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He has an extremely annoying high-pitched squeal of a voice. Once you get past that one obstacle, Meighan gets worse. He is extremely condescending, very rude, a terrible writer, and very unreasonable when responding to reasonable requests. His lectures are worthless to attend; he talks far too fast for understanding. Don't take his class.

terrible professor. simply terrible.

This man responds to misunderstanding with hostility. If you ask a question, its like you are questioning him. He is rude, and his exams are ridiculous. YOu can read the lab manual over, and you may pass, but he makes the exams so as to intimidate his students. Go to office hours if you dont mind feeling like a six inch tall retard.

Absolutely horrific. I would advise against taking this class and Mieghan but unfortunately, most pre-meds or science majors cannot afford the luxury.

Meighan is a miserable human being. He is a pompous, arrogant prick and his exams are way beyond what this class should be teaching, ie introductory biology. Unfortunately, he cannot be avoided so the only solution is to take a Bio 1A equivalent course somewhere else.

Since he runs this stupid class, he gets to put whatever on exams and on top of that, doesn't curve. So, be prepared or you will fail :(

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Awful, awful, awful..... super unclear and not helpful... good luck next generation... HE DOESN'T EVEN HAVE A PhD!!! why is he teaching us?!

Whining nasal voice, talks way too fast, and he's an ****. I suggest that you do as well as you possibly can on the quizzes and on the first midterm, because you will not do well on the second midterm. It's a timed, hands-on test that you can bomb even if you have memorized the entire lab manual.

Mike voice is really irritating. He keeps saying aite aite which really annoys the heck out of me. And he goes really fast in his lecture as if he has to run home to see his wife give birth but of course he aint marry. His lab exams are hard. I think he should be fired. Lab exams are totoally useless. I learn nothing and the lab exam RUIN my grade

Worst teacher of my life!!!!! He thinks that Bio 1a is the most important class at berkeley and the ONLY class that the students are taking. Lab exams are impossible, GSI's were horrible and arrogant as well. I agree with the other posters, this man needs to be fired!

The way he wrote the lab manual made makes me hate bio, my intended major. I think intro bio should be able to inspire interest, not depress it. I feel overwhelmed every week just thinkin about the 30 pages+ to read that are useless when the quizzes come. That being said, i haven't even taken the exam yet. AND i already feel this way.

You will wish you could take this separate from 1a. Lectures go so fast that you should probably just webcast it, since there's no time for notes. Only covers half the material anyways. Makes tests that are "challenging" for him, having taught for 18 yrs, and impossible for students. Excellent weeder. Lab sections: 3 hrs for 4 hr wk.

do people who think he's awesome seriously think the class is well-planned?

This is not a class that is hard for the sake of learning, but hard for the sake of being hard. Mike, although a generally nice man, prides himself of writing “difficult”, but useless tests. His lectures up to the first midterm were somewhat satisfactory, but were quite poor for the second half of the course. Also, the lab manual wad awful. I m

Easily the worst "professor" at Berkeley. Unfortunately, he's unavoidable.

Definitely worst professor at Berkeley. He tries to help but only ends up confusing his students. Not an encouraging professor.

Reviews here are spot on, Meighan is a TERRIBLE instructor. It hurts to fathom how he has been teaching this long... do they even read the student assessments of him? Lectures are just a blur of information he expects you to understand immediately; if you ask him to repeat anything he only becomes frustrated and repeats it faster than before.

Thanks to Meighan, Bio 1A became a terrible experience. Few others could have turned material so interesting into a lesson on annoyance tolerance. Lectures were generally a fact spewing session of which everyone is expected to remember every detail. I dont know how he could have became a professor after only serving as class coordinator.

The person below me got it spot-on. Meighan wants to spread his own misery and anger to students. There are profs who are worse at teaching but none who combine that with Meighan's arrogance, insensitivity, and rudeness. Meighan also managed to break down an interesting subject into plain memorization, then make it confusing at that.

just say NO. take it at a community college. I managed a B but it made my life a living hell. the material is not that "hard" but he will MAKE it hard. i don't understand why he is allowed to teach. cal adminstrators suck.

By far the most inept lecturer, if that?s what you even want to call him. Clearly he has to overcompensate for the fact that he holds no merit when it comes to research/ academics. Here?s a bright idea- how about you make the material interesting to learn, instead of having every student resent you by the end of the class. Just a thought.

