Information | Review |
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Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Anonymous 12/10/2024 |
dr lee is an interesting professor. he tries to be funny in class which keeps it somewhat engaging at 9:30am, but sometimes he just doesn't care. he can be a little rude when answering questions b/c i think he feels like biochem is common knowledge. our first exam had a very high average (80) so he made exam 2 and 3 much harder to offset that. our overall class average before the final is also an 80, so i feel like hes going to make the final extremely hard. most assignments in this class are less than 1 point, excluding the exams, so they can really damage your grade. he goes very fast in class but when he sees we're lagging behind, he tries to go slower. i dont think his slides are helpful b/c some of the important things he doesnt write on them, so going to class is very important. he also does pop quizzes that are basically completion bonus points which help ur grade. however, he has participation stuffed animals that he throws around and if u get it u have to answer the question which really sucks. overall, he cant really teach and his exams are very difficult. i feel like i'll be very underprepared for BCHM462. don't take him unless u have to. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/22/2024 |
DO NOT TAKE HIM IF YOU HAVE TO TAKE BIOCHEM 2!!!!!!! Cannot emphasize this enough, in our whole semester we have yet to finish protein and we are behind, other professors finish proteins half way through the semester and start carbs, lipids, etc, which is vital knowledge to have for biochem 2, so do not take him if you need to advance forward. He goes super fast in lecture, skimming over topics that ultimately are very important for exams. Sometimes when a student has a question, he literally whines like a child and says he does not want to because "it will take too much time" or "he doesnt feel like it" and youll have to go to his office hours for more clarification, where he is also lazy there. Would also like to emphasize the fact that the class itself is out of only 100 points, with 3 25 point exams (one is dropped), 35 point final, 10 points of quizzes and one project worth 5 points, meaning every point off in his class is a whole percentage point. He also is snarky when it comes to exams; we had a pretty high average on the first exam which he made very fair if you went to class, studied his in-lecture practice problems, and did the gss worksheets, he did not like the high average and made the second exam exponentially harder and was happy and proud of himself when the average dropped by nearly 8 points. He is a nice and funny guy and does want to help i guess, but he is not suited to be a professor. This is the only class he teaches because he runs a full-time lab on campus, so his priorities for this class fall no where near ours as students. He has stuffed animals that get passes around the class and you WILL have it at least once a week and you have to answer whatever the question is, he will give extra credit sometimes if the answer is hard and you get it correct, but you will have to speak (and fail at some points) in front of the whole lecture. Overall, to me the class isnt horrible in my opinion, i think orgo 2 was worse because this content is definetly crammable, however, he makes it hard to study and succeed. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/22/2024 |
He goes really fast sometimes but he also does a lot of practice and review to make sure people understand it. His exams can be tough and you definitely need to study but if you pay attention in class you'll be fine. He tends to emphasize in class the kind of questions he will ask on exams. If you don't understand a topic, he is very open to explaining it to you in office hours or after class and he is pretty responsive to emails. The way he holds class is also pretty engaging and he manages to make it interesting (in my opinion at least). Go to class, don't fall behind on the material, pay attention to his slides, ask questions if you need help, and you'll be fine. The only time I've ever seen him be rude or snarky about questions is when students ask questions about material we went over a long time ago. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Anonymous 11/14/2024 |
He needs to work on his teaching. He speeds through many important concepts. We have pop extra credit quizzes that he goes over before we turn them in. Multiple people asked him to draw the mechanism on the board for the specific problem we did because they did not understand the answer. He stated, "That would take a lot of time," then moved on to teaching the next topic. I would not take a class taught by him again because he is very rude when people don't understand something and want him to go over it. He'll make snarky comments such as "study more your exam is in 2 weeks" instead of helping those who don't understand. Exams are also brutal... The first exam was fine, but he said that since the average was too high on the first exam, he had to make the next exam harder. The second exam was way too difficult to the point where everyone stayed for the entire hour and 15 minute class time to take the exam. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 05/10/2024 |
I will admit that I don't think teaching is Dr. Lee's strong suit, but I think he does his best to explain the content. His slides aren't always the most helpful, and he doesn't record lectures BUT if you show up to class you will be fine. Most of our exam questions came from practice problems that he did in class and went over. He sometimes goes through a lot of material quickly, but those don't show up on exams. The content that he repeats over and over are the things that show up on exams. Overall, this is a tough class, but Dr. Lee is really helpful if you ask him questions, and he genuinely wants to see his students succeed. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/15/2024 |
