CHEM 1410

Welch is the fucking man. He's easily one of my favorite professors at UVa. He is incredibly approachable if you have any questions, and is impossibly intelligent on his course content. Seriously, you can ask him anything about chemistry and he'll give you an actual MEANINGFUL answer (not just one where professors dodge around the question and completely fail to answer the question in the slightest). His grading is more than fair, and his exams were challenging, but not impossible. This class takes effort and persistence, but once you understand the base concepts (which can be very intimidating), doing the actual chemistry is very straight forward. Welch curved all of our exams (which were take-home/online) so myself and most of my friends did really well in the class. His lectures are designed pretty strategically. Basically you do the reading on TopHat and answer the online homework questions BEFORE you go to lecture that week, then during lecture he goes over all the material to solidify what we read. This class is heavily independent and it is important to try to understand the TopHat readings as much as you can before going to lecture, so everything welch discusses is just gravy on top to cement the content. He's understanding and knows that the content can be challenging, but from my experience, I felt like the content wasn't necessarily challenging, but just very intimidating at first glance.

Overall, Welch is an amazing professor and everyone should try to enroll in his classes. He's incredibly intelligent, passionate, approachable, and fair. Don't get me wrong- you can easily fail this class if you don't try your ass off, but its not impossible like a lot of people make it sound.

I agree with everyone else below, Welch is an amazing professor because he is an amazing PERSON, however, I don't really like his teaching. He taught very surface level which was frustrating because every lecture he never got to the most difficult parts of the required TopHat readings. He did though, explain the surface level concepts very well... Overall, I did not like the TopHat format. The TopHat readings were often difficult to digest and read, and it doesn't help that Welch doesn't thoroughly go through the more difficult parts of the readings. I also did not like the EXPO format. They say group work helped the TAs a lot, but I honestly think they're bluffing. All anyone wants to do in EXPO is to hurry up, finish and LEAVE. (EXPO is basically discussion for chemistry done on TopHat)

On your busiest WEEK, you will be required to do TopHat readings and questions, Writing to Learns (basically a two-page essay about chemistry concepts you probably don't understand and find 25 other students in the same TA office hours trying to also figure them out), Individual Exam Questions (which I promise you are the most difficult out of textbook questions I've ever taken), Group Exam Questions (which you take your individual exam answers and bring them to EXPO and agree on one answer, this was a huge grade booster and I was hard carried by my group lol), and the actual in-class exam that is somewhat doable - did I mention you do this all in one week, three times?

However, as a professor, he is the most approachable, easy-going professor I had. You can feel it during his lectures that he's a pretty nice dude. Also, if you miss a TopHat assignment he's more than happy to open it up for you again on the spot. I don't think he even asked me for an excuse, which I thought was nice. This review was mostly for the style of the class. If what I mentioned above is not the type of style you prefer than I would not pick Welch just because of his better rating. I am currently taking Morcowchuk for CHEM 1420 and it is a style I much prefer. She's also not as bad as everyone said she was, she's also nice as anyone else. I think there were a lot of negative things said about her and negative reviews, but I believe that she has gotten better. It's more traditional but straightforward. Three lectures (50 Min.), Mastering Chem HW questions (MAX 3 Hours (which is the same amount of time you would combine EXPO and TopHat homework, etc.)), and Exams. Nothing else.

I remember talking to Welch after the first semester was over to ask if there was any way I could join his class (it was full after the first two days of enrollment, rough time for a first-year like me). He said he couldn't do anything about the limited capacity and admitted that Morkowchuk's exam scores are better than his that semester. Take that as whatever you want it too.

In conclusion, choose the professor for the style you most fit!!! Not the actual professor!!! Chemistry concepts will always be hard to understand without your individual hard work and ALL the professors and TAs are resources to help you understand! Good luck.

I took this course with Prof. Welch as a prerequisite for a bio major. Honestly, I didn't enjoy the class, but that's partly just because I don't like chemistry and mostly because I hated the Tophat textbook format. Professor Welch is probably the best intro chem prof there is - his lectures are very engaging and he really communicates the subject matter well. He's also really nice and easy to approach if you need clarification. However, he's using the Tophat Expo format, which I'd say is a downside. Tophat is a textbook platform you have to subscribe to, only to access extremely long, typo- and error-ridden chapters that don't always help you learn the material. Instead of having lectures twice a week, you have lectures on Tuesday and expo on Thursday (a sort of group-work on Tophat day which is supposed to make you think more deeply about the subject to better understand it. Honestly, I didn't get anything out of expo). However, between all the tophat assignments for the chapter, expo, and weekly assignments, you do get a bit of a grade buffer. The exams take place over three days; the first part is an individual in-class exam, usually pretty straightforward. The second part is an online, open-book exam, which sounds good until you've spent hours on five questions (they make them very detailed and you have to have minute understandings to answer). The third part is reconvening with your expo group to re-answer the questions from the second part as a group. The final was harder than I'd expected but not ridiculous. Overall, this class was a bit tedious, but it's required for many, and Prof Welch makes it a lot better than it would be with only Tophat. I'd definitely recommend taking this class with Prof Welch.

