Heres the thing, Barr is a professor people love to hate. Now would I say this out loud? No, no I wouldn't. But everyone else on here made him seem like the worse guy and teacher they'd ever met. Maybe its because I'm an engineering major and have delt with FAR worse but this man is so generous in his grading LMAO. For reference, winter quarter was the worst quarter I have ever experienced mentally. I was lacking in ALL of my classes and failed the first midterm. I watched all his lectures in 4 weeks, crammed, and I got a 60 on the final and like a 65 on the last midterm. I STILL GOT A B. I failed every quiz except for one. For the first midterm, I made up like all my answers on the test, EVERYTHING. Like not a single thing I put made sense or was correct and I got a 60 percent... This man grades so easy and gives so much partial credit and extra credit. In summary, do I personally like the man or the class, nope. But is his class super forgiving and generously graded YES! So don't be scared to take this class, I think Barr has read his horrible reviews from years prior and got his shit together.

Ok this professor. WHERE DO I EVEN START. I definitely learned a lot, and I'm glad I did because I had Kavner before Barr and it was the worst, however, Barr was really engaging. You come into the tests thinking they're so hard and look back and see how easy it was. I averaged like mid 80s which was "Some flavor of an A". The quizzes tbh are harder than the exams. The first exam was super easy, it's just EXTREMELY easy to overthink simple things. Also, the TA's grade very generously. Like VERY generously. I literally got points for putting down something completely wrong (Literally said x=1) and got partial credit for an extra credit problem. Don't be worried, you'll be fine, Barr has definitely gotten better. He's like the Corbin of Chemistry but easier. Everyone loves to hate him but he really wants us to do well. His office hours are 1.5 hours but often extends it an extra hour just to go over problem sets, etc. Like its very clear that he cares about us. You dont need an A on every exam to pass, an 80+ will get you some type of A in the class (according to him), so don't stress. And no, you don't need to know anything from 20A to do well. You also don't need to read the textbook. I lived off of problem sets, and office hours. Looking at my grade, you'd think to not listen to me, but I make stupid mistakes on exams and it costs me so many points, I also happened to fail the first quiz (one incorrect answer messed up the rest of the parts). I think I was around an 87, when an 87.5 was an A- and an A was an 89, so not too far off, tbh I think if I wouldve gotten 2-3 more questions right on any exam I probably would've gotten an A but oh well. TLDR: You'll be fine. DONT fall behind and go to office hours. You'll survive.

Enjoyed it. He gave tons of partial credits and extra credits on his exams which made them not as stressful. I almost cried trying to read the textbook, and I honestly don't think it's helpful at all. You don't need to understand everything that's on his problem sets. Go to his lectures and maybe his office hours if you're not sure about something.

this class made me switch my major (biochem) LMAOOO to be fair, i did not put in enough time for the class, but even then, there is sooo much content that you'd have to have a prior chemistry background to fully understand what he goes over.

you don't really have a choice if you're in stem, and must take this course, so my biggest advice: throw away ur social life and grind chem!! jk. but fr go to office hours bruh

I did not like this class. I think most people in engineering or similar majors will have to go through this, and it seems as if Barr is the only option. I'm sure you see all of the other reviews and I would likely agree with most of them. Unfortunately, this might just be the hazing for engineers that we don't get otherwise. Some people would say go to office hours or do the problem sets, but I'm really not sure how much my studying was worth it for the exams. If you want to do well in this class, I recommend not taking a difficult load and studying 10+ hours a week and also have a passion for chemistry and hopefully have taken AP Chem and gotten a 5.

Barr's course is tough. He expects a tremendous amount of time and effort that not all students have. Aside from that, his tests and quizzes are extremely hard to study for since, for the most part, they focus on one concept. So, you either studied the right material or you didn't-- it's a gamble. He has three quizzes, two midterms, and a final-- one of the midterms being mid week 9. A huge portion of both midterm two and the final were concepts we literally just learned, leading me back to his high expectations outside the classroom. He uploads problem sets weekly but provides no answer key, forcing you to attend one of his not-so-helpful office hours. What does help a lot if his scaling. He scales all quizzes and midterms, so, if you get a 50 on all of his work you're guaranteed a C. Don't let him trick you though, his tests are rough.

Where do I even start? Barr is a terrible professor: he seems to be caring and concerned about our learning at first but after a while it all goes to shit. He is pretentious and has no good intentions in teaching. His teaching philosophy emphasizes collaboration, and while this approach isn't harmful to us, it should not be mandated for COLLEGE STUDENTS. Students are in a constant state of confusion and making us work together just makes us more confused.

The discrepancy between his lecture material and exam content is the reason we struggle. The material in CHEM 20B is not exactly easy but a good amount of effort should result in a decent grade. Not in Barr's class though. He is a decent lecturer and explains concepts with example questions. HOWEVER, his exams are not reflective of the course material and he expects us to understand these "higher level concepts" that he barely explains in class. He does have a group portion for the midterm which helps your grade slightly.

There are a lot of things I dislike about Barr, but the one thing that I hate about Barr is how he refuses to release answer keys for his problem sets, homework, and practice midterms. He claims that solutions would not benefit our learning, but that's just gatekeeping... It's really frustrating and it just shows how indifferent he is when it comes to students' success.

OVERALL: this class isn't impossible, but you will keep questioning yourself the whole quarter. Go to office hours because he usually goes over problem-set questions. This class is poorly designed and I DO NOT recommend it. Barr needs to start taking student feedback as a professional. I hope he realizes his flaws more than he boasts about his strengths. Good luck to those of you taking Barr.

I have never felt so miserable in a class.

Winter Quarter included the worst day of my life (and that's only ever going to be topped by my loved ones dying) and while I'm not giving Barr that much power over me, this class certainly didn't make that day or the aftermath of it any easier.

Honestly I would just recommend reading the Gatekeep, Gaslight, Girlboss review because it summarizes my feelings so well in a succinct and somewhat polite manner. My main take away from my quarter in hell with one Kristopher K Barr is that this man either enjoys torturing young adults, is straight up delusional about his own teaching skills, is secretly a Disney animatronic sent to kill us all, or all of the above. Sadly Barr is currently the only option for Chem 20B, which I sincerely hope changes in the future. All I can say is good luck, make sure to take care of yourself, and be prepared to suffer.

This class is not hard to get a good grade in, but it's very frustrating for those who actually want to understand the material. Lectures seem to jump around and unevenly emphasize content, though I appreciated the recaps. We either spent too much time on complicated derivations or extremely basic problems, rather than the applications more suited to an introductory-level class. Many generous policies made up for the resulting poor performance.

Yeah... no