Professor Austin did a great job teaching the class. She's also one of the nicest professors I met at UCLA. She posts weekly notes recapping the week's lecture material which helped a lot for studying. Professor Austin also offered extra credit throughout the course so I didn't feel too worried about my grade in the class. The workload wasn't bad at all, and you only had to attend around 40% of the lectures so you don't have to show up to every lecture. The lectures were very interesting and covered recent developments surrounding stem cell treatments. Professor Austin also hosted weekly office hours recapping the week's content which was extremely helpful. If you attend most of the lectures and submit your assignments on time, you should easily be able to get a good grade in the class.

Dr. Austin is the best Professor that I have seen at UCLA. She explains everything very clearly and tells you whatever is needed for exams. I wish she would teach more classes, but I am so happy that I was in her MCDB 90 class. I learned a lot, and I will never forget her efforts and how helpful she was. Thank you very much Dr. Austin for everything.

I took this class as a GE and highly recommend since I found it to be very interesting and enjoyable with a small class dynamic. Professor Austin taught this class well and clearly communicated to students on how the tests and quizzes would be. The workload was very manageable and her assignments were unique and interesting, often evoking critical thinking. My favorite one was a presentation on a stem cell topic of our choice. Additionally, her lectures were in-depth and engaging, and getting a good grade in the class is easy as long as you pay attention in the lectures. The tests include some tricky questions, but they are more than made up for by the abundant extra credit opportunities she gives. If you do happen to miss some classes, Professor Austin is also very accessible at office hours to help you catch up.

The only good thing about this class and teacher is that its an easy A. Other than that prof. austin is actually a horrible lecturer and bad teacher in general. She treats us like children, and forcibly makes us participate even when we dont have our hands raised. She is always late to class and was even late to the final, the quizzes and exams she swears will take you ten minutes and is really easy, but makes it actually difficult for no reason at all. Her final made 0 sense, it was poorly written and seemed like it was made the night before. Overall, if you're looking for an easy A but horrible experience take the class, lol. But if you do not want to deal with the headache that Prof. Austin is just take LS7A as your GE lol.

I went into this class as a non-STEM major, and while a class on stem cells seemed daunting, learning complex and relevant topics was a rewarding experience for me. Professor Austin is wonderful--she is knowledgeable and passionate about the material. Although this class is a GE, there are a lot of MCDB/STEM majors. The professor is aware of that, and at times, I felt overwhelmed as some bio topics were briefly glazed over in lecture. However, going to the professor's office hours and asking the TAs questions helped close that gap. There are numerous opportunities for extra credit, and all of the assignments, quizzes, and presentations are manageable.

I never felt like my time was wasted or that I didn't gain anything from this class. The professor changes the material each quarter and makes it relevant to current day. This quickly became my favorite class. Also, the professor selects very committed, helpful TAs.

I also want to mention that Professor Austin really values participation. I personally went to all of her office hours + occasionally raised my hand in class; I want to emphasize how important participation is to succeed in the class. She actually cares about her students and makes a note of the ones who are participating and trying to engage with the material. All in all, would recommend.

Worst professor I've ever had at UCLA (and I'm a MCDB major, rising senior, so I've taken some pretty tough classes with some pretty horrible professors). Super disorganized from the beginning, and two weeks into the course she decided to change our quiz date for no concrete reason - based on 'popular vote'. Yet when students stated that they would not be able to take the quiz on the new date due to conflicts, she stated that there would be an online option, but that we would be given 'significantly less time', as if that would somehow discourage us from taking that option, even if we had no other choice (once again did explain why we would be given less time online). In my opinion, a professor has to lead by example, and can't expect students to accommodate to multiple changes in deadlines, course structure, etc., while refusing to give students an INCH of leeway. When I asked WELL in advance if there was any way I could make up my attendance for a discussion section and lecture, due to a medical appointment, she did not even bother to respond, and my TA only responded the day after the section had already happened, only to state that "there is no makeup policy for this class". So are students simply expected to accept doing poorly in this class, not because of a lack of effort or poor academic performance, but because of extenuating circumstances they cannot control? Additionally, our assignments would randomly get regraded to lower grades with NO explanation, and the TA did not grade according to the rubric. Which meant that there was no consistency with grading, yet because this was such a small class, there weren't enough students to stand up to the professor or TA, without fear of retribution. Overall, poorly disorganized and if I had known this required class for the minor would have been taught like this, I would not have applied to the minor at all. Point blank period.

