2.3
Quality3.5
DifficultyN/A
Would Retake98
ReviewsN/A
Would Retake
98
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
5
14
4
14
3
11
2
23
1
36
What Students Say
“An acid burn would teach you more about chemistry than this guy”
CHEM1021 - 1.0 rating“I was in a constant state of confusion and frustration”
CHEM4311W - 1.0 ratingClass Info
Attendance Mandatory
100%
Textbook Required
86%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A-
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.73 avg changeRatings by Course
OCHEMIANDII
4.0
(2)OCHEM
3.7
(6)CHEM23012302
3.5
(2)CHEM2301
3.4
(20)CHEM2302
2.8
(8)Difficulty by Course
2301
5.0
2302
5.0
ORGANICCHEMII
5.0
CHEM1201
5.0
ORGANICCHEM
4.0
Reviews (98)
This class is really hard, the only thing that makes up for it is the fact that he tells you everything you need to know for the final, if you need to know anything about the material after the class, don't take this prof.
No Comments
No Comments
No Comments
He is very easy, there is almost no way you could fail his class unless you don't try at all. He goes to great lengths to help students understand the material through review sessions, online chats the night before an exam, and practice tests.
Teaching style is not very diverse, but George explains the material thoroughly. Tests are very straightforward, but still challenging.
Can't teach, he sucks.
He is difficult if you prefer to memorize things rather than see how they work. I believe students would do better if he taught in a more structured way. There is no rhyme nor reason to the things he writes on the board.
No Comments
Barany's is probably the easiest of all the organic teachers. The class is still hard, but if you go to lecture (imperative), and read you should do well. Make sure to attend lecture because Barany is known to do problems in class that are on tests
Unorganized lecture
It might not be the hardest class to pass, but to actually learn the stuff is a different story. His tests are almost the same as his practice tests so you just memorize the practice test. He's horrible at giving notes. The one substitute prof was applauded by the class after his structured lecture.
A teacher who I believe has an honest will to see his students succeed. Only problem is he isn't much of a teacher. He lets the smart kids in the class do most of the examples and only speaks up to tell them what they are doing wrong. Why doesn't he just do it in the first place!?
Professor was absent minded and didn't teach. Professor also was rude to students, yelling during class.
I felt that he was a very fair teacher. He only tested on material he covered and his grading scale was very generous. He may jump from one topic to another but that's how he keeps you awake and pay attention.
Prof.Barany is an intelligent man who ignites student’s passion for chemistry.He is a wonderful teacher who can explain any aspect of organic chem in a way that makes sense.Anytime a student needs help, he is more than happy to help & is very generous with his time.He truly cares about his students.
Professor Barany is wonderful instructor who challenges his students to work hard and get into the material presented. He truly goes out of his way, unlike most chemistry professors, by providing additional learning tools, WebCT, Chatrooms, Help Sessons, and is always available to answer questions.
Professor challenged students in class. He just did not give answers to problems which would have been easier for some.
Prof. Barany is unique and you need to accept him for who he is. If you do this, you'll enjoy his class. I found through many interactions with him that he really cares about his students and people in general. He tries to present the material from multiple angles, including current news items.
Prof Barany won't just teach you chemistry, he will teach you to be a teacher, a scientist, and a person who doesn't just accept the status quo. He expects a lot from students because he wants us to expect a lot from ourselves. Pay close attention, he is a genius.
Professor Barany goes to extremely great lengths to make sure that all his students have the opportunity to be successful in his classes. He is very available to those students who are willing to get the most out of their organic chemistry experience.
The man is a joke of a prof. Most of the time he talks about getting his Ph.D. at 22 and praises the 3 students in the class who are getting over 100% then gives them EC for answering questions in class, while the class average is around 50% and all other students are lost. HE CAN'T TEACH!!
Gives you no idea what will be on the exam and follows no logical order in the text. Also, he spends more time in class making announcements than teaching.
He is a very poor teacher, I would suggest that you take it from someone else. The positive reviews seen on this page are form kids that help him make the test (the top students in the class). Also, he is very unorganized, you can't even teach yourself, bc he coves random pages in the book.
He is not a good teacher at all and I hated how he threw in his dumb political views at various times throughout the class. Do NOT take George Barany.
In his class, you do most of the learning at home. Coming to lecture only works to solidify what he expects you to learn. Considering he jumps around the book, don't even think about skipping lecture. The tests are challanging and hard to predict; yet the practice tests give you a VERY VERY good idea of the real test.
very bad teacher, a waste of time
No Comments
I did not try at all, I was not one of his helper students. but I easily passed. He has a huge curve. If you want to do well he will help you. His finals are key, and he takes the comments you make to him to heart.
