No, seriously...WTF you talkin' about?
Yes, courses vary but, really, there are some principles to go by for ochem. Many of them have been mentioned here. Yes, instructor matters, but, honestly, the classes all teach the same basic things. The variation isn't that great....
The variation is HUGE. This is WTF I'm talking about:
I've tutored students online in o-chem in close to 50 schools across the country and I can start to see some patterns repeat. As far as I can see there are basically three main categories of courses in orgo. It's an oversimplification but I'm still in the process of really learning the variations in how orgo is taught.
Type I: . Exams will involve active thought and problem solving. Very time intensive courses. These are the ones that give nightmares. Do problems. Understand concepts. Write and rewrite notes. Get a good supplementary book like Ochem as a second language. Find a well-matched, disciplined study partner if possible. Get a whiteboard for drawing out mechanisms and structures. Practice synthesis. Keep track of little mistakes, with eye on eradicating them. Small mistakes kill. Some of the tougher ones I've seen (in no particular order): NYU, Rice, USC, UCLA, UGA, Syracuse, SUNY Binghampton.
Type II: And then... every once in awhile I come across profs from well respected schools who are basically mailing it in. Especially in Org 2. Their way of testing people is just to throw up 3 dozen reactions and have people give the products. No concepts tested. You have to know where the arrows go, but a straight up memorization approach would work here. No real push from the instructor to apply concepts. To prepare for these, get access to prior exams: questions often repeat. Problems are good practice, but less important as preparation than knowing reactions and synthesis. That's what's tested.
Type III I'd say is the community colleges. You still have to understand the concepts and to be able to push electrons. Again, focus is really on knowing the material in the lectures, not so much on applying concepts. If it isn't in the course notes, it won't be on the exam. There's a ton of material regardless, and knowing the reactions is paramount, but if you do the work and apply yourself the course shouldn't give you nightmares.
You're right - there's lots of great advice on this thread and the concepts you have to learn are basically the same. That being said, the examination style of the instructor matters tremendously to the difficulty of the course as well as to some of the strategies people find optimal for doing well in it. That's why you get a lot of seemingly conflicting advice like "don't memorize, learn the concepts", and "Orgo 2 for us was a lot of memorization".
I shouldn't have said "100% dependent", on the instructor though. There's a lot that's in your control.
tl;dr There's an enormous difference in study strategy between taking Orgo with Maitland Jones at NYU and taking it at Northern Virginia Community College.