The course itself was structured with a focus much too heavy on exams, there were literally no other grades in the class. Homework was "optional", and it wasn't graded, but those types of questions always showed up on the tests. The class was basically Gen. Chem 3, with an extended focus on electrochemistry and statistics.

Learned all types of tabletop analytical techniques, it was absolutely useful and really applicable to all types of chemistry/science in general. The statistics/quality control portions weren't very interesting, but they were fundamental too. The curriculum was pretty typical of any analytical chem course, although we didn't talk about instrumental analysis or bio techniques at all, even briefly.

One of the worst professors I've ever had, for many reasons. Even though Dr. Martin was and is obviously very intelligent and competent in his field, he has absolutely no skill in transferring that knowledge to anyone. Lectures were always very scattered, and he tended to interrupt class a lot to talk about random things, some of which would appear on exams as questions, ie., "What was the name of my coworker from 40 years ago?", or "What are the three things I've arbitrarily assigned as miracles that you must remember?", or "How do you do this obscure textbook calculation question I never mentioned all semester?". Otherwise, he would usually talk about his cat during class (which he wrote songs about), or his band performances, or he would spend the entire class giving us an unrelated spe...read more

The course material was pretty dry, but you need to pay attention and understand it for any future scientific lab/work in general anyway. Definitely brush up on gen chem before taking it if it's been a while, but it's an otherwise pretty average and doable course if you have a competent professor.

Dr. Jacobs