Just do the practice tests and you will be fine!!
He is a good teacher if you can follow his unique teaching style. People either love him or hate him. I thought he was great.
Professor Barany is a really interesting guy and is VERY timely getting back to emails and questions. I thought he was a great professor and he doesn't put up with BS from whiners and complainers (about exams) like other chem profs have in the past.
If you do his practice tests, you will get an A in the class. The content is always the same. Go to class and participate and you will pass with ease. Imagine Woody Allen with no sense of hygiene and fashion. This is him!
He has a 10-yr old son who is supposed to be a genious. He lets the kid take the exam first and if he can do it in under 10 minutes, he thinks the test is suitable for the class to do in 50 minutes. The average on the first exam was 28 out of 100. That's when I dropped and took Richard Hsung instead. Easy A, baby!
the worse teacher ever
Very good sneak previews of exams
If you want a good grade in his class, you need to be a kiss-ass and do all his stupid little "extra credit" crap. Don't count on learning anything in lectures, but go because that's the only way you'll know what nitpicky things he's looking for. He jumps around and didn't give us a syllabus so we didn't know what problems to do to prepare.
He was a bad teacher, he jumps around alot and was unorganized.
Completely destroyed a life-long fascination with chemistry in just a few months. One of those guys who can't understand how terribly difficult his course and the subject matter is. It is obvious the man would rather be in the lab than teaching a class.
Very smart, but rarely actually teaches.
What makes him think he can teach? Elitist. Chooses the 12 people in the class that hang out in his office the most and tells them exactly what to study, leaving the rest of us out to dry. Speak to these "elite", and you'll find they don't know much about o-chem because they were spoon fed the exams!
I think that Barany is a really great prof. Yes, he is rather snobbish but he really cares about his students doing well. He is very available for questions and is open to new ideas. I highly recommend him!
Worst professor EVER!!! avoid at all costs
The subject matter of this class is an even mixture of chemistry and ass kissing.
Had him for Chem2301 and continued with him into 2302. Lot's of outside help available through study sessions and online chat. He isn't the best at lectures. You can tell he doesn't always go with the original plan, But he pieces it all together in the end.
While the class is not incredibly difficult and extra credit is quite abundant, he rarely failed to break from his section-by-section tour of the text to talk about his research, his love for crosswords and his oh so brilliant children. He knows his stuff but his pomposity can be overbearing. His practice exams are a great help.
Lectures consist of self biographic stories about himself, his kids or his research as well as unstructured class content. It seems he is teaching the flavor of the day, choosing random stuff about a topic to talk about for the day. Teaches the class to only the few ass sucker in front and is not very helpful when you ask questions...
He is completely useless and doesn't teach anything.
He is the worst professor, it is really unfortunate for those students that plan of continuing in chemistry that have Professor Barany. His lectures and useless and a complete waste of time.
worst.teacher.ever. Test questions are useless and random...it was his 1st time teaching general chem so there were no practice tests to study from...and other professor's tests are radically different (and understandable) than Barany's.
His lectures are extremely disorganized and often the demos have little to nothing to do with the subject matter being taught. Unfortunately,these demos WILL show up on his needlessly verbose tests. AVOID!
If you can avoid him at all costs. He is the worst chem teacher ever. His tests are horrible, he tries to put real life meaning in them but really they make no sense what so ever. He is disorganized and makes the class way harder then it needs to be.
Taking chem 1015 with him is a complete waste of your time. His lectures are random and provide no help whatsoever. Frequent demos that barely relate to the text are done in class and tested on IN DETAIL. Bad at answering questions. Provides not study material and the other professors available materials will NOT help you.
AVOID AT ALL COSTS! He is the worst teacher I have ever had. It is shocking that he even has a job. His test questions are extreamly wordy and are difficult to even understand. No point in even studying because his test barely follows the material in the book.
Horrid man. I went in for office hours hoping to save my grade and understand what I was doing wrong, but while he went over the test with me he ended up just complimenting himself on how hard his questions were.
Horrid man. Went in to try and understand what I did wrong on a test. Instead of being helpful, he just ended up complimenting how hard/well-written (NOT) his questions were.