I truly like Professor Austin's class because I found that 5HB exposed me to research concepts a lot. This class is doable, the workload is manageable if you plan ahead and do not wait until the last minute to finish your assignments. Expect to have a lot of homework, mini quizzes, and assignments, but keep in mind that the worksheets are mostly graded based on effort. Of all classes at UCLA, this class is one of the easiest classes I've taken so far. Professor Tina Austin cares a lot about her students but she was overwhelmed with a heavy workload so it seems like she doesn't have much time to reply to emails, so please be patient with her! If you have any difficulties, try to stay back after class and discuss directly with her, she always welcomes students and wants to know more about her students. If you email her but did not get a response, your email might be buried in tons of emails she receives every day. If you have difficulties but do not reach out to her or do not find other ways to reach out to her, I don't think it's her fault. This class is the hardest class in BMD Minor but it's completely doable! The worksheets are designed to help you to read scientific papers and review concepts, worksheets and quizzes are only worth a small grade distribution so don't stress about them too much. She is very flexible. Sometimes, she may change some quiz dates or small things but it won't affect everyone much overall. People only complained about some random small things that make them mad here but don't tell you what she has done for the class in general. According to a review above that she changed the quiz date. I agree, but that quiz was only worth 1% of the grade, she sent out a poll and everyone agreed to change the quiz date to a bit earlier so we would have fewer materials to study for the quiz and avoid conflicts for some folks in the class. There were so many times she changes to due dates to later, was super lenient with grading, and be flexible with deadlines, and offered tons of extra credits, no one even mentioned it here! People forgot to mention that our class had the worst TA ever because she did not teach us or help us with anything at all. She also did not grade our assignments until super late and our final research proposal depended on her grading. She graded harshly and did not follow the rubrics. Professor Austin had to step in and resolve all the issues caused by the TA without even complaining or telling the class overall. I think it's not fair if some people only complain about some small things that made them not happy but do not look at the overall results and what they have gained from the class.

Note: In class, you'll be introduced to a lot of new research concepts and if you have not been in any lab yet, you may be overwhelmed at first. However, her slides are usually very helpful and she repeats/reviews concepts a lot during class. She usually reviews old lecture materials before starting a new lecture, so try to pay attention in class, review the slides after class, and if there's anything you don't understand or want to discuss further, come to her OH! She loves talking with students in the OH, it's also the way she knows you personally and gives you many helpful advice. I have learned a lot from Professor Austin's OH. Or if you have time, pop by her OH to say hi to her is fine too!

This is a great class to start BMD Minor overall! Pay attention in class, allocate your time to start and finish the assignments properly, and go to OH are my tips to rock the class!

What can I say!!! Dr. Austin is one of those professors that you will never forget in your life. This woman is absolutely incredible. She made MCDB 50 so so so so fun and interesting. She is extremely knowledgable and laidback. She gives a SHITTON of extra credit assignments like its insane lol. Just do the HWs on time and do well on exams and you'll be fiiineeee. Also, she selects amazing and very chill TAs so you'll have a very chill class. I took her class as an elective my last quarter at UCLA and it was the best decision I made in my life. Crying cuz I didn't have her teaching me biochem :((((

(If you get a chance to take her, DO IT non negotiable!!)

Also, PARTICIPATION IS IMPOrTANT. Dr. Austin has a different way of teaching which I love. She turns the class into a big discussion so you get to hear many viewpoints. Please participate a lot. Y'all love to talk a lot so this is your chance to have a great conversation with a great audience :)

This class was great. Workload is very manageable. Professor uploads notes for weekly content covered which was incredibly useful and helped narrow down what you were supposed to focus on in class so you dont need to take notes during lecture and can just listen. TA discussions were incredibly helpful and reinforced content gone over in class weekly and highlighted what you should know for quiz and exams. Highly recommend showing up for discussion before quiz's and exams as they really prepare you for them. If you arent related to anything bio related this class is very light on the bio topics and doesn't require any background knowledge on topics and helps introduce you to a ton of new content that is pretty interesting. Class is basically half Bio and Half ethics and everything is interesting enough to remember. If you need to take a GE and dont want to be bored to death take this class. Extreme amount of extra credit and the professor genuinely wants you to succeed and get an A in the class with grading being readjusted in weight to better benefit students. Professor also adjusts course to do what students are interested in she included multiple lectures on new content because people had stated that they wanted to learn about x topic. Highly recommend taking this course you wont regret it. Teaching team for this class want you to succeed and get an A which i cant state is the goal for every class.

I took MCDB 138 with Professor Austin and it was honestly my favorite class at UCLA. Not only did Professor Austin do a fantastic job covering developmental bio, she also cared deeply about her students. One time I asked a few questions during class about the lecture content and Professor Austin reached out to me after class offering additional help with the course material.
As for grading, I thought it was very fair since we were provided extra credit and our lowest graded midterm was dropped. Professor Austin also gave us the opportunity to give a short presentation to the class and allowed us to be very creative with it. She also made it easy to study for the class since she posted weekly notes with all the content we needed to know for the midterms and the final.
I recommend attending Professor Austin's office hours because she's incredibly helpful at explaining and clarifying anything from her lectures. Attending discussion was also really helpful because my TA made sure we were prepared for all assignments and exams. During week 10 the class TAs also hosted a Jeopardy game during discussion to help us review for the final exam.
The class was very interesting and fair in terms of grading. I highly recommend taking Professor Austin’s class if you have the chance.