Reviews of professor Nathan Astrof

Rating: 4.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
Had Astrof for Biochem I and II, and he's a good lecturer and helpful if you ask questions. I enjoyed Biochem I, but don't take Biochem II unless you have to. Tests are difficult, he's not generous with partial credit, and the material is extremely challenging volume wise, and conceptually. Grading system is not forgiving and there's no curve.

Rating: 1.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
would not recommend, he teach 50 slides a day and have to do 40-60 problems per week. It is important to have time management!

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
Clearly passionate. Great teacher. Exams straightforward and from slides. Issue: Amount of material. Felt rushed. 300+ slides/150 problem set questions per exam. Do every question on problem set. 9 questions on the exam out of 150 set questions. Drops hints as to what is on exam. Make the class your priority when taking it. Only way to do well.

Rating: 2.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
I got As in orgo and I'm failing this class. The exams are just way too hard and there's too much content. Very unforgiving with partial credit it's insane how there's no curve in this class when much easier classes have had significant curves. He's nice but his exams are hard and way too long for 1 hour. There's not even time to think.

Rating: 2.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
Actually do not recommend to take this class if you have job and other science classes, it is a lot of work on problem set and long lectures. The average on the first exam was around 70%.

Rating: 5.0/5, difficulty: 4.0/5
BiochemII is a huge amount of work and a huge amount of material.  More work than Biochem1. Astroff is a good lecturer and there are no surprises on exams, but you actually have to know the stuff well.  Other reviews say there's no curve - technically true but there are very large score adjustments on exams, often more than a full letter grade.

Rating: 2.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
He did not care about people who were struggling in this class. He chose his favorites in the class and only spoke to them. He uses students who do well on exams as a the grading scheme for all exams which is not fair grading. He does give extra credit but his exams focus on little details instead of the things he mentions to focus more on.

Rating: 1.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
Although he is a good lecturer, he is inconsiderate and arrogant - its very difficult to access him outside of class and some of his responses to students is just condescending. His exams are fair, but there is a lot of material to cover. His partial credit is literally 1-2/10. There is a reason why only like 70 students go from biochem 1 to 2.

Rating: 2.0/5, difficulty: 5.0/5
I took the class bc I heard he was nice but something must have happened this semester. He was not as caring as people claimed and his lectures were very dense. He seemed too stressed to be accessible and the best resource was the Saturday PGL who did reviews of problem sets. I wish I took him last year. Would recommend only if u have a lot of time