needed to think about it harder. There was never a rubric or solutions manual released. These same questions would then appear on the exam and be graded for "mastery" which means no partial credit! I would end up just memorizing my answers to the pre exam questions and then regurgitating it on the exam. Dr. Maisel seemed to find helping her students a burden. When we would email her with questions she would just tell us to read the question prompts again and say "you have everything you need." In class, she would scold students and say "this is just simple arithmetic" while gesturing to long partial differential equations! She offered no office hours and you had to jump out of your seat to catch her before she left after class. I have never felt so hopeless in a class. After realizing at the beginning of the semester, that our professor was incapable of explaining the concepts, I turned hopefully to the textbook to teach myself. To my dismay, the textbook purely focuses on physiology and doesn't help to explain the complex modeling problems we were expected to know. This class made me feel stupid and helpless, and I am not alone in this experience. Dr. Maisel should not be a professor.
Katharina Maisel BIOE340 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 07/18/2024	Dr. Maisel is honestly a good lecturer. Her lectures are captivating and it's obvious she enjoys what she's teaching and is passionate about it which makes the class much more interesting. She can come off as a little harsh at times, but this wasn't a constant thing and even professors have bad days so it's not something that students should take to heart. Exams were kind of hard and the written response questions were graded very hard, but her pre-exam and cheat sheet policy is more than fair and if you just give yourself adequate time to prepare (I didn't and that's why I don't have an A) you should be able to get a good grade. I hear Fisher makes everyone submit lab reports by themselves, but Maisel lets you submit as a group which alleviates a lot of unnecessary stress.
Katharina Maisel BIOE340 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/18/2024	TLDR: Weird grader, Kind of simple content exams, Pre-exam content excruciating thats made only slightly better with having 12+ hours to complete the Pre-exams. Honest and straightforward about questions, which can devolve into annoyance if asked too many repeated questions. Pros: decently interesting and straightforward labs! only 3 required labs and while challenging, were simple to write a report on. Course content is incredibly interesting, Maisel does good job about explaining why things are the way they are in the body and doesn't require you to know exact anatomical terms/functions. When going through the content, seemed very interested and was actually quite helpful learning the physiological systems. Cons: the Pre-exams were some of the most mentally challenging days I'd ever have throughout the semester. Only 2 pre-exams thankfully, and you can get corrections done for half credit, but I would spend upwards of 7-8 hours on 3 problems due to insufficient practice problems to compare to and lack of clarity on details within the problem that I needed (cant ask TA's for help, and when asking Maisel, would give some cryptic clues like we're stealing the declaration of independence). Exams are structured so half the points are legit copying the pre-exam problems and then the other 50% is answering simple physio questions. Gives a one sided sheet for exams, double sided for final. Exams are also graded on mastery for the copied pre-exam problems, so you either earn a 100% (fully right), 80% (conceptually right, but small little errors), or 0% (made concept error). I lost 4 points because I forgot a negative for context (out of 20 point problem, aka 80% mastery). Also, would come off short tempered/impatient if is repeated asked silly questions/questions she wont give more detail on. Dont get me wrong, everyone's human and has bad days, but it was to the point that I was scared to ask questions about the content of the pre-exams because the answer would either be "I cant tell you more" or "read the problem" or something else more annoyed.
Katharina Maisel BIOE340 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/11/2024	Honestly one of the worst professors I've ever had a class with-- acts nice, does meditation exercises each class before throwing us into a very confusing set of content to learn every lecture. The course depends on 2 pre exams and midterms, one final, a couple of quizzes, and 3 labs. The labs are unorganized and there was no helpful direction in what to do for any of it, and as much as teh TAs tried to help, it was basically to no avail. There's a 4th lab (optional), but its so work intensive for a menial amount of extra credit that a lot of people just didn't do it, as it was also way too much to balance with the rest of the course. The 2 midterms have a pre-exam before it-- this is a take home, all-day collaborative set of 3 math questions that she puts on the actual midterm later. While this should be helpful, those pre-exams took HOURS; everyone in the class would be sitting together for 9 hours for each pre-exam, and even then it was so hard to figure it out. On these days, she provided no resources, we weren't allowed to ask for much help from the TAs, and when any student would email for help, she would respond with a very unhelpful email stating "everything you need is on the exam", even though these exams had math problems VERY LOOSELY related to any of the course content we learned. During lectures, while she would show examples of certain problems, she would never actually solve them and go through the proper math-- when asked to, her response was that "it's simple arithmetic." When we asked for any supplmental resources-- practice problems, tests, anything, to help with studying for the exams, she told us to "find material online"-- there's no material online. She's unsupportive of the students in this class, and felt very unprepared for teaching this course; I would not reccommend her to anybody for this class. I wish I could give her a 0 lol.