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BMD RES 1A

Science in Your Time

Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Exploration of current topics in biology from media sources like news organizations and TED Talks, tracing information back to primary research. Students learn to critically evaluate primary sources. Discussion of bias in system producing primary research from undergraduate education through tenured faculty, and medicine and national science funding (National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation). Addresses lack of Black and Latinx representation and its impact on science valued by current system. Letter grading.

Course statistics

Predicted GPA
3.79
n = 600 · 10 terms · ± 0.022
A range
86%
of letter grades
Taken P/NP
0%
— of those passed
D / F / W
0.5%
incl. withdrawals

Sections in Fall 2026

Not offered in Fall 2026.

Enrollment history

Final enrollment per term, averaged across that term's sections. Four years deep, summer excluded. Per-section live curves are on each section page.

  • 4921F
  • 5422W
  • 4522S
  • 7722F
  • 7123W
  • 3223S
  • 7223F
  • 6124W
  • 7724S
  • 7425S
Enrolment by term: 21F 49, 22W 54, 22S 45, 22F 77, 23W 71, 23S 32, 23F 72, 24W 61, 24S 77, 25S 74
Peak 77 Most recent 74 in 25S 10 terms on record

Grade distribution

  • A+ 189 · 30.9%
  • A 268 · 43.8%
  • A- 60 · 9.8%
  • B+ 28 · 4.6%
  • B 24 · 3.9%
  • B- 4 · 0.7%
  • C+ 8 · 1.3%
  • C 11 · 1.8%
  • C- 5 · 0.8%
  • F 3 · 0.5%
  • I 12 · 2.0%

Grey bars are non-letter outcomes — P/NP, S/U, incompletes. They are excluded from the GPA entirely rather than scored, because counting a P as a 4.0 would be a fabrication.

By instructor

Instructor Predicted Raw n Terms A range
CLARK, IRA E 3.79 3.79 600 10 86%
TURLO, KIRSTEN ANN 3.82 3.83 284 4 89%

“Predicted” is shrunk toward the course average, which is itself shrunk toward the department — so an instructor with a handful of students sits near the course mean rather than topping the list.

By term