Medem Isaac

Excellent teacher- really prepares you for the exams. The review outlines are great, and the grading scale really works for the students benefit. The real problem the that the class was at 8 in the morning, and I slept in more then I attended, but I still left with a B, so that shows you something. It is very important to Issac that her students know the material. She will gladly answer questions and her examples of compounds are entertaining.

Whatever you do, don't take her class over the summer. These "review sessions" other people talk about don't exist over summer and the tests are hard (many tricky questions). On top of that, much of the class will have tests from previous years that basically give away all the answers while everyone else is struggling. Multiple choice exams are the worst idea for organic chem tests, especially reactions and syntheses. Her final synthesis problem of every exam was always worth at least 20-25% of the grade and forced you to put down five or six scantron choices each of which corresponded to a particular reagent (given a starting reagent) in the proper order. Put the first one down last or vice versa and even though you have everything else in the correct order you automatically lose 25% of the points for that test (if you miss any, you'll most likely miss two since you displace two correct answers ~ 10% of your score gone).

Lectures were hard to follow as the pace was too fast. She confuses people and herself answering questions sometimes. Try to avoid her class over the summer at all costs...

The material may just be too much to cover in a month and a half (more like five weeks). She is very open to talking/helping students, but it seems like there is no way for her to have tests where partial credit is a possibility...

The people that wrote negative reviews about Dr. Isaac were probably high when they wrote their reviews. Dr. Isaac is a great professor.

She makes learning soooo much easier by typing out a basic outline of her lectures for you. If you pay attention to her teaching and study, there's no reason not to get an A on her exams...they're totally fair.

She gives quizes and these go by super fast at the end of class.

But as for lecturing, she could've made learning chem a little more exciting. The only time I remember her getting psyched at teaching chem was when she came with her lab coat on and started playing 'pyromaniac' in front of everyone.

You do learn a lot, and if you're a bio or chem related major...those typed outlines are indispensible.

Dr. Issac is a superb instructor. Although, she has a slight accent, her lectures are very understandable and easy to follow. She is very sweet and answers questions to a great extent. Her exams and quizzes are not so easy, yet not that hard. Be sure to attend the exam reviews (she gives away a lot of answers that are on the exam), do the homework she lists (most problems are on the exams and quizzes), and be sure to read before each lecture. Dr. Issac knows her chemistry and she'll make you know it as well!!!

She is a good instructor. I read the material before class, and did the sample problems that were really helpful for the tests. YOU SHOULD GO TO THE TEST REVIEW! she tells you what is going to be on the test, and what to memorize! She is a really good instructor, and she drops the lowest test score.

Ms.Isaac is a teacher who seems to be so nervous when teaching her class. She speaks softly which is not appropriate for a big class. When you sit on the back of the room, you can hardly hear her. She also makes the lectures confusing. She confuses herself sometimes. I think that she doesn't really know how to deliver the lecture to her students. Her quizzes are easy, it's only 5 questions and multiple choice. The exams are hard though. Few people get a good grade on the exams. She just teaches so fast and writes too much on the board, and sometimes I can't catch up.

The lectures did not do a good job of clarifying the material, which made doing the labs difficult because there were two sets of often conflicting procedures. The exams were pretty out of pace with the labs themselves, often more difficult than the pretty basic write-ups. My real problem came on final exam day--we got there to take the exam, a few people said they didn't want to take the exam that day and so she caved and changed the exam date, and told the people that were prepared for an exam that day that they couldn't take it that day. Needless to say, chaos ensued with many people left somewhat confused by the whole thing. On top of this, she was mad at US for being angry with her inconsistency and inability to make up her mind and stick to it about exam dates. I thought it looked really bad for the chem department to have this kind of stuff happening in their classes. Often people say to take her because you will get the easy A, but in the end you don't learn a whole lot and you end up being lost in the next class--it isn't worth it, and not that many people made A's anyway...

I went to class everyday for the first two tests, and I got Bs on both tests. I stopped going to class, never went to anothe class for the remaining 3 tests and got As on every one. She has the most confusing lectures I've ever been to! I would read, study and still be totally lost in her lectures. You'd do better to stay home and study and then take the tests. It worked so much better for me!