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/15/2023	Dr. Fisher is one of the worst professors I have ever had in my college years. His notes are handwritten which is fine but he tends to abbreviate things so much that you don't even know what he is talking about at some points. The lecture slides are usually ranging from 15-40 slides and are extremely word heavy since they are directly taken from the textbook. While the MATLAB wasn't as bad as it was in previous years (from what I've been told), the labs were still extremely long and time consuming. The lab reports are the only thing that saved my grade in this class along with the homework. The exams seemed to be reasonable when taking them but once they were graded you realize he gives no partial credit and wants specific words when answering questions. There is no multiple choice and he gave one 5 point extra credit assignment that only some of the class was able to attend. I would study for hours on end for each exam and still fail. He gives three exams that cover all the material and STILL gives a final. Save your mental health and time and take another professor.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/14/2023	In 4 years of bioengineering, Fisher might be one of the worst professors I’ve ever had. He teaches completely haphazardly and essentially just shows rhe slides and then writes his own “simplified” notes on the board - notes that are all in his extremely confusing shorthand because he’s too lazy to write out full chemical names or anatomical parts so instead creates his own abbreviations. The exams would be fair if he offered any sort of review or tried to emphasize important information, but instead it is up to you to condense hundreds of slides into major concepts. He spends lecture just repeating information from the slides but never actually seems to know what he’s talking about and has no idea how to introduce topics or connect major ideas. Also seems to get annoyed when people ask more than one clarifying question. TAKE FLUIDS FIRST. The math at the beginning of 340 was taught awfully and didn’t make sense until we got to that section in fluids 6 weeks later. The only upside of this course is that the labs are graded easily and are worth a lot so they end up being a grade booster. The TA holds review sessions which are essentially them going over they’re exam notes which is helpful - to do well on the exams you basically have to memorize everything because he doesn’t release any old exam info, exam keys, or any supplemental material besides a list of topics (which is usually 50+). His blasé attitude is extremely frustrating when it’s clear the class is struggling and his only response is “the labs are easy you can do well in this class even if you get 50s on the exam”
Steven Jay BIOE340 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 04/12/2022	This class is purely invigorating, even better than doing the white stuff (sugar). Every time I learn about a new vessel or a new body part, I feel my adrenaline rush a little, especially in the nether regions. Say goodbye to your parasympathetic system because it will cease to exist in this class. I weaned off my caffeine addiction over the course of the semester because this class itself was enough to energize me for the entire day. I lied, I merely replaced my caffeine dependency with this class. I am thinking of dropping this class just so I can take it again next year to feel the same rush. If I was given the opportunity on my deathbed to relive any moment in my life, I would choose my time in this class in a heartbeat, my last heartbeat. Dr. Jay is the epitome of hype and I will vouch for him until the day I drop out (soon).
Steven Jay BIOE340 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/29/2021	Dr. Jay is a great professor who treats his students with a great deal of respect. He has a policy where he will replace your two midterm grades with the score from the cumulative section from the final exam (and vice versa). This can help you a lot even if you slip up on one of the midterms. The lab section of the class is pretty hard, with some complicated MATLAB and not much guidance besides office hours. There are no homework assignments, and Dr. Jay is very skilled at explaining things in terms of modeling and giving an engineering perspective to physiology.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/25/2015	He doesn't know what he's talking about, he just reads directly from his notes. Clearly doesn't know the information and also teaches factually incorrect information that contradicts what is learned in other Biology classes. Does NOT teach all the information necessary for tests. TA's grade too harshly. On one question when it asked "What is the effect?", if you just write "decreases", then you would only get 1/2 credit. You have to write "decreases by 50%" even though the question does not ask "by how much does it decrease". Overall, everything about this class is unfair. In order to do well in this class, pay very close attention to the Homeworks, and the discussion problems. Discussions are at 8 am so it's tempting not to go, but if you don't you will miss vital information on the exams. Also, be sure to take fluids before taking this class. Fisher loves to throw in a whole bunch of fluids into this class for some reason.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/22/2015	He explains concepts clearly, but does not teach what is important or what we need to know for exams. Only discusses the basic concepts in lecture and does not discuss how to apply them. He has no idea of how to run/organize this course. He primarily teaches the biology in lecture, and makes the TA teach the math in discussion. Tests are about 60-70% math based, so this is clearly a problem. The lab part of this class is all matlab and if the matlab in bioe241 is like biking on a flat road, the matlab in this class is like biking up Mt. Everest. Unless you are a professional matlab programmer, you will struggle tremendously with the matlab this course. He expects you to apply the math/physics that you've learned in all other previous courses to this course, but doesn't go over it in lecture. Make sure that you focus predominantly on the math part of this course, not so much the biology. Disagree with the review below that this class is like a physiology class.