3.0
Quality3.9
Difficulty48%
Would Retake86
Reviews48%
Would Retake
86
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
5
22
4
15
3
11
2
13
1
25
What Students Say
“If you put in the effort to be active in class and lab, you'll do great”
BIO1141 - 4.0 rating“No lecture recordings available and lecture slides lack clear information”
BIO1141 - 2.0 ratingClass Info
Attendance Mandatory
73%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
B
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.25 avg changeRatings by Course
BIOL1140
3.2
(17)BIO1411
3.1
(42)BIO1141
2.5
(27)Difficulty by Course
BIO1411
4.1
BIO1141
3.9
BIOL1140
3.6
Reviews (86)
Dr. Osadchuk makes a lot of funny jokes and tries to make class entertaining. She wants you to succeed but some of the content was a little confusing. The lab helped a lot for any questions that don't want to be asked in lecture. The class is definitely not easy but if you study and pay attention it is not difficult to get a good grade.
Not very available to students outside of class time. Said to email her with any questions before finals and didn't answer anyone's emails. Also didn't post the study key before finals like she said she would. Very unprofessional and never apologized for it. Seemed nice but wasn't available when it really mattered
The content is not the easiest, however Dr. Osadchuk makes a huge effort to make lectures entertaining and is an overall great and caring person. She does everything in her power to make it possible for us to do well on exams and succeed in the class.
The class has pretty difficult content, but Prof O did a great job with wanting her students to succeed. She gives you multiple options to gain points back with exam corrections and even gives you 10 tophat questions that are on each exam. The labs are boring, but fairly easy. Attend lecture regularly and put forth effort, you will be just fine!
Krista is a fast speaker and her go though a lot of content in a short period so I would recommend taking notes before class. The class for non-majors goes into more depth than you would expect so be prepared. There are numerous things due each week including tophat participation, lab quizzes, pre-lecture quizzes, and in class writing assignments.
She's great! Super funny, provides a lot of extra resources and is very accessible
Professor O. was okay, there is just alot of material covered in lecture and there are no textbooks. Overall, the class was good! If you put in the effort to be active in class and lab, you'll do great!
Quite a bit of homework- weekly pre-lecture and pre-lab quizzes that are graded for credit before you learn the material and daily in-lecture questions for participation points. No lecture recordings available and lecture slides lack clear information. Exams are long and wordy and way more specific than the information presented in lecture.
She makes lectures fun and tries her best to make difficult concepts easier to understand. Slides are vague but if you listen to her words it makes more sense. A lot of out of class assignments that are easy to forget. Labs are boring but easy. Overall good professor for a subject I really don't like
This class is difficult, but honestly you learn a lot of valuable info you just have to do the work and go to class to earn a good grade. Makes you think about biology/life in a different way. Harder than your highschool biology class, but worth the effort to knwo how your body works.
Pretty easy for a bio class. Work outside class was very manageable and related. Lectures are VERY info heavy - be prepared to listen to her words and not just read the slides. Offered test corrections and released the written question for exams in advance. Labs were simple, and no lab reports required - just post/pre-lab quizzes.
She was a great professor for biology. She explained the concepts throughly and clearly. The only annoying part about the class in general was the pre/post lecture questions we had to answer. it was a lot of busy work on top of the post lab quiz. Overall, great professor, make sure you study and you should be good!
Short story she was a good teacher, but a bad person. She was funny in lecture and kept things interesting. However, she was incredibly rude if emailed privately and I was scared to speak to her because she was downright mean whenever you needed to email or speak to her.
The tests are extremely hard and often the questions are not based on what is on the slides but what she says. She covers so much in one lecture it is hard to full grasp concepts.
Prof Osadchuk wasn't horrible, but this class was extremely overwhelming at times. She covers so much in lecture that you don't even have time to write everything down and process it. Would recommend taking notes before/after lecture. Lots of pre/post lecture work on top of everything. Having test corrections was nice though.
