Reviews of professor Neal Melvin

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Dr. Melvin is an overall great biology professor. Uses humor to emphasize important points and suggests ways to help remember the content. Lectures were very informative, I only read the textbook to clarify. I had trouble with a topic and he was easy to get ahold of and schedule a meeting for extra help. His portion of the exam was pretty fair.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Midterm was so stupid, as he expected us to remember concepts from day 1, even though he didn't post slides on Moodle?? Can not emphasize, how important it is to write EVERYTHING he says and shows in class, which is a little difficult, when you are trying to listen but also write notes????? Great at explaining concepts overall though. trash test!!

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
One of the best profs I've had. He will make you think. If you are interested in research/grad school take a course with him! If all you want out of university is an easy ticket to med school or gift A+s avoid.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
He brings a lot of humor into his lectures and teaches in a very engaging way, that requires scientific thought. He teaches you a lot about methodologies and how they apply to what you are learning (in a way you will actually remember), which I think is great! The readings are heavy, but no more than should be expected.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 3.0/5
Posts his lectures online, but often not till after class. Slides are bland so you have to take separate notes. The content wasn't too difficult to grasp but a lot of information is thrown at you in a short timeframe. His portion of the exam was fair enough, definitely had to study very hard for it though. Overall not bad, but LOTS of information.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Used humour and made important points memorable. He posted his lecture notes at the end of each week. Best strategy is to take notes of the things he says NOT on his slides, then add these notes to his slides (once posted) to make complete. Cells unit test was fair and mostly from lectures, but read textbook to fill in any gaps.

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
Somehow made Zoom lectures less weird. Assigned the dummy version of the author's textbook and still pretty thick to chew through. I used a previous edition and the publisher was too lazy to even switch the chapters around, same material. Score some brownie points by wearing an Oilers jersey to class. Or talk about his home town of Creston, BC.

Rating: 3.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
I found his class to be interesting it is extremely tho. He doesn't post slides so trying to follow along you are taking lecture notes/ slide notes and diagram notes making super hard to do all. If you do not participate he will have a harder time warming up to you. and he does oral exams to make sure you understand and are not just "memorizing".