5.12 Class Home

5.12 Organic Chemistry I

Spring 2019

Instructors: Rick L Danheiser, Christina Z. Rotsides

TAs: Hayden Monroe Carder, Leo Delage-Laurin, Xin Gu, Keith Edward Laurence Husted, James Levi Knippel, Gino Eduardo Occhialini, Merjema Purak, Elaine Christy Reichert, Kathryn Marie Yammine

Lecture: MWF12 (10-250)

OCW archive available

Announcements

Final Grades for 5.12

The final exams are now graded and are available for you to look at in the Chemistry Education Office (6-205) along with a copy of the answer key. You are welcome to look at your exams and the answer key but they cannot be copied, photographed, or removed from the office. Final course grades are indicated on the cover page of the exams.

Overall we were very impressed by the performance of the class. Great work!

You were a terrific class and we enjoyed serving as your instructors in 5.12 this semester. Please accept our best wishes for a great summer!

Rick and Christina

Announced on 24 May 2019 1:48 p.m. by Rick L Danheiser

Please Complete 5.12 Subject Evaluation

Dear Class,

Subject evaluations close tomorrow morning at 9 AM. If you have not yet completed an evaluation (48% of you have not as of the time of this message!), please take a few minutes to evaluate this semester's class. Subject evaluations are taken very seriously by instructors, TAs, and faculty who are involved in course development in the department. We read every single evaluation and evaluations have led to significant changes to the way 5.12 is taught! If you have already completed an evaluation, thank you very much. We will see you all on Wednesday.

-Christina Rotsides and Rick Danheiser

Announced on 19 May 2019 10:48 a.m. by Christina Z. Rotsides

Preparing for the Final Exam

The solutions to the past spring semester final exams have now been posted on the Exams page of the 5.12 website. About 230 pages of fun organic chemistry!

The optional review session conducted by Professor Danheiser and Dr. Rotsides is scheduled for Saturday from 11 AM to ca. 1:30 PM in 6-120. We will go over the problems from the beginning of the Study Guide and answer questions from the class. We recommend that you do not look at the solutions to the Study Guide questions ahead of time since we are going to discuss them in the review session; they are included in the Study Guide Answer Key for the benefit of students who do not attend the Optional Review Session.

Some suggestions for how to prepare for the exam:

We suggest that you begin by browsing through a few previous final exams to get an idea of the typical format and scope. The most recent exams will give you an idea of the format you can expect on this year's final. We suggest you also watch the Lightboard videos on selected problems from the 2018 final. After doing a certain amount of reviewing of this semester's notes, reading, cool-down questions, problem sets, and hour exams, the next step is to try to do one or two of the past finals within the three hour limit. This will allow you to identify which topics you have not yet mastered and help you to focus your further studying.

We have provided you with quite a number of past finals, and the exam this year will not be significantly different from past exams. Previous experience suggests that it is much more beneficial if you actually try to work problems rather than just looking at the solutions in the answer key. That is, simply reading through the answer keys does not really help you master the material and does not allow you to determine how well you are prepared for the exam.

Don't forget about the "Last Minute Help Center" and telephone hotline that will be available on Tuesday night. See teh Final Exam Info and Study Guide for details.

Reminder: please don't forget to complete a subject evaluation via the website http://web.mit.edu/subjectevaluation. The deadline to submit is Monday 9 AM. As you know, the faculty and TAs cannot see any evaluation results until after the final class grades are turned in to the Registrar. However, we can view a figure for the percent of the class that has completed evaluations and quite a few members of the class have not yet provided evaluations as of today. We read all comments carefully and are eager to get your feedback and suggestions how to improve the class for next year. Thanks!

Announced on 15 May 2019 2:43 p.m. by Rick L Danheiser

Poetry Competition Results Posted

The winning entries in this year's competition "Poetry in Organic Chemistry" are now posted at the end of the Syllabus and Lecture Notes page of the 5.12 website. The complete versions of all of the winning entries are included in this pdf file. Congratulations to the winners, and thanks to all the many students who contributed entries. There were a number of brilliant compositions in addition to the few we were able to celebrate in class today.

The solutions to the final exam study guide will be posted shortly. Thanks for your patience.

Reminder: please don't forget to complete a subject evaluation via the website http://web.mit.edu/subjectevaluation. The deadline is 9 AM Monday and most of the class has not provided evaluations yet. We read all comments carefully and are eager to get your feedback and sugggestions how to improve the class for next year.

Announced on 15 May 2019 2:38 p.m. by Rick L Danheiser

Exam 4 Answer Key Posted

Dear Class,

You can find a detailed answer key to Exam 4 as well as a blank copy of the exa on the Stellar Site (under the "Exams" tab). I encourage you all to review the answer key, regardless of your grade, as it can serve as a great study tool! I would like to encourage you to keep up the hard work as we continue through to the final exam! If you struggled with this exam, you should meet with your TA to discuss your exam.

Your exams will be handed back to you at the end of lecture.

Exam Regrade Policy
Requests for regrades for Exam 4 should be submitted to your official recitation TA. No requests for regrades will be accepted after noon next Monday (May 20). DO NOT WRITE ON THE EXAM ITSELF OR ERASE ANYTHING. Submit the exam together with an explanation of your request on a separate sheet of paper. Be sure to include your name and recitation instructor's name on the request. Please note that except for cases involving arithmetic errors, your entire exam will be reviewed and regraded.

Announced on 13 May 2019 11:45 a.m. by Christina Z. Rotsides

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