Dr. Osadchuk explained everything really well for how hard the content was. The exams were really hard, but she offered corrections. She gave you your essay question ahead of time as well. When studying try to understand concepts and scenarios rather than memorizing anything. It's a hard course but she does her best to make it better.
Professor Osadchuk goes through numerous slides in one lecture. Personally, her slides didn't even make sense or help and I was better off taking detailed notes from the online textbook. The exam corrections were nice but the exams were awfull and information on the exams sometimes wasn't even on the slides, which was annoying. Good luck taking bio
I'm suprised by the negative reviews. Dr. O makes sure upfront that students know this class takes effort on their part. If you put effort in for every lecture, this class is manageable and you learn a lot. Biology is just hard and she tries to help. Super helpful if you have an issue or conflict. Go to office hours!
This course is very difficult if you do not put in much work or if you have a lot of other hard classes. If you are considering taking this course because someone said it was easy.. think again!! Krista is passive aggressive at times and even though she gives test corrections you still could not get all the points back.
Professor doesn't respond to emails. Class is interesting but difficult. Exams are a majority of the grade and have a written section that she grades very harshly. Pre lecture readings, videos, and quizzes as well as in lecture/post lecture questions for each lecture.
Dr. Osadchuk is lowkey super cool. Negative reviewers just hate to see a girlboss winning.
She was a good lecturer and I liked her as a person and professor, but I do not like biology so the class was a little difficult. wasn't terrible just not for me
Professor Osadchuk was funny and well-informed. It is clear that she knows what she is talking about. For a gen ed, this class was pretty hard. Lab was fun but didn't feel useful. Lots of memorization of body functions/systems if you don't already have some knowledge. She was funny and kept lecture entertaining.
Why did the department let her teach this course, shes ok at teaching the gen ed style bio courses but keep her away from this class she is not mature enough for this! Total crash out after the exam avg was cheeks, chill out Krista only makes 68 bands with a PHD lmao.
I don't recommend taking this class if you want to have a life outside this one course. For a non-major class, this was so much information in such little time and covered topics that were not talked about in the course description. Her lecture slides have little info on them. It's hard to know what to study for because of how dense this class is.
Foundations is a hard class, but at least she lectured well and I actually understood what she was talking about. Lesser of two evils for the 2 lecturers this semester. Exam averages were pretty low but I did ok by studying what I was told to study and emailing her any questions I had about course content.
Literally the worst professor I've ever had. She addressed the class after an extremely hard and poorly written exam and told us we weren't studying correctly and its our fault. It was completely her fault, she just reads off the slides and doesn't answer questions correctly. Her exam averages are always 50%. AWFUL PROFESSOR
Everyone got upset about her telling us we need to try harder after the 1st exam scores, but imo she was right atleast for me. It was the motivation I needed to actually study and I wish she lectured the second half of the course. Nice to have a professor who cares about us
Dr. O was a great professor. If you go to lecture and put effort into the class you will do well. Course content is hard, it's supposed to be. She cares about students and wants to see them succeed. Exams are really hard, but that's always going to be true for BIOL:1411, it's not Dr. O's problem you don't study well, stay mad you got weeded out
I found it hard to connect some of the topics she attempted to teach us. She gave exam corrections which was really nice, but I found the exams somewhat difficult because it was hard to put her lectures into questions.
I had previously left her a good rating but I HAVE to revoke it, girl just does not get through to the class. Takes no feedback, rude, like I tried to give her the benefit of the doubt but I can't do it anymore. She's an excellent researcher and a menace to the learning environment.
Queen Krista, where do I even begin? Prof Osadchuk gives you everything you need to succeed and is very accessible outside of lecture. Her tests are tough, but if you just prepare, they are very doable. The people who don't do well are people who had everything come easy to them in high school and never learned how to study. Welcome to college.
The WORST class I've taken at Iowa. Test averages are around 50%, which says a lot about the class and its professors. The lab is even worse, with major projects worth large portions of our grade but little to no instruction, leading to 70% averages. Grades aren't updated until after the semester is over. iClicker penalizes wrong answers too.