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a B thearn182 12/17/2012	Fisher changed how he teaches a lot this semester. He doesn't just read off slides anymore. The material is straight from slides, but he presents it in a more concise manner. However, this means come time for the exams you have to look through the slides in case he didn't go over something completely. The labs and homework requires some solid effort, but they're never impossible. He admits he's not too helpful with MATLAB, but it's nothing you can't figure out. So basically this course is a lot of work, but not impossible. Get started early on everything. Seriously, the day you get an assignment at least look at it right away. Fisher is not a bad professor, there's just a lot of material to this course. Honestly, if the department didn't try to make it like Mammalian Physiology (a pre-med class) it wouldn't be that bad. Good luck!
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting an A anon01 05/22/2012	Fisher is supposed to be amazing at research. But he is one of the WORST professors I have ever had. The amazing Guyton and Hall textbook is your best source of information for this course, and a vastly better teacher than Fisher. He reuses old slides from previous years, which are basically summaries of certain section of the book. There are a couple lectures where Fisher very poorly derives the continuity equation and some chemical kinetics like Michaelis-Menten kinetics. He never mentions this material again, instead focusing on the material in the book. As said in previous posts, exams were extremely math-based this semester. I feel really bad for students who have not taken fluid mechanics before this course, because he basically expects you to start with Navier-Stokes and get a solution for a velocity profile from start to finish without practice, and without explanation of your basic assumptions. There is practically no partial credit on exams, you will either get full points for regurgitating what's on his slides or no points at all. If you forgot to study the math, expect maybe 25-30 pts off per section. Overall the exam averages were in the 50s and 60s, with overall final grade cutoffs of 83%, 70%, 60%, 50%. About ~15% A's and ~25% B's/C's this semester. I think the lab assignments boosted the poor exam grades. Fisher doesn't understand any MATLAB, but the entire lab portion of this class is done on MATLAB. No goggles or labcoats necessary. He relies on an equally clueless grad student to teach this entire topic. Most of the lab assignments came directly (unaltered!) from the recommended MATLAB textbook, and students could easily just copy the answers and get full points. I will never forget that Fisher made the group project deadline, the 3rd exam and the final exam, all within 2 weeks of each other. And afterwards, he wondered why he got low courseevals.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a B bloopity 12/27/2011	Dr. Fisher reads off slides but he does try to kind of explain them once in awhile. Actually sometimes he does add in things that are not on the slides, but the things he adds in are also found in the book. You go over a lot of material in this class, it is insane amounts of biology. But for whatever reason, this semester (Fall 2011), a lot of his tests were mostly math based, which can be frustrating when you just spent so much time memorizing a lot of biology. If you're pre med you'll enjoy the material but before you go into any test make sure you're solid on any math concepts covered. I'm going to stress that again, make sure you're solid on any math that you've done in class. Also, if you didn't pay attention in class it might be a good idea to go over the graphs from lecture by looking them up in the book. When it comes to memorizing all the information, everyone is different. Personally, drawing pictures helped me and so did making use of whiteboards, doing a question-answer thing in a group, or explaining things to others. Bottomline, if you're not doing well on the tests because of the biology, try a different study technique because the one you used before was clearly not working. Another thing, if you're BIOE don't completely rely on what people say from previous semesters, BIOE classes change A LOT so be careful. Do your best and don't procrastinate, know that this class takes up a lot of your time. But again, the material is highly enjoyable if you're pre med so have fun while you're at it. All the best!
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a B pat 10/30/2011	Fisher is a really cool guy, but this class is literally the source of my depression this semester. It is like drinking from a fire hose when you aren't thirsty for the material at all. There are some useful sections here and there involving math and modeling certain situations, but for the most part it is overwhelmed by superfluous material that is truely not interesting at all unless you are a pre-med (Heart and muscle physiology, blood flow physiology, physiology physiology). The math stuff also seems to be pseudo chemical engineering, transfer, and fluid dynamic stuff (kind of like the hodgepodge of most BIOE classes), but it doesn't go into near satisfying detail on how to use it to model phenomenon, or into the actual material itself for that matter. This class sucks up entire weekends to study for with ease. I am on 16 creds this semester, am a senior, and have to halt everything for these tests - which I tend to do very poor on despite my best efforts. Tests: Complete bullshi* through and through. Our grader is obviously not a nice person at all, and she grades your test based on keywords. Essentially, unless you are rainman, and can verbalize the material word-for-word , it really doesn't matter how well you understand