Professor Barr's greatest weakness is his inability to understand that his students are humans.

The tests are so much more difficult than what he actually prepares you for. Even with excessive amounts of self-teaching and absolute devotion to studying for the tests, the tests kicked my ass. He is a really nice person, he tries so hard to be a good professor, and he really puts in an effort for the class, but he just doesn't give tests that are reasonable for what you learn.

To me, Barr was much better than I thought he would be. He was generally an understanding guy and gave lots of extra credit on exams -- which honestly weren't that bad in themselves. I was terrified by reviews from his previous class (which was during COVID) citing impossibly difficult exams --- and they were definitely right as we were given a past midterm for practice and all I'll say is I'm so glad I didn't choose to take it then. But since we were in person this quarter and exams weren't open note (we did get a cheat sheet every time though), it seems like Barr adjusted his exams to be easier to reflect that. I did not do any extra studying outside of class other than the day before each exam; I did not do his problem sets, and did not read even one word of the textbook. What I do recommend is going through his learning objectives list and going to his office hours -- especially the ones right before the exams -- because he would often give really important information that will be on the exam that he NEVER mentioned before in class. Another annoying thing about the class is that there are so many random assignments due on random days and as someone who is disorganized it's impossible to not miss one or two. So yeah. Good luck y'all!

Really caring but a lot of work!

This class is hard. avoid. The exams are unnecessarily difficult. prof literally does not give answer keys. He really likes group work. He will call on you in office hours. Honestly, the only way to survive this class is do all your other work and stay on top of the problem sets. Go to ta office hours.

Barr emphasizes learning and accompanies that with a lack of teaching. The way he lectures seems somewhat coherent (like content wise it flows) but he barely teaches. Its not that he assumes that you understand hard topics he just states them randomly, pretends to explain, and then talks about how he values education and the "learning process".

If you do well on at least one midterm and mediocre on the final you should do alright in the class but it will be miserable. He doesn't ever post answers and gives lots of problem sets so it easy to get lost and behind. Overall, if you're looking at these reviews, you're probably gonna have to take the class anyway so brace yourself. If you don't understand anything, I promise you are not the only one. Go to your TA's office hours (they give a lot of answers / help) and just ride it out.

Practically disregarded all of my other classes just so I could study chem for hours every day and then still fail both midterms, which had almost zero relevancy to the course material. Often, I can appreciate professors who give "creative" questions on homework or tests, but there's a difference when these questions are just plain vague. I've been to many office hours where even the TAs were struggling through practice problems because each one requires you to make about 10 different unrelated assumptions to solve them. Attending office hours is pretty much a requirement for this class since Barr simply refuses to give answer keys for his insanely hard problem sets (which are not even completed for any credit to begin with). I know a lot of people complained about both of his midterms, so the final was a bit better and somehow I ended up with an A- in the class. I'd still be wary though, as his questions are very inconsistent. Also, he speaks soo much about how much he "empathizes" with us but in reality, does not respond to valid inquires about his grading system, class structure, or difficult tests on campuswire or in emails. Avoid him if you can but if not, best tip is to try your best to get through his problem sets.

If you aren't naturally gifted at chemistry, you will need to teach yourself most of the material--which is fine but there are almost no resources to do this. Professor Barr's exams are insanely difficult, and the study resources you have are limited to practice problems with no answer keys (so if you don't know how to approach a problem, good luck) and recorded lectures. The recorded lectures have almost no material that ever shows up on the exams. There's also no curve.

Professor Barr is an excellent teacher, but this was his first time teaching a college class. There were a lot of issues with the class structure, no doubt. But overall, I learned a ton, and I was able to perform very well in the class.

Few things to note:

- You'll have to work hard to do well in this class. Do the problem sets the week they come out. Go to office hours whenever possible to learn how to solve the problem sets (he doesn't give answer keys). Read (or at least skim) the textbook, and do textbook problems before exams. All of these things will pay off tremendously when it comes to exams.

- Exams were very application based for us. We complained heavily about this as they made exams difficult in the time provided, and for our final exam, he changed the exam such that it was not very application based. Made it WAY easier for us. He will likely continue that trend for you all. Should make things pretty nice.

- Try to enjoy this class. Professor Barr has a nice sense of humor and a quirky energy to him (he has an excessive love for Disney, for example). You'll learn a lot of cool stuff. Barr tries to make the applications interesting (and although that made things more difficult for our quarter, it'll likely be better for yours).

- NOTE ABOUT THE GRADING SCALE - THIS IS IMPORTANT! Barr has a very skewed weighing system. Exams end up making up 62% of your final grade (and 6% of the exam grades are group midterm grades - this means you go back and REDO the midterm exam with group members and submit one exam together, which is worth 20% of your total score for that midterm). 38% of your grade is based on gimme easy points (homeworks, OWL assignments, participation / attendance in discussion, completing mandatory surveys on CCLE, etc.).

He ALSO shifted the scaling system such that some type of A (A+, A, A-) is 88%+, B is 75%+, C is 63%+, etc. to work out in your favor. I was able to get an A+ even though I technically got a B on a midterm and As on the other midterm and final.

- He gives 5 points of extra credit on exams just for writing out a statement / signing your name and assigning pages correctly on Gradescope. Helps immensely (midterms are out of 100, so 5 points goes a long way).

Take all of the other reviews here with a grain of salt. Barr is a great guy, and this class will be nice if you put in the necessary effort. Enjoy!

Honestly, I was going to give a lot harsher of a review before we got our final grades back. This class was a lot of work and effort but it seemed to have ended up paying off in the long run. Barr is a decent teacher, he is new and I think he is just adjusting to UCLA still. No doubt he is a hard hard hard teacher but he definitely solidifies the material in your brain and if he keeps up this final grade curve it isn't THAT bad, just a ton of work. He is a textbook Gemini, which has its pro's and its faults, possibly has a Virgo moon and I speculate Capricorn rising- some variation of those three. Very very organized but may still be in an adjustment period to college teaching.