Incoming freshman: do not take Lavelle!!!! He is the hardest chemistry professor for general chemistry. Yes he is a sweet man and tries to give a lot of resources, but at the end of the day his quizzes screw you over since you will not be prepared for them at all, and his final scarred me for life. Please chose another professor if you can!! This professor ruined my first 2 quarters of college.

Selling the textbook and solution manual for $70.
I can throw in the course reader for $10.
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I took Lavelle for both Chem14A and 14B and got an A in both. He's actually not that bad. His lectures are podcasted, but I went to class anyway. He's a nice guy but his tests are crazy. He throws hardballs at you. You have 3 quizzes in discussion. Those are extremely hard and time consuming. I didn't finish my quizzes most of the time, but one quiz grade is replaced by take home quizzes that you turn in. Make sure you do those because they aren't required, but you could get 100% on those and replace a quiz grade! The quizzes are apparently made by the TA's, and they make it so hard for some reason and so long. You really have to know what you're doing. I recommend doing all the homework problems even though they're not required and it seems like a lot. If you actually work through them, they're not that bad. Also do all the past midterms he gives you in the back of the course reader. The books and course readers are so expensive. But anyways, the midterm and final, you're given a lot of amount of time to finish them, so you could take your time in them compared to quizzes where you only have 40 min to finish. He also requires you to post on the Chemistry Community every week. You either post a question or answer a question. I always answer questions. It's pretty easy. Discussion sections are required, but they actually helped. Dan Hatfield was a great TA! He's really chill too.

Great class! Lavelle was awesome and didn't need to study too hard, but the books were definitely critical.

Selling textbooks for Chem 14A/B with Lavelle (same book) with solutions manual.
$80 or best offer.
Contact at **********.

selling textbook along with solution manual for chem 14A for $90
can give the book on campus
contact at **********

selling textbook and solution manual for chem 14A for $90
Chemical Principles: The quest for insight by Vollhardt fifth edition. textbook + study guide and solution manual

In addition to everything everyone has said so far, his TAs suck ass. Like really. Some of them can barely speak english, and will mark you down even if your answer is CORRECT, but does not exactly match the solutions. The UAs are great though.

Also, you will lose a minimum of 15 points on sig figs over the two quarters, especially if you haven't worked with them before.

It's definitely a tough class to take during your first quarter in college. It's a ton of material and you have to manage your time really well and be very efficient to avoid getting behind. It's easy to prioritize other classes with actual assignments due, but don't let this happen to you. There are tons of office hours so that's really nice and you're required to use Chemistry Community every week so you might as well ask questions that might actual help you. The down side is that his quizzes and tests are really hard even if you know the basic material. His quizzes are manageable but the timing will leave you making mistakes or having to guess. His tests are are super application based so even if you know the material and the homework questions in and out you'll still probably end up feeling like you're making an educated guess. My conceptual chemistry background was okay but my AP Chem teacher didn't even know how to use a graphing calculator so I was pretty much teaching myself all the calculations for the first time. I pulled through with a B after studying my ass off but if you're looking for a more doable class I would take Scerri for 14A.

Lavelle is an extremely unfair professor. I did not take AP Chem in high school, so I made sure I would use all the resources I could to get a good grade (I was aiming for an A or A-). His class is set up so it has 3 quizzes (40 points each), a midterm (110 points), and a final (180 points). The first quiz is usually known to be really challenging because it's a "buffer" quiz, so those who aren't serious about being pre-med will drop the course due to their bad score. This isn't really a problem because you have the opportunity to drop your lowest quiz score with the supplemental workbook in the class, so that's what I did. I got a 100% on the first quiz (because of the workbook), 93% on the second quiz, 90% on the midterm, and 75% on the third quiz, which led me to go into the final with an A/A-. After days of studying and hours of tutoring, I went into the final confident I would get a good grade, as I mastered all the material that was on previous exams and stressed in the course reader. However, Lavelle decided to change the structure of his final after 10 years, switching from mathematical to conceptual. The final was extremely unfair, and there was material on it that was barely discussed in class. The majority of the class bombed the final and it dropped almost everyone's grade that I know. Also, there wasn't even a good curve for the class. I even went up to him prior to the final and asked him if the final was going to be combined with Scerri and conceptual, and he lied to my face and said "no, where did you hear that?" and that the exam would surely be "fair". Scerri's students were comfortable with the material and got good grades in the class while Lavelle's kids suffered. I would definitely recommend taking Scerri, as his online quizzes are online and his exams are actually fair unlike Lavelle's.

I really like Lavelle. He's straightforward and clear, and if you do all the problems he assigns (textbook, workbook, practice midterms/finals), you will be prepared for the midterm/final. However, I cannot stay awake in his classes. (His voice is too soothing!) But he podcasts his lectures, so it's not a big deal. I just watch all his podcasts in my room. If you try hard, this class shouldn't be that bad. I recommend that you take him.