CHEM 1410

Please keep in mind that this class is meant to be a weeder class and is supposed to challenge you! At first it will seem extremely overwhelming, but as long as you keep up with the weeks' content and review all the Tophat assignments before the exams (pro tip: go to ALL the TA review sessions and take notes during them!) you should be sitting pretty well. I enjoyed the testing format for this class- the three sections (one individual, one group part completed by yourself, and one group part completed with your expo group) were weighted differently for each exam and made the transition to the individual exam weighing the most much less stressful.

This class seems very overwhelming at first but after the first few weeks you really get the hang of the format. Pretty much every week is the exact same schedule/format except for exam weeks with only the chapters and material varying each week. The textbook reading can be confusing at times which is stressful but once you watch the lecture videos and answer the associated LBLA and Expo questions the material often seems much simpler than you initially thought from the chapter. Professor Stains is a great professor and is readily available to help with any questions you have, she even joins each expo group for a short period of time to make sure things are running smoothly and to offer assistance. The format of the exam changes so that the individual portion of the exam gradually increases in weight as you move further into the semester. This is nice because it helps take the pressure off of the individual portion of the first exam. The group portions of the exams are tough but manageable as long as you learn to work well with your groupmates. When studying for the exams make sure to look back through previous tophat questions and to understand the concepts mentioned in the portfolio. If you put in the effort to make sure you get all the points you can for tophat assignments and study for exams it is definitely possible to get an A.

Professor Stains is by far the best CHEM 1410 instructor! She does a really great job at explaining complex topics in the course and is always quick to respond to any questions or concerns you send her way. I switched out of CHEM 1810 two weeks into this semester and she was really understanding while I was trying to catch up on missed work from the first two weeks of the course. I ended up with an A- as a result of the three exams, final exam, and Expo/textbook questions. But as long as you attend lecture, take good notes, and actively particpate in your Expo session, I think that this class is very manageable.

Prof Stains was a great professor for my first experience with college chemistry. She's very enthusiastic about chemistry, and she's always very cheerful and has her funny moments when lecturing. Her lecture style was by far my favorite compared to what some of my friends had with their 1410 professors, as she always prepared informative and easily understandable lecture slides, which she mixed in with PollEverywhere slides where the students would try to solve problems together. She also put in the effort to have slides covering trouble spots in the previous week, which were often very helpful. While I never had to reach out to her, she always seemed very kind and receptive to everyone.

The coursework covered was always a head-ache inducing confusion when trying to first understand it with the textbook reading, but after taking good notes at her lectures, actively participating at the Expo, and working on the weekly assignments, I was always able to have a relatively solid understanding by the end of the week. Overall, this class was as not as hard as I thought it'd be, and I'd definitely recommend Prof Stains!

If you have Professor Stains, this class is not bad at all! Her lectures and reviews honestly can be a little repetitive if you felt like you understood the textbook material, but I would still recommend going in case you missed anything or need more review. My only chemistry experience was taking chemistry (non-AP) my sophomore year, and I still felt like everything was pretty clear, especially since she goes over the topics people struggled with during her lectures. It's definitely possible to do well in the class if you just do the work (and put in a little studying before exam weeks). #tCFfall22

Dr. Stains is absolutely amazing. She is the sweetest professor ever. She cares a lot about her students and will take the time to explain and re-explain difficult concepts to you. She has the patience of a god. Her lectures are pretty straightforward, all the information you need is on the slides. The textbook readings are very difficult though, more so than the exams or the questions she asks during lectures. Portions of the textbook don't even correlate to what we learn in lecture, so don't spend too much time using it to study because it really won't help you for the exams. The LBLA and BIT are ok, they can be difficult at times to definitely try to have a good study group that you can ask for help for difficult questions. Also try to ask as many questions as possible during expo because many of those concepts will turn up on the exams. The exams were open note, so the exam question involved a lot of critical thinking about why a phenomenon occurs and how certain properties give rise to characteristics of chemical compounds so make sure you focus on those topics when they come up in expo. But the class isnt that difficult overall as long as you go to lecture, pay attention, and take notes.