I enjoyed the lab more than I did lecture. Krista is nice but her lectures are very information heavy. However, there are in-lecture quizzes that you are expected to do. I found the exams to be relatively hard. I appreciate that she offered corrections but it can be stressful knowing that they are worth 50% of the overall grade.
Awfully boring lectures, hard to follow along. She goes too fast, doesn't repeat questions from students in a 600 person lecture hall, and the tests are very hard. 1st exam average - she tore us to pieces the next lecture complaining that it was disheartening to her. I had to seek outside help to even begin to understand the content.
Way too much for a gen-ed class. Lecture-heavy, moved too fast to take notes or retain info. Ripped on the class when everyone scored bad instead of perhaps self reflecting. Her amazing TA was the only reason I got any good grades. Uncooperative to SDS accommodations, and very hostile over email (never spoke in person, its a 300+ person hall).
Very tough professor, hard to work with disability accommodations, and very boring lectures
Clear straightforward lectures with good examples. Gave us a lot of extra resources to help study so we didn't focus on things that weren't important. Tests were hard.
She definitely moves fast in lecture and the tests are for sure challenging. I know this is supposed to be a hard course so I can get behind that to some extent. However, what I can't get behind is how hostile she is to students, especially over email. She'll tell the class to email with questions but then respond extremely rude. I do not recommend
I think Krista gets a bad rep but if you go to office hours, she's amazing. I love Krista during office hours, she was able to help me understand certain topics and was able to go over past exams and why I got the answers wrong. I didn't like her during lecture but office hours, she was great. She's also very understanding when you email her.
Dr. Osadchuk gets a bad reputation - but I think she's doing a great job. Lecture is extremely fast paced, and the exams are not easy, but she has always been extremely helpful and approachable during office hours or via email. She gives the class an abundance of resources to help her students succeed in a course that is difficult by nature.
This Class is horrible. If you zone out in lecture for 2 minutes you might asweel kiss your grade goodbye. Professor O is a nice person but the way she teaches makes me fall asleep. The course content isn't that hard to understand but the way questions are asked on exams is what I struggled with. I would not reccomend whatsoever...
Horrible. The lectures move at a fast pace and cover so much material in a short amount of time (50+ slides a lecture) and the tests are challenging. The lab component is also very challenging with long experiments and tough lab reports.
Dr. O is incredibly knowledgeable, and unfortunately believes her students are equally as knowledgeable. Nearly 50 slides per lecture three times weekly. Lectures are just pure information overload with little elaboration. Additionally, there is pre-lecture homework and excruciating weekly quizzes through the worst homework software available.
Her lectures are awesome and concepts explained really good. She gives an outline and a map of concepts and a header slide for each new concept, makes it easy to structure my notes. hard stuff is broken down into multiple slides and the pictures she uses for her slides are really helpful. idc about length of powerpoints they are good
This entry-level biology class is the hardest class I have taken in 5 years of college. The pre-lecture homework is difficult and quizzes take 2 hours to finish. The homework software is the worst I have ever dealt with. Lectures are impossible to keep up with and the 3-hour labs are a slog of hearing your TA talk nonstop. Horrible class.
took this class last semester and it's wayyyyyyyy better this semester. pre-lecture homeworks are kind of a pain but are helping understand whats going on in lecture. quizzes are way better than last semester exams are better too. its challenging but biology is hard so i dont know what people expect
She is awesome and so are her slideshows and lectures. Best professor ever
Taking this course after they redid it so there are 6 exams instead of 3 exams because she flipped out on her students and called them stupid when everyone was failingThis is not easier like it may seem average is 55%, the exams are confusing, trick questions, and she puts stuff we didn't learn. Never gone to her office hours but heard she's rude.
Dr. O doesn't even deserve the title doctor because she spends each lecture talking back to students, and twiddling her thumbs thinking of how to ruin other peoples days. If I had a penny for every snarky email Krista has sent me...I would no longer need to go to school here. Krista is miserable inside and out, point blank and the period.
