Karl Laroche

I took his cell bio class and I will say that it was definetly challenging. To be fair, this teacher is amazing at explaining and probably the best one you will find that gives this hot mess of a class, but the workload was intense. There were pre-class quizzes, post-class quizzes, pre-labs and post-labs and labs, a full lab paper, 2 midterms, a lab exam and a final. The good thing is that he usually gives 100 on labs and quizzes, but that is probably because his actual tests are nearly impossible. They are very reading-heavy and the multiple choice questions are all tricky (you gotta use your brain, no memorization is really needed... ). However this is true for most sections of this course and it will be a challenging class regardless, so I would recommend him because he makes videos giving out what's on the exam (but you still won't guess) and also he is MASSIVELY available for office hours and VERY helpful and open to feedback. Super great teacher, probably the best for this class.

Super organized teacher. He's one of the teachers that actually understand and explain very well biology. His class is very interesting and he catches your attention. Don't study for the test at the last minute they can be challenging sometimes :)

it’s a very content heavy class because you have to learn most of the material before class so if you have a heavy workload (7 courses) it can be more challenging.. however he is a really great teacher and as a plus he doesn’t go too much in depth with the material like other bio teachers.. also he gives the topics for each question on the tests, even the final

His class is great!! If you watch the lectures or do the reading and pay attention in class you’ll be fine for the tests.

(Fall 2020 student) Karl is BY FAR one of the best science teachers I have ever had. Bio 1 is a content-heavy course, so it wasn't much of a surprise that there was quite a lot of work to do. I should note that the graded work isn't all that time consuming IF you stay on top of the material. This semester, he made it so that the course was easily done asynchronously even though he held synchronous sessions. As of the beginning of the semesterALL of the necessary materials were available online (I'm talking about review materials, extra videos, notes in powerpoint format, lecture videos he recorded, quizzes, even the necessary material for the final project. ) All of the team meetings were available online (after the fact). His tests were challenging, I won't lie, however, he made it so that the bulk of our grade was not based on our test performance. If i'm not mistaken, the module tests contributed for 20% of our grade. The final assessment, on the other hand, was worth ~40% of our grade and it was probably the best part of the semester. It allowed my team and I to better understand the material and have a support system throughout the course. I wrote a lot, but this prof is a diamond that you should absolutely take if you plan on registering for Bio 1.