Overall pretty good experience. Pros: - Lots of review and in class practice. Takes times to do practice questions that would be on the exam and always holds review sessions before the exam. He generally teaches slower than the other professors. For example, he goes over each amino acid one by one. - Exams are very straightforward and if you studied the basics you should do well on the exams. - Lenient Grading. There were often extra credit points on the exam. There was one pymol assignment which was worth 5% of the grade and it was graded very leniently. There was also a pretty heavy curve at the end. - Fast grading. Generally you can expect feedback on exams in around 1 week from the time you take it. - Generally nice and understanding. He recently pushes for an increase in class participation, and enthusiastically teaches at 9:30 every morning, ever semester. Cons: - Slides aren't great. A lot of the practice questions are not legible the way he formats them, so going to class is important. - Less material covered compared to other biochem 1 classes. He does not cover sugars, dna, or lipids. It's all proteins. I think I had a lesser understanding of biochemistry compared to my peers in other classes. However, it does make the class an easy A. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/24/2023 |
Never left a review before but let's give it a go. Alright, I won't lie, it's a tough class. Here's my pros and cons: Pros: -teaches biochemistry that is actually used in the research field/ lab-setting. He is very practical and won't spend a lot of time teaching you concepts that you don't need/ are outdated -forces you to learn graduate-style level teaching. Not all professors will hold your hand, and they certainly won't in upper-level classes. Sometimes you have to learn to use alternative resources to learn the content and fill in the blanks, and this class teaches you the importance of that. -little to no graded outside work. The quizzes are free points (yeah a few points will be lost here and there but in the grand scheme they don't matter) and he gives you two months notice for the major assignment that's worth 5% of your grade. -he has become more empathetic about students having other exams and other class content to study for. As a result he has significantly slowed down the pace of teaching content -large curve Cons: -office hours are far away (which is inconvenient for a lot of students), and for our semester it was at very inconvenient times during the day (around 11-ish twice a week which is when I had other classes) -very textbook-dependent (if you actually want to understand the class content and its importance). You will often have to attend the lecture, and then immediately after read the textbook chapter that was covered in class. You could also do it before if you happen to have the time. The good news is that every individual lecture covered at most 5-10 pages of content and you can easily skim the textbook to get to the parts you recognize in the lecture. To be honest, not a lot of students do it, and I think that's why this class can be so confusing. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT. -the exams will be a bit tricky to follow sometimes as the professor gets a bit creative with his questions. However, if you ask for clarification, the TA (who's super nice!) or the professor will try to clear it up for you so that you have a better idea of what the question is asking. Don't be afraid to ask questions. The averages will be around 50-60% because there is little to no partial credit, making exams stressful. To be honest, this was not as bad a course as some of the comments I read before the semester made it out to be. Here's my advice: -read the textbook chapter before or after class -ask questions and actively participate in class. Blurt out the answers to his open-ended questions during the lecture and if you get it wrong you'll remember the right answer because you'll be engaged. -do the Pymol assignment (5% of your grade) as soon as you can to get an idea of how Pymol works and how to get around its features -REMEMBER/ REVIEW ENZYME KINETICS FROM GEN CHEM II -study with your peers and try to teach each other Honestly, he's a pretty smart and nice guy if you engage and participate. You guys got this!!!! |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 12/20/2023 |
As a professor he seems to be more fixated on his own research which prevents him from focusing on the class. Unfortunately for students this means you have to heavily rely on showing up to class and reading from the textbook (he will never post his slides). Even with practice problems from the text book and showing up to class the exams will kill your grade. The most alien, thought provoking questions show up on exams which you are expected to answer with a short amount of time. As almost everyone says about this class, the curve will blow your mind above a 30% is considered passing. As someone who is expected to continue with biochemistry courses I worry that perhaps I don't have a strong enough concept of biochemistry to do well in the classes following. He's a sweet professor but don't expect him to respond to your emails or schedule exam reviews. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Eliser003 12/19/2023 |
Could not disagree with the previous reviews of this professor more- his exams are NOT based on textbook, lecture or homework problems. There is no homework for this class except for weekly quizzes worth 0.75 points PER QUIZ since the class is out of 100 points TOTAL. This man lives for biochemistry and his exams are beyond this courses understand |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting a B- Anonymous 12/15/2023 |