Class is hard and she was decent but the exams are very tricky
I take zero responsability for failing, it is 100% her fault. College is supposed to be easy, who does she think she making this class challenging, smh.
I don't get how everyone thinks this class being hard is Dr. Os doing. My friend is in bio at another college and its just as hard there. Her office hours are so fun and she is nice and welcoming. Also, I've never gotten a snarky email and I email her a lot.
Dr. O is AWESOME! I don't know what these people are talking about, they are the miserable one to be honest. Can't take accountability for their own actions. English is my second language, and it's my first time taking biology, so it felt like a whole new language, however if YOU attend her office hours WHEN YOU have questions, you'll be fine.
Krista is actually a miserable person who should not be teaching this course. She gets snippy when people ask questions in lecture. In office hours, she refused to answer my friend's question. She goes way too fast in lecture and expects you to remember things that she stated we didn't need to know. Better than John Logsdon, though. Avoid class!
The BIO department has a problem that is much greater than just one professor. Dr. O is not to blame about the structure of the course but her exams are unreasonably difficult for an "Intro" course. The material is tough but they should cut back the amount of assignments/quizzes/presentations/reports required by students to allow more study time.
Overall, if you are scared to take foundations, dont be. Its really not that bad and Dr. O is great. Although her exams are tough at times that is to be expected when taking a bio course for majors. I thought she was the better of the two instructors by far.
If you actually work to stay on top of material, Dr. O has everything set up for you to be successful. Her lectures do go fast, but it's an information heavy course. She provides full lecture slides, lecture recordings, pre and post lecture problems, videos, and is super easy to access during office hours. Exams don't allow for gaps in knowledge.
Dr. O is an engaging professor and I appreciated that she was available to answer any questions in and outside of class. It's a lot of work, but if you keep up on studying, go to lecture, and take good notes, this course with her is absolutely manageable. I took this course for my major, but it might be a bit much for those looking for a gen ed.
I hope Krista Osadchuk reads this reviews and feels horrible about herself, like she made me, and so many other students feel. I have never met a professor so selfish and heartless to her students, I honestly don't know why she wanted to be a teacher in the first place. I try to show empathy for her because she has a lonely, sad life.
She literally just reads off of slides. Doesn't deserve to get paid. Goes way too fast, and had an exam in the 4th week.
We had to buy access to a textbook and quiz site for $80. Ridiculous as this is, the textbook was written by her (so guess why she wanted us to buy it so badly). The content in the book often felt thrown together, and she blamed that on her cocreator, She goes through slides far too fast.
She is terrible at lecturing, I dont know why attendance is required if it is more beneficial to take a nap than attend this. The prelecture quizzes are nice becasue they include important material... which she doesnt talk about in lecture. Loving all the exams!
I didn't take this class seriously and failed the first exam. Met with prof osadchuk and she helped me with study suggestions. I ACED THE 2ND EXAM! Use the resources she gives you and stay on top of content and you'll do great! Lectures are good too, she breaks things down and speaks to her audience at a level that makes sense
Terrible. Just terrible.
After a two week break with the other professor, I was so happy to see her at the front of the room again. I feel like I actually learn something during her lectures and she helps us understand what we need to know and how to do it.
She is the better of the two professors who teach this course. She definitely tries to trick you on the exams. Her lecture slides have pictures and animations, helping with understanding. I understood her content, but her difficult exams do not reflect that, which is incredibly frustrating.
She's just okay. Her exam questions are clearly designed to throw you off, so exam averages sit around 50-60% usually. She is a pretty good teacher, and offers us tons of help outside of class though.
Good lectures and knew what she expected us to know for exam
She is so incredibly snarky and this course is laid out horribly. Why was I doing topics in lab before we even learned them in lecture? She doesn't actually explain why things happen, just what is happening, and I think you have to know the application to know when something is going to happen or not. The textbook was more informative than she was.
