I throughly enjoyed the 'hands-on' and applicability of this class; I feel it prepared me and gave me confidence in my laboratory techniques as well as giving me a real taste of how gritty the life of unexpected failures and successes that day-in and day-out lab work can be. I felt that our class project was engaging and that we were able to actually investigate and carve out a very tiny piece of new knowledge. The TA's were very helpful even if this work was sometimes (or mostly) boring for them (they might have just been exhausted). Alex is very approachable, helpful, and is hard on you when you're not giving your best (as he rightfully should be). This class gave me the ability to reflect on my own failings and how I could do better. Take it, if you're willing to put in the work, you won't regret it.

Professor Spokoyny is one of the best professors I met at UCLA. During his CHEM 174 class, I learned how to be a part of a group to work on a research project. I also learned from professor Spokoyny about how to think like a real chemist and approach sophisticated questions in a straightforward way. Although the research project was not easy for me to understand at the beginning, professor and three TAs were always willing to answer my questions during and after class. We were taught to write scientific papers in ACS style and professor helped us one by one on improving the quality of the papers. We were also provided the opportunity to learn a number of lab techniques such as glovebox and Schlenk line.
I highly recommend this class to any student who want to pursue an advanced degree in chemistry or who want to work in a lab after graduation, because it can teach you many knowledge and skills to help you get well prepared for your future study and career in chemistry.

You will feel right away that Alex is one of the best professors you will see in the chem department. He is a very caring person and knowledgeable. He guides and encourages you how to think and approach problems like a real scientist. You will get to learn a lot of essential techniques that will be useful in graduate research.

I highly recommend his class.

Alex is a great professor. He is fun and approachable! It was refreshing to have a class that was different from all other classes I have taken. His class will give you an idea of how a graduate research will be like. Also, I liked that we got to work with other classmates and got a paper published as a class! If you are interested in going to grad school, I would highly recommend taking his class.

Alex is a great professor and the best co-worker. Joining his class, you will have a great opportunity to work with him. Instead of just telling you what to do, he offers you the time to think what you should do and the way you should approach a problem which is very important cause we eventually all need to learn how to do science by ourselves. So take his classes!

I loved taking this course with Spakoyny. I learned a lot about research and developing catalysts.