what is going on if you don't have the exact keywords in the solutions manuals that are created for each test. There are no home works all semester, just end-of-class quizzes. After you feel like jabbing your eyes out for over an hour trying to pay attention to the material, Fisher gives a 10 point quiz on what was covered that lecture. Averages tended to be around a 6 or 7/10 on good days, which left Dr. Fisher stunningly surprised most of the time (kind of funny). The lab's consist of ridiculously ill-explained MATLAB lectures at the end of most weeks, and depending on the assignment, a very large amount of work. The prime example was that we had to program a MATLAB script which would take any linear system Ax = b, put the larges t value of A in the 1,1 position of the matrix, do all of the row and column swaps, put the matrix in reduced echelon form, find the solutions, back substitute, and display all of the solutions. If you didn't understand that , it's ok - it's linear algebra stuff, which for reasons unbeknownst to me BioE doesn't include in the curriculum. The TA had notes that everyone tried to follow, but at least 80 percent or more of the class ended up attempting this monster from scratch because her notes were incorrect, overly complicated/convoluted, or poorly explained. I got it to work, after an entire Saturday and > 24 hours of no sleep. Warning: If your MATLAB isn't in tip-top shape, you will struggle I promise you. What else....hmm...not much I suppose. This class just really sucks a fat one in every imaginable facet of sucking fat ones. It's really miserable. I am actually deferring my study time to write this review. I suppose I should get back to it, but I have a similar expectation of working ridiculously hard to no avail - earning roughly a 63% on the next test. What a bummer. This class elucidates why BIOE as a whole is kind of disappointing here now that I think about it. If you happen to be thinking about choosing it as your major - choose a more traditional major here and apply it to medical systems later on, I sure wish I did. FML
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting an A zhangsta 12/23/2010	Dr. Fisher teaches from powerpoint slides which were taken right out of the book. The only information that wasn't in the book were the parts where we were supposed to do math, but those weren't too bad since they were pretty much simple integrations or first order ODEs. The semester starts off slow, but it gets faster towards the end. This semester, 55% of our grade was determined by assignments given in the last 3 weeks of class. Also, there is absolutely no point in going to his office hours because he will answer your question in the most unhelpful way that will only lead you to ask the same question again. Homeworks weren't too bad as they tended to involve math. The MATLAB assignments weren't so bad as long as long as you save the MATLAB notes from BIOE241 since you can't really count on the TAs to be helpful in any way. The lab reports are generally no more than 10 pages, and if you follow his lab report guidelines, you should do fine becaused the TAs grade the lab report exactly how Fisher outlines it in his guidelines. Also, make sure you go to every lecture because he'll randomly give a quiz or something to count for attendance if he feels like there aren't enough people going to class. The exams were what really determined our grades. Just going over slides are not enough to get an A on his exams. You need to read all the chapters covered on the exam and remember every detail because he will ask a question on some of the most random bits of information out of the book and this class in general covers A LOT of material. At least 20 points out of 100 will be a math-based question where he asks you to derive something, which is either really easy or really hard depending on how well you know fluid mechanics.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/04/2010	The review posted on 10/2/09 is a little bit skewed. The page lengths for the lab reports were blown out of proportion. The lab reports were at a MAX of 12-15 pages except for the final report which was around 20 pages and was completed in a group. There is A LOT of material to cover. He follows the book very closely and condenses the book into notes on a powerpoint. By the end of the semester there are 600+ slides. The difficulty of this class is that it takes a lot of time to remember the content on the slides. Exams were 100 points and usually covered about 200 slides of material. You could say that the exams were usually hit or miss unless you really did know every detail. He looks for key words in exams which can be a good and bad thing but he's really generous with partial credit. Homework and MATLAB assignmetns alternate in due dates. 1st week = HW, 2nd week = MATLAB, 3rd week = HW, etc. Homework isn't too bad if you work with friends. MATLAB is difficult/time consuming so make sure you save your notes from BIOE241.
John Fisher BIOE340 Expecting a B Anonymous 10/02/2009	He teaches by the book and slid show, (very boring in his class), sometime he tried to reword the way book has for description and it just makes things more difficult to understand. He won't allow you to use computer because he don't want you to look at his slid show during class. Very computer illiterate and doesn't know how to use computer at all! Many times students ask him a question and he doesn't know the answer at all, he would say he don't know or move on with out bothering to answer the question that is related to the topic that he is teaching!! Horrible professor, don't take his class if you can help it! Exams are half short answers (he look only for key word, so any long description is wrong!) and other half is problem solving plus short answers. The average for class exam is C, so you must work very hard at the 4 full lab reports (report length: 1st 10page, 2nd 25page, 3rd 35page, 4th 35-50pages). You must have a hell of understand for MATLAB in order to get good grades for your 4 full reports, basically you must analysis your MATLAB. Good Luck!

