This class was not nearly as difficult as my peers had told me it was supposed to be. Everything is straight-forward, just go to his office hours and let him tell you how to answer his homework problems.

Study and take the practice tests and you will do fine!

Dr. Bacher is a magician when it comes to chemistry. I've seen him fix mistakes in the lab that were considered a lost cause by a TA. His door is always open, and you can sense that he really has a genuine concern for his students. BUT, be very very careful with this class. Lots of smart people fail it because they think it isn't a big deal(i.e only worth 3 units). The labs, quizzes, TA evaluations are easy to do well on, just keep up with the work and go to the two lectures every week. But the final is a killer and if you do horribly on it, you will have to take the class over again. My advice is that you familiarize yourself with his final exam reader early in the quarter. You'll get an idea of the basic stuff that will be on the exam.

Wish this course was taught by other professors.

WHAT IZ THIZ!!

That is Dr. Bacher language for you. Overall he is a good professor who makes it a point to go over everything little detail of the experiment in his lectures. So I would highly recommend going to lecture. He walks around during lab hours making sure everyone is doing the experiment correctly and helps you whenever you need him. He is always in his office even when he says he doesn't have office hours. His final is pretty hard but he gives you numerous practice finals and an awesome reader to study from. Most people score low on the final so study and you will do fine. And one more thing, take his quizzes seriously!

Wish the course wasn't only taught by Bacher. All in all, fair professor.

Dr. Bacher is sooo cool. He's so funny! He's extremely nice and caring, but his accent can become frustrating sometimes... The class is alot of work but then again, all o-chem labs are a lot of work! Whoever has taken 30AL knows that. You have to work by yourself in lab which may be intimidating at first. However, Dr. Bacher is always there to answer questions. Accasionally, he may get frustrated with you and roll his eyes, but keep asking him. He really doesn't mind. He is usually in his office, so you can practically stop by anytime you feel like it and he will help you out with the labs. As I said earlier, people complain about this class, but it's not because of Dr. Bacher. THe class is demanding by itself and he tried his best to make you learn. In any case, I'd recommend his class and you probably dont have much of a choice anyway! So just take it and do the work and go to office hours and study hard for the final. good luck.

Bacher is very funny and intelligent. He was very concerned about student learning and didn't mind when I popped into his office almost everyday between classes. He is very friendly and answers any question you may have, concerning labs and theories in general. Although the pace of the class may be quick, it is understandable, as the class only meets for 1 hr every week; it is difficult to teach a lot of material in that short amount of time. I strongly encourage taking 30C before taking 30BL if you have time; this is what I did & that made 30BL EXTREMELY easy. I enjoyed the labs, maybe because of the cute TA I had!~ ^^ But overall, Bacher is very approachable and you can learn a lot from the course if you really want to. I recommend dropping by his office to ask questions, prepare for the lab before the lectures, and do his past finals for practice, as his final always follows a similar format.

Dr. Bacher is a nice person and very concerned with student learning. The lectures are sometimes difficult to follow. If you have a knowledgable TA go to his/her office hours. One piece of advise -- do well in the quizes and in the lab write ups. There is NO guarantee that you will do well in the final since it is extremely long. I did well on the quizes and the labs, however I got a curved B on the final. My final grade was an A-.

I do agree with those reviews commenting on Prof. Bacher being very nice and quite available for office hours. I learned a lot from him just going to his office hours, and I think he does a good job explaining concepts one-on-one. But, just be aware that he may make you think and answer your own question before he helps you. He does seem to have quite a high expectation for students, but I don't think the class is to the point where it is impossible to do well. You may need some time to absorb the important concepts in the lab, and the in-lab hints posted on his website are good places to go to direct your studying. As most people have said, the final is very long, so my advice is that you know everything DOWN COLD. Yes, I really mean it, from lab techniques to predicting reaction products. I had to write something and go on to the next question within a couple of seconds. Timing is very crucial, and as we all know, do the questions you know first. The IR graphs may be hard to read, but if you've done enough practice, it should not be too difficult. Know the general ranges of each functional groups. Start with graphs that have unique peaks that stand out, like the broad alcohol groups, the nitriles, alkynes, etc... For most spectra, try to FIRST identify the one particular functional group peak in the graph that only one or two of the listed compound structures have, and through process of elimination, you'll have the answer in a few seconds. I know someone who did the IR graphs in like 5 minutes and got them all correct.

I usually write long reviews, but I wont this time. I'm just gonna say a few things. The lectures are alright, they're not great, they could use improvement. He is a bit difficult to understand and he needs to enlarge his overheads. I haven't gotten my grade yet, but the class is pretty easy, and getting a good grade is not too difficult.

Work for this class is actually very independent. You do the entire lab alone (no partners) and you gotta take care of your own s--t in doing the labs. The TA's wont be too involved. But the labs are pretty straightforward.

I just want to say that Bacher is a really great person. I know I messed up a few times and he would be really cool about it. He has a positive attitude about things going wrong or whatever.

During lecture, for some weird reason, his accent makes listening to him kinda FUN---go figure.

I expected this class to be REALLY hard, but it's a pretty reasonable class, the only problem (which is serious in my opinion) is that the class is only 2 units...not very fair... the class should either be more units, or have less work...

Anyway, word up to Bacher...