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"And how hard should organic chemistry be anyway?" Heaven forbid, it should be as hard as is necessary to achieve the stated outcome. If someone does a course

"And how hard should organic chemistry be anyway?" Heaven forbid, it should be as hard as is necessary to achieve the stated outcome. If someone does a course in organic synthesis and graduates from that course then a company hiring the person expects him or her to be able to synthesize chemicals to the extent or level that the course coverd. Graduates need to know what they're taught and companies expect their prospective employees to understand the work that they need to do. When I was a student I used to sometimes whinge about the 'tough grading' in certain courses and think I was hard done by when I either failed an exam or didn't do well in it. The fact was that the education system made it hard for me because I either wasn't good enough and or I had not done sufficient study to pass the course. Students shouldn't be allowed to reset the standard because they think it's set too high or that they consider the work too tough.

forgetbook 4y ago
What connection do you see between the company hiring and the course content? I don't think there is a closed-loop there.
- hilbert42 4y ago
  Tough question, but it boils down to the type of subject matter that's been taught. I'll use myself as a illustration: I've done a wide range of subjects in my time and I'll use two instances. One was philosophy which included political philosophy the other electronics (which was separate from science, physics, chemistry, etc.). Philosophy covers a vast field: analytic Phil./logic requires mathematical precision whereas political Phil. requires a different type of thinking altogether much of which is subjective in nature. If I were to be employed in this field an employer would be mainly looking for my ability to assess and judge situations, etc. but that would have had precious little to do with any course materials. Here, an employer is looking at the worldly skills Phil. has taught me which is very different to my electronics courses. An employer who was employing me for my electronic skills would expect me to have perhaps basic but very specific skills as taught in the course. If given a spectrum analyzer or oscilloscope, my employer would expect me to know what they were and how to use them. If I'd not used those models previously, any reasonable employer would give me operations manuals and a little familiarization time then set me to work on some electronics project. Essentially, in electronics there are certain specific skills that one must be taught and be familiar with or one cannot do the work. In essence, in some professions there's a very tight coupling between one's education and one's work, especially so in engineering, chemistry, etc. and less so in others.
  - forgetbook 4y ago
    So, it varies, and is loosely coupled at best, even looking from a macro-level. The problem I see is that while students have enormous incentive to match a company's standard, companies have very little incentive to be a part of that process. A student pursuing a degree in a larger pursuit of a career is faced with a founder's dilemma. They shoulder all of the risk of failure, and have no recourse. It isn't a company's problem if they aren't trained properly, nor is it a professor's. When starting a company founders are able to seek funding and declare bankruptcy, but students are expected to take out loans that cannot be defaulted on. If the macro-level goal is a highly trained, highly effective workforce, then why aren't students supported in pursuing training by any of the institutionsthey interact with on that macro level?
    - hilbert42 4y ago
      The point you raise isn't unique to the medical profession (although it's likely at the sharp edge), but it's endemic in other professions too. It's a much bigger cultural issue involving employees' attitude to work, long term job security and employers' indifference, etc. Huge topic, too complex to make much sense of here. A related problem is the continuing education issue/ongoing skills etc. It's always been a bit of a joke from a workforce-wide/global perspective. Again, the reason why that's so is also involved and complex.
engineer_22 4y ago
It seems to be a pervasive attitude. Today a group of my colleagues received their grades on a linear algebra test. The class average was below the failing mark. One of my acquaintances remarked: "The professor is going to have to do something about these grades, they can't fail the whole class!" Maybe it's the class that should do something about the grades...
- forgetbook 4y ago
  It is trivially simple for an educator(edit: typo) to write a test that every student fails, curve the grades into a normal distribution, and place blame on students while showing a normal distribution of outcomes to administration. Do you think that practice produces better learning?
  - hilbert42 4y ago
    Despite my comments above, some examiners can be bastards. Deliberately setting examinations to fail students is counterproductive and demoralizing (sometimes to the extent that potentially good students leave the course). In practice, examiners who do this are usually inexperienced and they soon learn to discontinue the practice for all the obvious readons. That's why in this instance I'd be inclined to think the students are at fault as this NYC prof has long and extensive experience (he'd have learned not to so long ago).
    - forgetbook 4y ago
      I don't mean to assume malice where incompetence will suffice. You're correct that its generally inexperienced instructors, and in this case was a very experienced instructor. Is it possible then, that this very experienced instructor, experienced a difficult time adapting to teaching in a new setting, and failed to adapt their examination? The solution likely isn't for pandemic students to be told they have experience they don't have, but the structure in place created a situation where an entire class experienced the fallout from their professor's failure. In this case, the professor was fired. In many more, students bear the same punishments (both to their academic records and actual learning), while inexperienced instructors are simply told to do better next time. Why shouldn't students have the same option to do better next time?
