2006 Quality Assurance Feedback

Chemistry 1

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CHE11GEN - General Principles of Chemistry

(Dr John Traeger and Dr Jeff Rowe)

Overall this unit was well received, with an overall rating of 3.9 out of 5 (1 = very poor, 5 = great). There were 118 responses. Most students made use of the extensive web-based material available for this subject and commented favourably on it. However, it has never been the intention of the lecturers to make the web based material identical to the material that is presented in lectures and attendance at lectures is still very important to gain a proper understanding of the unit.

Dr Traeger's lectures were very well received, particularly those in Unit 1. His use of film clips was appreciated. Dr Rowe's online notes were briefer than those of Dr Traeger, with students preferring the more detailed notes. However, this difference is up to the personal choice of the lecturer. Dr Rowe was thought to be not "colourful" enough in lectures! Dr Rowe was pleased that no student complained of not being able to hear him this year, so that problem from previous years seems to have been solved. Students liked having the problem sets handed out in hard copy in Unit 2. They also liked the experiments during the lectures throughout the semester.

All American text books like Chang have very little of the organic chemistry covered in Unit 2. The few students who purchased the supplementary text book "Organic Chemistry" by Atkins and Carey found it useful.

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