Katharina Maisel
BIOE340

Expecting an A
Anonymous
07/29/2024

I am a dedicated student who is willing to work hard to master challenging content. I do not shy away from difficult classes, but I can confidently say this was the worst class I have experienced at UMD. I learned nothing from this class. At best, I can apply some of the modeling techniques to a very limited set of problems. We were not provided with an adequate amount of examples or practice. Our "practice" was 100 point graded, collaborative assignments. The entire class would spend 8-10 hours (I am not exaggerating) trying to solve these problems. The professor had assured us we could complete these pre-exams in 1-2 hours. The questions were poorly worded and there were frequent typos. On both pre-exams there were problems written about concepts we had yet to cover in class. After these exhausting assignments, we would get a discouraging 60% grade. Dr. Maisel would then directly insult us in class by saying things like, "did you guys even take 5 minutes to read the questions?" She refused to answer how to solve these problems and would always say we just needed to think about it harder. There was never a rubric or solutions manual released. These same questions would then appear on the exam and be graded for "mastery" which means no partial credit! I would end up just memorizing my answers to the pre exam questions and then regurgitating it on the exam. Dr. Maisel seemed to find helping her students a burden. When we would email her with questions she would just tell us to read the question prompts again and say "you have everything you need." In class, she would scold students and say "this is just simple arithmetic" while gesturing to long partial differential equations! She offered no office hours and you had to jump out of your seat to catch her before she left after class. I have never felt so hopeless in a class. After realizing at the beginning of the semester, that our professor was incapable of explaining the concepts, I turned hopefully to the textbook to teach myself. To my dismay, the textbook purely focuses on physiology and doesn't help to explain the complex modeling problems we were expected to know. This class made me feel stupid and helpless, and I am not alone in this experience. Dr. Maisel should not be a professor.

Katharina Maisel
BIOE340

Expecting a B+
Anonymous
07/18/2024

Dr. Maisel is honestly a good lecturer. Her lectures are captivating and it's obvious she enjoys what she's teaching and is passionate about it which makes the class much more interesting. She can come off as a little harsh at times, but this wasn't a constant thing and even professors have bad days so it's not something that students should take to heart. Exams were kind of hard and the written response questions were graded very hard, but her pre-exam and cheat sheet policy is more than fair and if you just give yourself adequate time to prepare (I didn't and that's why I don't have an A) you should be able to get a good grade. I hear Fisher makes everyone submit lab reports by themselves, but Maisel lets you submit as a group which alleviates a lot of unnecessary stress.

Katharina Maisel
BIOE340

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
05/18/2024

TLDR: Weird grader, Kind of simple content exams, Pre-exam content excruciating thats made only slightly better with having 12+ hours to complete the Pre-exams. Honest and straightforward about questions, which can devolve into annoyance if asked too many repeated questions. Pros: decently interesting and straightforward labs! only 3 required labs and while challenging, were simple to write a report on. Course content is incredibly interesting, Maisel does good job about explaining why things are the way they are in the body and doesn't require you to know exact anatomical terms/functions. When going through the content, seemed very interested and was actually quite helpful learning the physiological systems. Cons: the Pre-exams were some of the most mentally challenging days I'd ever have throughout the semester. Only 2 pre-exams thankfully, and you can get corrections done for half credit, but I would spend upwards of 7-8 hours on 3 problems due to insufficient practice problems to compare to and lack of clarity on details within the problem that I needed (cant ask TA's for help, and when asking Maisel, would give some cryptic clues like we're stealing the declaration of independence). Exams are structured so half the points are legit copying the pre-exam problems and then the other 50% is answering simple physio questions. Gives a one sided sheet for exams, double sided for final. Exams are also graded on mastery for the copied pre-exam problems, so you either earn a 100% (fully right), 80% (conceptually right, but small little errors), or 0% (made concept error). I lost 4 points because I forgot a negative for context (out of 20 point problem, aka 80% mastery). Also, would come off short tempered/impatient if is repeated asked silly questions/questions she wont give more detail on. Dont get me wrong, everyone's human and has bad days, but it was to the point that I was scared to ask questions about the content of the pre-exams because the answer would either be "I cant tell you more" or "read the problem" or something else more annoyed.

Katharina Maisel
BIOE340

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
05/11/2024

Honestly one of the worst professors I've ever had a class with-- acts nice, does meditation exercises each class before throwing us into a very confusing set of content to learn every lecture. The course depends on 2 pre exams and midterms, one final, a couple of quizzes, and 3 labs. The labs are unorganized and there was no helpful direction in what to do for any of it, and as much as teh TAs tried to help, it was basically to no avail. There's a 4th lab (optional), but its so work intensive for a menial amount of extra credit that a lot of people just didn't do it, as it was also way too much to balance with the rest of the course. The 2 midterms have a pre-exam before it-- this is a take home, all-day collaborative set of 3 math questions that she puts on the actual midterm later. While this should be helpful, those pre-exams took HOURS; everyone in the class would be sitting together for 9 hours for each pre-exam, and even then it was so hard to figure it out. On these days, she provided no resources, we weren't allowed to ask for much help from the TAs, and when any student would email for help, she would respond with a very unhelpful email stating "everything you need is on the exam", even though these exams had math problems VERY LOOSELY related to any of the course content we learned. During lectures, while she would show examples of certain problems, she would never actually solve them and go through the proper math-- when asked to, her response was that "it's simple arithmetic." When we asked for any supplmental resources-- practice problems, tests, anything, to help with studying for the exams, she told us to "find material online"-- there's no material online. She's unsupportive of the students in this class, and felt very unprepared for teaching this course; I would not reccommend her to anybody for this class. I wish I could give her a 0 lol.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a C
Anonymous
12/15/2023

