such a horrible teacher, i don't even remember how to spell his name. horrible. impossible quizzes, horrible class lectures. take anyone but mccormick...

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Man this guy blows. Too bad you're stuck with him if you take orgo. Poor man thinks he's somethin else.

His labs are disorganized, students are generally unhappy with his performance. His post labs and the labs themselves are usually unrelated. The post labs are not explained nor are they taught. This is not a class. In addition, he is extremely unapproachable, unreasonable, and cold. Avoid at all costs.

Prof. McCormick's tendency to penalize people for nitty gritty details makes this class less than enjoyable. Labs are often disorganized and his pre-lab lectures often have little to do with the labs themselves. The post-lab assignments are usually vague and the TAs grade them harshly. Avoid taking his class unless you necessarily have to.

He's very condescending... If you had a choice, I'd advise you not to take him, but he supervises all of the Chem150L classes, so you're kind of stuck with him. If you don't want him to make snarky comments at you during lab, all you have to do is be perfect!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :/

He can be really rude most of the time and really condescending. Quality checks are important so try to get full marks if possible. especially and definitely don't overlook the one in the final (that one dropped my 99% grade to an A- fml). Otherwise it's an easy class and grades are mostly dependent on which TA you get

He is inaccessible, arrogant, and grades unfairly

broke my hand before the final. He said i didn't need the paperwork for extra time. He never showed up during the exam to tell the proctor and I didn't finish the exam. I missed an A by 0.3% overall. When i asked him if there was anything i could do to pull it up (because of the broken hand), he made it very clear that it was my problem not his. :(

I had him for lab during zoom semester. Super unorganized and little regard for students.

Had Professor McCormick during fall zoom semester. He held little regard for students, was super unorganized, and came off as extremely rude in emails sent to students (with many grammar mistakes as well). The class basically depends on how good your TA is - he barely intervenes.

McCormick does not care about you. He doesn't care if you learn chemistry. He doesn't care that literally every single person in college right now is so burnt out that they would rather eat sand than do their assignments. He just keeps piling on stupid and unnecessary and worthless extra non-lab assignments that do nothing except stress people out.

Very unorganized. He had a summer and a fall semester to improve and he changed nothing. The most disappointing course I have taken thus far.

It is misplaced to call Michael McCormick a Professor. He does little more than assign copious amounts of work outside of the labs with little to no teaching. He repeatedly plagiarizes his assignments off the web and puts no effort into teaching students CHEM. The TAs are nice, but the class is horribly structured with too much unnecessary work.

The non-HOL assignments are not well-written and super-confusing. Even my TA doesn't know what to do or how to help on these assignments. Chem lab is the hardest class I've ever taken, because the assignments just don't make sense

Major assignments are idiotic and you do not have any idea what they want from their questions most of the time. He will have assignments revised numerous times including the day its due because of the errors and typos, so it just turned into every chem student working together to get the assignments done in groupme. You have labs to do but no clas

I wouldn't recommend Dr. McCormick. There was very little communication with the TAs and therefore they were often unable to answer questions. There's useless/irrelevant and time consuming busy work (e.g. essays). The dysfunction may have been because of the online format, but I didn't learn anything new and was constantly irritated by this class.

Gives an overload of busy work that isn't conceptually covered in lecture or lab. Both TAs and students are often baffled by what to do with his assignments. He's pompous, arrogant, and condescending. Like he can't believe that freshmen chemistry students aren't at his level. He's tough to avoid, so do assignments early and hope for a good TA.

Professor McCormick genuinely has no regard for his students. He is condescending and will harangue students if theyre not up to his standards. Students are given tedious post lab assignments, that take hours, but theyre only worth 5% of your grade. The final is worth everything in this class and its difficult and unlike class material.

Do NOT take him if you don't have to (many pre-health students do though, unfortunately). He's a cold person and will show no sympathy for you or your grade. Labs are extremely stressful despite being most students' first semester of college, and your grade in the class is highly variable even if you are a great student. Do the pre-notebook checks!

