Metcalf isn't the greatest professor. He is nearly impossible to pay attention to because all of his lectures are so dry. Just go to class to get the clicker questions correct, stay on top of your reading (and read BEFORE you get to class so you can at least try to pay attention to Metcalf's monotony), and use these lecture notes since they are pretty much all that you'll need to know: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B7m7vrP2fFK5RzNZblMwOGxaMDg

Avoid Metcalf if possible. He barely taught anything; everything I learned was from the textbook or from my high school chemistry classes. He is very bad at explaining concepts, and makes them seem more complicating than they actually are. Go take it with Welch and Morkowchuk if you can. I have heard are much better.

Metcalf sucks, likes to give students bad grades, and just doesn't really care about his students. If you do the readings and pay attention though you can get a solid B. Basically this is a weed out for premeds and engineers, good luck.

Metcalf is clearly very knowledgeable about chemistry, but the way he explains some of the more advanced topics was not the best. The textbook definitely helped understand these topics, but still it was hard to grasp without someone to explain it to you. Metcalf's class was definitely more difficult than the other professors and it was graded harder than the other professors' (ex: Metcalf clicker questions are partially based on accuracy whereas the other professors only had clicker questions for a participation grade). Overall, the class wasn't terrible, but I would recommend taking it with another professor instead.

Take with another professor if you can. I learned nothing in lecture and he uses ALEKS, the most annoying online homework ever, that none of the other professors use. Seriously, if you want to learn chem and preserve your GPA, find another teacher.

Here's how to get an easy A/A- in this class:

- Show up to lectures, and pay attention (don't mess around on your computer). Kids complain about how hard this class is while they're the ones who are on Facebook and stuff during class and then do poorly on exams. Just show up and pay attention for 50 minutes. Not that hard. A big portion of this class is participation through clicker questions, so do these little things and you should be good.
- DO THE READING. Metcalf's lectures don't cover all the material that's on the test. You can get solid Bs on the tests by just doing the readings. Also, I know this sounds weird, but cram these readings like two days before the test. If you try and space out the readings, you just forget the minute details, which are the hard questions on the mid-terms. But if you're someone who struggles with chemistry, I would do the readings every night they're due. Again, not that hard.

Literally that's it. Show up to class and pay attention. And do the very short readings. If you have any questions about either of those, go to discussion or office hours! Really not a hard class if you're good at doing the little things.

Love Professor Welch!! Course is hard but his is by far the easier section!

This course was especially difficult because Metcalfe doesn't teach literally anything that is on the tests for the most part, he likes to teach stuff that he himself thinks is interesting, which would be great, but it's usually super advanced and no one actually cares! highly don't recommend.

Take this class with literally any other teacher.

Professor Metcalf was a terrible teacher who would badmouth the other professor who made the exams. He flew threw the material as if we already knew it and acted as if he hated to teach. If someone asked a question in class about the material or the past exam, he would act as if the student was stupid. This class was discouraging, unnecessarily difficult, and made you hate chemistry. If you have to take this class, I would recommend taking a different professor or just reading the textbook.