Dr. Fisher is one of the worst professors I have ever had in my college years. His notes are handwritten which is fine but he tends to abbreviate things so much that you don't even know what he is talking about at some points. The lecture slides are usually ranging from 15-40 slides and are extremely word heavy since they are directly taken from the textbook. While the MATLAB wasn't as bad as it was in previous years (from what I've been told), the labs were still extremely long and time consuming. The lab reports are the only thing that saved my grade in this class along with the homework. The exams seemed to be reasonable when taking them but once they were graded you realize he gives no partial credit and wants specific words when answering questions. There is no multiple choice and he gave one 5 point extra credit assignment that only some of the class was able to attend. I would study for hours on end for each exam and still fail. He gives three exams that cover all the material and STILL gives a final. Save your mental health and time and take another professor.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a B
Anonymous
12/14/2023

In 4 years of bioengineering, Fisher might be one of the worst professors I’ve ever had. He teaches completely haphazardly and essentially just shows rhe slides and then writes his own “simplified” notes on the board - notes that are all in his extremely confusing shorthand because he’s too lazy to write out full chemical names or anatomical parts so instead creates his own abbreviations. The exams would be fair if he offered any sort of review or tried to emphasize important information, but instead it is up to you to condense hundreds of slides into major concepts. He spends lecture just repeating information from the slides but never actually seems to know what he’s talking about and has no idea how to introduce topics or connect major ideas. Also seems to get annoyed when people ask more than one clarifying question. TAKE FLUIDS FIRST. The math at the beginning of 340 was taught awfully and didn’t make sense until we got to that section in fluids 6 weeks later. The only upside of this course is that the labs are graded easily and are worth a lot so they end up being a grade booster. The TA holds review sessions which are essentially them going over they’re exam notes which is helpful - to do well on the exams you basically have to memorize everything because he doesn’t release any old exam info, exam keys, or any supplemental material besides a list of topics (which is usually 50+). His blasé attitude is extremely frustrating when it’s clear the class is struggling and his only response is “the labs are easy you can do well in this class even if you get 50s on the exam”

Steven Jay
BIOE340

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
04/12/2022

This class is purely invigorating, even better than doing the white stuff (sugar). Every time I learn about a new vessel or a new body part, I feel my adrenaline rush a little, especially in the nether regions. Say goodbye to your parasympathetic system because it will cease to exist in this class. I weaned off my caffeine addiction over the course of the semester because this class itself was enough to energize me for the entire day. I lied, I merely replaced my caffeine dependency with this class. I am thinking of dropping this class just so I can take it again next year to feel the same rush. If I was given the opportunity on my deathbed to relive any moment in my life, I would choose my time in this class in a heartbeat, my last heartbeat. Dr. Jay is the epitome of hype and I will vouch for him until the day I drop out (soon).

Steven Jay
BIOE340

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/29/2021

Dr. Jay is a great professor who treats his students with a great deal of respect. He has a policy where he will replace your two midterm grades with the score from the cumulative section from the final exam (and vice versa). This can help you a lot even if you slip up on one of the midterms. The lab section of the class is pretty hard, with some complicated MATLAB and not much guidance besides office hours. There are no homework assignments, and Dr. Jay is very skilled at explaining things in terms of modeling and giving an engineering perspective to physiology.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a C
Anonymous
12/25/2015

He doesn't know what he's talking about, he just reads directly from his notes. Clearly doesn't know the information and also teaches factually incorrect information that contradicts what is learned in other Biology classes. Does NOT teach all the information necessary for tests. TA's grade too harshly. On one question when it asked "What is the effect?", if you just write "decreases", then you would only get 1/2 credit. You have to write "decreases by 50%" even though the question does not ask "by how much does it decrease". Overall, everything about this class is unfair. In order to do well in this class, pay very close attention to the Homeworks, and the discussion problems. Discussions are at 8 am so it's tempting not to go, but if you don't you will miss vital information on the exams. Also, be sure to take fluids before taking this class. Fisher loves to throw in a whole bunch of fluids into this class for some reason.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a C
Anonymous
12/22/2015

He explains concepts clearly, but does not teach what is important or what we need to know for exams. Only discusses the basic concepts in lecture and does not discuss how to apply them. He has no idea of how to run/organize this course. He primarily teaches the biology in lecture, and makes the TA teach the math in discussion. Tests are about 60-70% math based, so this is clearly a problem. The lab part of this class is all matlab and if the matlab in bioe241 is like biking on a flat road, the matlab in this class is like biking up Mt. Everest. Unless you are a professional matlab programmer, you will struggle tremendously with the matlab this course. He expects you to apply the math/physics that you've learned in all other previous courses to this course, but doesn't go over it in lecture. Make sure that you focus predominantly on the math part of this course, not so much the biology. Disagree with the review below that this class is like a physiology class.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a B
thearn182
12/17/2012

