Great class! Loved Professor Scerri. He is so intelligent and very willing to help you at office hours!

Selling textbook and solution manual--$30! Message me at **********!

Scerri is one of the worst professors I have taken at UCLA. His teaching online was not the best because the class requires a lot of math problems so he would mainly say how to solve them instead of actually be able to write out the steps, this of course was simply due to the online format. I think he is okay to take in person, where you can form study groups and ask questions. But he was very unaccommodating to the current situation and expects everyone to come in with solid knowledge of chemistry. His sarcasm during office hours and lectures made my blood boil. If you have the chance, take any other Professor.

Believe ALL the reviews posted for Scerri, no matter the course, and I know there is a lot. If you are thinking about taking chem 14A, DON'T TAKE IT WITH SCERRI. His class is a mess, disorganized, and not fun at all. During class time (took this class online because of COVID), he just reads off his lecture slides word for word. Often focuses on the history of chemistry instead of actually solving problems. When he does show us problems, he doesn't physically go through the problems with you and because this is an introductory course, it's kind of important that he does. For midterm and final "reviews" he just combines all his slides from past weeks into one big slide and spends the class time reading them word for word, just faster. You're better off not attending lecture, just discussion. (He interrupted multiple lectures by asking why no one had their cameras on instead of focusing on teaching. When we gave reasons (internet connectivity, more cameras on = lagging issues, distractions, etc) he basically dismissed them and said they were stupid and untrue.) Discussions aren't mandatory but they're IMPORTANT if you don't want to listen to Professor Scerri. In discussions, TAs help with actually solving problems and what they mean in the context of the class. I had Spencer as my TA and he was a GREAT help. Besides 1 midterm during week 5 and the final, there are 9 Sapling quizzes you have to do. He doesn't offer any schedule to do the quizzes, just one big deadline at the beginning of week 10 so you have to create your own or you can choose to save them until the end of the quarter (I don't recommend this though). This class is heavily curved but you'll survive if you learn to work well with your peers and ask for help. Join a PLF session and talk with your peers on help with sapling quizzes. Class only consists of 3 grades: Sapling, Midterm, and Final. Our midterm was very easy with almost all questions copied word for word from another exam in previous years but for the final, it was devastating so don't think that you can float on by in this class.

tldr: This class is messy from start to finish. Don't go to lecture; go to discussions. Try to get Spencer as your TA. Sapling is required and try to finish one quiz a week to be on track. Midterm is easy but final was excruciatingly hard. Class is curved. Get help from PLF sessions. Grade consists of: sapling, midterm, and final. If you're in this class, you can text ********** for pdfs of past midterms and finals with answers (as well as blank ones so you can practice with).

Said this for 14A too but he's literally not that bad. If anything, he was better for 14B by a large margin. My friends that took 14B with other professors had a way worse time because the exams were harder. At least Scerri's exams are graded with partial credit in mind. He reuses a lot of questions from former exams that he provides which were my main source of studying. He had a lot of in class practice problems that were really similar to exam questions too. Attendance wasn't mandatory but I went to lectures because they were interesting enough and he's a funny and unpredictable guy. Idk I think people just hate him because they don't know how to self-study and they get mad when they don't get an A despite the class having enough resources to succeed if you put in the work. The TAs were great and made so many exam study resources that were posted for the entire class to use.

Do not take this class. This is my second class with this professor and I can officially state that I have retained and understand ZERO information. His slides are so confusing and he runs through 100+ slides in 50 minutes. His lectures consist of him reading off slides and even reading the solutions to practice problems without actually going through the way to get the answer. Chemistry is not supposed to be taught this way! It should be progressive and the professor should work throw the answer, not just read the answer off of two long slides in a few seconds as if anyone would understand that. The TA strike after midterms also meant that there were no sections so any chance of understanding the content outside of his lecture was destroyed and there was zero support given from TAs when it was needed the most. The achieve quizzes are SO long and tedious that it felt like I had numerous final exams for the class. The class is graded in the most confusing way ever that it isn't even possible to know what grade you're at and what the curve is. This is the worst class and professor I've ever encountered.

I took this class with no prior experience in chemistry. Overall, I put a good amount of work into this class (took lecture notes, read through the textbook, attended office hours, completed practice questions, etc.) because I was scared of getting screwed over by curving. The workload in this class is deceptively light, so I would make sure that you find ways to study on your own time. I do not think I would have been able to do as well if I didn't dedicate as much time to this class as I did. Scerri seems to be knowledgeable and passionate about chemistry, but his lecture slides often had mistakes, which made me rely much more on the textbook. A large portion of our grade (50% I think it was) came from completing online Thinkwell quizzes. The quizzes weren't bad at all, as we could take them up to three times, open-everything, with no time limit. I was just annoyed that the questions were pulled from a bank that included some concepts we did not (and were not going to) cover. Scerri acknowledged we wouldn't be tested on those concepts, too. The midterm and final were fair and reflected practice questions done in class and discussion sections, but I would make sure to also pay attention to conceptual ideas mentioned in the lectures/textbook so you aren't caught off-guard when they show up on exams.