Wow. This was a rough class to take. Let me say this, Dr. Lee is a very sweet person but I truthfully do not think he should be teaching this class. Typically, chem professors provide some type of practice exam or answer keys to midterms for us to understand what went wrong. For this class, it didn't happen. He provided us with questions from the textbook, which did help a bit but did not prepare us for the exams as much as we needed to be prepared, as only a handful of questions from the textbook were on the exam. For the first midterm, the average was pretty high, in the 70s. Dr. Lee wasn't a fan of how people left before the exam time finished and made the second exam longer, leading to many people being unable to finish on time. One question (which was from the textbook), we were never taught or provided a conversion for. Even if you did do this question from the textbook, if you didn't remember the conversion you were screwed. The average for this exam was in the low 50s. For both exams, an answer key was not provided. After being asked to provide an answer key, he told us he would have to look for it. I guess he never got around to looking. He created discussion boards for us to ask questions but would only respond to 1/3rd of them a few days before the exam. He would answer a few during review sessions but for the most part, those review sessions were primarily based off of bits and pieces of the discussion board which didn't really help overall. The final exam was a doozy, to say the least. It took the whole two hours to complete and it was rough. I would honestly not recommend this professor. If you can take it with anyone else, please do. Dr. Lee is a nice person, but not a good professor. |
Jinwoo Lee
Expecting an A+ Anonymous 06/06/2022 |
Not the worst professor I've had, and not the best. Biochem is a hard class, and requires you to study and be on top of the material. Professor Lee does test fairly (he tests the material he teaches), but you definitely have to show up to class, take notes, and study to succeed. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Anonymous 06/01/2022 |
exams are unbelievable and his slides/notes are pretty much worthless. Basically, just read the textbook, but even then there will be totally alien things on the exam. But, he himself is nice and does not make class a hostile environment (like Dr. Friedman for example). And, the curve is superrrrrr generous and it is *very* difficult to not pass (getting above a 30% is a pass I believe). Getting a good grade on the other hand is another story and will require some serious work. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Anonymous 05/13/2022 |
Allow me to summarize his style of teaching. Teaching style: -Very textbook heavy. -Each lecture consists of 50-60 slides and every slide is compacted with information. -Alway read from the slide and half of the time does not know what he’s talking about. -Does not record the lecture (so good luck with that) -Rarely post any written or annotated notes he made on the slide to elms. If he does, you’ll notice it won’t be a fews days after. -NO SCHEDULED OR EXAM REVIEW DAY. But he does answer any question that students may have on the day of the l lecture before the exam and he’ll go over them. -When you ask questions, he would often say “would do you think?” (I mean seriously if I know the answer I wouldn’t be asking the question). Half of the time he never really answer the question. -Rarely go over any practice problems yet the midterms consist mostly short answers and calculations. (I managed to get an A on the second midterm, but that is only when he posted a key to the practice problems we’ve done. AND literally whole class asked him to post the key. So, what does that mean? It means that he didn’t even considering posting the key if not the whole class asked. But the average was still below 50% for the 2nd midterm. So, I was very lucky). -BTW, the midterms and final combined are 85% of your grade. So failing one midterm will put you at most a C. Homework/assignments: -Only worth 1 point total -Mainly consists of completing the problems from the textbook, usually falls in the range of 15-25 questions. -BUT, he specifically said on the first day of class that he will only grade ONLY ONE QUESTION and give you the whole credit if you got it right and showed work. -That means if he grade the ONLY one question you got it wrong on the assignment you will get a 0. Doesn’t matter if you got every other questions correct. Quizzes -Fairly easy. -Around 4-6 points -You’ll be okay as long as you read over the slides. Midterms (I don’t even know where to start) -Consist of 2 midterms -Consist of 25 points total -Around 15 questions (some of the question consists of multiple parts) -Few multiple choices questions that is derived from the quizzes. -The rest are short answers and calculations. -Very ugly, but you’ll do just fine if you look over the practice problems he did during lectures, but as previously stated he rarely post any annotated notes to elms. So, you’re essentially screwed if he doesn’t post it. -Class average are below 50% for both midterms. So, essentially means more than half of the class failed. -But he does give out a huge curve for both exams based on the average, A lot of people are happy with that, but in my opinion you should know that giving out a huge curve is not a good thing. It means that the reason why the whole class in failing mainly lies on the professor. -I even heard that the TA struggled to grade his midterms. Final (You’ll feel like giving up 10 minutes into the exam). -Consist of 35 points -Around 21 questions (including questions multiple parts, so around 30 questions in total) -NO MULTIPLE CHOICE. ALL SHORT ANSWERS AND CALCULATIONS. -Very very ugly. It’s like taking the exam from another course that you’ve never taken. -Previous midterms and practice problems are no help. -Almost over half of the exam consist of unfamiliar questions and materials. -There will be questions that was never covered in the previous midterms. Or should I say that barely any questions from the previously exams will be on the final. Guided Study Section (GSS) -HIGLY RECOMMENDED. This is the only time I feel like I understood something from lecture. Seriously, even the GSS instructor are better at teaching. This is hands down the worst class I have since first day of college. Even Organic Chemistry I & II is lot easier compare to this class. |
Jinwoo Lee
BCHM461 Expecting a B mintman 05/18/2020 |
Do not take any classes with this man! He said our test average was too high and made our last 2 exams so hard the averages were in the 40s. Also an awful teacher and just reads off slides. |