Professor Bennoun is goated. Mbappe in the World Cup final type of goated. You only get one homework and one lab assignment per week, which is completely manageable. Midterm and Final is fairly easy to study and prepare for. Most learning is done by doing the homework. If you do the homework honestly and look at the answers after the due date then you should be fine. The coding is not too difficult, you just have to be patient with it. Overall, I would take again and recommend, but this class is not for those who like to complain when faced with a bit of difficulty.

He taught LS30A so good that he tricked me into taking 30B

Professor Bennoun is an amazing professor and he is generous. He switched our bonus from 0.5% to 2.5% after finding out that Professor Shevstov let her students gain back points for their midterm. He's great at teaching, but please don't think this class is an easy A. A lot of the reviews from the past were from COVID so they took it online. In 2022, the grade adjustments were made so it was also easier for them.

Textbook: You don't need to use it all.

Lectures: Go to the lecture and make sure you pay attention, especially during the clickers. A lot of the concepts from the lecture show up on the midterm. When Professor Bennoun explains concepts, make sure you understand them and you're able to write down what the concepts imply when you take your tests.

Homework: Going to the lecture alone wasn't enough for me to complete the homework successfully. I went to office hours each week. I highly recommend Micah Vinet's office hours if he's still a TA by the time you see this. He has the most students coming, but he does the problems on the board and it starts to make so much sense. I received 100% on each homework assignment AND I understood everything thanks to office hours.

Midterm: It was so bad for me. I got a C- and I thought there was no chance of me getting an A, let alone an A+. I studied a lot, but I feel like I didn't study right if that makes sense.... The practice midterms were not enough and were way easier than the actual midterm.

Labs: The labs were easy at first but they got pretty difficult. Make sure you try to do as much as you can during lab sections and don't be afraid to ask your TA for help. It's their job and all of them are friendly.

Lab Practical: The lab practical was easy because I studied the past labs, but it took me a while to get the hang of it. Start early and keep practicing until you feel like a pro.

Final: When I flipped through the final, I was so relieved. I think Bennoun and his team realized that we struggled a lot on the midterm, so the final was fair. I got an A on the final and I studied by going through the past homework, doing the practice midterms, and attending office hours. At one point I attended four office hours a day. It was a lot of hard work but it was worth it in the end. Also, the TAs are so generous when it comes to grading the exams.

The reason I got an A+ in this class is because of Bennoun's grading schemes. Two grading schemes take away the midterm and increase the final exam percentage from 35% to 60%. If you do badly on your midterm, don't think it's over. An A in this class is so doable, but it's not extremely easy. Good luck!

Dr. Bennoun is a very helpful professor. He speaks clearly and is easy to understand. He teaches topics from the basics and builds it up so it is easier to grasp the concepts. The class is generally easy, however the concepts and the coding can definitely be a bit challenging to grasp. I'm taking him again for LS30B next quarter because my experience was so positive! And if enrollment is anything to go by, his class always goes away first.

I'm convinced that this man's spirit animal is the GOAT.

This class is NOT extremely calculus-heavy, more-so applications of those concepts in actual biological scenarios. The first couple of weeks had almost no relation to calculus so if you're behind, it's not too big of a deal. The midterm and final were extremely easy if you actually understand the material (don't memorize the formula, know why they work).

The python coding labs are not as challenging as you might think! I had absolutely no prior coding experience and still managed to breeze through them. The trick is to actually READ the labs, because they often give you the answer and you just have to reapply it to the context of the problem. The labs can be pretty engaging and fun with the right mindset, and they're really good ways to strengthen your problem solving and logical skills.

Professor Bennoun is an excellent teacher and a very considerate person. If you can, I would highly recommend attending his office hours, because he can teach the material efficiently and help you UNDERSTAND the material instead of just knowing it. Due to the TA strike, Professor Bennoun made two critical changes: replacing the lab practical with the lab grade (essentially increasing how much labs were worth) and changing the cutoff for an A from 93% to 90%. In my opinion, this made the class a lot easier (almost trivial) but it goes to show how considerate this man is. Even if you're not skilled with calc/coding, this class is really manageable and I'd highly recommend taking it with Professor Bennoun.

Only take this class if you already have experience with calculus!! Bennoun is a kind, good lecturer. However, his tests are unfairly hard and he often gives long homework assignments that feel like busy work.

LS30A was definitely a struggle - this was pretty evident based on the overflowing office hours that kept increasing in attendance as the quarter went on, and sentiments from friends/peers. This class is not curved, so you really need to have a solid understanding of all the concepts to do well. The midterm (for F23) was extremely challenging, like some others mentioned - I studied literally so hard for it, thought it was difficult (everyone did), and got an 81%. However, Professor Bennoun has 3 different grading schemes that you can use to get the best possible grade in this class - which is really nice. I got a 99% on the final (I thought it was way easier than the midterm), so I was able to pull my grade back up using a different scheme. The lab portion of this class is also pretty challenging, especially for people with no coding experience (basically everyone). They start out pretty simple and guided with a lot of instructions, but they get harder pretty quickly with less instruction and more "figure it out on your own"! It also didn't help that labs were almost nothing related to the class/lecture content. Therefore, I thought the lab practical (the coding "final" of the class) was pretty difficult, but I still got a 90% somehow through generous partial credit, I guess. Ending with some tips:

- GO TO MANY TA OFFICE HOURS. Pick your favorite TAs, and go to their OHs every week. And don't just go to get answers to your homework and labs. Try to really understand and learn from office hours, because if you're just copying the TA's answers, you won't do well on the exams. You have to know what they're doing and be able to replicate the work/concepts yourself.
- Study consistently for this class - try not to cram before exams. Review your lecture notes after each lecture, make them more organized, and see if you understood everything.
- Try to get help on and understand the labs and the *meaning* of the code. Again, you can copy code from peers and TAs who help you, but you'll have to understand it when the lab practical rolls around in week 10.