She is a great professor. She goes at a great pace in lecture and her slides are very good. Her exams are hard but if you study, they are manageable. She has anonymous discussion boards on icon which she was very quick to respond to. The class has a lot of work and has a lot of content though.
Thought she was bad until the other professor started. She talks super fast in lecture and makes them very boring. However, I could tell she knew what she was talking about, and she explained processes pretty well. I did respect that she was often very honest with us and admitted whe she or the other professor made a mistake. She grew on me.
She gets a lot of hate, but honestly it's overdone. It's supposed to be a tough course. If you put the work in you'll get a good grade. I bombed a test, went to her office hours and she did a great job walking through the concepts. Use your resources, understand that this course is meant to be tough, and recognize everyone is human.
She gets way too much hate. She is very clear in her lectures about what is and is not essential to know on exams. She knows what she is talking about, and her slides are easy to follow. Textbook isn't necessary for her part of the class imo, but is for John's portion. Her free responses are straight forward and you will know what to expect.
I'd rather drag my bare cooter across the cement than ever take a class taught by her again.
If you do not NEED to take this class DO NOT take it!!!!! Im taking to all you needing gen eds and such. This class is nuts. Be ready to keep up with so much information it is stupid. You need to know when shit is due or have a good TA which reminds you. Good luck.
Had her for Foundations of Bio; she made everything about this class miserable. She had apologized to our class profusely about making the tests too hard, but didnt change ANYTHING for the next test. She was on academic PROBATION from our class for failing too many kids. Her average grade point has gone down every year since she started.
I thought she was bad until I had the other professor for this course. At least she tells you what to expect with the free response and how to practice. The exam questions are designed to trick you, the averages keep going down. Don't take this class with any other difficult class. Hard for a foundations class??
I loved having Dr.O for Foundations of Biology! She made the class expectations very clear, and was always reachable for questions. She is experienced in teaching this course, and I believe she does it very well. Put in the work and you will do well!
Krista was a grade A chiller. She had great lectures and really puts in 110% effort to help students. She responds to all emails and discussions with great detail, and is very approachable in office hours. I'm not sure why she has bad reviews. She was one of my favorite professors I have had at Iowa.
If you have Krista for this course, run for your life. She spends 1 second on each lecture slide. Be prepared to learn absolutely nothing from her. Also, she's very rude and judgy, so if you attend officer hours, be prepared to cry. If you're not religious, pick a god and start praying. She cannot teach, so start studying now if you need credit
If you have Krista for this course, run for your life. She spends .2 seconds on each lecture slide. Be prepared to learn absolutely nothing from her. Also, she's very rude and judgy, so if you attend officer hours, be prepared to cry. If you're not religious, pick a god and start praying. She cannot teach, so start studying now if you need credit
You can tell she is really trying to reshape the class and help students. Yes, the class was extremely hard but I never really felt uncomfortable with Krista's material, more the other prof. She gave us so many resources to help with the final and responded to what the students asked for in the discussion section on ICON. I appreciate her trying!
I preferred her over the other professor. Her slides were not very detailed, but the way she lectured made sense. I consistently did better on her exams than the other professors'. She is a kind person and will help you out when you ask questions. Unfortunately, this class is taught as if it were an upper-level class, which is very unhelpful.
doing her best with the relatively short amount of time compared to the amount of information she is required to test on. its not her fault the course it hard. basically just reads off the slides. Reading the textbook can be helpful, do the guided notes, Work hard, you'll be fine.
Her note guides/lectures are key for exams. Carried when it came to explaining frqs + what was needed to know for the final. Its a rigorous/stressful class but if you go to office hours, study the lectures, and do well in lab you'll be fine. Exams are tricky though so be prepared.
Class Info
Attendance Mandatory
73%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
B
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.25 avg changeRatings by Course
BIOL1140
3.2
(17)BIO1411
3.1
(42)BIO1141
2.5
(27)Difficulty by Course
BIO1411
4.1
BIO1141
3.9
BIOL1140
3.6