Gen. Chem II: Withdraw or Stay?

[HopefulDoc31]

Hi Everyone,

I apologize if this question has been asked before (and that its extremely long), but this is my first time posting here, and I feel I may be in a somewhat unique situation. Any advice that you have would be extremely helpful and greatly appreciated! I am rather stressed.

I am a junior who has been taking 18-20 hours each semester and have a GPA of 3.9.

Some Backstory:

I'm a junior who is currently taking a General Chemistry II course (that is not going well). Yes, I did say junior.

I started my freshman fall semester as a Pre-Med student, took Gen. Bio I and Gen. Chem. I (amongst other courses), I had a "B" in Bio and a "C" in Chem. This first semester was obviously not a very good one for my GPA. However, I had some serious health issues at the time (I was frequently in the hospital and/or having surgeries), which definitely contributed.

Very discouraged about my medical school chances, but still passionate for a career in healthcare, I decided to change majors to Nursing, where I did my pre-nursing courses for the following three semesters. In the spring of my sophomore year, I received acceptance into the nursing program, which I was thrilled about, but somehow couldn't shake the feeling of still strongly wanting to do medicine. At this point (end of soph. year) I had a 3.9 cumulative GPA. During the three semesters of my pre-nursing courses, I also added on pre-med courses as well: Psychology, Sociology, Microbiology & lab, Anatomy and Physiology I & II, Human Pathophysiology, Pre-Calculus, Statistics, etc. I did well in all of these, and received either an "A" or "A+".

During this past summer, I decided not to accept my invitation to the nursing program and changed my major to a pre-med major of microbiology. Here is where my situation comes in. I will be graduating one semester behind, meaning that i'll be doing 9 semesters of university rather than 8. I'll also be taking the MCAT my senior year, rather than my junior year. With both of these things combined, i'll (hopefully) be entering medical school two years later rather than immediately following graduation. During this time I plan to do a masters program in Public Health or the like, something I have a passion for. I'll also seek additional experience in the field before medical school.

With this in mind, here's my situation.
It's been two years since I have taken Gen. Chem. I (which I did poorly in). Over this past summer, I took a 4.5 week Gen. Chem. II course through my local community college which was an all day course (7am-5pm). I (only now) know that summer courses are frowned upon, but it was only so I could graduate on time. It didn't go well, and I withdrew. I had a hard time finding the time to study when the class was all day long and exams being on Thursdays each week (not leaving the weekend to study). I also felt as if I was learning material without context, which didn't help.

This fall, I am RE-taking the Gen. Chem II course through my university. It is also not going well. I can't understand my instructor's lectures (accent) and he rushes through lectures, which is a clash for his teaching and my learning styles. I prefer to learn the material through the lectures, and solidify later that night through studying. Because I can't understand him, i'm finding myself trying to learn the material before the lecture, in an attempt to possibly understand him better. I feel as if his lectures are in Greek. I thought I had a solid understanding of the concepts (solely by reading the textbook, because I still couldn't understand him), but after the first exam, it was clear that I wasn't and I received a very poor (and surprising) grade. I chose this instructor because although he is known for being the most difficult Gen. Chem. instructor at our university, he gives generous curves to accommodate for such. However, this semester he decided that he no longer wants to curve exams, although the majority of the class averages 60% on exams. I have another exam in a week, and I have a strong feeling that just like the previous exam (I felt prepared), i'll do poorly again. As of now (crunching numbers), i'm not sure i'll even be able to pull off a "B" in this course. Hopefully, I gave you enough insight on my situation. By the way, this course material is nothing like the Gen. Chem II I took over the summer, as it appears that this is the genuine material we should have learned and the summer condensed course was extremely abbreviated (beyond expectation) in regards to content, which was disappointing because I thought I might have an advantage from taking it over the summer.

With my "C" in Gen. Chem I, and my previous "W" from Gen. Chem II, should I "W" again in this course out of fear for a "C"? I know having a "C" in Gen. Chem 1 & 2 would look rather bad. But would having two W's and then a "B" (if I re-re-take) look better or worse?

Also, if I did re-take the course, would taking it through a community college (online) look bad? In other words, withdrawing from a cc, withdraw from university, retake online at cc?

O-Chem Question:
I have an "A" in Gen. Bio II, and I anticipate doing well in my other courses as well. I feel like I may have just had some back luck in this course, with the curving perspective in mind. I am a very visual person, and have heard that O-Chem is extremely visual, yet students say it is very hard. Is this just a thought passed down from student to student or is it genuine? What makes it "hard"? As with me, "hard" just determines the time of studying required. With general chemistry, I don't like the non-visual concepts. Do you anticipate me doing better in O-Chem, if I don't "like" Gen. Chem? Just a question...

