CHEM 1421

This class isn't that bad at all, and it just depends on your TA. My TA wasn't the best, and had a thick accent so it was difficult to understand her, but all in the class itself is fine. Just make sure to study for the quizzes, and if you don't master the first one, just study for the try agains.

1421 is similar to 1411, but less people take it so there's no alternating lab/workshop. I actually preferred this format; I found workshop to be stressful the first semester. We did 8 labs (compared to 6 first semester), but overall I spent less time outside of class on 1421 than 1411. The labs were also more interesting, in my opinion.

This class was not too bad at all. The labs are painful and sometimes confusing. But all assignments are absolutely doable, and it's easy to get an A, even an A+ in this class. The post labs are kind of different than semester 1 - they are heavily focused on data analysis, which meant there was a lot of step-by-step math and less conceptual explanations, which I actually thought was better and took way less time.

My only advice and something I did differently than 1410 was that I did actually watch the prelab vids. If they are 40 mins (1 or 2 were very long, I think titrations being one of them), just put it on double speed. These videos have all prelab answers (purposefully so that you watch), and if I hadn't watch, I definitely wouldn't have been able to complete the prelabs. The plans aren't bad, and the actual lab assignments aren't either. The quizzes were pretty difficult but as long as you have all of your info organized, and you took the time to understand each lab thoroughly, you will master it. They are pretty generous with grading in this class, allowing you to get a few wrong and still get a "mastered" grade (instead of grading on a numeric scale, you either get 0/1 or 1/1, with a 1/1 being that you got most of the questions right).

Overall I learned a lot and this class caused me minimal stress. I liked having the 2-5 slot more than the 9-12, but either way you really will only use 1-2 hours max each period (never the full 3), so don't worry too much about timing.

I got an A+ in this class, and I found this semester much easier than last semester.

Grading:
This course uses mastered and not yet mastered grading. This means you only have to get an 80% on a certain number of assignment to get an A. If you want an A+, you only have to do one extra assignment. The writing assigment changed to a full lab report as oppposed to the two partial lab reports from last semester. You still have 6 tokens you can use to to redo assigments.

My advice:
1) Always check prelabs and postlabs with your friends and if you got the same things you probably will master the assignment
2) Something I didn't learn until later is you can use the postlab assignments to help write your plan. The postlab tells you exactly what tables you will have to make.
3) Quizzes: use her emails that say the main ideas on the quiz and make a document with the information you will need to know on the quizzes. You can use this document on the quiz. The quizzes can make or break your grade because you have to master all of them to get an A.

The class is annoying and way more work than a one credit course should be; still, it is not too difficult to do well if you do the assignments.

Chem lab is graded by specification grading, which means you need about an 80% on an assignment to master it, and you need to master a certain amount of each category of assignment to get each specific letter grade. Along with this you are given tokens to re-do assignments or quizzes if you did not master them the first time. For each lab you must do a pre-lab, a plan (you must write your own procedure for each experiment), a summary, and a post-lab. Additionally, you have to complete quizzes, a formal lab report, and two presentations. The work was not too overwhelming but it is a lot for a one credit course. The TAs are super helpful and have office hours weekly if you need help with any of these assignments. They are also very helpful in lab. I personally never had many personal encounters with Lisa other than her doing "goggle checks" in my lab each week, but I thought her pre-lab videos were only mildly helpful in completing the pre-lab assignments.

This class really depends on the TA you get. My TA was fortunately extremely chill, nice, and really helpful when we were confused about what to do in the lab. However, I know some of my friends' TAs were a lot stricter and more nitpicky with their postlabs. The prelabs weren't too hard and I thought Professor Morkowchuk was really good at explaining the concepts in her videos.

I don't enjoy labs in general so I didn't enjoy this class. Taking it with Chem 1420 definitely helped or I would have been lost. The grading was straightforward, same as 1411 with the specifications grading, but I found the quizzes harder this time. Definitely understand all the subjects Professor Morkowchuk emails about saying will be on the quiz. The formal lab report was a lot longer this time and time-consuming to make, but not too difficult because it was mostly a summary of information from the postlab for your experiment. The labs themselves took longer than 1411 because it was just more stuff to do. Instead of 1 class being a lab and 1 class being a workshop, we often did the lab and the plan for the next week's lab in the same class, so usually we stayed for 1.5-2 hours. A surprising amount of work for a 1 credit class that can be annoying if you don't get a good group, but straightforward and easy to do well in.

