Ignore all the old reviews, Rubin is absolutely goated. All of his exams were online, open note, open book, and he often gave us extra time to complete them. The grading scheme is also super forgiving (you literally only need 20% in the class to pass with a C-) and homework is weighted 33% of your grade. I got an A- with only an 81% since the class average was a 60% on the second midterm, which lowered my overall grade a bit. He also gives us super useful slides, summaries, and links that we're allowed to use during the exams. He has great humor and is a super sweet person who truly cares about his students and our success. 100% recommend this class, I would not have scored so high given how little I studied with any other professor. Rubin is amazing.

The old reviews are not accurate to his current teaching style. This class is extremely easy with an extremely easy grade distribution. His exams are all online so they are open book and his current exams are much easier than his older exams. He's super nice but his lectures are very dry. The spectroscopy portion is WAY more in depth than most 30B professors but that's probably because that's his research focus. However, the exam questions on spectroscopy were super easy. If you want an easy A, take this guy.

-Grading-wise, Rubin was super lenient. Problem Sets, Midterms (2), and the Final Exam were each 1/3 of your grade. An 85% was a straight A, 75% A-, 65% B+, etc. This took the pressure of grading and just let you focus on learning the material. He may change his grading scheme to be a lil less lenient as he mentioned the department was surprised by his distribution. His exams were still very fair, and were open note open book and online.
-Teaching-wise, Rubin definitely got better over the course of the quarter. He hadn't taught the class in many years, so the first couple weeks were a little rough. After class though, I spoke to him and asked him to do more examples and less theory; he listened and started to do more problems and his lectures became way more clear, so I really appreciate that he was willing to listen to our feedback and improve from it. Also, he always threw jokes and some funny examples in his slides, so it was always pretty engaging. Expect some laughs along the way. Finally, he was very clear with his expectations, so before exams he would post in his slack channel exactly what chapters/topics would be covered so you could always guess what would be on the exams.
-His Office Hours were super helpful and informative, I feel that this is where his teaching was the best. He would walk through problems on the PS so you could easily get your questions answered. He was also available 24/7 through slack so you could always get your questions answered there. I also had a conflict with the original OH, so he moved them to accommodate me so he's def a very understanding and caring person.
-One complaint is that he would post his slides in parts, so he'd post like Ch17 Pt1 and then a week later post Ch17 Pt2 and I thought it was kind of annoying that I had to combine them all afterwards. But I think he did this because he was creating new slides each week, so I'm guessing if he teaches the class again they won't be chopped up. As a professor though, he was pretty organized and had a really organized slack channel, even having tabs where he would post old exams/solutions and summary sheets/slides.
-Overall, ignore the old reviews from way back when as I highly recommend Prof Rubin. I'm not even a Chem/Bio major but I still found the class to be very painless with him. I remember him saying that when he was taking College Classes, his professors made OChem very hard and stressful so he said he wanted to make his classes as manageable as possible. What a guy!

I really liked Prof Rubin's course. His course structure allowed him to make organic chemistry interesting without it being stressful, and I really appreciated this. Grading consisted of problem sets (graded for correctness) and exams, which were online and open note. While his exams were not easy, I found that they tended to be very fair! The fact that they were open note I feel made the course more about understanding and applying reactions, spectroscopy knowledge, and key concepts, rather than memorizing material. In addition, the class is not curved, however the grading structure was much more lenient than typical courses (85-95% = A; 75-85% = A-, etc.). I also loved that he consistently showed examples of what we were learning in lecture. Personally, prior to this course, I already (mostly) liked learning organic chemistry, and I appreciated that I was able to continue learning it and see how it is applied without being so stressed out.

I really liked Prof Rubin's course. His course structure allowed him to make organic chemistry interesting without it being stressful, and I really appreciated this. Grading consisted of problem sets (graded for correctness) and exams, which were online and open note. While his exams were not easy, I found that they tended to be very fair! The fact that they were open note I feel made the course more about understanding and applying reactions, spectroscopy knowledge, and key concepts, rather than memorizing material. In addition, the class is not curved, however the grading structure was much more lenient than typical courses (85-95% = A; 75-85% = A-, etc.). I also loved that he consistently showed examples of what we were learning in lecture. Personally, prior to this course, I already (mostly) liked learning organic chemistry, and I appreciated that I was able to continue learning it and see how it is applied without being so stressed out.

I recommend taking Rubin if you can study ochem well on your own. He is not that great of a lecturer, especially during the first four weeks of class when he covers spectroscopy theory, which is useless and will leave you confused. Make his old tests your primary study resource, and then read over the book, etc. His lectures on reactions tend to have little continuity, thus sometimes it can be tough to figure out what exactly he's talking about since he tends to jump from topic to topic. Try to pay attention to his examples in lecture though because often times he will slip in something not emphasized by the book and put it on an exam. Many people seemed lost in my class. However, this comes to your advantage if you know ochem, because you'll be way ahead of the curve. So I guess your best gauge as to whether or not you should take Rubin is how you did in 30A. Don't take him if you struggled (unless you get a tutor or something). Take him if you owned 30A and feel confident with ochem. By the way he's very generous with the final grades. He even said himself that he rarely gives out any Ds or Fs. I think typically his curve is about 33% As, 33% Bs, 33% Cs. Be prepared for that 2nd midterm (our average on it was a 40).

What can you say...evidence why forcing researchers to teach is a recipe for disaster. I would feel better if I felt like he was making an effort. But that just isnt the case. I got an A in his class primarily as a function of how many hours I spent pouring through the book. As a lecturer he causes knowledge regression if anything. I felt more confused after leaving his lectures. Also, he is on the more difficult side to understand his accent. Best not to take him if you have any difficulties just learning from a textbook.

YOU CAN TELL HE IS A NICE GUY BUT HE REALLY DOESN'T LECTURE WELL. HE REALLY LIKES TO GO OFF ON TANGENTS BUT AS LONG AS YOU STUDY HIS NOTES, THE RELEVENT PARTS, AND THE PRACTICE MIDTERMS AND EXAMS EVEN THOSE FROM THE PAST QUARTERS, YOU SHOULD DO FINE.