Andrew Ichimura

Dr. Ichimura taught the lecture and lab section of Chem 452. His lectures more or less follow the book. His exams test lecture material and his "suggested" homework problems (sometimes these homework problems showed up on the exam verbatim). He is really enthusiastic about chemistry, especially happy to answer any questions related to spectroscopy (if you dig that stuff he is extremely knowledgeable and will talk about some pretty interesting related topics). He is great at answering questions during office hours or via email (usually returns student emailed questions within 8 hours!) Beware, he likes to answer your questions with questions to make you think and derive the answers yourself...it used to bug me at first because I was like, "c'mon he knows the answer and it will only take him 30seconds to tell me so why doesn't he?" but then I found out it felt so much better (2hours later) to come to the answer myself with his hints and questions and I usually remembered it during the exams. I would say his class put bags under my eyes, but I learned a lot and was really impressed with his teaching style. He really gets how the student learning process occurs and makes the effort to encourage and motivate students. Toward the end of the semester some students were looking for work so he lent them a copy of a brochure for biotech employment tips...Do you a college professor who knows that much about what's going on with their students and bothers to help them post class? I certainly never met ones like this in the past. This professor rocks!

Dr. Ichimura is a new professor at State. He team taught Chem 452 with Palmer. Contrary to what some students say, he is a good professor. His lectures are well organized, even if they are not very original. He was always available, and was very lax about helping students whenever he was in his office. His exams are fair; no real surprises. I advise doing the problems he assigns even though they don't have to be turned in.

Dr. I expects students to work and learn the material. Don't come in to his office saying you don't understand something without trying to figure it out yourself first. He's going to ask you what you did or what you think, and you should be able to tell him. Otherwise, he will start to ask you some intense questions, that could put you on the spot. But if you show him you have made a reasonable effort to understand the material, then he seems more than willing to help you understand the material. His grading seems generally fair, but he is very particular about how lab reports should look. Follow his directions! Don't try to fudge the references or the calculations; he actually checks! Yes he checks the references, the man is a p-chemist...

The one negative thing I can say about Dr. I is that he is terrible at handing back work in a timely fashion. I'm sure everyone complained about this on his semester review.