I apologize for the very long post, but I am in need of great guidance. Any information/thoughts would be very appreciated!!!

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[miniginger]

Hi there.

I have a similar situation and have been a long time lurker as well. I figured I'd step out of the shadows and give you my opinion on this.

For context (and solidarity), I'm a sophomore taking Gen Chem II after taking a semester "off" of pre-med courses after getting a C+ in Gen Chem I in my first semester of freshman year. I also am struggling with Gen Chem II with a professor who ridiculously rushes through lectures and I ended up doing quite poorly on the first exam. However, I know that getting another substandard grade in a general chemistry course can really dampen my chances of getting into an MD program, so I went directly to my professor for advice. It might work for you, it might not, but it's helped significantly so far for myself.

He said the problem he sees with so many of his students is that we don't actively study. He had told us initially to read the textbook chapters before class and to use lecture time as a way to reaffirm the topics. I'm the same way as you -- I like to learn in lecture and then integrate my lecture notes into my textbook notes after. But actively listening rather than frantically copying down notes has been super relaxing. Find extra practice problems online if your professor doesn't assign many, and redo the ones you get wrong over and over, even after you start getting them right. My personal preference is to redo the SAME problem over and over, so I can start predicting the answer, then once I can do it enough to memorize the answer, start applying the knowledge to similar questions. It helped me tons in calculus and has been helping significantly in chemistry so far. Of course, that is to say the contextual problems aren't giving you trouble, which I'm assuming since you're so good at bio!

As far as withdrawing, I would not do that again. You can try to explain the first W to an adcom but taking another shows lack of commitment in my opinion. You likely still have half a semester left to get yourself on your feet, so really just try to buckle down and focus any extra time on this class. Also, you say your professor curves, so if he's anything like mine, if you finish the semester with a B- you'll probably end up with an A. Talk to others who have taken the class before you to see how generous the final curve has been.

If you choose to retake the course, I wouldn't take it at a community college for the very reason you have already provided. They're abbreviated courses, and you really need this information to build upon in organic chemistry, biochemistry, and the MCAT. Anytime my motivation is lacking, I try to remind myself that if I don't take the time to understand these concepts now, I'll only be making my battle with o-chem and the MCAT that much harder.

 

[Wiggly Tuff Da Ruff]

Regarding your Ochem questions/anxieties:
I felt that Ochem was easier to understand than Gen chem and pretty much nothing like Gen chem. As long as I understood a few of the basic principles of Gen chem I was able to understand a majority of Ochem. The "hard" part about Ochem was learning how to think about problems and how to approach them. Time spent on Ochem varied with what we were doing. Nomenclature? not much time spent studying. Sn1 Sn2 E1 E2? Hours and hours until I got the hang of it and can do it quickly. The faster you can understand WHY something is happening, the less time you need to study it. Don't sweat it. Ochem is really not that bad, get through Gen chem first

 

[Mclovin0351]

Finish the course but step it up and get a C+ or a B. Your professor sounds very average for gen chem, your grade is on you.

I slept through almost every gen chem and Ochem lecture (still went to class) but succeeded by doing literally hundreds of practice problems. Listening to lecture then "reinforcing" by reading will not work. You need to do practice problems from your book and lots of them. Then multiple practice exams.

 

[RogueBanana]

I was a chem tutor for my University I may be able to help with this,

Gen Chem II is ridiculous. I'm just gonna say it.
It is heavily calculus-based, but most schools don't require or even mention calc during the course. This makes it much harder to understand when we talk about rate, order and exponents.

In fact, I've seen more students fail Gen Chem II than either of the O-Chems (though O-Chem II is a close second)

From this point on, you need to think of yourself as a chemist.
You need to approach this material with the goal of truly understanding it, and not just memorizing it. The biggest piece of advice I can give you is to focus on understanding & not memorizing.

You cannot be successful in chemistry by rote memorization. There are more reactions & conditions than any human can successfully memorize. Once you understand the basic archetypes, you will begin to see patterns and realize that most reactions follow the same 2-3 mechanisms.

As far as withdrawing, I would say no. Your first withdrawal can be explained (illness) but you will have a harder time justifying dropping regular chemistry and taking it at a community college. You will have an even harder time explaining why you re-took it as an online course.

