Spring 2027

Introduction to Epidemiology

An interdisciplinary introduction to epidemiology covering disease causes, outbreak tracking, population health monitoring, and study design.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Kara Bresnahan3.0/5

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Kara Bresnahan

Problem sets focused heavily on Excel with minimal guidance, while online honor-locked exams were described as way harder than necessary. Bresnahan did not prepare students well for these assessments, making the content harder than it needed to be.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Describe principles of epidemiology and its tools and methods

  • Calculate and interpret basic epidemiological measures

  • Describe major exposures, related health outcomes and the burden of disease

  • Identify types of epidemiological studies and assess strengths and weaknesses of different study designs

  • Interpret epidemiological evidence and identify threats to validity of epidemiology studies

  • Connect epidemiology with its use in public and global health

  • Explore how epidemiology is related to their field of interest or career path

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
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AB
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All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

PSYCH 210,STAT 240, 301, 324 or 371

NUTRSCI 379

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027
Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 1.29/5 from 7 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Past student reviews · Kara Bresnahan

Kara Bresnahan taught a hybrid course where students relied on pre-recorded lectures that were often difficult to follow due to rapid pacing and missing transcripts. Problem sets and exams focused heavily on Excel and were described as harder than necessary, with unclear questions and minimal guidance provided. Bresnahan was reported to be unaccommodating of questions and posted materials late, leading to significant student frustration.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.80 GPA, 89.4% A/AB (n=199 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.59 GPA, 76.2% A/AB (n=210 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.53 GPA, 76.4% A/AB (n=216 letter grades). Includes jointly taught sections.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

KARA BRESNAHAN is recorded teaching in Spring 2024, Spring 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 003Online (some classroom)0 / 1000

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Kara Bresnahan

Kara Bresnahan taught a hybrid course featuring pre-recorded lectures and in-person Excel activities. Students found the format required significant self-teaching, as the textbook was often more helpful than the provided slides.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.80 GPA, 89.4% A/AB (n=199 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.59 GPA, 76.2% A/AB (n=210 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.53 GPA, 76.4% A/AB (n=216 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Kara Bresnahan

Problem sets focused heavily on Excel with minimal guidance, while online honor-locked exams were described as way harder than necessary. Bresnahan did not prepare students well for these assessments, making the content harder than it needed to be.

Past student reviews · Kara Bresnahan

Students reported that Bresnahan was unaccommodating with questions, sometimes appearing annoyed or shutting down inquiries. Several reviewers noted that quiz and exam questions were unclear, and she did not always admit when she was wrong.

Topics

  • Disease causation, outbreak tracking, and population health monitoring
  • Association, causality, study design, and limitations of epidemiological evidence
  • Major exposures, related health outcomes, and disease burden
  • Applications of epidemiology in public and global health

Skills

  • Principles of epidemiology and its tools and methods
  • Calculating and interpreting basic epidemiological measures
  • Assessing strengths and weaknesses of epidemiological study designs
  • Interpreting epidemiological evidence and identifying threats to validity

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2026— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2026

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records
NUTRSCI 379 · Spring 2027

Introduction to Epidemiology

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:694:025688",
    "course_id": "NUTRSCI 379",
    "course_uid": "course_eec04fd90af6ed324aa0366d",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "025688",
    "source_subject_id": "694",
    "title": "Introduction to Epidemiology",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 3,
    "typically_offered": "Not Applicable"
  }
]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

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Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "cd7f020939bb544360599a70447f30ce6faf6f14639c1dab4b81d5ffea641df6",
  "requirements_status": "needs_review",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}