CHEM 3811

This class is the most poorly coordinated class on earth. If physical chemistry lecture requires a hidden pre-requisite of being a math and physics double major (ode, linear algebra, calc 3, introductory physics, modern physics) and a natural talent of covering two semesters worth of quantum mechanics from the physics department in 12 weeks, then physical chemistry lab is a dumpster fire. Why? Because this class is damn impossible. Nobody in this class knows anything what's going on, and it's because the concepts involved in physical chemistry is way beyond the scope of the class that the lecture is covering. Each week the requirements gets exponentially more demanding, to a point where I think half-way across the semester it's almost impossible to complete the lab unless you are literally taking this single class for the entire semester. Matlab is used extensively throughout this class, and about 80% of the class has never heard of coding. Yet, we are doing non-linear function fitting in week 3, and doing tasks that a 3rd year CS major probably would have difficulty doing. The lecturer encouraged students to actively use ChatGPT as a guidance for help in terms of coding. Interference of optics is covered, which to this day makes no sense why it is in a physical chemistry lab. We are using oscilloscopes and nobody knows what it's doing. We were never given an explanation in terms of what they do and how they function. And one more thing: in addition to the CS, math, and physics triple major that might be required to pass this class, you might need an English major as well, because Kevin genuinely cannot write a comprehensible sentence for his life. Every single one of his documents are written poorly, and are extremely difficult to comprehend what he wants for lab reports. Oh, and don't forget a therapist too. You will need it.

tl;dr: the chemistry department should make pchem lab not required for a B.S. Chemistry degree. This class teaches nothing and is the most useless class on Earth. Such a time waster (actually, if you go into the lab, about 3 out of the 4 hours will be wasted on Kevin and the TAs desperately trying to troubleshoot the lab that barely works). This is the only class that should be pushing you towards a biochemistry major. If I could give a 0/5 for everything, I would.

This class is probably the worst taught class at uva. Even the professor cannot figure out how to do the labs, probably because his own lab manuals are so horrid, his old ass cannot even comprehend them. He's literally a havard graduate and thats probably why they keep him, but god he is horrible. There are a few TAs that are helpful during lab that, frankly, also don't understand what is going on, but at least they try. No one, not even the TAs actually understand what the measurements/calculations we are taking mean. This class says its about pchem, but its actually just about matlab coding, which most people in the class have never done before. I think the worst part about this lab is that its actually impossible. Not in an "omg this lab is soooooo hard way but you can do it if you put in effort!" way, but in a "i physically cannot start this lab report because i do not understand what the instructions are asking me to do." And I know it's not just my stupid ass that can't do it, pretty much every in the class cannot do the labs.
And not to mention the countless times we've gone to lab, just for the TAs and the professor to be setting up/trying to figure out how to do the lab for 2 hours. Last lab we were sent home after 3 hours because guess what. the instrument wouldn't work.
god this class is the worst. genuinely.

This class is horrid and I am still in it . I feel like we are being academically hazed. Lab reports are 80 percent of the grade and the grading goes from being very lenient to extremely harsh (dependent on the TA grading your lab which is random). If you are in the Monday section, they try to figure out how to do the labs and we just waste an hour and a half not doing anything. For a Harvard grad, this is very unprofessional and a waste of a class. The people in the class (classmates) make it much better due to shared trauma, but you have been warned.

While Lehmann is a nice guy, he isn't super helpful in actually writing lab reports since he doesn't simplify concepts enough for undergrads to understand, but the TAs are extremely helpful. If you're aiming for an A in this course, I strongly recommend going to office hours or attending other lab sections to work on your data analysis with the TAs. Start the reports as early as you can since the data analysis takes several hours and can't be completed in one sitting.
#tCFfall22

absolutely horrible. this man is a Harvard grad but cannot form a coherent sentence to save his life. his instructions and lab manuals are so much of a disaster that for our final he said we can rewrite a manual to make it coherent. he expected us to understand very advanced statistics as chem undergrads when most of us have never taken a statistics class and basically acted like we were dumb when we said we had no idea what was going on.
however, he did eventually try to listen to us and adjust to our many complaints. he always adjusted deadlines when it was impossible for us to do his labs, which was nice of him. our TAs graded very easily because even they could not understand most of what the labs wanted us to do. he ended up curving our grades down at the end though.