<p>i am a sophomore chemical engineering major,and am doing multivariable calculus,physics(Electicity$ magnetism),biology,organic chem and english.my question is,for those of u who have taken organicchemistry,did it help u much in ur junior courses?
Answers pliz!! its imporant .thank u</p>
<p>it’s probably only going to help to understand what people mean by those crazy IUPAC nomenclatures to help you find the molecular weight of those compounds. That’s it.</p>
<p>Yeah, I have to agree that, sadly, much of OChem is really not that useful to most chemical engineers. In particular, the memorization of all of those reactions and who attacks what and why - all of that stuff is just not useful to the chemical engineer, because you’re not really going to be expected to actually know all of those reactions by pure memory when you’re on the job. That’s what books are for - so you don’t have to memorize those things. If you’re on the job, and you need to know how a reaction proceeds, you simply look it up in the book. </p>
<p>However, Ochem is far from the worst in this respect. I would actually say that the most ‘useless’ chemistry class in ChemE, if your program requires you to take it, is PChem, which has to do with quantum mechanics. Very few chemical engineers except those in research positions will actually use quantum mechanics for anything. Whether you’re choosing to model an electron as a particle in a box with infinite walls or some other model (free particle, particle in a ring, finite potential well, or some other model) in order to solve your Schroedinger equation - frankly, the world of practical chemical engineering doesn’t care. The only connection that stuff has to the practical world of chemical engineering is its explanation of chemical reactivity, but, again, the truth is, when you’re out in the working world, you’re not going to really need to know the reasons why some compounds are more reactive than others, and certainly you won’t need to know why from the quantum level. All you’re going to do is look up a table in a book like Perry’s to tell you which compound is more reactive. Trust me - no ChemE’s out in the field are actually trying to solve Schroedinger’s equations as part of their daily work tasks. </p>
<p>Now, to be fair, I would say that most engineering curriculas in most disciplines force you to learn things that you don’t really need to know. So ChemE is far from alone in this respect.</p>
<p>well, i’d have to disagree somewhat. it’s true that chemical engineers in industry don’t really need to know this, but if you’re looking for a future in academia, then a robust knowledge of orgo could be very useful. in addition, a good knowledge of pchem, qchem, achem, inorgo, etc is very useful, b/c in academia, chemE is more science-based and not so much application-based, and for the student who looks to go into research or grad school, then these chem courses are very important, because what is driving the new discoveries right now are advances in molecular engineering, nano, and bottom-top processing.</p>
<p>for me…am torn between going for grad school( nucear engineering) and going into the work force.</p>
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<p>I believe the vast majority of chemical engineers either head straight to the workforce, or if they go to graduate school in the subject, it’s just to get a master’s degree where they intend to learn things that are highly practical (so they can work as higher-level production engineers) as opposed to working in R&D or academia. </p>
<p>The sad truth is that many engineering schools, especially at the “top” engineering programs, are not really training you to become future engineers. They are actually training you to become future engineering professors or researchers. The problem with that is that only a small minority of the students have any intention of becoming future professors or researchers. </p>
<p>But to be fair, I don’t see this as a problem specific to ChemE, but to all of engineering, and even to many of the non-engineering disciplines - students are being trained to become future researchers despite the fact that few of them have any intention of becoming future researchers.</p>
<p>well, that’s why they encourage u to find internships. i don’t see anything wrong with the curriculum content. people just make a big deal about orgo and pchem, instead of just buckling down and learning the material</p>
<p>Well, actually, I see a BIG thing wrong with the curriculum content, because it is OChem and PChem which serves to weed many students out - students who could be perfect functional real-world chemical engineers, but aren’t allowed to do it because they can’t pass OChem/PChem. If you’re going to weed people out, you should utilize topics that the graduates really need to know. For example, I have no problem in weeding people out if they can’t pass Unit Ops or Process Control, because I agree that real-world ChemE’s really do need to know that. But OChem/PChem? Come on. That’s like denying somebody a degree in English because he can’t speak French. One has nothing to do with the other. </p>
<p>Hence, the reason why people make a big deal about those subjects is because people don’t really need to know that stuff, yet the programs force them to learn them anyway. It’s an unnecessary, artificial obstacle.</p>
<p>Similarly, the same rule applies for why junior high students spend an entire semester learning geometry theorems and proving them. I don’t feel any college science/engineering students using them at all.
My opinion is, the purpose for learning ochem/pchem is to understand the “why”. As as science/engineering person, it is highly critical to learn the why and not simply the superficial knowledge. A chemical engineer can be highly experienced in the process development of the synthesis of a molecule. But if he doesn’t know why the reaction occurs inside the reactor, it is not very convincing that he is the expert in this process.
I think the real point of education is not just to train individuals to succeed in jobs, but also to train them to become better thinkers and to understand why.
