Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Thank you for considering this course!

I am excited to help students learn a strong organic chemistry foundation!  More than 15 years ago I adopted the Straumanis Guided Inquiry Workbook to actively engage students in learning this challenging subject, which has resulted in the CH243 students scoring, on average, 10 points higher than the national average on the standardized American Chemical Society Organic Chemistry Exam. 

Both the lecture and lab for this course will be in-person at the PCC Rock Creek campus. We will meet in person on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10-11:50 am (lecture) and on Thursdays from 12:30-3:20 pm (lab). You need to be able to attend both lecture and laboratory components in order to register for the course.

Lecture and lab sessions will be interactive and designed to help learning and measure understanding.  This information will be used to guide the speed of content and delivery methods.  Therefore, student participation will be key to instruction.  Because lecture and lab sessions are in person, there will not be zoom recordings of the classes.  However, it will be encouraged that students share notetaking responsibilities to assist those that cannot attend due to COVID, the flu, or other absences.  Lecture slides will be posted on the class website in D2L.

This class will include completing group activities from the well-written Straumanis workbook, clicker questions, hands-on laboratory experiments, lecture and lab homework assignments, weekly quizzes, two exams and a final exam. Office hours will be available in person and in Zoom.

You will find that most students adjust to the teaching approach in the course and find the lectures to be very informative, fun, and engaging.  It can take students with no experience in active learning (i.e. familiar with passive lecturing only) a little longer than others to truly understand the value of the teaching methodology, but once the students adjust they learn how fun it can be to attend a chemistry class!  We often hear comments from students that they were doubtful of the efficacy of the teaching style, but after a term of adjustment, they prefer it to traditional lecturing. I strongly encourage you to read the first few pages of the workbook to learn more about the class format prior to the Week 2 drop deadline.

Although the PCC Bookstore lists the required materials for this course, I will provide you with several different options for purchasing these prior to the start of the term. I will contact enrolled students by email near the beginning of the term with more information on the course. You may contact me at patty.maazouz@pcc.edu with any questions regarding this class. I look forward to working with you to build the necessary organic chemistry foundation for you to reach your next education goal!