HIS TESTS ARE IMPOSSIBLE. He has such a strange way of thinking that it is incomprehensible to the rest of the normal world. His tests are 10 pages for 20 questions, meaning that every question is a short novel. SO HARD
Horrible Horrible HORRIBLE professor. Dont ever take chem 1011 or any class with him ever! he should not be teaching!
I can hardly tell what he's trying to explain in lecture. No TA, so there's nowhere else to turn but the book. If you get him, you'd better be ready to learn it all yourself. I could learn more in my sleep than in his useless lectures. I'm sure he's a perfectly fine human being; it's not personal. But I'll be lucky if I pass this course...
Not very good at teaching. Lectures are helpful if you read the entire chapter and learn the material on your own. its a good place i find to play tetris. His test are great at surprising you and there is no way to fully prepare for them other than taking the class with a different professor at the same time.
I really didn't think Prof Barany was that bad. He is eccentric, I'll give you that, but there was a lot of griping from people about the exam content BUT on most days that lecture hall was near empty! Those of us that were there every day, did great. And funny enough, I did much better on the exams with the "wordiness" than the other...
holy cow! i had to take an internet course at the same time as this class and i still only came out with a B-! there's no way to figure out what he's trying to say. the average score on all the tests was 55/100... that should tell you something! the university needs to fire this guy!
Avoid at all costs.
These bad posts are ridiculous. Whoever complains this much about such an easy class has got some issues - try studying sometime, it helps. Prof Barany is very helpful and approachable, and although his exams may be tricky so are every other prof's in the Chem department. This isn't supposed to be easy - if you can't handle it, try Basketweaving.
These bad posts are ridiculous. Whoever complains this much about such an easy class has got some issues - try studying sometime, it helps. Prof Barany is very helpful and approachable, and although his exams may be tricky so are every other prof's in the Chem department. This isn't supposed to be easy so if you can't handle it, try Basketweaving.
VERY easy for a 3CR class. True, he's a little awkward -- But a nice guy, and not difficult at all if you carefully read the book. I spend 1hr/week and am getting a B+, and it's my first chem class EVER. He's a good guy, and I have nothing bad to say about him. =)
VERY easy for a 3CR class. True, he's a little awkward -- But a nice guy, and not difficult at all if you carefully read the book. I spend 1hr/week and am getting a B+, and it's my first chem class EVER. He's a good guy, and I have nothing bad to say about him. =)
Absolutely horrible. He can't explain things clearly. Lectures are disorganized and aren't helpful at all. You basically have to learn everything from the book, or seek other help.
He's very enthusiastic about what he's teaching and he does his best to make the subject understandable for beginners. My only complaint is that he has a tendency to occasionally dumb it down too much. He has numerous office hours on multiple days of the week, so if you want help from him, he's very available.
If your going to take it I recomend taking it with the lab wich is 1011 I think. He isn't the most clear person when it comes to teaching because of his disorganization. Make sure to take highly detailed notes especially on his demonstrations . He is not the best lecturer but he is very enthusiastic and loves teaching his students. VERY WORDY TESTS
ahahahahahahahaha! If your considering to fail chemistry, take it with him.
This prof wants students to learn chemistry,not memorize formulas. show up for class, do the homework, read the book, you'll pass easy. people complain about the exams but lecture is always half empty so who's fault is it when you fail?
He means well, but I'm not sure how he's allowed to teach. He's definitely a rambler. I always went to class, but I never really found it helpful. (I just read the textbook carefully.) It definitely helps to do the online practice tests. I easily could've taken this course online, and I've heard they will be offering it online next semester.
His lectures are very broad and he rambles a lot. His tests are also finicky, he will find one minute thing and ask a question about it on a test. If you are going to take this class I would advise finding a different teacher.
He is a very funny good hearted professor. likes to interact with students. his exams are more of analytical thinking than just memorizing formulas and jotting them down. if you really want to learn chemistry take the class with him, even though the average on his exams are a 50-60 but you can still can get a A or B becuase theres a curve.
Even though he means well and loves his subject manner,I don't think he is a very good basic teacher. It's obvious that he knows a lot about Chemistry,but it was hard to get a basic understanding from him because he didn't know how to break it down well.He also spent a lot of time just on demonstrations early on instead of teaching
Don't take Barany if you need a good foundation in chemistry. He does too many demonstrations than he can handle and often times does not manage to explain them all. He spends too much time on announcements and not enough on chemistry. He rambles a lot and tests on material that wasn't covered in class.
He lured my love of Chemistry into a dark alley and beat it with a 2x4.