Fisher changed how he teaches a lot this semester. He doesn't just read off slides anymore. The material is straight from slides, but he presents it in a more concise manner. However, this means come time for the exams you have to look through the slides in case he didn't go over something completely. The labs and homework requires some solid effort, but they're never impossible. He admits he's not too helpful with MATLAB, but it's nothing you can't figure out. So basically this course is a lot of work, but not impossible. Get started early on everything. Seriously, the day you get an assignment at least look at it right away. Fisher is not a bad professor, there's just a lot of material to this course. Honestly, if the department didn't try to make it like Mammalian Physiology (a pre-med class) it wouldn't be that bad. Good luck!

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting an A
anon01
05/22/2012

Fisher is supposed to be amazing at research. But he is one of the WORST professors I have ever had. The amazing Guyton and Hall textbook is your best source of information for this course, and a vastly better teacher than Fisher. He reuses old slides from previous years, which are basically summaries of certain section of the book. There are a couple lectures where Fisher very poorly derives the continuity equation and some chemical kinetics like Michaelis-Menten kinetics. He never mentions this material again, instead focusing on the material in the book. As said in previous posts, exams were extremely math-based this semester. I feel really bad for students who have not taken fluid mechanics before this course, because he basically expects you to start with Navier-Stokes and get a solution for a velocity profile from start to finish without practice, and without explanation of your basic assumptions. There is practically no partial credit on exams, you will either get full points for regurgitating what's on his slides or no points at all. If you forgot to study the math, expect maybe 25-30 pts off per section. Overall the exam averages were in the 50s and 60s, with overall final grade cutoffs of 83%, 70%, 60%, 50%. About ~15% A's and ~25% B's/C's this semester. I think the lab assignments boosted the poor exam grades. Fisher doesn't understand any MATLAB, but the entire lab portion of this class is done on MATLAB. No goggles or labcoats necessary. He relies on an equally clueless grad student to teach this entire topic. Most of the lab assignments came directly (unaltered!) from the recommended MATLAB textbook, and students could easily just copy the answers and get full points. I will never forget that Fisher made the group project deadline, the 3rd exam and the final exam, all within 2 weeks of each other. And afterwards, he wondered why he got low courseevals.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a B
bloopity
12/27/2011

Dr. Fisher reads off slides but he does try to kind of explain them once in awhile. Actually sometimes he does add in things that are not on the slides, but the things he adds in are also found in the book. You go over a lot of material in this class, it is insane amounts of biology. But for whatever reason, this semester (Fall 2011), a lot of his tests were mostly math based, which can be frustrating when you just spent so much time memorizing a lot of biology. If you're pre med you'll enjoy the material but before you go into any test make sure you're solid on any math concepts covered. I'm going to stress that again, make sure you're solid on any math that you've done in class. Also, if you didn't pay attention in class it might be a good idea to go over the graphs from lecture by looking them up in the book. When it comes to memorizing all the information, everyone is different. Personally, drawing pictures helped me and so did making use of whiteboards, doing a question-answer thing in a group, or explaining things to others. Bottomline, if you're not doing well on the tests because of the biology, try a different study technique because the one you used before was clearly not working. Another thing, if you're BIOE don't completely rely on what people say from previous semesters, BIOE classes change A LOT so be careful. Do your best and don't procrastinate, know that this class takes up a lot of your time. But again, the material is highly enjoyable if you're pre med so have fun while you're at it. All the best!