Lab is definitely not hard but your grade and the amount of work you put in depends heavily on your TA. Fortunately, my TA was super helpful and guided us in the right direction whenever we were confused or got stuck, but I know a few friends who weren't that fortunate. The labs are very simple though and there is not too much work outside of class outside of the postlabs and prelabs which dont take long and the one big lab report near the end of the semester. With the tokens, getting a good grade is not much of a challenge if you really want it!

This class is easy its just so much busy work. Everything is graded on a mastered or non mastered scale so if I'm being honest you really don't have to try that much. You also get a chance to redo like 6 assignments I think if you don't master them, but trust me you do not need to use all the tokens because the assignments at the beginning are so easy you will master them. The only thing is there is a 7 page lab report in the middle of the class, but again its graded on a mastery scale. The Ta's will literally just go through and make sure you have 80% of the requirements, and if you do you will get a mastered. The writing does not have to be good. Honestly that paper took me like 2 hours total, which is really good considering it was 7 pages long. #tCFspring2022

My TA this semester was great with grading. The specifications grading system and tokens to redo assignments reduce stress and makes it easy to get a A with minimal effort. That being said, the class is so poorly designed in regards to having students plan the experiments themselves. No one knew what they were doing most of the time and the TAs can't really help so I feel like I did not learn as much as I could have. Also, Microsoft Teams sucks. #tCFspring2022

This semester's class was very different with our in-person/online partner rotations and mastered/not mastered specifications grading, so a lot of this may not be applicable. Overall, the class was very similar to 1411. In my experience, I would say the course is not that bad. A lot of people had problems with the knowledge quizzes because they were a large portion of our grade, but I think if you make sure you understand the lab procedures/concepts she talked about in her lecture before each lab, you will get a decent grade. I would recommend taking notes during her lectures. Also, buy your lab equipment from Amazon and not the bookstore. #tCFspring2021

Warning: take this all with a grain of salt because I was entirely online due to covid and me not being on grounds. I had the worst possible experience in this class. All I ever did was write plans and do post labs, while learning absolutely nothing. The grading system for this class was adjusted to be more "fair" but all it did was screw us online students over. The 4 knowledge quizzes outweighed the other 40+ assignments. The quizzes were impossible to get an 80% or higher (necessary for an A) and when we said to Lisa that it was unfair, she basically did nothing. My TA (Bi Youan Eric Tra) was also incredibly frustrating. He would take off points of all group members if he got an email about any assignments, which basically was his way of saying "if you need me, come to my 1 hour office hour once a week, otherwise don't contact me."
#tCFspring2021

I was a fully online student this semester so I did nothing in the lab. Spent the entire semester writing "plans" for experiments and then writing post-labs based on the pictures of data that the in-person people obtained. I know a lot of people didn't like the grading scheme they implemented this semester, but it worked out really well as long as you prepared well for and performed well on the knowledge quizzes. Honestly didn't feel like I learned very much at all in this class, but I'll bet that it's because of the online situation. The TAs were pretty helpful though, and I recommend asking them any questions you might have.
#tCFspring2021

My TA Marc Bennett was great. Unlike many of the other TAs, he is not a harsh and petty grader. I got an A+ in the course (if I lost just one more point, I would have gotten an "A" instead LMAO). He gave me full credit on everything except post-labs and quizzes. He was very helpful whenever my group had questions. Only take this course if you have to (e.g. PREMED). As many others have mentioned, it is a lot of work for a one-credit course. The key to success in the lab courses is to go to your specific TA's office hours to show that you are a committed student. I would go to TA office hours every week and ask very specific questions. Warning: some of the TAs are irresponsible (sometimes, they show up late or not at all). Some of them also give vague answers. I would recommend showing up early because there is ALWAYS a crowd.

