General Chemistry Laboratory · Chemistry
So much - from lab techniques to the science behind experiments to critical thinking to crafting lab reports
6-10 hours per lab report, and 1/2 hour weekly to study for the quiz.
Joan is such a nice lady. Her pre-labs are well organized and very understandable. She covers subjects not already taught in lecture so well in such a short amount of time. She gives quizzes on the previous lab, but they count for so little and no one really does that well on them. She's very willing to help if you have questions. Joan is great!
10 experiments, midterm, final. Lots of work. I've heard some losers spend over 20 hours per week, so prepare to stop going to the West End for a while.
One lab report is due each week on the day of your lab. It can take anywhere from 2-6 hours to write the reports (at least for me) so it is moderate amount of work, but not too bad.
I'm also submitting this only b/c students are requesting info. I also only had her for recitation, not lecture. But, Dr. Doerrer was very clear, informative, engaging, and exteremely approachable. She's wanted to teach G-chem for a long time, and I'm sure she'll do an awesome job.
Qazi is amazing. I ended up taking this course on Saturday mornings, and aside from the obvious drawbacks, it was a fantastic class. We didn't have a TA, we had our own lecture and Qazi in the lab the whole time. Qazi is so helpful, funny, caring, and he lets you know what's important and what isn't. I learned far more from this class than I did from Valentini, especially about acids/bases and kinetics. Advice: beware of the quizzes, they will either make or break your grade. Once you figure out how to do the lab report the way he wants, that's the easy part. It's remembering all the little details for the quiz that separates the B's from the A's in this class. Also, try to take this class spring semester, it really illuminates the 2nd semester lecture material.
It all depends on which TA you have. Try to pick a friendly one or at least a member of the opposite sex so you can flirt your way to a better grade. Watch out for the omniverous premeds.
Dr. J, as he prefers you call him, is a bit of an enigma in the Barnard chemistry department. While a lot of people have a strong aversion to him, I have grown to be "okay" with him. He is the director of the BC2001 gen chem lab, meaning he teaches pre-lab (recitation) and some of the actual lab classes (I had him as one of my instructors). I really appreciated his concision and knowledgeability in pre-lab lectures. He knows what he is trying to say, he says it very well, and he answers questions, albeit in a smart ass way, vey well. He isn't a lovely dovey guy in lab and won't tell you exactly what to do or answer any basic questions that you should already know before entering lab, but he will help you if something goes completely wrong in your experiment and he will answer small questions here and there. His demonstrations of the lab are very concise and make perfect sense, which I couldn't say for the other lab instructor in my class. Most people dislike the guy because of the grading though (he doesn't directly grade your lab reports, but he is in charge of the rubrics the reports are graded off of). I found that the quality of your actual lab report (you record data in your lab and then write the report at home and the report is due at the beginning of recitation the next week) doesn't matter much; the grading is mainly focused on the quality of your data. It can really…
Sig figs, chemical reactions, pH, lab processes, what waste goes where