Robert Beer

If you have little to no chemistry background, this course can feel overwhelming at first. You can still do well, but it will require a lot of time, consistency, and independent practice because Beer doesn’t offer much support during lecture. He’s definitely the weakest lecturer I’ve had so far (first semester here, so take that with a grain of salt)—and honestly one of the weakest teachers I’ve had in general—but his exams are fairly straightforward and generally align with the practice tests. If you stay on top of the textbook problems, thoroughly review the practice exams, and read through his posted lecture notes—which lay out exactly what he expects you to know—you’ll be in a strong position to succeed. If you’ve taken AP Chemistry before and are comfortable teaching yourself, this class will probably feel manageable. For most others, though, a different instructor may provide a better learning experience. That said, the midterm averages—20, 19, and 18 for Exams 1, 2, and 3 respectively—were relatively high compared to other sections, reflecting how closely his tests follow the practice materials. The final is similar in difficulty to the midterms and gives you plenty of time. Overall, I wouldn’t recommend taking him unless you’re a strong self-studier with prior chemistry experience, such as AP Chemistry or the equivalent.

Ok. I was scared going into this course based on his negative reviews, but honestly, it wasn't that bad if you are ok with teaching yourself the entire course. This sounds sarcastic, but I finished the class with an A- while the rest of my peers in other chem sections struggled to get a B+. I am also an athlete, so I was taking this class in addition to having 20+ hour practice/game weeks. If I can do it, so can you. He does not post any online notes or have office hours (his TA's do...GO TO THEM they are so helpful) so you basically teach yourself from the textbook. But the silver lining is that his quizzes and exams are practically all from the textbook. If you thoroughly study from the textbook, you will be well above the mean for every exam. The exams are also very fair. No trick questions, from what I remember. He is also a very nice guy! Don't let the negative reviews scare you-- if you are the type of student that loves to independently study from a textbook, this class is for you.

As someone who have had a solid science background and a great deal of understanding of Gen Chem prior to enter this class, I will not try to speak for everybody. It's not fair to say that the exams are hard or tricky. How should I put this, a 40 year old vigin might find all women tricky and mysterious. A lady's man will tell you Humans in general are mysterious, but there are differences among inidividuals which can be significant. And I'm your lady's man.I usually get above 90% (raw school or ranking) on any given science exams. I would have to say, Beer's exam and grading schem are by far, is one of the most straightforward out there. Too straightforward for my lady's man's taste. I love getting the kicks in hard exams--Beating standardize tests is a hobby of mine. Beside lacking the kicks, the problem with easy exams is that you can't secure your spot high on the curve just by being on top of your materials. There are just way too many people gettiing above 23 out of a 25 point exam. You can know all the tricks and materials. But one misread of "NOT" will destroy your Z-score by a minimum of 0.2. It's not a problem is you don't aim for above 22. For the easy exam will get you an easy B+ easily. Beer's lecture is perfectly sensible, logical and concise if you are prepared in advance, but I can see why it might be hard to follow if you have absolutely no clue what he was ta…

I usually don't write reviews but I feel I have to in this case. I had two semesters with Beer because he's only teacher who teaches in the evening. Nice guy, pretty funny but he can't teach...seriously. He doesn't use powerpoints, jumps around, isn't receptive to students, and writes his test questions in a way that doesn't readily relate to what we learn in lecture, recitation or the textbook. He messes up his own tests, as though he didn't take the time to look over them at all (questions are numbered wrong, or the right answer isn't one of the choices which he admits afterwards, that type of thing). If you have questions, even about what he meant in a test question, he usually refers you to TA's. I really don't know where he gets his exam materials. The exam questions are related to the topics we learn in class but they're more think outside the box, critical thinking questions than anything that you'd be able to actually study and learn from the resources provided. He curves but not nearly enough considering how he teaches and tests. I consistently learned twice as much from my TA's in the 50 mins a week I had with them than with Beer in the 3 hrs a week of lecture. The one and only upside to Beer is that he gives good feedback after the tests, i.e. puts up solutions and class performance statistics. It doesn't at all make up for what his teaching does to your grade thoug…

So I'm not sure if Prof. Beer read up on previous culpa reviews, but my experience wasn't that bad. Everything was completely fair (tests/ quiz/ hmwk). The only thing that can be particularly difficult is the material. His tests were doable (there were mistakes every once in a while, but really not a big deal). And he is a very nice guy. He really wants people to learn the material. Like most science courses, his lectures can be quite dry. So, don't fear this class if you have to take it. Just do the work and you'll be fine.

She is the worst TA out of all of the TAs. 1 Columbia University: Arts & Sciences Fall 2023 Course: CHEMUN1407_002_2023_3-GENERALCHEMISTRYI-REC : CHEMUN1407_002_2023_3 - GENERAL CHEMISTRY I - REC Instructor: Xavier Roy

I didn't learn anything from his lectures. He doesn't use slides, just written notes in very bad handwriting and badly explained. I had to learn most of the content on my own.

When I registered for Beer's class having seen a slew of negative reviews, I thought to myself "How bad could this class really be?" The answer: BAD. Do not take this section of the course unless you have no other choice. I would especially caution those who struggle with procrastination or self-motivation against taking this class because a) you basically have to teach the class to yourself and b) there are no graded homework assignments to keep you on schedule. First, Beer is an incompetent lecturer. He handwrites notes on the board, but writes only the occasional single word or random drawing. Nothing that he writes on the board is valuable, and he essentially spends the whole lecture reading out his notes to the class. These notes, although written in chicken scratch and rife with errors, are posted to courseworks. Because he cannot explain concepts well and everything he says in class is posted to courseworks anyways or written in the textbook, lecture attendance was sparse. I would often pass the 70 mind-numbing minutes of lecture by counting attendance, and found that only around 30% of enrolled students actually showed up to class. Next, neither Beer has no attention to detail. You *must* practice with his equation sheet when doing textbook problems because it has errors. Even after being informed of one such mistake after the second midterm, the error had not been rem…

When registering for classes there were two second semester chem options. The first was taught by Gonzales/Kaufman in the morning and then there was this choice: Professor Robert Beer taught Mondays/Wednesdays from 6:10 to 7:25. Me and my friends contemplated which class to take and decided we would take Beer's class, thinking that it would be pretty easy because it's a night class so there would definitely be a bunch of post back people. Let me tell you this much. Taking Beer's class was THE WORST DECISION OF MY LIFE. First semester chem was really easy. I got an A in it without a problem. I know a lot of people had Beer for first semester as well and said it was a great class so it might just be the material. But Beer for second semester is the WORST. He posts all his notes online so there was never any point of going to class because he would literally read his notes word for word. Sometimes it sounded like he didn't even know what he was saying. He could barely explain some of the material himself.

Overall, a good/fair professor. After reading the first few reviews on CULPA from 2004, I was frightened of him. In reality, he was a pretty nice guy. His lectures were dry and straight from the book, but that's expected of a gen chem professor. He knows his stuff, and tries to answer any student questions. He takes student input seriously, as he would take in student comments and adjust his tests accordingly. The tests were fair and didn't have many mistakes (they were usually minor: spelling/grammar errors, etc). Overall, I found it to be a fair class.