A lot of people only take this class because they have to (i.e. being on a pre-med track), and that makes sense because this class is awful. Everything truly does depend on your TA. Fortunately, I had a very sweet TA who I would argue was the best one this semester. It truly is a risk game in getting a good TA, and the chances aren't good. This class is NOT worth 1 credit considering how much effort it takes. Especially with online lab, there were like 5 different assignments due on one day, and they would be big ones (like a prelab for one expt and a postlab for another). The scheduling for online lab was not great at all and it was truly overwhelming. Doing it in person was a little better, fortunately. I only did well in the because I put so so so much effort into this class, which makes the only 1 credit part really annoying. Definetly go to office hours to save yourself some time. The quizzes were the bane of my existence and tanked my grade. They have no right being that hard and worth that many points. They're so easy to get a bad grade in. The only tip I can offer is to straight up memorize the experiment overview and know every little part of the experiment for any chance of getting higher than a C.

I took this class during the covid-19 pandemic, so my experience may be a bit different. How well this class goes ultimately depends on your TA. My TA was very chill and reasonable, but I had friends whose TAs had very high and strict expectations and did not communicate them well. Who ever you have, make sure to ask them what they want specifically because some TAs have different expectations than what is on the assignment overviews that go to all the lab students. This class has a lot of outside work for a one credit class. Go to office hours!! If you are struggling with the programming or writing for any of the assignments the TAs are very understanding and will look over your work. If you do this, you should do well. Watch out for the quizzes, though, because they are difficult and its easy to lose points.

Lab this semester sucks more than usual. Lisa added a whole extra experiment compared to 1421 in previous years so now it's 4 experiments each with 2 parts. You do an experiment plus a plan for next week almost every week. Try and prepare for the quizzes and go to office hours for help with post-labs. A lot depends on your TA but with a lot of hard work you should be able to overcome a bad TA. Also, try and get along with your lab group, mine was horrible, and because the lab is longer you have to spend 2-3 hours together every week, a bad group makes it even more miserable.

This lab was significantly harder than last semester. First semester lab was doable, but this semester definitely threw some curveballs at me. My TA was not extremely organized or knowledgeable regarding the subject matter, and the expectations for the lab write up were not very clear. It was definitely annoying having to figure everything out on our own. The quizzes were also ridiculously difficult and made a major negative impact on my grade; this whole semester was very frustrating and the experiments were difficult to get through due to lack of organization.

This course is a lot of work, but you likely have to do it because it's a requirement. I would recommend starting lab reports early because they can be long and complicated. Also, I recommend being careful on the lab quizzes, because it is easy to lose a lot of points. Overall, this course will be a pain, but getting an A is not difficult as long as you keep up with the work.

Hands down the hardest lab I've ever taken, not just because the lab reports were long and tedious, but because my TA (Renna) didn't set clear expectations for any of the assignments (kinda wanted you to guess how to do things and then graded very harshly) and was very unaccommodating (when I was absent due to health reasons). Renna wasn't nice enough to make up for not telling us how to do anything and then taking tons of points off of the formatting of the post labs (which she graded completely differently from the samples provided by Lisa). Lisa was amazing and super kind, but she's always extremely busy, so I wouldn't recommend going to her office hours for lab stuff. However, it's not hard to make an appointment to meet with her, so I'd definitely do that if you're struggling and she will help you out!!

chemistry lab really depends on the TA some are really good and some are not as good. The lab is not that hard sometimes it is a bit of work but never more than a few hours.

The class is so bad the TAs are not on the same page, your grade depends on the TAs atitudes one class will average out 95s on post lab while another class will average 20s. This class is so much work for one credits. The TAs are the reason this class is really bad.

Pretty similar to the first semester of Lab (CHEM 1411). The Mathematica pre lab assignments were a lot easier and didn't take nearly as long in my opinion. However, the post lab assignments required more work (2 partial lab reports and 1 full lab report). Again, the lab quizzes were pretty difficult in my opinion, but it is not that big of a deal because they barely count towards your grade. Hope for a good group and a nice TA because that will surely improve your experience. I'd recommend doing the readings before the lab so that you have some semblance of what is going to be happening in the lab, unlike the majority of the class and most likely your group. Overall though, it is not that hard to end with an A.