This review is for Chem 14C: Structure of Organic Molecules, taken with Dr. Shao in Spring 2023.
Dr. Shao seems to be a kind and caring professor, and this was her first quarter teaching Chem 14C. Her lectures were incredibly unclear, fast, and disorganized. She would have slideshows that she would annotate on during lecture, where she mainly rushed through a wide variety of practice problems rather than explaining the concept with clarity. The lectures were unclear and fast; she often did not have time to field any questions because she wanted to rush through all the day's slides.
Outside of class, Professor Shao offered to help students in office hours and via email. Via email, Dr. Shao was quite blunt with her replies and not very helpful. Most of the learning done in this class was via Youtube videos and studying with friends. The lectures were unclear and Dr. Shao did not provide much clear help outside of class either.
As for the exams, they are open note, so there is no memorization needed in this class, which is a relief considering that organic chemistry is considered quite memorization heavy. There were 2 midterms and 1 final exam. The tests were written quite fairly; the two midterms were rushed in terms of time, but the final felt quite short and simple. Each exam had multiple choice questions, short answer questions, and then longer comprehensive problems. There was scope for ample partial credit. The first midterm was slightly curved up, but the second midterm and final were not curved.
Dr. Shao's grading scheme was incredibly friendly. The class average was an A-, which seems high for an organic chemistry class. She offered 3% Extra Credit in the form of surveys and feedback forms and then an additional 1% Extra Credit in the form of bonus questions on the final exam, which really boosted grades. Additionally, discussion section worksheets were worth 24% of the grade, and Canvas quizzes were worth 16% of the grade, most of which were free points.
Overall, for an organic chemistry class, Dr. Shao made it quite easy to get a good grade in this class. The exams were open book/note and there was a lot of extra credit offered. However, Dr. Shao was not a clear and helpful lecturer, and it felt like I did most of the understanding of the content of this class by myself via Youtube videos. All in all, easy A class but mainly all self-learning outside of lecture.

Professor took experience from her previous quarter and adjusted the exams so they are more manageable compared to what I had heard from my friend. Need to do more practice in the book to be able to do well. She listens to students' opinions after every exam which I think is very nice.

Dr. Shao is a good professor. She records lectures, posts her worked-out notes, and makes herself available to help students during her office hours. The class was painful because of how disjointed and confusing the textbook was, and given that this was Dr. Shao's first quarter teaching 110A, she relied heavily on the textbook to structure her curriculum (she acknowledged this by giving absolute tons of EC). She announced early on in the quarter that the best way to study was to practice end-of-chapter textbook problems, and unsurprisingly many exam questions were derivatives of chapter problems. Exams were fair, and my peers who did more than just memorize assigned homework answers and formulas did relatively well in the course. Do the practice and read the textbook, and you will be chilling. This was not an easy class, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. (Discussions were a mess though because the TA just scribbled homework solutions on the board without interacting with students and offered very little advice and explanation when asked questions).

One of the worst classes and professors I've ever taken here at UCLA. Lectures are recorded and honestly not bad to reference if you need to miss a class, unless she decides to start writing on the chalkboard, then good luck trying to find whatever she was writing there anywhere. Unresponsive to emails and while she uploads lectures to Youtube, before the second midterm and before long weekends she has forgotten to post and doesn't reply to emails that ask her to upload the missing lectures until multiple days later. The worksheets are the only homework in the class, worth 35%, and very doable if you go to discussions because 1/2 of the packet will be done during the discussions. Our TA really really improved during discussions after the first couple weeks and made it worth going to discussions/tutorial near the end of the quarter.
Up until the final, the midterms are horrendously long and while she makes it seem like she cares about feedback with surveys and etc, the reality is she doesn't change anything on the future tests. Final was doable, have good notes to bring with you on test day. Not every one is a good teacher, and she's a good example of that. Doesn't answer questions well in class and it's honestly almost funny, until you realize you need to understand fundamental concepts to do well in the test. (Save your questions, just go to the textbook) Her attitude is dismissive (of course, since everything is so easy and "straightforward" to her as she makes sure to remind you) Her 50 minute midterms were both way too long and it's abundantly clear when barely anyone finished her midterms and they averaged in the 50's (yes, both midterms).
With how heavily the class relies on the textbook, I would study the book religiously and dedicate time and effort to those practice problems in the back of the book and take good notes for the open note exams and final. Class was curved after the overall avg grade was a C-

I'm honestly probably just high on my A right now, but I feel like I actually liked this class. Her lectures are clear and straight to the point. Her tests are all based on content she went over(especially the stuff on worksheets/midterm reviews). The worksheets are honestly not that much work, and the TA goes over most of the problems in discussion anyways. The only problem is that she makes the midterms so damn long. It's a 50 minute test, why are there so many derivation problems? The final was alright though.
In general really is just relations between partial derivatives class. Just understand what equations to use and what situations to use them in, and you're pretty much set for the class.

