Thomas G Mason
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
AD
3.2
Overall Rating
Based on 11 Users
Easiness 3.1 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Clarity 3.9 / 5 How clear the class is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Workload 2.6 / 5 How much workload the class is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Helpfulness 3.6 / 5 How helpful the class is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

TOP TAGS

  • Needs Textbook
  • Useful Textbooks
  • Would Take Again
  • Tolerates Tardiness
  • Is Podcasted
  • Appropriately Priced Materials
  • Gives Extra Credit
GRADE DISTRIBUTIONS
22.0%
18.3%
14.7%
11.0%
7.3%
3.7%
0.0%
A+
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
C-
D+
D
D-
F

Grade distributions are collected using data from the UCLA Registrar’s Office.

39.3%
32.8%
26.2%
19.7%
13.1%
6.6%
0.0%
A+
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
C-
D+
D
D-
F

Grade distributions are collected using data from the UCLA Registrar’s Office.

21.3%
17.7%
14.2%
10.6%
7.1%
3.5%
0.0%
A+
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
C-
D+
D
D-
F

Grade distributions are collected using data from the UCLA Registrar’s Office.

ENROLLMENT DISTRIBUTIONS
Clear marks

Sorry, no enrollment data is available.

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Reviews (5)

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Quarter: Fall 2021
Grade: A+
COVID-19 This review was submitted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Your experience may vary.
Dec. 22, 2021

Homework was a lot, but the tests were much easier than homework problems and extra credit was offered on both the midterm and final (I think like 5% of the test grade available). I was nervous about this class from his other reviews on here but he explains everything well and clearly outlines what is what's important to know. only thing that frustrated me about this class was the textbook, it had multiple errors and used weird notation that was often unexplained but was necessary because it was the source of the homework problems.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Spring 2023
Grade: A
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
June 23, 2023

Lectures: No lecture slides or notes are provided. I really recommend attending all lectures and not skipping. Lecture material covered is usually simpler than the textbook and more practical (just write down the formulas etc.). Lectures also sometimes covers material not within the textbook. Professor has a bit of a sleep-inducing voice and likes to use a projector w/ pen and paper. He has nice handwriting and is very neat.

Reading: Required for you to do homework. Although I mostly just skimmed through readings and wrote down all the resulting formulas.

Homework (40%): This is the MOST DIFFICULT part of the class. Every week, other than the midterm week, you are assigned A LOT of homework (took me ~6 hours per week on average). It's also worth a lot. Marking scheme for hw is: 50% for completion, 50% for correctness (TA's pick two random questions to grade). But yea, take my word for it that this will be the most difficult part of this course.

Exams (Mid-20%, Final-40%): Midterm was very, very, very easy. However, part of the reason is that ours was take-home. Midterm median was I think 97 or something. Problems were relatively simple and straightforward, no trick questions (pretty much same difficulty as the practice midterm). 5% extra credit.
In contrast, the Final was fairly difficult. For comparison, avg was 69.8% and median was 73.8% with a std deviation of 20.9%. Personally, I struggled a bit with time as it was a very thick exam packet, but all questions are definitely doable within the time given if you work through all the homework and practice final. I think it was 10% extra credit? I forgot lol.

Discussion & Tutorial: I had a really good TA (Tucker Allen). Very helpful responding to emails within a day for questions. Office Hours are super helpful (especially when there are no ppl lol). Discussion is for going over concepts from the textbook, kind of like an extra lecture or summary by the TA. Tutorials are for going through practice midterm/final or worksheets. Both are pretty useful, extra practice is always good.

Overall: The professor and TA for this course were absolutely amazing. Thermodynamics is interesting, in particular, it explains a lot of the AP chem stuff that was just kinda blown over me. Homework is the devil, don't let the midterm make you underestimate the final exam, and do the readings and go to lecture.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Fall 2021
Grade: A
COVID-19 This review was submitted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Your experience may vary.
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
Dec. 13, 2021

Aight this man is so insanely kind ugh. I don't know how it'll be off quarantine but we had a week long midterm and final and the problems were honestly quite fair. He was incredibly kind and accommodating and was genuinely happy to see everyone doing well (our midterm average was around 90%). Homework is EXTENSIVE and takes an insane amount of time and is also worth 40% of your grade so you need to put a lot of time into the class. The lecture content is slightly tangential at times with derivations so it reminded me of a physics class where you really have to read the book to understand problem solving, but the good part about that is that the math is quite a bit easier and it's mostly just formula bashing (no derivations on exams!) Book problems are a lot more similar to what you can expect on tests. He's a lot better than most of the other pchem profs so would definitely recommend for a nicer time~

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: N/A
Grade: N/A
Nov. 17, 2012

this man (& the TAs Kenny/Xiaoming) teach a proper course.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: N/A
Grade: N/A
March 23, 2009

slow and boring lecture. midterms were not that hard. Final was straightforward too. although i hate his class and lecturing style, i would actually recommend him for 110A cause u do little to none calculus (compared to other harder 110a prof like newhauser or valker).