Dr. Stains was not bad, probably the best option for chem 1410. Some aspects of the course itself are annoying though. Online readings are long and contain required questions. Oftentimes the content doesn't really correlate with expo or exam questions, so you find yourself lost and having to make assumptions. The course is structured for you to 'learn as you go', but this can make assignments hard to complete with asking for help. Exam questions were sometimes unnecessarily detailed, sometimes with each multiple choice option only being slightly different. It was difficult to study without knowing what concepts were most important. Only understanding the gist of concepts also isn't enough as questions were almost always application-based. Overall, the course is definitely passable but you will have to work hard to get a solid A. I ended up with an A- putting moderate effort in. I know a lot of people struggled to even get an A-.
Warning, future exams may be on paper instead of online. Midway through the semester Stains changed the exam format due to cheating (even though the exams are supposedly open note and internet).
#tCFF23

Dr. Stains is a good professor. Her lectures are very informative, and it’s wonderful that she posts them view later. The course is taught very intuitively, and the assignments are all designed with learning and retention in mind. Dr. Stains can be hard to understand at times during lecture as she has a rather thick accent, but being able to watch lectures back later made this easy to get through. The expo portion of class was very well organized, and so long as you have a solid group, it will be a great learning opportunity. This semester Dr. Stains and the other CHEM 1410 professors found great issues with cheating, which led to the exams (which were online and done at home prior) to be done in person in the lecture hall. Another CHEM 1410 professor (Welch) allowed his students to continue the online exam while Dr. Stains had her students take it in person. I think this situation was handled poorly by the professors of the course as a whole, but Dr. Stains made efforts to ensure that grading of exams was fair and no student would be disadvantaged by the format of the exam. This was an annoyance, but I found that it made me study harder and retain more information.

If you're going to take CHEM 1410, I suggest you take it with Professor Stains. I came into UVA having a terrible high school chemistry experience, and this class cleared up my misunderstandings. This is a difficult class, but if you have to take it, I would with Stains. The general consensus that I've got is a lot of people like Stains and how she teaches, but the subject and material is difficult so a lot of complaining happens. I feel like Stains is a very good lecturer and understands what concepts are difficult for students, and she specifically covers these in depth in the lectures and problems for the week.

TLDR; Stains good, class structure really bad.

Stains is very nice, but the class itself is really bad at teaching chemistry. The class is set up like this: before class, you have a weekly chapter reading with questions. Stains skims through the notes, teaching the information that students had the most trouble with. You'll have some individual assignments due by Friday and an in person expo with group work. On the surface, as a class, it is relatively light compared to other stem classes. However, there are quite a bit of departamental issues with the class that make it unreasonably tough and dense to learn from:

1. The textbook - although written by UVA professors, it is very bad. It is somehow extremely convoluted and simultaneously not enough information. While the questions you are asked for the readings due Sunday (based on the chapter) are relatively tame, trying to learn the content for the work in this class is way too tough.

2. The lecture - Stains is very good at using her time, but for the majority of students, learning solely from the textbook (which is expected in this class) isn't enough. More often than not, I'd find myself guessing on expo/out of class work just because I had no idea what I was talking about. Personally, I'd prefer to have more lecture time.

3. The exams - they are open note and online (except for one exam for us because of a cheating scandal lol), but don't let that fool you. They are tough. A lot of the content on the test, especially the parts done with your expo group are way, way too complicated. Many of the questions don't have concrete relationships with the notes (i.e., with the information that I was taught and from the notes, I felt uncomfortable with most of my answers I chose on tests). I understand why they did this (because it was open note), but I didn't feel like I was being tested on my knowledge of chemistry, if that makes sense.
#tCFF23