While the O chem teachers transform monotony into fun, Meighan is a champion of doing the opposite. Pompous and arrogant, his only pleasure in life seems to be making students suffer. After looking at what I learned in the other classes, I realized I didn't even learn much in 1AL. The only reason it seems that way is because Meighan makes it hard.

Biology is one of my favorite topics but after taking BIO1AL with Meighan, I now hate it to the guts. I don't understand why Cal would hire such ridiculous lecturers who are incapable of inspiring students about such important topics. Year after year, 100s of students are being discouraged. Cal would be a better institution without Mike Meighan.

The worst prof. at Berkeley. Makes interesting material boring. Transforms easy coursework into difficult memorization. Then add a pompous, arrogant attitude. He proves that anyone can be a professor.

Meighan is a miserable self righteous man. He doesn't care about the students and is a staunch believer in the old, dry, Gradgrindesque "what I care about are facts" method of teaching. But he isn't even able to do that. Prepare to endure hours of random fact spewing, impatience, and unpleasantness.

Terrible professor. The class is unnecessarily difficult, especially considering the first exam. He seems scatterbrained and talks at way-too-fast a pace. This 2-unit class has an amount of work likable to 6-7 units, and it's all thanks to Mike. Add on top of all this that he seems to recruit awful GSIs and specifically puts them in the night labs.

Cares too much about ploidy.

Mike is the sole reason I disliked Bio 1AL. He's unclear, scatter-brained, disorganized. He spends a lot of time on really simple concepts, and moves past materials we've never been exposed to quickly, assuming you can follow him. He makes the tests and quizzes unnecessarily difficult - be prepared to learn EVERYTHING on your own.

very unorganized and unclear. assume you know everything. All the lectures are in a rushed style without really emphasized points.

Meighan is a very rude man and TERRIBLE course coordinator. Not only does his grading for Bio 1A make no sense (89.9% does not round to an A-), but the lab is insanely difficult for a 2 unit class. The manual is poorly written, labs are disorganized, and the exams, which he writes, are purposefully tricky (52% averages?!) luckily the curve saves

Does not care about students. Extremely hostile when approached.

As an upper-division taking 1A/1AL, I can easily say these classes are fairly useless and trivial. Prepare to spend hours memorizing random facts from slides, struggling to answer test questions unless you recall every single detail. Mike is one of the most abrasive men I have ever spoken to/has an anger problem. The material is interesting.

Very rude. Does his job as coordinator but WILL NOT let you go about your life without constantly telling you he works so hard. Its as if he thinks him doing his JOB requires us to worship him and praise him for doing the tasks he is supposed to do. He does not care about students and simply works to find new ways to trick them on exams.

As others have said, he is the course coordinator which sees him in control of Canvas and other behind-the-scenes-duties. Unfortunately, he doesn't understand how to use it which makes for an incredibly unorganized class. The class grading is frequently wrong and he'll blame it on the system, rather than learn how to properly use it.

Poorly worded exam questions with frequently incorrect answers. Students needed to check every quiz and exam for correctness or risk losing points. Students were correcting him on his final exam up until the 12:00 am grade submission deadline. Hes condescending and doesnt own up to his mistakes. He doesnt like to appear wrong.

Meighan is as bad as they come. An absolute nightmare of a course coordinator. He hates students, is condescending in Piazza, and believes he never does anything wrong. Every quiz and midterm had errors. He posted final grades without letting students see grade bins. His class management should be an example of what not to do.

The least empathetic professor I have had. The Piazza posts constantly belittle students' concerns and makes us seem like we are the problem. Mike has unfortunately made this class much worse, even though the instructors and GSI's are doing their best

I'd email him 4 times for personal problems and he didn't reply once. The grading is awful, and he basically tries to make the class as difficult for you as possible. Because there are so many students, if you mess up once, you're not really granted a 2nd chance. You would think his time as a professor would make him more understanding, but no.

Horrible course structure online, no resources for studying, unclear on expectations of what would be on the tests. tests made impossibly hard, no one I know that didn't cheat did well on the tests.

