For anyone that has done high school chemistry (acids bases, bonding, moles), this class is extremely easy. The only thing that might be new is the Quantum section which is all just plug-and-chug. Dr Lavelles Class is really fun, and all are recorded if you miss the in-person lectures. Only discussions are mandatory attendance. Dr Lavelle also provides many resources, his own website with questions and videos, workshops, and Chemistry Community (24/7 portal to ask and answer questions) + many questions from the textbook and on achieve for practice.

Grading:
Chemistry community (40 points) - answer 2 and ask 2 questions every week (4pts a week x10)
Discussions (40 points) - attend class thats all! (4pts x 10)
Achieve questions (50 points) - 5pts a week mathematically, but its divided based on the topic length. You have unlimited tries to do them

These 130 points are 100% guaranteed and take no time at all

Midterm 1 - 60pts
Midterm 2 - 60pts
Final - 120pts

Both midterms were very easy, and each had 15mcqs
Final has 30mcqs
In both midterms and the final, writing your name gets you 4 points (12 total)

100% Recommend this class

Lavelle is so amazing, I could say infinite things that make me think he's the goat of this school. His lectures are engaging and really applicable to life science - the whole point of taking 14a instead of 20a - and he's just such a kind and funny person. If you didn't take AP Chem, make sure to take advantage of his massive amounts of student help hours offered. If you did, then do whatever you think is necessary to make sure you grasp everything well. In terms of difficulty of tests, I'd say that they are very similar to the difficult of the Achieve and textbook problems - ie if you have no difficulty in those then you'll be fine for the midterm. This guy is the goat.

Good professor but the tests absolutely suck. No room to mess up even the trick question on the test because thats already -7%.

Workload is solid tho and lots of resources.

Lavelle was ok. His lectures started out very straightforward and decently engaging but by the end of the quarter he would go on so many tangents that it was hard to follow. He would also spend a lot of lecture explaining extraneous stuff on the whiteboard and it was hard to tell what was actually going to be tested. The midterms were fair. I kind of tanked the final but he was generous with rounding which I really appreciated. There were some questions on there that felt a little unfair—he likes to ask vague conceptual questions so be ready for that. Make sure you know how to draw Lewis Sturctures really well for the final. The most annoying thing about class is that the grading is total points based so make sure you're getting the easy points from the Achieve homework, Chemistry Community, and going to discussion. Chemistry Community is outdated and janky but he will brag about it all the time. The best thing about Lavelle is that he organizes a lot of out outside resources so my #1 tip is to GO TO STEP UP / WORKSHOP SESSIONS AND DO THE TEXTBOOK PROBLEMS IN THE SYLLABUS. Good luck! :)

Took AP Chemistry in high school, but still struggled a bit in this class.
The content includes a good amount of quantum chemistry in the first half of the quarter which made the class feel more like physics for a bit -- this is where a lot of people struggled (including me).

- Exams were multiple choice and not too many questions (around 15), but honestly they're quite difficult. Some questions were based on things Professor Lavelle mentioned once briefly in class, and a lot of the other content we learned and practiced in class weren't on the exams. Exam grades heavily impact your overall grade
- Lecture attendance isn't taken and lectures are recorded. Professor Lavelle has his own website with a bunch of content and help.
- Attendance for discussions were taken -- I personally had a TA who didn't really help us much; she just gave out a worksheet for us to complete and that was about it. I attended two other discussion sections with other TAs over the quarter, and they were fine so I guess I just didn't have the best luck when enrolling.
- There were extra credit points for completing the reviews which thankfully boosted up my grade

Dr. Lavelle should get more credit. Even if he is not an amazing lecturer, and the lectures often make me fall asleep, he makes up for it by providing a plethora of different resources. If you are struggling you can review the lectures on Bruin Learn, ask a question on his "Chemistry Community" website, or attend one of the numerous UA (undergraduate assistant) sessions that happen every day. You can tell that he really cares about the students, and he'll often drop a question on exams if most students get it incorrect. One difficulty is that it's so easy to make a mistake on a midterm, and be screwed for the quarter. Each midterm usually has 15 multiple choice questions, so if you mess up on 2, you're at a 52/60 or B for the midterm. Since you can't drop midterms and there's only one grading scheme, this becomes a little bit stressful.