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a B
pat
10/30/2011

Fisher is a really cool guy, but this class is literally the source of my depression this semester. It is like drinking from a fire hose when you aren't thirsty for the material at all. There are some useful sections here and there involving math and modeling certain situations, but for the most part it is overwhelmed by superfluous material that is truely not interesting at all unless you are a pre-med (Heart and muscle physiology, blood flow physiology, physiology physiology). The math stuff also seems to be pseudo chemical engineering, transfer, and fluid dynamic stuff (kind of like the hodgepodge of most BIOE classes), but it doesn't go into near satisfying detail on how to use it to model phenomenon, or into the actual material itself for that matter. This class sucks up entire weekends to study for with ease. I am on 16 creds this semester, am a senior, and have to halt everything for these tests - which I tend to do very poor on despite my best efforts. Tests: Complete bullshi* through and through. Our grader is obviously not a nice person at all, and she grades your test based on keywords. Essentially, unless you are rainman, and can verbalize the material word-for-word , it really doesn't matter how well you understand what is going on if you don't have the exact keywords in the solutions manuals that are created for each test. There are no home works all semester, just end-of-class quizzes. After you feel like jabbing your eyes out for over an hour trying to pay attention to the material, Fisher gives a 10 point quiz on what was covered that lecture. Averages tended to be around a 6 or 7/10 on good days, which left Dr. Fisher stunningly surprised most of the time (kind of funny). The lab's consist of ridiculously ill-explained MATLAB lectures at the end of most weeks, and depending on the assignment, a very large amount of work. The prime example was that we had to program a MATLAB script which would take any linear system Ax = b, put the larges t value of A in the 1,1 position of the matrix, do all of the row and column swaps, put the matrix in reduced echelon form, find the solutions, back substitute, and display all of the solutions. If you didn't understand that , it's ok - it's linear algebra stuff, which for reasons unbeknownst to me BioE doesn't include in the curriculum. The TA had notes that everyone tried to follow, but at least 80 percent or more of the class ended up attempting this monster from scratch because her notes were incorrect, overly complicated/convoluted, or poorly explained. I got it to work, after an entire Saturday and > 24 hours of no sleep. Warning: If your MATLAB isn't in tip-top shape, you will struggle I promise you. What else....hmm...not much I suppose. This class just really sucks a fat one in every imaginable facet of sucking fat ones. It's really miserable. I am actually deferring my study time to write this review. I suppose I should get back to it, but I have a similar expectation of working ridiculously hard to no avail - earning roughly a 63% on the next test. What a bummer. This class elucidates why BIOE as a whole is kind of disappointing here now that I think about it. If you happen to be thinking about choosing it as your major - choose a more traditional major here and apply it to medical systems later on, I sure wish I did. FML

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting an A
zhangsta
12/23/2010

Dr. Fisher teaches from powerpoint slides which were taken right out of the book. The only information that wasn't in the book were the parts where we were supposed to do math, but those weren't too bad since they were pretty much simple integrations or first order ODEs. The semester starts off slow, but it gets faster towards the end. This semester, 55% of our grade was determined by assignments given in the last 3 weeks of class. Also, there is absolutely no point in going to his office hours because he will answer your question in the most unhelpful way that will only lead you to ask the same question again. Homeworks weren't too bad as they tended to involve math. The MATLAB assignments weren't so bad as long as long as you save the MATLAB notes from BIOE241 since you can't really count on the TAs to be helpful in any way. The lab reports are generally no more than 10 pages, and if you follow his lab report guidelines, you should do fine becaused the TAs grade the lab report exactly how Fisher outlines it in his guidelines. Also, make sure you go to every lecture because he'll randomly give a quiz or something to count for attendance if he feels like there aren't enough people going to class. The exams were what really determined our grades. Just going over slides are not enough to get an A on his exams. You need to read all the chapters covered on the exam and remember every detail because he will ask a question on some of the most random bits of information out of the book and this class in general covers A LOT of material. At least 20 points out of 100 will be a math-based question where he asks you to derive something, which is either really easy or really hard depending on how well you know fluid mechanics.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting an A
Anonymous
01/04/2010

The review posted on 10/2/09 is a little bit skewed. The page lengths for the lab reports were blown out of proportion. The lab reports were at a MAX of 12-15 pages except for the final report which was around 20 pages and was completed in a group. There is A LOT of material to cover. He follows the book very closely and condenses the book into notes on a powerpoint. By the end of the semester there are 600+ slides. The difficulty of this class is that it takes a lot of time to remember the content on the slides. Exams were 100 points and usually covered about 200 slides of material. You could say that the exams were usually hit or miss unless you really did know every detail. He looks for key words in exams which can be a good and bad thing but he's really generous with partial credit. Homework and MATLAB assignmetns alternate in due dates. 1st week = HW, 2nd week = MATLAB, 3rd week = HW, etc. Homework isn't too bad if you work with friends. MATLAB is difficult/time consuming so make sure you save your notes from BIOE241.

John Fisher
BIOE340

Expecting a B
Anonymous
10/02/2009

He teaches by the book and slid show, (very boring in his class), sometime he tried to reword the way book has for description and it just makes things more difficult to understand. He won't allow you to use computer because he don't want you to look at his slid show during class. Very computer illiterate and doesn't know how to use computer at all! Many times students ask him a question and he doesn't know the answer at all, he would say he don't know or move on with out bothering to answer the question that is related to the topic that he is teaching!! Horrible professor, don't take his class if you can help it! Exams are half short answers (he look only for key word, so any long description is wrong!) and other half is problem solving plus short answers. The average for class exam is C, so you must work very hard at the 4 full lab reports (report length: 1st 10page, 2nd 25page, 3rd 35page, 4th 35-50pages). You must have a hell of understand for MATLAB in order to get good grades for your 4 full reports, basically you must analysis your MATLAB. Good Luck!

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