Least empathetic professor I've ever experienced. Despite being in a pandemic, his expectations of his students are the same as they would be pre-pandemic. He considers providing alternate exam times as "accommodations" when they're really just bare minimum necessities to provide for students in different time zones. Really disappointing

I try to be pretty understanding of instructors, but there's really no getting around this guy. He's the kind of guy who thinks alternate exam times and reviews are going the extra mile, and not the minimum in a pandemic. He's just a difficult person work with and feels pretty unsympathetic compared to most instructors in these trying times.

Honestly, he was just really rude when I would ask questions. His email once made me cry because of the amount of sarcasm in it, honestly just he's really condescending. The class itself is also asking a lot, 6hrs of lecture a week for a regular semester class with quizzes fairly often and chapters of text a week. Honestly made me hate Bio.

This guy is complete trash. He is so rude and condescending to students and always has to be right at the end of the day even if he clearly made a mistake on the exams. He rarely responds to piazza and emails and when he does, he makes a fool out of you which creates an environment where asking questions is discouraged. Please fire this guy.

Who is letting this guy stay? He is the most condescending and patronizing person. this course is difficult without a doubt. You must memorize every word spoken during 6 hours of lecture a week to have a shot at getting a good grade. Doesn't ever want to admit he is wrong.

As a DSP student, I interacted with Mike several times. In person, he is less blunt and seems to be a decent instructor. However, online and through Piazza, Mike is very condescending towards students. It isn't right that he brings up race, gender, and religion in emails as ways to justify course fairness and his actions. Cal should/can do better.

Extremely inconsiderate of students, not a good course coordinator. The material is already tough, but having quizzes be outside of class/discussion time makes it worse. When you take this class, you will have to devote your whole life to it. The alternative times are not good, and the schedule is inconsiderate to students.

Don't write him emails. I've never personally written him emails before, but friends who did received quite passive-aggressive responses.

One of the most unprofessional and disrespectful people I have met in my life. He is unhappy and makes sure to communicate that to his students. I really don't understand how he is still at such a prestigious university.

This class is insanely dense for a 1A course, even if you are able to understand the content, the test questions are worded so weirdly and you are expected to know such small random details. The content itself is hard enough on its own, I don't see the need to try and trick your students. Mike is also not the most accommodating or understanding.

disrespectfully passive aggressive

He's literally so passive aggressive and mean for no reason and is not understanding at all in giving extensions -- he will go an extra mile to be mean

Mike was not the main instructor for this course however he was the course coordinator. He is extremely rude, passive aggressive, and unhelpful. Told all of us that would we be unsuccessful and fail the class

dont know who gave him the right to treat and talk to students as subhuman but idk

I don't know who hurt this man, but he is absolutely responsible for why everyone hates this class. The material itself isn't bad, but Mike's approach to how the class should be run is probably the worst I've seen out of all classes I've taken at cal. The biology department never misses with horrible course structure and taking fun out of biology.

everyone i've talked in bio 1a found this guy unfair and unprofessional. he treats the students as if they're fetal masses with no cognitive ability, constantly passive aggressive and puts a bad rep on biology at cal. the way he runs the course should be studied in textbooks about what not to do.

does not care about students rather puts fault onto students saying attendance is everything. every bio related major at berkeley takes this course and can tell you how this course literally will suck the soul out of you.

This was the most difficult class I've taken at Berkeley, not due to the content but due to how it was taught. Lectures were manageable, but exams were confusing and overly detailed. When students raised concerns, Professor Meighan often responded passive-aggressively, placing the blame back on us.

This man is truly incapable of showing any decency for the intellect of his students. So dismissive, so passive-aggressive, so pompous, yet so incapable of acknowledging his own mistakes or having any accountability for himself. An absolute disappointment of a human being, I pray that you don't ever find yourself needing to interact with him.

Mike genuinely made this class insufferable, I never felt comfortable with my grade and for the final grade I was 0.20% away from a completely different letter grade, but the class would not get curved. The idea of a curve or a shift in grade bins was shot down. He was also rude when you would go to ask him questions about the class content.

DO NOT TAKE HIS CLASS

Difficult exams that reflect nothing learned in class

Mike is difficult to communicate with as he does not accommodate and is passive-aggressive when students ask questions on EdDiscussion. He made this already challenging course harder to navigate.