CHEM483 | PlanetTerp

Information	Review
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/22/2023	Souna is one of those people that is clearly very smart, but in my opinion, she is a horrible lecturer. Her lectures felt extremely disorganized and messy, which made writing lab reports difficult because discussing the theory behind the lab was made challenging by her lectures. As a lab instructor, she was great. She was very helpful and involved. But she is honestly one of, if not the only, professors where I could sit through the entire lecture and be completely confused by the end. Grading is on and off for lab reports. I'd say it's pretty light for most of the reports besides the final major report, where they are pretty strict. Overall, the class isn't that bad, but good lord were lectures hard to sit through.
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A Anonymous 07/10/2023	Dr. Souna is very involved in the labs and would frequently come in during labs and TA office hours to check on students. She was very helpful and would give solid recommendations and troubleshooting if you had an issue putting your lab reports together or getting Matlab to run. While this class was definitely easier than 277, this class was still way too difficult for being a 2 credit lab. While it's nice only having two major reports, the smaller data reports can be very time-consuming depending on the lab.She does have weekly lectures but they're not very helpful since she just reads off of the slides that she posts later anyway. Also -- she attaches all sorts of resources for each unit which are very helpful, especially for writing the introduction for major reports. Be prepared to spend a lot of time on lab reports for this class, however, its definitely a do-able class (even alongside chem481).
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A Anonymous 06/26/2023	This class was organized and the labs were built on each other. The lab reports were very time consuming, but TAs were very helpful. Dr. Souna also often came in during lab to help out (which most instructors don’t). The rubrics were sometimes vague, but I went to office hours before turning them in and ended with an A on every report. Also, lab reports were 80% of the grade. There was a final exam which was very fair and only 5% of the grade. So if you put in enough time and effort, you will end with an A.
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/23/2023	The class is well structured and she lays out her expectations pretty clearly. If you go to the TA's and her office hours, they spell out pretty clearly what they want you to include in the reports. The concepts themselves are not too complicated to grasp so long as you attend class and keep up with lecture slides. With that being said, the class is a lot of work and the weekly data reports get really tiresome towards the end. The lab partner you get can also make or break your experience. The major reports are graded quite harshly, but there are a lot of opportunities in general to get a good grade so long as you're willing to commit time and effort. Overall, upper level labs can be a pain, but I believe Dr. Souna ran it as smoothly as it can get.
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A florm 12/24/2022	The way 483 is structured was a lot better than any other labs I'd taken previously. There are only 3 different labs, each broken down into several weeks. Data reports were due every week, and major reports were due at the end of the first and third labs. These reports made up 80% of the overall grade, so they're really important to spend a lot of time on. Souna provides extremely clear guidelines for all the tables and figures you need to include in the results section of your reports, but she doesn't make it as clear what you need to write about in your discussion. She'll often mention random concepts or equations in lecture and say "this is worth writing about" so you have to pay attention for things like that. But she also brings up a bunch of useless and overly complicated theories and equations that aren't necessary, so you have to learn how to make judgment calls on what's actually important. Souna can also be pretty nitpicky about formatting and phrasing in reports, but her and the TAs weren't too harsh grading them. The labs themselves were not difficult to perform or understand conceptually (except for getting Matlab to work). Souna often came into lab to check how we were doing and answer questions, which a lot of chem professors rarely do. At the end of the semester, you have to turn in your lab notebook for her to go through and grade. I was expecting an easy hundred from it but she actually checks them thoroughly and was pretty harsh, but it was only 5% of my grade so it didn't really matter. The final exam was also only 5% of the grade so even though it was pretty tough and required a ton of explaining, it had a small overall effect. In general, I'd say Souna ran a surprisingly efficient and well-put together lab that wasn't too difficult, but required a lot of work. She and her TAs always did a good job answering our questions.
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/12/2022	Like other students said. No rubrics given or and very little guidance given for reports which she expects very specific things for.
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/19/2021	Just go to her office hours
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/09/2021	class was all over the place and there was no guidance to students OR TAs regarding grading. She didn't respond to any of these student concerns, only offered regrades - which would only make her life harder because her rubrics for data reports were so vague that she would have to regrade an entire section's worth of data reports every week. she's not cut out to be a professor, she's quite smart, but she has no connection to students, no care for our questions or concerns, and she certainly doesn't understand how we aren't as smart as her as only undergraduate students. seriously, if you don't have to take this class, don't. if it's required, bother souna about any questions you have or you're going to be putting in hours of work every week to get C's and D's from one TA and A's and B's from souna.
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/08/2021	class expectations were never clear because TA's grade on a separate rubric even for just the weekly data reports that is not given to students. Class basically had no curve and you can see that less than 5% of students got A's in the distribution. Kind of ridiculous for a class that is conceptually easy. I don't know why she thinks not having any sort of curve or scale is reasonable. She seems to have bizarre ideas of "fairness" that don't really align with reality. I asked for an extension on an assignment about a week due to my circumstances before it was due and she said no due to "fairness." She ought to realize that people have personal circumstances that get rid of her fanciful idea of "fairness"
Amanda Souna CHEM483 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/08/2021	Awesome lecturer, awesome person. Super helpful and responsive. She made CHEM 483 so much manageable. Clear rubrics for the lab reports. Exams were tough though-average was around 50's so she curved a lot.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A-
Anonymous
12/22/2023