cannaceo 4y ago
I completed medical school back in 2012. Here's the unfortunate rub with this particular class--organic chemistry is a requisite for medical school and probably shouldn't be. The class is mostly pre-med students and very few chemistry majors. It seems that once upon a time some administrators decided that students should complete 2 years of chemistry and organic chemistry happened to be the most common second year course available. Physics courses, at least at my alma mater, were separated in to physics for physics majors("honors physics"), physics for engineers, and physics for life sciences. A similar structure would be a great compromise to maintain the quality of education for those continuing on to perform organic synthesis versus those who want to be physicians. I was exposed to exactly zero organic chemistry in medical school or beyond.
- hilbert42 4y ago
  "Here's the unfortunate rub with this particular class--organic chemistry is a requisite for medical school and probably shouldn't be" I've not studied medicine but I've some organic chemistry knowledge thus I've come across this bane of contention previously from others. It doesn't take long for organic chemistry to get bogged down in technical details that I reckon wouldn't be needed by most medical professionals. For instance the angle formed between a benzene ring and an amine group after bonding. That's useful info to chemists but to few others. But where to we draw the line and how do we determine whether it's actually relevant? I'll make an observation on that question at the risk of encroaching upon your profession with an example (please bear with me I'm not a professional pharmacologist). Let's start with a well-known example: the metabolism of ethanol by the liver. If I put on a chemist's hat then I'd not be expected to know much more than that the liver employs enzymes to partially oxidize ethanol to acetaldehyde thence from there to acetic acid and finally water and carbon dioxide. However, if I specialized in the area then I'd need to know much more such as the Gibbs free energy for each metabolic stage and calculating that suddenly becomes very complicated, it'd require me to know much more about the liver's physiology and its enzyme processes. If so, then I'd posit the level of knowledge I'd require would be more than would be expected of you if you were, say, a general practitioner. Viewing it from your side, you'd have to know enough basic organic chemistry to make sense of the various stages the liver goes through to reduce ethanol to H2O and CO2 such as the basics of Gibbs free energy as ethanol's metabolism provides the body with energy thus you'd have to have an overview of how enzymes go about their work—alcohol dehydrogenase/ADH for instance. This is where drawing lines gets complicated. If we treat an enzyme as a black box that does various things then we can map out an overall picture of how the liver does its job and perhaps that's all the average practitioner needs to know (I'm not familiar with the extent of that requirement). However, if you are required to have a thorough understanding of how enzymes work then a much greater knowledge of organic chemistry would be required. For instance, the chemistry of alcohol dehydrogenase/ADH and it's complicated, so too the final stage of ethanol's elimination wherein acetyl coenzyme A is involved. From an outsiders' perspective, it doesn't seem reasonable to me that to do their job that those on the first line of medicine would need chemistry to a depth required to understand how acetyl-CoA works at the molecular level. That would seem a waste of time. On the other hand a basic understanding of organic chemistry seems necessary to have a cognizant overview of the workings of the liver. Looking in from the outside it's a difficult call. My own doctor usually writes prescriptions in a drug's proprietary name, on occasions he asks if I want the cheaper generic version to which I always answer yes, he's then been been known to ask me for its chemical name having forgotten it (for some unclear reason he seems to assume that I know more chemistry than he does). Perhaps this is an indicator that many if not most doctors practice drug/pharmacy medicine at a much higher level than that of molecular chemistry—if so then it would seem that having to have detailed knowledge of the subject at this low level is unnecessary. Apologies if that seemed a little short on in depth. I intended more but omitted some relevant stuff for brevity (there's more to discuss about this topic but there's practical limits to that on HN). Also, as my profession is electronics, my emphasis may seem a little off not having the same familiarity with the issues as you would have.
poopnugget 4y ago
whywhywhydude 4y ago
Organic chem 1 and 2 are prerequisites for medical schools. A lot of colleges actually make the courses as hard as possible to make sure that the med school acceptance rate for their graduates is very high.
hintymad 4y ago
> "And how hard should organic chemistry be anyway?" For christ's sake, Organic Chemistry has a mechanism that's solidly based on theory of chemical bond and structural chemistry(chirality and what not). And for the empirical part? We've got more than a hundred years of experience. How the fuck hard could it be for an undergrad-level course? What's wrong with the students?
- hilbert42 4y ago
  That's how it was (and things were) when I was doing organic chemistry. To answer your last question I could suggest some answers but they'd only be inflammatory. Here, the real problem is that it's not that my answers would be inflammatory but why they'd be considered such (as opposed to being just options or ideas, whether right or wrong, in a much wider rational debate). The real issue is that illogical, unfounded and ill-informed opinion has stifled rational debate, it having the loudest voice—and that nowadays there's no longer any moderating mechanism that's able to pull it back into line.