As you may know, medical schools look at your BCPM GPA, and if they notice that you took all of your chem courses at a CC, or had multiple withdrawals, they will think (Correctly) that you took the easy way out. You need to buckle down and deal with this head on. Stop making excuses and hit the books.

Some resources for you:

-Khan Academy- Best Chemistry videos bar none. Watch these for every topic.
-Your Textbook- Do practice problems until you can get them right 80% of the time at least
-Chem.Purdue.edu - still don't understand a topic? Purdue has explanations.
-Chemguide.co.uk - even more topic-based explanations

once again, you need to understand the topics. You can memorize reduction potentials until you're blue in the face, but if they throw you a random redox reaction you didn't memorize you're in trouble. If you understand how to figure out which way the reaction goes based on the numbers, then it doesn't matter what the reactants are, you'll get it right every time. They all follow the same principles!

 

[Noxy]

I HATED gen chem 1/2. My professor was a great person but had a horrible accent and was so shy. He wouldn't look you in the eye, talk to you directly, or even really say much of anything at all. I ended up with C's for both 1 and 2. I can honestly say that maybe my brain just wasn't wired to understand gen chem and when studying for MCAT I realized just how deficient I was. Granted I took this class 7 or 8 years ago and had no Khan academy available. Khan academy is so great, use it! Don't worry about orgo until you get there. I feel like it is totally different. Orgo was great for me even after hating and not fully understanding gen chem, I learned and understood so much from that class and biochem was a breeze because of how much I loved it.

 

[HopefulDoc31]

Hi everyone,

Thank you so much!! I will continue with this course, even if I do get a "C". However, I really do believe that I can knock out a "B" if I really hit the books and study practice problems like my life depends on it. I really appreciate all of the recommendations for additional course material/learning sites. If I did get a "C" however, but I did very well in the rest of my future courses, would I be in major trouble (because of the C's in CHM 1 and CHM 2)? Even for DO schools? I honestly do not care which type of program I am in, or the letters after my name, as I just want to be in medicine.

Also, since I'm already a junior, I was able to calculate my BPCM grade and cumulative grade (through my degree completion), making assumptions for my future class grades (I went on the low end, rather than the high end, and yet I still had a 3.5-3.6 BPCM gpa, 3.75 cum, 3.9 AO). I included B's for O-Chem and Physics(which I have not yet taken), which gave me the above GPA's. If someone has a strong BCPM gpa, yet they are receiving B's in all of their courses, how would that look? I'm obviously going to aim for as many A's possible, but what if I still had the above (strong, I think) BPCM GPA while having many B's? I uploaded the AMCAS GPA Calculator that I used below.

Thanks again for all of the help. I really appreciate it!

 

[Lawpy]

Gen Chem II is ridiculous. I'm just gonna say it.
It is heavily calculus-based, but most schools don't require or even mention calc during the course. This makes it much harder to understand when we talk about rate, order and exponents.

Gen chem II is calculus-based? This is news to me. The only thing that i can think if that involves a semblance of calculus is chemical rates and kinetics, but it was really mild and pretty basic. I can't think of anything else in gen chem that uses calculus: thermo was covered extensively in physical chemistry, orbital stuff was covered in detail in quantum mechanics, so if either were discussed with equations in gen chem class, i would blame poor teaching and bad professors.

Now, to the OP, you did bad on gen chem I, and are struggling twice in gen chem II. So chemistry is your weakness, and you need to assess why. You're not understanding the basic concepts well. Already withdrawing from gen chem II and withdrawing it again looks bad. Taking the same class three times is bad, and even worse if you can only achieve a B in the third attempt.

Ideally, you should be acing gen chem II in your current retake. To do that, you should get outside help: tutors, office hours, academic resources are the best. I second Khan Academy to learn and master chemistry. Use it and study it religiously. Make sure you do a lot of practice problems. Do this daily and you will see your scores improve.

Hi everyone,

Thank you so much!! I will continue with this course, even if I do get a "C". However, I really do believe that I can knock out a "B" if I really hit the books and study practice problems like my life depends on it. I really appreciate all of the recommendations for additional course material/learning sites. If I did get a "C" however, but I did very well in the rest of my future courses, would I be in major trouble (because of the C's in CHM 1 and CHM 2)? Even for DO schools? I honestly do not care which type of program I am in, or the letters after my name, as I just want to be in medicine.

