BIOL105

In college, as many of you already know, the class title often reflects the difficulty of the class, and the number of units reflect the amount of time you will spend working on material outside of class. As always, science is the exception of these rules.

For all 3 unit classes, you are expected to spend 2 hours working outside of class for every one hour in class. Science courses on the other hand, require 3 hours. Also, the average (non-science) class is about three hours a week. Science classes often have three hours of lecture AND at least three hours of lab. Some science courses, such as CHEM109, even have a one hour discussion on top of the six hours of lecture and lab. CHEM109 at least knows it demands much of your schedule and is a rare 5 unit class. But the 109 means it is the lowest of low division. This class is inferred (based on its title)to be a freshman level class. Which is an outright lie. CHEM109 is considered to be one of the hardest classes to complete. CHEM109 is a prerequisite to BIOL105.

Now, BIOL105 does not have quite the reputation CHEM109 does. However, it is on the long list of impossible 100 level science courses. At least, I have now placed it on the list. Along with: BOT104 (General botany), CHEM109, and various others that I don’t care to think about.

The life sciences are my personal hell, just due to the way my brain operates. However, the reason BIOL105 has reached the list is because of the dreaded fly lab. Every science major on campus knows of the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) lab. The lab consists of 100% outside of class group work, where you must determine the sex, the eye color, and breed various mixtures. This is a 13 week process during which you must ID over 20 tiny, ugly fruit flies. At the end of this massively frustrating project, our entire class compared data. Not a single group (of the five) got remotely close to the predicted results. Basically, not a single person got the results right. And now we have to write a lab report about it.

I effing hate Drosophila melanogaster. Even more than Fenniculum vulgare.

Emily Treat