forgetbook 4y ago

What connection do you see between the company hiring and the course content? I don't think there is a closed-loop there.

hilbert42 4y ago
Tough question, but it boils down to the type of subject matter that's been taught. I'll use myself as a illustration: I've done a wide range of subjects in my time and I'll use two instances. One was philosophy which included political philosophy the other electronics (which was separate from science, physics, chemistry, etc.). Philosophy covers a vast field: analytic Phil./logic requires mathematical precision whereas political Phil. requires a different type of thinking altogether much of which is subjective in nature. If I were to be employed in this field an employer would be mainly looking for my ability to assess and judge situations, etc. but that would have had precious little to do with any course materials. Here, an employer is looking at the worldly skills Phil. has taught me which is very different to my electronics courses. An employer who was employing me for my electronic skills would expect me to have perhaps basic but very specific skills as taught in the course. If given a spectrum analyzer or oscilloscope, my employer would expect me to know what they were and how to use them. If I'd not used those models previously, any reasonable employer would give me operations manuals and a little familiarization time then set me to work on some electronics project. Essentially, in electronics there are certain specific skills that one must be taught and be familiar with or one cannot do the work. In essence, in some professions there's a very tight coupling between one's education and one's work, especially so in engineering, chemistry, etc. and less so in others.
- forgetbook 4y ago
  So, it varies, and is loosely coupled at best, even looking from a macro-level. The problem I see is that while students have enormous incentive to match a company's standard, companies have very little incentive to be a part of that process. A student pursuing a degree in a larger pursuit of a career is faced with a founder's dilemma. They shoulder all of the risk of failure, and have no recourse. It isn't a company's problem if they aren't trained properly, nor is it a professor's. When starting a company founders are able to seek funding and declare bankruptcy, but students are expected to take out loans that cannot be defaulted on. If the macro-level goal is a highly trained, highly effective workforce, then why aren't students supported in pursuing training by any of the institutionsthey interact with on that macro level?
  - hilbert42 4y ago
    The point you raise isn't unique to the medical profession (although it's likely at the sharp edge), but it's endemic in other professions too. It's a much bigger cultural issue involving employees' attitude to work, long term job security and employers' indifference, etc. Huge topic, too complex to make much sense of here. A related problem is the continuing education issue/ongoing skills etc. It's always been a bit of a joke from a workforce-wide/global perspective. Again, the reason why that's so is also involved and complex.

engineer_22 4y ago

It seems to be a pervasive attitude. Today a group of my colleagues received their grades on a linear algebra test. The class average was below the failing mark. One of my acquaintances remarked: "The professor is going to have to do something about these grades, they can't fail the whole class!" Maybe it's the class that should do something about the grades...

forgetbook 4y ago
It is trivially simple for an educator(edit: typo) to write a test that every student fails, curve the grades into a normal distribution, and place blame on students while showing a normal distribution of outcomes to administration. Do you think that practice produces better learning?
- hilbert42 4y ago
  Despite my comments above, some examiners can be bastards. Deliberately setting examinations to fail students is counterproductive and demoralizing (sometimes to the extent that potentially good students leave the course). In practice, examiners who do this are usually inexperienced and they soon learn to discontinue the practice for all the obvious readons. That's why in this instance I'd be inclined to think the students are at fault as this NYC prof has long and extensive experience (he'd have learned not to so long ago).
  - forgetbook 4y ago
    I don't mean to assume malice where incompetence will suffice. You're correct that its generally inexperienced instructors, and in this case was a very experienced instructor. Is it possible then, that this very experienced instructor, experienced a difficult time adapting to teaching in a new setting, and failed to adapt their examination? The solution likely isn't for pandemic students to be told they have experience they don't have, but the structure in place created a situation where an entire class experienced the fallout from their professor's failure. In this case, the professor was fired. In many more, students bear the same punishments (both to their academic records and actual learning), while inexperienced instructors are simply told to do better next time. Why shouldn't students have the same option to do better next time?