Avoid this man at all costs: like seriously no matter what you have to do don't take chemistry with Scerri. Currently taking 14A and its not even over and it's absolutely terrible. Day 1 I began and on zoom was this old man who did nothing but self promote his work and confuse me beyond belief.
Spoiler Alert: His slides are screenshots from textbooks or random questions online. So they are not cohesive and don't make a ton of sense. He just reads the pictures during lectures. During lecture he does a lot of self-promotion for this book he wrote on the periodic table (1/2 his lectures thus far *its week 6* have included pictures of the book). He hosted a review session for the midterm where he covered 5 weeks of content in 10 minutes, he clicked through the slides so fast you barley had time to read them let alone write anything down. His midterm was on a Sunday, mind you(who does that?), in-which included far too many short answer questions for the allotted time and had an entire 4 part question that was based on fake/made-up chemistry(I really wish I was making this up). His tests have typos, he doesn't explain topics that shouldn't be that hard and causes a lot of confusion. Overall he is one of the worst Professors I have ever had. Every lecture literally makes me more confused. He might be a nice guy but he is definitely one of those people who know what they are talking about so well that forget that we aren't on the same level. Organic Chemistry Tutor is the only reason I even know what the vocabulary words mean and what the equations are for this class. If you have to take him, don't do it. Please save yourself the head-ache and the stress.
-Thank you

The class itself is not that hard, especially after they removed o-chem. I found his thinkwell quizzes to be quite confusing and frustrating but they did help me learn the material before exams. Do all of the recommended homework problems and you'll be fine. Know everything that he talks about in his slides because that is the material that will show up on the exam. I don't consider this class unreasonable at all.

I did not take AP chem in highschool

I would not recommend to take this class with Scerri unless you absolutely have to. The grade is divided 30% for sapling quizzes, 30% for the midterm, and 40% for the final. The class is essentially asynchronous and I ended up watching all of the lectures on 1.5 or 2 speed the next day. The lectures only consisted of him reading through the (already posted) lecture slides but, occasionally, he would add new information or complain about how few people had their cameras on.
There are 5 sapling quizzes, all due at the end of the quarter. The questions come from the textbook and there was some overlap to the class content, but just as much content was never introduced during lecture. I would not recommend reading the textbook or doing the practice problems because there is just too much of a disconnect from the actual, tested class content.
The midterm and the final were excessively long and tedious. If you took AP Chem, the midterm should not be too difficult but towards the end of the course there is a good amount of new material that you will have to study in depth. Thankfully Scerri posted practice tests that were in the same format as both exams which were helpful for studying for the exams. Discussion was not mandatory, but I wish I went more often since the TAs essentially review the material from the past week. You can go to any section so I would recommend asking around to see which TA is the best.

Eric Scerri is the worst instructor I've ever had the displeasure of having during my time at UCLA, and throughout my entire lifetime of education. He couldn't care less about the success of his students and fails as a teacher in a multitude of ways. 1) His lectures are not only monotonous and boring, but irrelevant to course material and do not, in any way, prepare students for the exams OR homework in the course. 2) the homework on Achieve provides a ridiculous amount of busy work; which could be useful, however, the problems are ALSO irrelevant to the exams given. 3) the exams. Absolutely ridiculous tests, impossible to finish in the slotted time amount, always riddled with mistakes that are only given after Scerri figures them out mid-test and then has proctors write the corrections to the question mistakes on a whiteboard, piece of paper, etc. These exams are not a measure of what is taught in lectures or homework, the only reason I was able to pass them was because I had an angel of a TA (AJ, you are my savior) and had to lean on her immensely to teach the class; something she is certainly not getting paid to do (at least not to the level she should be). 3) Scerri is extremely unprofessional in his communications with students; he is extremely rude and unwelcoming and is extremely inflexible and fails to accommodate his students' needs whatsoever.
I am frankly shocked that UCLA would allow such an awful instructor to step foot in a classroom or lecture hall, much less get paid for what he fails to teach. cannot even fathom how he's kept a job here for 20+ years much less 20 days. I've never had a worse teacher, instructor, lecturer, joke of a professor, whatever you can call him; in my life. And I'm 150% sure that the majority of my classmates would agree, he is astonishingly awful.