Just my thoughts.</p>
<p>The ‘understanding of the why’ is not what I have an issue with. The issue is with * kicking people out of the program (and sometimes out of the school entirely) * if they don’t understand particular subjects to the arbitrary level that the program deems that students need to understand those subjects. In other words. my beef is not just the fact that the classes are required. My beef is with the fact that these classes are used as * weeders *. Just because you’re ‘bad’ at OChem doesn’t mean that you don’t have the ability to work as a chemical engineer. But the rule is at many schools is , if you can’t get past the OChem weeder, then you can’t get a chemical engineering degree. </p>
<p>This is the key difference between college OChem and high school geometry. Let’s face it. High school really isn’t that hard. Even some of the laziest slackers I have ever met in my life still managed to graduate from high school. But college engineering is completely different - plenty of reasonably solid students who try engineering will not actually complete the degree. Numerous studies have shown that significantly less than 50% of incoming engineering students never get the engineering degree. Many of them get weeded out and end up having to major in something else. Some of them can’t major in something else because they got weeded out so harshly that their GPA’s dropped so low that they got expelled from their schools entirely. Nor are these all bad students who get weeded out. Some are bad, but others work extremely hard, and STILL get weeded out anyway. </p>
<p>My point is, engineering programs ought to be more careful about when, why, and how they use weeders. Program administrators ought to really ask whether certain classes really need to weed people out.</p>
<p>i have yet to see ppl who truly work hard and not pass the class. i have seen ppl who TALK about working hard and not pass the class.</p>
<p>While I am not trying to dismiss sakky’s argument that ochem and/or pchem are not very good criteria in seeing students’ potential in chemical engineering, I find it hard to believe that students who can pass process control and transport processes can fail ochem easily.
O well, maybe I am a little biased, because I enjoyed ochem a lot and in fact found it quite easy.</p>
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<p>Perhaps you’d like to try out OChem/PChema at a harsh place like MIT or Caltech, and see if you can’t find people who work hard but still don’t pass the class.</p>
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<p>2 reasons why this happens. </p>
<h1>1) The grade curve. You can know the material quite well, and get a failing grade anyway, just because everybody else knew it better than you, and the curve is such that somebody has to fail. Hence, in such a situation, it doesn’t matter how much you know, or even how hard you work. It only matters how you much you know or how hard you work relative to how much everybody else knows and how hard they work.</h1>
<p>To give you an example, I knew a guy who scored an 85% on his midterm exam. Cause for celebration? Hardly. Why? Because the mean on the test was in the mid-90’s. Couple that with the harsh grade curve of the class meant that his 85 translated into, at best, a ‘D’ grade, probably an F. It didn’t matter that he knew most of the material on the exam. All that mattered was his position on the curve. </p>
<p>The upshot of the story is that grade curves are highly arbitrary in nature. You work quite hard, know the material quite well, and still not pass the class simply because, when you use a curve, somebody has to do poorly.</p>
<p>The worst aspect of OChem (less so with PChem) is that OChem tends to attract hordes of pre-meds who are absolutely diehard about getting the best grade they can, and will therefore study day and night. Not only that, but many premeds shift their schedule around such that OChem can be one of the few (or sometimes, the only) difficult classes they take in that particular semester, which means they can devote all their time to just studying OChem. ChemE students generally have to take extremely difficult and time-consuming engineering coursework in conjunction with OChem. That’s what you are dealing with when you are trying to avoid the failing grade in the OChem curve. </p>
<h1>2) - Talking specifically about OChem, OChem is basically memorization. Seaweed, I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. To do well in OChem basically means memorizing a whole bunch of, often times, arbitrary reagents and mechanisms. There are no numbers, there are no equations - it’s just lots of memorization. If you’re not good at memorization, you’re toast.</h1>
<p>Physical chemistry is not required in my chem E curriculum, but I need to take a non-calculus-based pchem course to get a minor in chemistry. What topics specifically are covered in a non-calc based pchem course?</p>
<p>Regarding organic, I got a C+ and an F/B+ in my two organic chem courses, but my thermo professor straight up told me that most practicing chemical engineers don’t deal with the how and the why of a specifcally reaction, just the reaction itself.</p>
<p>organic chem sucked for me.these were my grades.</p>
<p>Physics(E&M)-B+
Multivariable calculus-B+ or A-
English-B or B+
Biology- probably a C+
ChemE 291 seminar-A
Organic chem-D+</p>
<p>Ick…sorry about the organic grade. What is the minimum grade your college requires for prereqs? My school requires a C- for prerequisite courses?</p>
<p>bump…</p>
<p>^^For what?</p>
<p>I know that this is almost a decade later from the original post, but I found this so interesting that I have to give my grain of salt on the matter for future readers. </p>
<p>I am in my junior year of Chemical Engineering Degree. And to this day I do not understand why it is that I have to take organic 2. I understand that orgo 1 is important because as somebody who will most likely work with chemistry almost everyday in the field, you need at least a basic understand of organic chemistry, but why do I need organic 2. To me according to what people have told me is just more memorizing and more reactions which I see no use for. And lets be real if a company needs an expert in orgo chemistry they are not going to require the engineer to know it all, they will hire an Organic chemist who will explain it to everybody. And then the chemical engineer will do their engineering part.</p>
<p>I manage to pass organic 1 with a C, out of 4 exams I got 2As and 2Fs. 2As in the analytical part of naming and spectroscopy, and Fs in the memorizing synthesis part. To this day I am doing great on my math, I have mostly As and a couple of Bs. I currently have a 98% on my material and energy balances class after getting 100% in the first exam, and I love that class and I feel that I get the content better than most of my classmates. However I am terrify to this day that I will not get my degree in time or at all because of organic 2 and all its memorization which I am not good at. I think my only choice will be to take a summer off and take orgo 2 at a community college and just do orgo 2 all summer. I could never take that class with a full engineering schedule during a regular semester, I would surely fail. </p>
<p>Anyways I will still try as hard as I can, because there is nothing I want more in this world than to become a Chemical Engineer, I love everything about it, and my dream jobs from 1 through 100 all involve been a chemical engineer. Also I don’t think I would be truly happy doing anything else for the rest of my life. </p>
<p>Sorry if this upsets anybody for the decade long bump, but I needed to say this.</p>