He's a really sweet guy but he spent way too much time doing demos and never laid out a strong chemistry foundation. The midterms were somewhat easy and there were questions that pertained to the demos themselves, which means you have to attend lecture.
He would be a great guy to have as a uncle, but not the guy I want to learn chemistry from. I would avoid at all cost if you want to learn chemistry.
Probably the worst teacher I have ever had.
I feel like he's only teaching to get research money. He's a nice guy, but he's a little out of it.
I really didn't like him as a professor. He seems like a nice guy, he just CANNOT teach. I was completely dependent on my textbook to learn. I also had to go to another professor's lecture just to learn the material.
How is this guy a professor? This class infuriated me to no end considering he taught NO objective information or problem solving skills. I had to teach myself from the book and only went to lecture enough times to get participation points. This man is completely useless and should not be allowed to teach.
An acid burn would teach you more about chemistry than this guy.
It is a mistake to take Barany's class. Before him, I really enjoyed chemistry and it was a subject i wanted to pursue. Seriously, he is the worst. He makes you depend entirely on the textbook and the tests are too difficult for how little he teaches. He spends too much time joking around and giving completely ridiculous extra credit. Horrible
He doesn't teach you. His chemistry experiments are fun to watch, but you won't learn much from his lectures. He was even visited by a specialist from the U of M teaching offices while the other chemistry teachers weren't visited --> a professor only gets this if a lot of students have complained about his bad teaching. BEWARE!
Completely worthless as a teacher at the beginning of the semester. Mid-semester reviews came back and he changed his teaching style from all demonstrations to actually an attempt to teach. Didn't help much. Read the book closely, do the practice problems, and you'll be fine.
Absolutely loved his lectures. Didn't teach many concepts in class, but his demos were SO cool and usually showed up on the test. If you use the resources available to you (past exams online, tutor room, office hours) you will do just fine.
Honestly, the worst teacher I have ever had. He does way too many demonstrations in class, and when, as a class, he was asked to do more examples, he continued to do more demonstrations, saying they were the same thing. I would avoid this professor at all costs.
Worst professor ever, he is an intelligent man, but he doesn't know how to teach what he knows. He NEVER teaches from the book, his lectures are made up of demos he spends the other half of class talking about announcements. I lived in the tutor room, used youtube and tried to teach myself from the book-still didn't do well on exams and had to drop
Barany is almost impossible to follow. I am a good student and attended every lecture, yet found myself frustrated with his lack of teaching ability. He answers emails promptly, though often with an attitude if he deems your Q stupid. His tests are nearly impossible to study for, though if you memorize lectures you have a fighting chance.
Scatter-brained and impossible to understand. Read the book and do the problems very carefully. Cares about his students and seems to really love teaching and his subject, just doesn't know how to teach it.
Different from most teachers in that his tests are mostly based on things he talks about in class. As the year went on, tests got easier. His final was SO easy. He used old test questions for about 80% of the Q's, and pretty much told us the other 20%. He wants you to do well. A great guy, and would recommend him over other professors.
I ended up going to a different professor's lectures instead because I felt Barany wasn't explaining anything- and I doubled my exam score. His jokes get old really fast, and he likes to throw advice (that he asks for) back in students' faces. His exams often had mistakes and he spent half of the class time talking about WebVista.
Prof. Barany is confusing to say the least. He was rarely prepared for class and I was not ever happy to attend. I have only had him for a freshman seminar, but I can tell you, I am so glad that this class is over.
Barany offered almost nothing as an instructor for the class. He basically taught us how to use SciFinder and Reaxys, then it was up to us to learn about experimentation. I was in a constant state of confusion and frustration. Important deadlines were changed ~4 times, due to faculty oversight, so setting a good personal pace was really difficult.
This lab was the most frustrating course I have ever taken at the U. Do not take this class with Barany, and consider any other laboratory class instead. Expect two 35+ page reports with lots of regurgitating statements. Lab manuals were not helpful, you are expected to work completely on your own. Lectures were a waste of time.
Class Info
Attendance Mandatory
100%
Textbook Required
86%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
A-
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.73 avg changeRatings by Course
OCHEMIANDII
4.0
(2)OCHEM
3.7
(6)CHEM23012302
3.5
(2)CHEM2301
3.4
(20)CHEM2302
2.8
(8)Difficulty by Course
2301
5.0
2302
5.0
ORGANICCHEMII
5.0
CHEM1201
5.0
ORGANICCHEM
4.0