* Your Chemistry course is participating in the Follett Access program. This is an NYU Bookstore initiative that delivers required course materials digitally at the lowest possible price. The book, Chemistry by Silberberg will be delivered through the CONNECT platform. The cost of the book is $94.75, which will be added as a "book charge" to your bursar bill, this is a savings of $189.25 over the new hardcopy price. If you decide not to use this digital edition you can opt-out of the program. The deadline for opting out is May 31st. The link to opt out of the program is:
If you opted out previously you will need to opt out again.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, this course will be delivered remotely. It is unfortunate that we cannot meet in person, that we will be unable to utilize our traditional methods of assessment (i.e., written quizzes and exams), and that you will not have the opportunity to handle directly the apparatus and chemicals in the laboratory. Nevertheless, we believe that we can deliver to you the instruction, insight, motivation, and intellectual experiences necessary to understand chemistry. Because you will be working independently much of the time, it will probably require of you more than the usual level of dedication and diligence to "remain on task". However, if you do engage and actively participate in the course, you will be as well prepared for future chemistry courses as any student that has succeeded in General Chemistry.
Note that "remote instruction" is not the same as an online course. Online courses, designed from the start for that mode of learning, have little or no fixed scheduling, and do not encourage real-time interactions between student and instructor, nor between students and other students. We will do so. Lectures will be delivered via Zoom, and student questions will be encouraged. Recitations are intended to be a dialog between the students and the instructor, and Zoom accommodates that mode of interaction. I always have two office hours per week, during which you are more than welcome to drop in to ask detailed questions, or to just chat - again, Zoom allows this. This does, however, require that we meet at specific times, as described on the first page of this syllabus. Zoom lectures will be recorded, and you can view those recordings anytime that you wish (though it is best to be "present" so that you can ask questions). For recitations, quizzes, exams, and laboratories, you will need to participate in accordance with the NYC schedule (i.e., Eastern Daylight Time, EDT).
While attending lecture is important, it is not where you actually gain an understanding of chemistry. You have to take all of the information presented to you and fit it together. You have to build your own model of the (chemical) world that is consistent with everyone else's model (especially mine). That takes a lot of thought, effort, and practice. The amount of time necessary will vary from person to person. However, at a bare minimum, plan on spending at least twice as much time working outside of class as the amount spent in class. For the summer, that is a large fraction of your time. If you want to understand chemistry (and/or get a good grade), that is what it will take. I had a line in the first term syllabus that said you'd need to "eat, breathe, and sleep chemistry". As those of you from the first summer term now know, I wasn't joking.
Every topic that you need to know for this course will be either covered in lecture or specified in lecture as a reading assignment. There are topics in the book that we will skip or cover lightly. There are other cases where the book devotes little or no coverage to a topic and we will look at it in detail. To learn what is important, and what it is about it that I consider important, you need to attend the lectures. The course is the lectures. The book is a tool.
We will generally follow the sequence of topics from the book. However, whenever the notes differ from the book, follow the notes. They may only differ in emphasis, or they may actually disagree with statements from the text. I'll usually mention when any difference arises. One chapter in which we will differ from the book is Chapter 17.
To ensure that you have a correct version of the notes and to allow you to listen to the lectures rather than simply transcribe them, you should purchase reduced size copies of the lecture slides. These "Lecture Notes" are sold by the NYU Bookstore, and they can ship them to you upon purchase. Within the notes, there are some items that you'll have to fill in (generally, numerical examples) and I recommend that you use the wide margins to mark down other things that I say or to show the emphasis that I place on a particular section. I will not be putting the notes on our web page. This is not a distance learning course.
Attendance of the lectures will be monitored through the iClickers. During a typical semester, after you miss three (3) lectures, I begin to deduct 1/2 point from your overall score for each additional absence. This semester, no deductions will be made for lecture absences, since many of you may be attending from different time zones, but you are strongly encouraged to attend the lectures live - you will be able to ask questions and it will keep you more fully engaged in the course.
Some people like chemistry and some people don't. Most people like General Chemistry II more than General Chemistry I. I think this common preference for the second course is because the connections between various topics are easier to see (even when they appear in different chapters), you learn the truth about some points that were "oversimplified" in the first course, and you are able to generalize what you learn more effectively. By "generalize", I mean that by studying subjects like chemical equilibrium, you'll find it easier to understand some non-chemical things (if there are such things) in the world, such as traffic, the economy, life and death ... pretty important stuff.