Souna is one of those people that is clearly very smart, but in my opinion, she is a horrible lecturer. Her lectures felt extremely disorganized and messy, which made writing lab reports difficult because discussing the theory behind the lab was made challenging by her lectures. As a lab instructor, she was great. She was very helpful and involved. But she is honestly one of, if not the only, professors where I could sit through the entire lecture and be completely confused by the end. Grading is on and off for lab reports. I'd say it's pretty light for most of the reports besides the final major report, where they are pretty strict. Overall, the class isn't that bad, but good lord were lectures hard to sit through.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
Anonymous
07/10/2023

Dr. Souna is very involved in the labs and would frequently come in during labs and TA office hours to check on students. She was very helpful and would give solid recommendations and troubleshooting if you had an issue putting your lab reports together or getting Matlab to run. While this class was definitely easier than 277, this class was still way too difficult for being a 2 credit lab. While it's nice only having two major reports, the smaller data reports can be very time-consuming depending on the lab.She does have weekly lectures but they're not very helpful since she just reads off of the slides that she posts later anyway. Also -- she attaches all sorts of resources for each unit which are very helpful, especially for writing the introduction for major reports. Be prepared to spend a lot of time on lab reports for this class, however, its definitely a do-able class (even alongside chem481).

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
Anonymous
06/26/2023

This class was organized and the labs were built on each other. The lab reports were very time consuming, but TAs were very helpful. Dr. Souna also often came in during lab to help out (which most instructors don’t). The rubrics were sometimes vague, but I went to office hours before turning them in and ended with an A on every report. Also, lab reports were 80% of the grade. There was a final exam which was very fair and only 5% of the grade. So if you put in enough time and effort, you will end with an A.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/23/2023

The class is well structured and she lays out her expectations pretty clearly. If you go to the TA's and her office hours, they spell out pretty clearly what they want you to include in the reports. The concepts themselves are not too complicated to grasp so long as you attend class and keep up with lecture slides. With that being said, the class is a lot of work and the weekly data reports get really tiresome towards the end. The lab partner you get can also make or break your experience. The major reports are graded quite harshly, but there are a lot of opportunities in general to get a good grade so long as you're willing to commit time and effort. Overall, upper level labs can be a pain, but I believe Dr. Souna ran it as smoothly as it can get.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
florm
12/24/2022

The way 483 is structured was a lot better than any other labs I'd taken previously. There are only 3 different labs, each broken down into several weeks. Data reports were due every week, and major reports were due at the end of the first and third labs. These reports made up 80% of the overall grade, so they're really important to spend a lot of time on. Souna provides extremely clear guidelines for all the tables and figures you need to include in the results section of your reports, but she doesn't make it as clear what you need to write about in your discussion. She'll often mention random concepts or equations in lecture and say "this is worth writing about" so you have to pay attention for things like that. But she also brings up a bunch of useless and overly complicated theories and equations that aren't necessary, so you have to learn how to make judgment calls on what's actually important. Souna can also be pretty nitpicky about formatting and phrasing in reports, but her and the TAs weren't too harsh grading them. The labs themselves were not difficult to perform or understand conceptually (except for getting Matlab to work). Souna often came into lab to check how we were doing and answer questions, which a lot of chem professors rarely do. At the end of the semester, you have to turn in your lab notebook for her to go through and grade. I was expecting an easy hundred from it but she actually checks them thoroughly and was pretty harsh, but it was only 5% of my grade so it didn't really matter. The final exam was also only 5% of the grade so even though it was pretty tough and required a ton of explaining, it had a small overall effect. In general, I'd say Souna ran a surprisingly efficient and well-put together lab that wasn't too difficult, but required a lot of work. She and her TAs always did a good job answering our questions.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting a B+
Anonymous
05/12/2022

Like other students said. No rubrics given or and very little guidance given for reports which she expects very specific things for.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
Anonymous
12/19/2021

Just go to her office hours

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting a B+
Anonymous
12/09/2021

class was all over the place and there was no guidance to students OR TAs regarding grading. She didn't respond to any of these student concerns, only offered regrades - which would only make her life harder because her rubrics for data reports were so vague that she would have to regrade an entire section's worth of data reports every week. she's not cut out to be a professor, she's quite smart, but she has no connection to students, no care for our questions or concerns, and she certainly doesn't understand how we aren't as smart as her as only undergraduate students. seriously, if you don't have to take this class, don't. if it's required, bother souna about any questions you have or you're going to be putting in hours of work every week to get C's and D's from one TA and A's and B's from souna.

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
Anonymous
11/08/2021

class expectations were never clear because TA's grade on a separate rubric even for just the weekly data reports that is not given to students. Class basically had no curve and you can see that less than 5% of students got A's in the distribution. Kind of ridiculous for a class that is conceptually easy. I don't know why she thinks not having any sort of curve or scale is reasonable. She seems to have bizarre ideas of "fairness" that don't really align with reality. I asked for an extension on an assignment about a week due to my circumstances before it was due and she said no due to "fairness." She ought to realize that people have personal circumstances that get rid of her fanciful idea of "fairness"

Amanda Souna
CHEM483

Expecting an A
Anonymous
04/08/2021

Awesome lecturer, awesome person. Super helpful and responsive. She made CHEM 483 so much manageable. Clear rubrics for the lab reports. Exams were tough though-average was around 50's so she curved a lot.

Reviews for CHEM483