He has assignments that take sooo much time worth so little, it is physically painful. The final had absolutely no relevance to the lectures and was difficult in the wrong way. He was unsympathetic to any struggles students may have.

horrible. very few people get A's. good luck!

The way Professor Mccormick set up this class is so messed up. He says his main goal is to get you confident in your lab skills but the makes the final, which is not at all on lab skills nor most of what's learned during the lecture portion, worth 40% of the final grade. Really pay attention to post labs and understand the material

Greedy professor that makes money by selling the compiled "notebook" for a profit. This is OChem. In addition, if you have friends, buy used ones, since you won't use all the carbon copies anyway. Need to be an expert in OChem to excel in the course. And not much help from anyone. It is a fierce school. You are discouraged to collaborate.

Probably the worst professor I've had at Emory.

He's awful, unorganized, and doesn't communicate. The prelab lectures are long, pointless, and have nothing to do with the material. The postlabs take hours and are for very few points. The final is a majority of your grade and barely has to do with the actual experiments, mostly what you will have to read from his (poorly written) book.

horrible

He speaks with a passive-aggressive tone and I feel like he constantly judges his students. His grading criteria are very difficult to understand. Pay attention to the lecture as many of the topics covered will show up on the final lab exam. This exam is 40% of your grade so be prepared.

Professor McCormick is the worst professor I have encountered. Postlab assignments take multiple hours, but are worth almost nothing grade-wise. Instead, 40% of the final grade is determined by one 36-question exam. When students raised this concern, he simply told us to "be grateful for the learning opportunity." He's impossible to avoid :(

Just a straight up rude professor. I asked him a question once and in a snide tone he told me to "think more deeply about it" like hey thanks McCormick. Maybe you should think more deeply about getting a PhD Mr. McCormick because with only a masters degree most of your graduate TAs know more than you.

worst prof ever

incredibly difficult to receive an A in the class due to horrendous grading criteria. 30% of your grade comes from a disorganized "notebook check". Even if you have pertinent info from labs written down he will ask random stuff. 40% of grade is a final with no direction - AKA random Qs. Hours long post labs worth essentially nothing.

As many other students mentioned, your grade pretty much just comes from a notebook check with unclear criteria and a final exam. The exam does not test on laboratory methods but simply on seemingly arbitrary topics covered briefly during pre-lab lectures. He is very very difficult to avoid for pre-med.

Nearly impossible to receive an A in this course because the final exam is difficult, notebook evaluation is tested for the most minuscule details, and the cutoff is a 94 (which he let us know the day grades were released!). He's the only professor for the lab; put a LOT of effort into learning the content and keeping an extraordinary notebook.

Horrible professor with a terribly disorganized class. Unfortunately, you have no choice but to take him since he's the only professor for 150 and 202 L. Just know that you will be putting HOURS of work into assignments worth essentially nothing. Most of your grade comes from a final exam that is in no way relevant to the course learning objectives

Look what he say: What this means is that you may be 1/10th of a point away from the next higher grade and probably multiple DOZENS of you are that close to a grade line. Please understand that it is not appropriate to ask me to move you into the next higher category. And 94 is A.

He makes the post-labs for Chem202 Lab extremely long and annoying. Furthermore, the final and notebook evaluation were both worth 40% of our grade even though the post-labs take a lot of effort to complete. His lab is way too much work for a 2 credit class. Also he changed the grading scale to only a 94 and above is an A.

HORRIBLE professor --- didn't tell us grade cutoffs until the day grades were released and changed up the grade breakdown from the syllabus 1 week before school ended. Extremely rude and unforgiving with grades. He's the type of person who won't round you to a 90 even if you have a 89.9999999.

McCormick makes the class too subjective for it to be fair. Depending on the TA you have, you could be spending 30 min to hours on post labs each week. The grading for notebook evals were also very different across each section; some gave partial credit while others didn't EVEN THOUGH THE EXAM STATED WE WOULD LITERALLY BE GIVEN PARTIAL CREDIT

Unfortunately, McCormick is the only professor who directs the chemistry labs (I believe at all levels). Requires a lab notebook that has obvious typos in them, and gives the most boring pre-lectures. Not much else I can say, as he is very rarely in the lab itself. Pray you get a good TA and you'll be fine.

