This class series should be at least 3.5 units. Not only do the lab manual/lectures alone not prepare you adequately for the quizzes, but Dr. Bernt doesn't seem to do anything besides post material from past years. I have only seen his face in the weekly emails that he sends at inconvenient times, and if you email him, he simply will not respond.
You need to buy the lab manual and notebook from the UCEN which are expensive. Even though everything is submitted online they insist you take all your notes on carbon copy paper from the specific notebook.
Never seen this man's face. You have to watch video lectures (of another professor) before each lab and the reports and pre-labs take up a lot of time. TA's run all the labs and they grade very harshly (I got points docked because my report was too long?). Sometimes the weekly quizzes include material we haven't even learned yet.
I took Chem ab with bernt and c with joseph. Bernt really helped me learn the content, I responded well to his teching style. The curves were also VERY good; he was not afraid to challenge us. I definitely recommend bernt, I liked him better than joseph by a bit.
Im not sure what this man even looks like, he has never shown his face ever. I was only commiicating with the TA. Man only responds to emails and makes the quizs. Literally Yang 2.0.
doesn't respond to emails. not sure why he gets credit for teaching this class because all he does is post petra's lab content every week.
Biggest issue with Bernt is he never responds to emails!! It's very frustrating when you have a question and your TA tells you to email Bernt about it and you never get a response back ://
In my experience, it was difficult to contact professor Bernt. He would not respond to emails I sent him regarding the course. Other than that, I think that the course is fair, the final is easy and the quizzes do a good job of making sure you remember material from lecture. There were also only 5 lab reports which helped cut down the work load.
For gen chem. labs, the TA's run the entire class so overall my TA was the best. I think the labs were pretty straight-forward and manageable as long as you know what your doing. The lab reports are easy because the professor gives you a rubric which literally states word by word what you must include. The final was also easy!
Not sure why everyone's rating is so harsh. Yes, the labs and quizzes are challenging but they are graded by very clear criteria. Attendance to the weekly lab is absolutely essential to your success but that is true across all lab courses. The final was pretty easy and was based off all of the weekly quizzes. If you work diligently you can get an A
The lab is run by TA's who also grade all of your lab reports. The professor tells the TA's to grade harshly on the reports and they are very specific with the criteria on the lab reports. It is difficult to get a good grade, especially if your TA is one of the tougher graders. There is also a lot of work for a 2 unit course.
Prof Bernt had grad students run the labs. Each lab had very extensive homework assignments before and afterwards. Attendance was mandatory and you could only miss 1 and still receive partial credit, even with emergencies. Only took this course bc it was required for my major but I would suggest you avoid at all costs.
Professor Bernt has been my favorite chem professor so far, he is very concise in his lectures and the exams have been very fair. Taking him for fall has been amazing, he is very charismatic and loves his dog Hilda also he gave us candy on Halloween. Do aleks, book probs, practice exams, CLAS and go to class!!!! You can get an A :)
Bernt is a cool guy & does his job well. Aleks as the hw system was the department's decision and not his, but it's a demanding and dreadful aspect of the class. It's actually counter productive. If aleks material looked anything like exam questions, and if the hours spent on it each week were spent studying exam content, we'd be way better off.
Professor Bernt is honestly a really good teacher. His lectures were short and informational and fit really well with the textbook. While he was a little distant cause of asynchronous class, he was super approachable in OH. Definitely in my top 3 chemistry professors at UCSB
Took this course in Fall 2020. Professor Bernts PowerPoints are clear and straightforward but his handwriting is terrible. One thing excellent about him is that he prepares summary notes for his students during the end of the course. Super helpful. 3 exams in total, very exam-based course. No section. Get ready to be stuck on Aleks for hours.
I have no idea why Bernt gets so much hate. I took Sylvester's Chem 1A and barely got a C. Bernts class was way easier. His lectures gave examples of problems closely related to what is on the tests. He gave worked out book problem examples. He gave us more time on exams with less questions. And he let us take the exams any time of the day we want
Bernt is the best gen chem teacher out there. I had kunkel for 1A and 1C and got a better grade and understood the material better with Bernt. His teaching style is great, he explains materials and hard problems, and exams are exactly like the book problems. Straightforward class and he uploads all his lecture slides.
Dont let these reviews scare you. Ive taken the chem series with Price, Bernt, then Joseph in that order. Bernt was my favorite. His lectures actually went over some of the more tricky problems. Do the book problems throughout the reading, as he pulls some for his test questions. His office hours were practically empty, so take advantage of 1:1.
Took chem 1A in the fall quarter and it was an easy A. However things are total different in chem 1B. The courses are much harder but Bernt even would not like to give us the solution and open the review to our average-60 exams. He is not willing to reply emails to us. Top 20 is A- but it is hard. DO NOT take it as a GE and avoid him if you can.
These tests were crazy hard, I did all my aleks, took notes on the entire 2 chapters, did all the book problems, and did the practice test and barely got an above average score. oh by the way, the class average is failing, the only thing that helps is the curve. 1A w/ Bernt was okay, don't do 1B w/ him though.
1A was chill as long as you took high school chem, didn't learn much from Bernt and was banking off of what I learned over 2 years ago, Aleks was probably the most helpful in teaching, do the book problems, I made the mistake of not doing them. Test get harder and harder, or I got dumber and dumber, one of the 2.
NOPE. NOPE. NOPE. This man does not even release an answer key for tests. Tests are RIDICULOUSLY hard and we are not even allowed to see what we got wrong or how our grade was calculated. He assigns like 100 practice problems that are NOTHING like the exams. DOES NOT REPLY TO EMAILS. It's week 7 and he still hasn't finished grading Exam 1.
Messy lectures, inaccessible, ridiculous questions on exams. Doesn't teach to what is on exams. You will struggle if you don't master every concept referenced. Homework is excessive and irrelvant to what is on tests