The recitation is intended to help you to understand the course material. While it is also where you are quizzed and where you hand in your homework, you should view its primary purpose as a question and answer session where you can obtain an explanation of any course material.
A quiz will be given at the end of each recitation meeting. It will consist of a couple of problems or questions dealing with material covered in the lectures. You will always have more than 24 hours between lecture coverage and the quiz on a particular topic. However, since homework is not due until after a chapter has been collected, yet the quiz is meant to keep you current, you can be quizzed on a topic for which the homework has not been turned in. Stay up to date on topics, and you'll stay up to date for the quiz. 10 minutes is scheduled for each quiz.
As during Summer Session I, we will be using the McGraw-Hill Connect system to accompany your reading of the textbook, and for homework, quizzes, and exams. It is tailored to our textbook, so it should work well in helping you to work through the assigned materials. The assigned problems have been chosen to clarify concepts that I regard as important and to give you practice in solving problems of the types commonly encountered on quizzes and exams. It is NOT possible to perform well at test time unless you have done the homework. One of the most frequent remarks I hear (after an exam) is "I really understand the material. I just can't solve the problems!" What would you do if your doctor said "I understand your illness completely. I'm just not very good at curing it!"? I'll be happy if you do understand the material. But the fact is, your grade is going to depend upon your demonstrating that you understand it. To prove it, you have to answer questions and solve problems. Responding correctly, quickly, and coherently to these problems will require practice. So ... "do" the problems. In addition to the 20 % of your grade that they earn, you will perform better at test time.
Some recommendations:
- Read the chapter (and answer assigned LearnSmart questions) before trying an assignment.
- Work independently, but (at least some of the time) discuss problems with another class member (via Zoom, Skype, etc.). If you keep getting stuck, discuss it. Discuss concepts too! Visit office hours regularly.
- Write notes to yourself while you do the homework so that you can remember which problems gave you trouble and what was unclear. When you get to recitation (or office hours) use those notes to frame your questions.
There is a web page for all general chemistry courses at NYU. The URL is
We have set up an NYUClasses page for the lecture and laboratory. There will also be an NYU Classes page for your recitation section.
A note about email: Like last semester, do not send email to me. See me in person whenever you have a question or need something from me. I have 2 hours set aside to meet with you each week and I am willing to talk with individuals at the end of each lecture. I will not reply to any email sent to me (so you will be wasting your time by sending it).
There will be three examinations during this course. They will be held on alternate Thursdays (7/16, 7/30, and 8/13) from 9:15 a.m. to 10:55 a.m. They are not explicitly cumulative, though new chemical topics tend to build upon past topics. You are required to register for a recitation section for this course, where you will be given a brief quiz. You must also complete LearnSmart and Connect assignments, considered as homework. You will also be completing laboratory experiments, as described by Prof. An.
| lab | 25% |
| exams | 15% each |
| quizzes | 10% |
| LearnSmart | 5% |
| Connect | 15% |
If you have a documented disability you can arrange to take quizzes and or exams at the Center for Students with Disabilities (726 Broadway, 2nd Floor). It is your responsibility to make arrangements with that office and with me before the first quiz or exam.
If you miss a lecture due to illness, study the lecture notes and feel free to ask questions about them. If you miss a quiz, you must provide documentation on a physician's stationery that says that you were too ill to attend the recitation. If you are ill on the day of an exam and can provide a doctor's note, your grade will be calculated based upon the other exams and coursework. Lecture/recitation/exam documentation must be given directly to Prof. Halpin; laboratory documentation must be given to Prof. An. All documentation MUST include your name and dates to which it applies. YOU MUST attach to that a "documentation cover sheet" (downloadable in PDF format from our course web page) that shows exactly what work you missed (e.g., lecture, quiz, exam) and the section number of your recitation (if that cover sheet is missing, the documentation will not be used and the absence will go unexcused). Prof. An will provide her own documentation cover sheet for the laboratory portion of this course. ALL documentation is subject to verification. An excused quiz will not count, but you still have to complete the homework. Unexcused quizzes count as zeros. If you miss more than one of the three exams and you have a doctor's note, I will give you an incomplete (I) for the course and you can take a make-up exam during the fall 2020 semester. Any absence will put you behind in your work. At the pace of the course, it will be difficult to catch up.
Cheating in any form will result in a failing grade for this course and it will be noted in your university records. It will ruin your career. If you give information to another student during a quiz or an exam, you are both cheating. We are very good at detecting cheating. Don't try it.
last updated 1:24 am, Friday, June 19, 2019