Overall, an interesting and doable class that requires a lot of hard work and persistence. I did have a breakdown in one LS30A lecture this quarter because I was so overwhelmed. Just know it'll all work out and be fine in the end - all you can do is study hard and try your best. You got this!

Bennoun is an interesting man, and don't worry about his accent: you will understand.
Textbook: he gives you a pdf of a textbook, so no, you don't have to pay for that and I never even used it.
He has lectures with mandatory attendance (taken with Clicker questions, but he gives you extra credit for going to 16(?) of the 20 lectures. The clicker questions are pretty helpful to get a good grasp of what you're learning in class. For iPad/tablet users, he has a pdf of the day's notes on Canvas that he fills out throughout the lecture, which made the class engaging. He also stops frequently to ask if anyone has any questions and tries to get the class to participate, which I thought was really nice, but then again, he is an overall nice guy. He also does record lectures, which are helpful if you missed a class or want to revisit something.
There's one weekly 8-question homework assignment, though I *heard* that his 9am lecture got fewer problems because he was doing some sort of experiment, but I'm not sure how true that is. However, after the midterm, everyone did end up getting 8 questions for homework. I think the only time he didn't assign homework was week 10.
Content-wise, if you took AP Calc AB, or some sort of calculus, this class should be a breeze. If not, it's still doable as long as you know how to do basic math (adding fractions, which, surprisingly, a couple didn't know how to do). There's some new content either way so you will still be learning something new, even if you took calc before.
One midterm and one final; he posts 3 practice exams for them, which you should definitely do, as they're good practice for the actual thing. I thought they reflected the content on the actual exams pretty nicely, but you really have to pay attention to the wording of some questions. I also liked that he gives partial credit for questions, so even if you have no clue what to do, just write something remotely related to get any points you can. They are doable, but you have to dedicate time to doing the practice exams and past homework assignments. And don't leave all your studying to just one or two days before the final. Just don't. I'm not 100% sure if he curves, but I know he will round you up to the next grade (so like B to B+) if you are SUPER close to it, which is why I recommend doing the extra credit.
Labs are 1 hr 50 min, mandatory attendance, and they are soooo unrelated to the actual course content, but python is a pretty good skill to learn. You do have to pay just under $18 for it, but it's a required part of the class. Even so, they are tedious and annoying, but you work in groups so you can and should work together. You often finish before the class is up anyway and get some practice problems at the beginning of class that actually look like what you've been learning in class. For written questions in the labs, be as thorough as possible. I know it's annoying to describe something so clearly obvious but describe everything to get full points. You can also always ask for the TA and LA for help. I'm not sure about other TAs, but I had Ajay C. and I have no complaints about him. He was super helpful.
Another thing I recommend in going to office hours, whether to the TAs' or Bennoun's. I'll admit I only went once like the day before the final and I still got an A in the class but they were actually so helpful and you get to meet other students that way too.
He has two grading schemes, and apply whichever of the two gives you the higher grade.
I can't say anything about how useful this class was for LS30B since I didn't end up taking it, but I have to say I agree with everyone else that says this math is made up because it's so stupid and even though he gives you examples of real world applications, you will probably never use this again.
Overall, I'd highly recommend his class, especially over Shevstov's (I heard her class was hard).

I definitely prefer 30B rather than 30A. There's one midterm & one final. Bennoun was so much better at teaching. I'm sure if you attend office hours & ask for help, you can definitely pass this class with a better grade. The only thing that sucked was that the homework is based on accuracy. The workload is manageable but the labs have always been useless to me. We did have a project in lab based on a model of your groups choice and we had presentations during week 10. Also, he does take attendance through iclicker.

First of all I would like to say I enjoyed this class a lot more than 30A because the material was more math based and just easier to understand. Everyone says 30A is a lot easier but I disagree. However, Professor Bennoun teaches 30A a lot better than 30B so be prepared to be confused in lectures and to teach yourself when your trying to solve the homework problems. In lectures, he goes over very brief concepts but the actual material you need to know for the final and midterm go in a lot more detail. The midterm was pretty easy for this class, but the final was a lot harder. No matter how much I studied, the final covered questions that were meant to trick you, content that you briefly covered in lecture and overall just a difficult test that is worth 60% of your grade. Luckily I did better than I thought which saved my grade. Additionally, the labs for this class are a lot more difficult than 30A and most of the time you're not going to finish in section. Especially the last few labs are very difficult but if you get lucky with a good T.A. your life will be so much easier. Lastly, the capstone project was not bad at all and was extremely doable since the TA's allowed the students to use Chat GPT for it.