Enjoyed the class. Had no prior experience in chemistry and barely ended the class with an A-. The textbook is online which was a little frustrating for me. This class is more conceptual than the second semester. Welch is a fun and engaging professor. However, I like having three days of lecture with Morkowchuck in the spring because it kept me engaged. However, if you are very self-motivated, you will do fine.

I got an A in this class but I don't think Welch had anything to do with my success. I knew a lot of the material coming in because of AP Chem (didn't take the exam nor do I think I would have gotten a 4/5). This class is heavily self-taught through a really crappy online textbook called TopHat that is ridiculed with grammar mistakes, typos, and is overall just a pain to use. The class itself isn't too hard if you read the book and try to answer the questions in the chapters and assignments to the best of your ability. I would suggest taking detailed chapter notes because lecture is very pointless. I don't think I learned a single thing via Welch instead the textbook was sadly the main teacher. Expo is dumb but it's a relatively easier format I've heard than Morkowchuck's traditional but I think starting Fall 2020 it's all Expo style. The first 3 exams aren't too difficult but the final is a lot more challenging. I averaged a 95% on the first 3 exams and got a 78% on the final. There are a good amount of grade buffers with participation and writing to learn. Overall stay ahead of the readings and prep well for the final and you should be good! Good Luck!

If you don't need to take this class, don't. But, if you do, 100% take it with Professor Welch. He is, by far, the best and nicest professor who teaches this course. This class started off very difficult, but it gets much easier as the semester progresses. It is very confusing at the beginning because the professors use so many different platforms for grades, assignments, and lecture videos (multiple Microsoft Teams channels, TopHat, Gradescope, Collab, etc). Once you get through the first few weeks, the class isn't as bad. The tests are fairly difficult. Each test is 3 parts, so it feels super drawn out and takes up so much of your week. The first part, in my opinion, was very easy. The second and third parts are the same questions, but you have to do it first individually and then with a group. These parts are very difficult. However, with enough Googling, you can figure out all of the answers.

My biggest tip: go to a bunch of TA office hours at the beginning of the semester and find out who is more willing to give you help. Keep going to their office hours throughout the semester, and they might even help you with some of the harder test questions for part 2 and part 3 (they don't have a time limit).

If you've taken AP Chemistry, this class won't be too difficult since a lot of the material overlaps. The hardest content is at the beginning of the semester and I recommend watching Khan Academy and the Organic Chemistry Tutor videos to help.

Since this course was online this semester, the structure was a little different from the listed times. I had asynchronous/ pre-recorded lectures on Sunday (rotated between the four different professors each week), an optional Monday lecture, and a problem-session "Expo" on Thursdays. The Monday and Thursday classes were the ones listed in SIS, but it was a lot more work than I expected. Welch is a great lecturer and pretty fun. #tCF2020

Welch is a great professor. He explains concepts well and is a nice guy. I had experience with HL IB Chemistry. Overall the content is pretty easy except for a few difficult chapters and subsections. This class has a really weird format, and you ALWAYS have work to do. A lot of it is group work, so keep up with your group. You can boost your grade with the TopHat and Gradescope work, so I recommend you do all of those too. #tCF2020

This is a difficult course that heavily relies on an online textbook TopHat, and weekly group work during expo sessions. I know most people would disagree, but I found TopHat pretty useful in teaching the information. The reading was easy enough to understand and the TopHat questions tested my knowledge on the reading. That being said, TopHat did not help in teaching me how to apply the stuff we learned, which was basically asked on all of the exams. Expo was really based on your group. If you had a good group, you could actually learn from each other and teach each other about the difficult concepts, which is incredibly important for the exams, as they all have a group portion, except for the final exam. I thought Welch was a great professor! He goes over frequently missed TopHat questions and answers any questions during lecture. I wish I attended them more, they are pretty useful. I would recommend taking this class with Welch because he is extremely nice, attainable, and helpful. You don't need to have prior chemistry knowledge before taking this class, but it really helps if you do. The first real chapter hit like a truck and everything just built on top of that, so keep up with the readings and all the TopHat questions! Also, don't forget to do the Gradescope quizzes. I took this class as a premed requirement and I wouldn't recommend taking it unless you have to. #tCF2020

I loved this class. If you actually study and go to TA hours you'll be fine. I'm pretty sure TopHat is written by the professors and it sucks at delivering the content we need to learn for this class. I would recommend doing your own in-depth research on things that you do not understand. It not that hard to get an A if you take the time to review and understand the content.
TIPS:
- I would also recommend taking DETAILED notes on the chapter notes, it comes in handy for the midterms and final exam so you don't have to reread the chapter books all over again.
- After reading the chapter notes, go to TA's office hours and try to clear up anything that you don't understand. The earlier the better.
- Our exams are split into 3 parts (1st individual portion (20-30 questions), 2nd individual portion with only 6 questions or so, group exam). Through the semester these three parts are weighed differently. The first exam will be weighted (20%, 10%, 70%) and fluctuates throughout the semester. I recommend that since your group portion is weighed heavily (on the first exam) if you do not like your group, please change. Your group should not be determining if you pass or fail the class, welch will understand.

If your wondering about exam distribution:

The second part of the exam is weighted at 10% in all the exams because it is the hardest part, we usually average on the lower scale.

Exam one ( 20%, 10%, 70%)
Exam two (45%, 10%, 45%) i think
Exam three (70%, 10%, 20%)