I did feel like I learned a lot from Dr.Shao's class however, I think it wasn't the right class for me. Her format of lecturing is not very helpful for me as she has slides that she annotates throughout the lecture, but moves so quickly that you don't have time to write stuff down. She tries to provide lots of resources to succeed but none were super helpful in my opinion. My TA was definitely the reason I did decent in the class. The class starts out feeling like a physics class so it is very offputting because you signed up for a chemistry class, not physics. I took AP Chemistry in high school and maybe 10% of the material was similar so unless you have a strong background in chemistry, physics, and quantum mechanics, you may struggle. She is a very nice person and does want to help you, but isn't the easiest person to get help from. I only recommend this class if you have a strong background in the things I mentioned above or have a passion for them. It's a challenging class.

Challenging yet enjoyable class.

The content is definitely hard, but Shao does a pretty good job with it. Lectures are super organized and cover the content with decent depth. Discussions are mandatory (30% of your grade is the worksheets you do in them), but also super helpful. Tests are a bit difficult but nothing crazy.

I feel like I did not learn at my full potential. May have been my fault, but not totally sure. I feel like this is a pretty easy class if you've taken AP Chem in hs or with a help of people who know what they are doing. I can tell you I am not sure how I passed, but I think my friend would explain the material better to me than she would. Overall pretty easy, as long as you get everything done.

This class is polarizing to say the least but my experience was very positive. To address the negative reviews, I do agree that some of the content was far above me and might not have belonged in an introductory chemistry class but I do feel like I learned the basics of quantum mechanics and that it helped my fundamental understanding of topics covered later in the class. If you don't take the time to regularly attend office hours, read the textbook when confused, or meet with your TA, you won't learn anything and will only survive by sheer memorization. That said, if you put in the effort, things will start to make sense with time. A lot of the concepts covered before the midterm are really abstract and though it might feel like you're not learning anything, STICK WITH IT! At least for me, things eventually started to fall into place over time (you're learning just not realizing it until the end). Though others may claim this class is unfair to give to freshman, I have friends at Michigan and Harvey Mudd who were given very similar classes so I think that's just how it is.

Regardless, Prof Shao is an excellent lecturer and is extremely helpful in office hours (which she happily extends if you have more questions). The midterms are tough but are almost identical to the review packets she hands out the week before (just with different numbers).

My suggestions:
1) Only read the textbook before lectures if you have the time (though Shao suggests doing it before every class). The textbook isn't very clear and is VERY time consuming to read. Instead, I'd ask questions in office hours which are usually empty.

2) Don't procrastinate on attending office hours to ask your questions. There were quite a few lectures where I had no idea what was going on and if you let the questions build up, you'll continue to be confused during future lectures.

3) Break the Cengage homework into digestible sessions or risk spending 12+ hours straight grinding them out the night before. The Cengage problems are also really similar to those on the test so it's important to understand it and not just get it done.

Shao is a good professor who evidently cares a lot about her students as she provides handwritten lecture guides and creates review questions so that you are well-prepared for the exams. Also, as someone who is writing this review while in Chem20B *SHAO IS A GODSEND COMPARED TO BARR. I THOUGHT SHAO WAS A 'PRETTY GOOD' INSTRUCTOR BUT HE MAKES HER LOOK SO GOOD. ENJOY HER BEFORE YOU HAVE TO TAKE BARR*.

*Ahem* Going back to the review the grading is pretty generous, I forgot exactly what it was but I'm pretty sure you just needed to average above an 80% on the exams since the grading was like 50% was homework, discussion questions, Cengage, etc and the other 50% was exams so I think as long as you got above an 80% you were fine (it might even be lower than averaging 80% because I think above an 85% was an A or something like that). She provided us with handwritten lecture slides so if you have an iPad and have notability or something like that I would recommend doing that because it makes this class so easy when you can essentially just annotate what she's writing down instead of having to write it all from scratch.

Content Review: Ok honestly this class is a lot of random math/physics that you'll probably never use in real life, so don't get overwhelmed if you feel like a lot of the stuff you're doing is really abstract and random. Also for context, I never took AP Chem and my high school had a really bad Chem teacher so I came in with essentially no previous chemistry background and still ended up getting an A, honestly, if you have somewhat of a physics background then that will probably help you more because the first half of this class is a lot more quantum physics-based (Schrodinger Equation, Potential Energy Diagrams, etc). As a whole though, I thought the Cengage did a good job reinforcing the concepts from class (although the Cengage will take a while) and the Review Questions were also very good as well in preparing you. For me, the hardest part of the class is the material on the second Midterm: Valence Bond Theory, Molecular-Orbital Diagrams, and that kind of stuff, but for those with stronger Chem backgrounds, it probably won't be that bad. Again, as someone with little to no Chem background, following along with the Cengage, Review Sections, and Discussion Worksheets was good enough for me to not exactly understand it perfectly, but at least understand it enough to understand what to do when given a question like that on the test.

Overall: I liked Shao as a professor. She was kind, was a little hard to understand at times but really nothing major, and definitely knew her stuff. Even if you find yourself not liking the class, tell yourself to enjoy the class and enjoy Shao if you need to take 20B after this (if you are in this boat and are like wow this class sucks I hate this, just read some of Barr's 20B reviews and then you will feel a lot better about where you are right then and there). Grading was pretty lenient for a college Engineering Chemistry class, Shao and the TA's are always pretty helpful, and the discussion worksheets and Cengage do a good job reinforcing the topics learned in class.

While the class material was very difficult, Professor Shao did a great job at simplifying and explaining the concepts. The Cengage assignments provided questions very similar to those on the exams, and the explanations helped me learn a lot of the content. Textbook reading is not totally necessary, as the lectures cover all the content you need to know. Office hours are very helpful, as Professor Shao typically covers misconceptions from the lectures and goes over difficult homework problems. Great professor, would take the class again.

I think this is Professor Shao's first time teaching so even though the course started with lots of confusion, it got better at the end. The midterms are very time consuming and almost no one could finish in time, but she made the final a lot easier cuz most of the questions on the final are similar to her study guides and midterms. She goes over concepts very quickly sometimes so I recommend using a tablet so you can directly edit the slides and take notes. Her slides are very good and clean comparing to most of the other professors I have. The course starts off very hard but once you get used to it , it gets better.

Not going to lie the first midterm was awful. However, the class is curved and it is very easy to get an A or B with her grading scale. (50% of the grade is homework and passing is a 55% in the class) Also, tests are open note!
Shao's lectures slides are easy to follow, but sometimes she goes too fast. Slides are posted before lecture and recordings are posted.

Shao is a wonderful professor, but is still lacking in a few areas. She is incredibly understanding and accommodating–willing to help you out in office hours and on her own time. The amount of effort necessary to complete assignments is not much, but I recommend doing extra practice on your own just to familiarize with concepts.

At the beginning of the quarter, I full expected not to even pass this class (I did horribly on the first midterm), but here I am.

As Shao has open-book exams, I highly recommend having all of the assigned worksheets and practice problems printed out and separate from your notes–it will make it easier to look through and find them.