Also, since I'm already a junior, I was able to calculate my BPCM grade and cumulative grade (through my degree completion), making assumptions for my future class grades (I went on the low end, rather than the high end, and yet I still had a 3.5-3.6 BPCM gpa, 3.75 cum, 3.9 AO). I included B's for O-Chem and Physics(which I have not yet taken), which gave me the above GPA's. If someone has a strong BCPM gpa, yet they are receiving B's in all of their courses, how would that look? I'm obviously going to aim for as many A's possible, but what if I still had the above (strong, I think) BPCM GPA while having many B's? I uploaded the AMCAS GPA Calculator that I used below.

Thanks again for all of the help. I really appreciate it!

While your GPA/sGPA would be okay-to-good with many B's, you should ideally ace physics and ochem to show med schools that you can do well in science despite your gen chem struggles. Working hard and excelling these prereqs will also help you on the MCAT.

Additionally, medical schools look at your year-to-year GPA (i.e. freshman, sophomore, etc. GPA) to note any upward or downward trends. Getting B's in sciences will therefore look bad as you would be underperforming in later academic years. So this is why maintaining a near-A performance is key.

 

[RogueBanana]

Gen chem II is calculus-based? This is news to me. The only thing that i can think if that involves a semblance of calculus is chemical rates and kinetics, but it was really mild and pretty basic.

At my University, Gen Chem II was all about Rate & Kinetics & Thermo. They did not offer a physical chemistry course and as such included it in gen chem II.

 

[Lawpy]

At my University, Gen Chem II was all about Rate & Kinetics & Thermo. They did not offer a physical chemistry course and as such included it in gen chem II.

So you studied this in gen chem II?

 

[RogueBanana]

So you studied this in gen chem II?

Unfortunately. Though they trimmed down the calculus part. It was a "trust me, this is proven because of calculus" type deal. They expected you to take it on faith rather than teach you calc so you'd truly understand it.

 

[Lawpy]

Unfortunately.

damn sorry to hear that man. That's a total overkill.

Well, hopefully, OP's gen chem II isn't like that (idk unless we see OP course syllabus) because tips/advice for dealing with this stuff are really different from a normal course. Physical chem stuff isn't easy at all so i can see why it's hard to do well

 

[RogueBanana]

damn sorry to hear that man. That's a total overkill.

Well, hopefully, OP's gen chem II isn't like that (idk unless we see OP course syllabus) because tips/advice for dealing with this stuff are really different from a normal course. Physical chem stuff isn't easy at all so i can see why it's hard to do well

My school was definitely an exception to the rule,
Gen Chem 1 was ridiculously easy (an entire test was stoichiometry problems)
Gen Chem 2 was ridiculously hard

then the Organics were pretty much on par with Gen Chem 2, lots of mechanisms, reading NMR & Mass Spec & IR reports, and synthesis problems (how can I make x compound from y compound)

My school has one of the best Chem Departments in the northeast in terms of research, but the way the school set up the actual lecturing is ridiculous. Too many students, not enough teachers, not enough lecture seats. Most of the lecturers are the older chemists who are dialing back their research. They're brilliant chemists, and they expect their students to take a strong interest in chem and study/explore topics on their own. This is because they usually teach PhD. students & masters of chem students, they aren't accustomed to spoon-feeding the topics to freshman. It works out great for the chem nerds, producing amazing chemistry students, but it cuts the throats of the average students.

 

[HopefulDoc31]

I see. I wasn't sure if having a good BPCM would be all that matters (rather than the letter grades), since the letter grades make up the BPCM anyways (if that made sense). It appears that both matter equally. I do believe that I'll be able to knock out plenty of A's (except biochem and genetics). Yes, I can see why an upward trend is crucial as one progresses through their studies, and I didn't expect this issue with general chemistry. I didn't find Gen. Chem. I particularly difficult at all, but my health issue (kidney disease) resulted in me missing exam dates (bad timing), and using my final to make them up (which I didn't do as well on). The point is, I understood the material during that class. As of now, I am confused on buffers, but am using the materials you have all discussed to help me through. I'm finding Khan academy extremely helpful, as it's taking my instructor's lectures and translating them into a language I understand. Plus, I can reverse and play it back (which I have been doing...a lot).

This is a brief course description of my class: Equilibrium theory, thermodynamics, kinetics, electrochemistry, nuclear chemistry, descriptive chemistry.

 

[pioneer22]

I would stick with the Chem and premed classes and work your butt off.

You will find harder teachers or not preferable ones in college. The true test is how you respond.

Don't be one easy to quiver from challenges...medicine won't be a good career if you do.

There is a plethora of resources on the internet for intro science classes, outside all the university resources available.

Keep At it.