Final literally so hard and has nothing to do with anything you learned in class. You probably dont have a choice to not take him but he's truly awful so brace yourself. Post-labs are difficult and the final exam is a total grade killer. I feel bad for anyone who has to take Chem 150L.

Honestly, It appears many times that Dr. McCormick expects us tobe familiar with concepts that were barely covered in lecture, and treats the post lab assignments of this lab class itself as if we are taking a chemistry lecture. Avoid McCormick if you can because a majority of his work is simply busy work that does not help your learning.

Lot of errors in the lab manual...grades harshly. did not enjoy him from last year

His lectures were very boring and the tests matter a lot. Ur expected to learn concepts from the labs and post-labs but they were never explained. I recommend going to office hours more and taking notes on the application problems that show up on the post-labs. U get cram sheet for final so maybe prepare that throughout the semester.

Your success in this class depends heavily on the quality of your TA, which unfortunately can vary significantly. If McCormick were more involved or provided greater support to ensure consistency among the TAs, this class would be both more effective and fairer for students. Emory should do better.

Only the TA matters, he doesn't show up in class and doesn't care about you. Don't take the class, don't take the class, don't take the class, go somewhere else.

One of the worst professors at emory. Chem lab becomes the worst nightmare. Too bad it can't really be avoided since he's the only teacher doing chem 150 and 202 labs. Good luck kiddos

I've only ever seen him twice the entire semester. The class is really dependent on the TA, and the grade is based on notebooks and the final test. The notebook rubrics are arbitrary, and he doesn't explain what is expected in the notebooks. The final is made extremely hard for no reason and he doesn't help you prepare. Avoid if you can.

I have finished all the premed courses (including 203 and 204) before taking 202L. This was my lowest grade out of all those courses. The scavenger hunts ask the most obnoxiously specific questions that no normal person would write down, and the final test is the same difficulty as the hw quizzes, but double the questions in half the time.

Painful. Meaningless. Waste of time.

Gave essentially no materials for the final that is 23% of overall grade. Also, 94 is an A in this course, not the standard 93.

The post labs suck. Your grade is either screwed or not depending on who your TA is. His grading for confidence checks is kind of hard to determine. He doesn't give a clear answer when you ask questions. You don't actually learn concepts, he expects you to already know them. Pray you had a good HS chem teacher.

You spend most of your time on labs, which count for 5% of your grade. He is super unhelpful and looks to make the class hard, only saw him once all semester besides the two lectures. The test is hard and requires you to understand topics never covered, and the notebook is designed to screw you. Awful design class, and awful professor.

His "mandatory textbook" is hard to understand with little background chemistry knowledge provided. Final takes up 30% of your grade and most of them are questions you rarely see in your homework or anything.

I keep coming back to this to think about how I can form a respectful review in under 350 characters about how awful lab is compared to my other classes. but im not gonna waste time because the other reviews already say everything I want to say. I did fine, but sheeeeeeesh. good luck, hes the only lab teacher there is

The only thing you can hope to do is get a good TA. Some TAs give points for some things other TAs wouldn't for the scavenger hunt. This is 25% of your grade. The end of year test is NOT curved and is a little difficult. The majority of your time is post labs that are 5% of your grade. Write EVERYTHING down in your notebook and say a prayer.

this class is completely TA dependent - some grade harshly, others don't care, so pray you get a good TA. the lab test is really hard but if you study well and make a good cheat sheet it is doable. do not mess up your confidence checks and always ask your LA or TA for help. lectures are pointless and not worth going to.

If you don't write down the most simple, basic, commonly know description of a substance you will do terribly on the notebook check and do poorly in the class. Do the post labs (most work but only 5% of grade which SUCKS) and you might be more prepared for the final which lowkey blindsides you. Grade is locked in Canvas until end of semester.