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COVID-19 This review was submitted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Your experience may vary.
Quarter: Fall 2021
Grade: A+
Dec. 22, 2021

Homework was a lot, but the tests were much easier than homework problems and extra credit was offered on both the midterm and final (I think like 5% of the test grade available). I was nervous about this class from his other reviews on here but he explains everything well and clearly outlines what is what's important to know. only thing that frustrated me about this class was the textbook, it had multiple errors and used weird notation that was often unexplained but was necessary because it was the source of the homework problems.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
Quarter: Spring 2023
Grade: A
June 23, 2023

Lectures: No lecture slides or notes are provided. I really recommend attending all lectures and not skipping. Lecture material covered is usually simpler than the textbook and more practical (just write down the formulas etc.). Lectures also sometimes covers material not within the textbook. Professor has a bit of a sleep-inducing voice and likes to use a projector w/ pen and paper. He has nice handwriting and is very neat.

Reading: Required for you to do homework. Although I mostly just skimmed through readings and wrote down all the resulting formulas.

Homework (40%): This is the MOST DIFFICULT part of the class. Every week, other than the midterm week, you are assigned A LOT of homework (took me ~6 hours per week on average). It's also worth a lot. Marking scheme for hw is: 50% for completion, 50% for correctness (TA's pick two random questions to grade). But yea, take my word for it that this will be the most difficult part of this course.

Exams (Mid-20%, Final-40%): Midterm was very, very, very easy. However, part of the reason is that ours was take-home. Midterm median was I think 97 or something. Problems were relatively simple and straightforward, no trick questions (pretty much same difficulty as the practice midterm). 5% extra credit.
In contrast, the Final was fairly difficult. For comparison, avg was 69.8% and median was 73.8% with a std deviation of 20.9%. Personally, I struggled a bit with time as it was a very thick exam packet, but all questions are definitely doable within the time given if you work through all the homework and practice final. I think it was 10% extra credit? I forgot lol.

Discussion & Tutorial: I had a really good TA (Tucker Allen). Very helpful responding to emails within a day for questions. Office Hours are super helpful (especially when there are no ppl lol). Discussion is for going over concepts from the textbook, kind of like an extra lecture or summary by the TA. Tutorials are for going through practice midterm/final or worksheets. Both are pretty useful, extra practice is always good.

Overall: The professor and TA for this course were absolutely amazing. Thermodynamics is interesting, in particular, it explains a lot of the AP chem stuff that was just kinda blown over me. Homework is the devil, don't let the midterm make you underestimate the final exam, and do the readings and go to lecture.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
COVID-19 This review was submitted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Your experience may vary.
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
Quarter: Fall 2021
Grade: A
Dec. 13, 2021

Aight this man is so insanely kind ugh. I don't know how it'll be off quarantine but we had a week long midterm and final and the problems were honestly quite fair. He was incredibly kind and accommodating and was genuinely happy to see everyone doing well (our midterm average was around 90%). Homework is EXTENSIVE and takes an insane amount of time and is also worth 40% of your grade so you need to put a lot of time into the class. The lecture content is slightly tangential at times with derivations so it reminded me of a physics class where you really have to read the book to understand problem solving, but the good part about that is that the math is quite a bit easier and it's mostly just formula bashing (no derivations on exams!) Book problems are a lot more similar to what you can expect on tests. He's a lot better than most of the other pchem profs so would definitely recommend for a nicer time~

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: N/A
Grade: N/A
Nov. 17, 2012

this man (& the TAs Kenny/Xiaoming) teach a proper course.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: N/A
Grade: N/A
March 23, 2009

slow and boring lecture. midterms were not that hard. Final was straightforward too. although i hate his class and lecturing style, i would actually recommend him for 110A cause u do little to none calculus (compared to other harder 110a prof like newhauser or valker).

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
1 of 1
3.2
Overall Rating
Based on 11 Users
Easiness 3.1 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Clarity 3.9 / 5 How clear the class is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Workload 2.6 / 5 How much workload the class is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Helpfulness 3.6 / 5 How helpful the class is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

TOP TAGS

  • Needs Textbook
    (3)
  • Useful Textbooks
    (3)
  • Would Take Again
    (3)
  • Tolerates Tardiness
    (2)
  • Is Podcasted
    (2)
  • Appropriately Priced Materials
    (2)
  • Gives Extra Credit
    (2)
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