This was her first time teaching this class so, as you imagine, it was a mess. She started of the quarter by allowing the midterms and final to be open book, meaning we could use our iPads to look at our notes but the Wi-Fi had to be off. Well, obviously, there was some cheating later on in the course so she took that priviledge away and made us print out any notes we wanted to have out during the Final, which was totally absurd and expensive. She was a hot mess the entire quarter if you could not tell already. During the first midterm, she assigned us to different lectures and when the time came to take the exam the TA's tell us to share one exam packet for every group of 3 because she didn't make enough copies. It was a whole mess because she didn't want us looking over people's papers yet wanted us to share a packet. Everyone emailed the dean and department chair and she was told to re-administer the exam but she chose a day during class (50 minute time limit). She ended up assigning 8 questions all with (a-f questions) which was crazy so then everyone emailed the dean and department chair about it and she had to curve the exam immensely. Her lectures are very hard to follow so it doesn't help much. Her homework worksheets were alright. Her discussions were attendance tracked too.

This class was so much fun! Dr. Shao was so nice and helpful throughout the entire quarter. The concepts were extremely hard to grasp, which is why I’d say a lot of people had trouble in this course, but it wasn’t Dr. Shao’s fault. Quantum mechanics is never easy, but Dr. Shao helped us as much as she could. Her slides were very organized, and she didn’t rush through the lectures. The homework was done in a way that we were basically guaranteed 100%, (ten attempts on each problem, but after you got it wrong it would walk you through the steps) but it would help us a ton to gain an understanding of the topics and the kinds of questions that we would have to answer. The tests were easier than the homework problems. The first midterm was essentially just plugging stuff in, you just had to know which equations to use. The second midterm required a bit more chemistry knowledge, but it was stuff that we had done in class. As long as you paid attention, you’d be fine. The final was super easy, much easier than I expected, just long. Also, all of the tests were OPEN NOTES. She wanted us to understand the concepts more than just memorize problems, which I think is admirable. Learning shouldn’t be about just learning to take a test, it should be learning to understand. All in all, Dr. Shao was an extremely helpful professor and I would recommend this class!

You can tell that Professor Shao is new to teaching, so her explanations were not always the most clear, and she was unable to explain things multiple ways most of the time. HOWEVER I still thought she was an excellent professor because she makes up for her inexperience with a forgiving grading scheme, incredible organization, and an abundance of practice material. I think she's a solid professor, and if you're struggling it's very clear she wants to help you succeed.

It was her first quarter teaching this class when I took it. Many people have heard about the chaos of our first midterm (there weren't enough paper copies), but Shao ultimately tried her best to make sure it didn't negatively affect us. We were able to choose to retake the exam or disregard it and weigh our other exams heavier. The retake exam was more than fair; it was extremely similar to the original test. She also offered extra credit when most of us would miss an exam question. The people saying bad things about this professor are just mad about what happened in the first midterm, but that wasn't necessarily her fault and she did address it in the best way possible. I also think that Shao had very clear lectures and was very open to helping students. Homework and quizzes were fine and we were able to work together on them. Getting an A in this class is very doable but most people want to dwell on mistakes that happened rather than take the opportunities she gives students.

I say my overall experience isn't bad, but you really need to put the effort into this course
This course requires self-study due to the concepts and the homework are not being integrated perfectly. The homework is worksheets in the discussion and long cengage assignments due at the end of the week. You have to first fully understand the concepts in the lecture in order to understand what the homework is talking about. Shao posts all her lecture notes and recordings on bruinlearn with great audio. I stopped going to lectures after the first midterm because I find recordings were more helpful than live lectures. My TA is very clear and straightforward in the discussion which is really helpful in understanding the material as well as the homework. The cengage assignment is a bit miserable. You sometimes need to google/look at the answer to finish the assignment. The lecture didn't cover every homework assignment.
However, these assignments are really important because her midterms and finals were based on these assignments. I only lost 5 points in the first midterm just because I give an eye on the assignment that week. Also, all the tests are open notes which you don't need to memorize any formula. You can finish them properly as long as you are sensitive enough to the concepts.
Overall, I say my experience in Chem20a is easy and not troublesome.