Over the past several decades, the importance of mathematics in life science research has been growing, prompting high-profile calls to reform the mathematics education of biology researchers. These reports advocate for contexutalizedmathematics courses that focus concepts actually used in life science research. In this talk, I will present how UCLA has developed a course centered on modeling and dynamical systems to directly address this need. By taking a modeling-first approach, the course uses important examples from biology as the primary motivation to study mathematics. Students first learn to write models of biological systems such as epidemiological models, predator-prey models, and cellular protein production. Taking a geometrical approach, students learn to determine the long-term behaviors of systems using phase plane trajectories and stability of equilibrium points. This naturally leads to the idea of qualitative change, or bifurcation, enabling students to study important medical phenomena such as the abnormal breathing pattern called Cheyne-Stokes respiration. The second part of the course takes a more analytical approach culminating with the Hartman-Grobman theorem (or principle of linearization). I will conclude by discussing the adoption of this course by other universities. This work is supported by the NSF grant DUE-2225258.