cannaceo 4y ago

I completed medical school back in 2012. Here's the unfortunate rub with this particular class--organic chemistry is a requisite for medical school and probably shouldn't be. The class is mostly pre-med students and very few chemistry majors. It seems that once upon a time some administrators decided that students should complete 2 years of chemistry and organic chemistry happened to be the most common second year course available. Physics courses, at least at my alma mater, were separated in to physics for physics majors("honors physics"), physics for engineers, and physics for life sciences. A similar structure would be a great compromise to maintain the quality of education for those continuing on to perform organic synthesis versus those who want to be physicians. I was exposed to exactly zero organic chemistry in medical school or beyond.

hilbert42 4y ago
"Here's the unfortunate rub with this particular class--organic chemistry is a requisite for medical school and probably shouldn't be" I've not studied medicine but I've some organic chemistry knowledge thus I've come across this bane of contention previously from others. It doesn't take long for organic chemistry to get bogged down in technical details that I reckon wouldn't be needed by most medical professionals. For instance the angle formed between a benzene ring and an amine group after bonding. That's useful info to chemists but to few others. But where to we draw the line and how do we determine whether it's actually relevant? I'll make an observation on that question at the risk of encroaching upon your profession with an example (please bear with me I'm not a professional pharmacologist). Let's start with a well-known example: the metabolism of ethanol by the liver. If I put on a chemist's hat then I'd not be expected to know much more than that the liver employs enzymes to partially oxidize ethanol to acetaldehyde thence from there to acetic acid and finally water and carbon dioxide. However, if I specialized in the area then I'd need to know much more such as the Gibbs free energy for each metabolic stage and calculating that suddenly becomes very complicated, it'd require me to know much more about the liver's physiology and its enzyme processes. If so, then I'd posit the level of knowledge I'd require would be more than would be expected of you if you were, say, a general practitioner. Viewing it from your side, you'd have to know enough basic organic chemistry to make sense of the various stages the liver goes through to reduce ethanol to H2O and CO2 such as the basics of Gibbs free energy as ethanol's metabolism provides the body with energy thus you'd have to have an overview of how enzymes go about their work—alcohol dehydrogenase/ADH for instance. This is where drawing lines gets complicated. If we treat an enzyme as a black box that does various things then we can map out an overall picture of how the liver does its job and perhaps that's all the average practitioner needs to know (I'm not familiar with the extent of that requirement). However, if you are required to have a thorough understanding of how enzymes work then a much greater knowledge of organic chemistry would be required. For instance, the chemistry of alcohol dehydrogenase/ADH and it's complicated, so too the final stage of ethanol's elimination wherein acetyl coenzyme A is involved. From an outsiders' perspective, it doesn't seem reasonable to me that to do their job that those on the first line of medicine would need chemistry to a depth required to understand how acetyl-CoA works at the molecular level. That would seem a waste of time. On the other hand a basic understanding of organic chemistry seems necessary to have a cognizant overview of the workings of the liver. Looking in from the outside it's a difficult call. My own doctor usually writes prescriptions in a drug's proprietary name, on occasions he asks if I want the cheaper generic version to which I always answer yes, he's then been been known to ask me for its chemical name having forgotten it (for some unclear reason he seems to assume that I know more chemistry than he does). Perhaps this is an indicator that many if not most doctors practice drug/pharmacy medicine at a much higher level than that of molecular chemistry—if so then it would seem that having to have detailed knowledge of the subject at this low level is unnecessary. Apologies if that seemed a little short on in depth. I intended more but omitted some relevant stuff for brevity (there's more to discuss about this topic but there's practical limits to that on HN). Also, as my profession is electronics, my emphasis may seem a little off not having the same familiarity with the issues as you would have.

poopnugget 4y ago

whywhywhydude 4y ago

Organic chem 1 and 2 are prerequisites for medical schools. A lot of colleges actually make the courses as hard as possible to make sure that the med school acceptance rate for their graduates is very high.

hintymad 4y ago

> "And how hard should organic chemistry be anyway?" For christ's sake, Organic Chemistry has a mechanism that's solidly based on theory of chemical bond and structural chemistry(chirality and what not). And for the empirical part? We've got more than a hundred years of experience. How the fuck hard could it be for an undergrad-level course? What's wrong with the students?

hilbert42 4y ago
That's how it was (and things were) when I was doing organic chemistry. To answer your last question I could suggest some answers but they'd only be inflammatory. Here, the real problem is that it's not that my answers would be inflammatory but why they'd be considered such (as opposed to being just options or ideas, whether right or wrong, in a much wider rational debate). The real issue is that illogical, unfounded and ill-informed opinion has stifled rational debate, it having the loudest voice—and that nowadays there's no longer any moderating mechanism that's able to pull it back into line.