This class almost destroyed me. I ruminated on dropping this class countless of times....but I am glad I did not. I will tell anyone right now, if you are not good at unit conversions, you need to master that or get out of the class. I was great at unit conversions however it was hard for me to decipher his questions as all of them are word problems. Professor Bianchi is a passionate lecturer but do not expect to get any help from him as he will divert you toward your TA. Sometimes, even the TAs had no idea what he was teaching. Despite this, I remained indefatigable and sanguine. Here's my advice:
- Do NOT lose heart. I am not exaggerating when I mean I got almost every iClicker question wrong. Just guess on it and move on, do not take them personally. Also the quizzes, they suck, do not feel bad.
- Always and I mean always, try and review the lecture over again on your own, as in UNDERSTAND the concepts and attempt the iClicker questions again until you master it.
- Take pictures of ALL the quizzes you take on canvas, these are imperative to your studying and I usually never got a 5/5 but after countless of practice....I legit aced my final and my last 5 home works.
- Do not let the grade you see on canvas make you feel dejected, I had a C for like the entirety of the quarter and I ended up getting a 94% in the end.
- GO TO YOUR TA!!! I legit had only about 15 minutes to see her because I was taking 19 units but those 15 minutes were the crux of my success. Go over any problem you have on the HW, they are always happy to help. Love you Paige.
- Lastly, do not be lazy, this class requires a lot of work (practice). Before the exams I would practice redo every homework problem at least once and glance over the quiz problems. He gives you the equation sheet. I would print it out and write down the formulas and use a different color pen to define what the variables mean, and this helps because when you are ask to find e.g. time, or productivity, you can recall equations more efficiently rather than wasting crucial time scanning through the formula sheet. Understanding what the formula means in the mathematical sense and how it applies to the learning is what counts.
- The tests are almost identical to the homework problems if not easier given the 1 hr constraint. From what I remember the tests usually have 1-3 problems with each of them having multiple parts, therefore it was absolutely vital for you understand formulas because if you mess up one part, it will collapse the entire problem. I found myself finishing tens of minutes earlier than everyone due to having just practiced the homework problems.
- To nail the understanding part of the lecture, I would go back after every lecture and reupload his *updated* canvas notes that include iClicker solutions and the end of chapter summaries. This legit saved my life more than once when I was on a time crunch and needed to get the homework out of the way, the end of chapter summary recapitulates main ideas and includes necessary formulas to solve the home works.

Lastly, for anyone who feels like this class will be the death of them, I am a grown man and I shed tears the first 2 weeks of this class....I just did what I put up there^ and it ended up being one of my favorite classes lol.

to be completely honest, this class was not in my field of interest whatsoever, but it definitely was an easy A science GE. Take it with the lab credit if you're missing that because it literally just means a weekly assignment instead of biweekly assignments. I know other professors make this class a lot harder, but Bianchi is a great professor even if his classes are a bit boring. He posts all of the lectures online and discussion attendance is optional. Extremely easy if you took AP Environmental in high school.

Professor Bianchi was an excellent, engaging, and passionate lecturer. He runs through the content quite fast, however, so at one point I realized I should stop scrambling to take notes and instead digest the lecture which helped me out a ton. I used to dislike this and thought it was an unintuitive teaching and learning style until I met one of my current oceanography professors for spring 2024 who puts into perspective how phenomenal Bianchi is.

While the lectures were great, the homework (worth 20% of your grade) was personally the worst part of the class. Despite nearly acing the midterm with a 99% and doing great on the final where I got a high B, I averaged a 60% in the homework category because of how difficult I found the content to be. This was made worse by the fact that, usually, the math-based problems were something new you were seeing for the first time. You were expected to put together concepts and equations learned from class and apply it to the homework without any resources, guides, etc. When people started going to the TA's for help, they announced in class to "stop coming to office hours for help with individual questions on the homework" because they "can't accommodate everyone." Upon receiving homework grades back, you received almost zero feedback except for comments on bruinlearn that are unorganized and difficult to understand. That left me stuck with a 60% in the homework category which is worth 20% of your total grade in the class.

This is made worse by the fact that the tests are based on the homework (except the tests are a lot easier in my opinion which is how I was able to score high on them). Needless to say, however, the homework situation scared 20 people into dropping the class by week 3 before our midterm took place.

Overall I loved the class and the professor, but I would not take this class again. The homework and the lack of resources to do well on them gave me immense stress throughout the quarter as I was always wondering "if I'm getting D's on the homework, can I even pass the exams?"

The class was generally interesting but content wise it is crazy and you don't get a lot of time to practise the materials learnt. The professor's mid term was really difficult even though I prepared sufficiently. The mid term was badly made (lots of errors in the paper itself) and from what I gathered from the TAs, he made it at the last minute as well so the TAs did not have much time to review the test. My saving grace was my TA, Paige Hoel. The final was much easier probably due to all the complaints. There are other easier classes to take out there; this class is really not worth the effort.

This is not an easy A class but it is 100% manageable if you put in a bit of work. The homework assignments may seem hard at first but most of the answers and formulas needed are on the slides that he posts. If you want an A in the class just do the HW problems over and over again until you understand how to do them. The midterm and final are literally based on the HW so if you know how to do the problems you will be completely fine on the exams. Also the field trip was fun!

This was overall a really easy class that was also interesting. Professor Bianchi is passionate about the topics and makes lectures interesting. For the most part, there is minimal lectures on policy, and it is not a big overall topic of the class.