Samuel Lascio

This professor has taught: CHEM131, CHEM135

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Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C Anonymous 01/26/2026	Best chem professor for this class, but the class is super difficult. At the end of the year, he'll curve the entire class (50% was passing for us), but during the semester, it's unlikely he'll curve individual exams. Approachable guy, super kind and fun to talk to, and responds to emails fairly quickly (unless he's busy with grading around finals or midterms). Overall, I highly recommend him, but be prepared to study heavily for this class, especially if your chem knowledge isn't well defined.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 01/24/2026	Lascio is a great dude and is definitely the most effective CHEM135 teacher. He spends a little bit too much time on some topics, but I'm sure he'll get much better every semester. It's very clear he cares about his students, and he always sets his expectations higher than reality. His curve at the end of the year was very generous, and as long as you stay on top of each lesson as it is being taught, you'll be fine.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 01/23/2026	If you can take any other professor, please do. While his lectures are easy to follow and he is a good professor overall, his exams are extremely hard, with the average grades being 50%. If you ask him a question in lecture, he will give you an attitude back in front of everyone but claim that he's not giving an attitude. Overall, if you're willing to put in the work, which will require a lot of separate practice and textbook practice, because I didn't find that the two hour homework helped much, you should be fine.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C Anonymous 01/21/2026	Lascio is one of the better 135 professors. His lectures are pretty decent for the most part, although he poorly planned/paced some of his lectures. This caused us to fall behind at the start, and we kind of had to rush things/play a game of catch-up for the rest of the semester. Towards the end, leading up to the final, he skipped/rushed through a lot of material simply because he did not have enough time to teach us. His exams were pretty hard, and the sample/past exams were not the best at preparing us for the actual test. I would get high 60s to mid 80s on the practice exam, but would do terribly on the actual exams. Exam averages ranged anywhere from the 50s to the 70s. The class average was around 70% before the final. Homework was only 80 out of the available 580 points. There were 3 exams, each worth 100 points, with the final worth 200. You could bring a single index card to each exam, which had to be provided by him. Homeworks were somewhat hard and would sometimes stray a little from the lecture or exam material. However, he was very accommodating and understanding with deadlines. The final was absolutely brutal, with the average being in the 50s. Lascio curved a total of twice during the semester, once before the final, dropping the C- cutoff from 70% to 61%. After the final, grades took forever to release, but after he finished grading them all, he posted an announcement stating how he was dropping the C- cutoff down to a 50%. Overall, it's a really challenging class with a lot of material to cover in a short period of time. Lascio is a very understanding professor and is very easy-going and approachable. The curve saved me from failing the class, as I had a high-50, which ended up curving to a C.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 01/19/2026	Lascio was a great professor especially compared to the rest of the professors teaching this course. He understands that the class is difficult and tries to be understanding about it. The course is definitely hard and requires you to put in the work fi do well but it can be done. He also is pretty generous with the curve, this semester he curved the class at the end of the semester rather than curving individual tests. He gives out notecards that you can put whatever you want on but also makes the math based problems more difficult, If you do the practice problems on the slides and the questions in discussion worksheets you'll be fine. Also, if you are having trouble with topics in class or find that solving certain problems isn't intuitive go to the discussion, usually its just the TA solving out practice problems and answering questions which is a great resource if used correctly. Even if you don't think you have questions go to the discussion right before each exam since someone will have a question you won't know the answer to. He's also a huge fan of exception rules on tests.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 01/17/2026	Professor Lascio is a great and understanding guy. He's an engaging lecturer but lectures overall were boring and I fell asleep a few times. The day of an exam I felt horrible (probably due to stress and not sleeping at all cause his exams are HARD and I had been studying non-stop) and sent him an email asking if I could do a make-up exam even though I was not going to get a doctors note, expecting I would just have to tough it out and take it. He immediately replied and said to stay in bed. Literally was so thankful to him and I probably wouldn't have passed if I had taken that exam with a foggy head since I consistently kept a low grade throughout this course even though I had taken AP Chem in highschool. Also, once I showed my study guide to a friend with a different professor in this course and they had no idea what they were looking at- Lascio does go too deep into some chapters. The curve at the end saved me and I barely passed this class, though to be fair I should have studied for the first exam more and set myself up poorly. I also had no idea I would pass as one of my exam grades and final exam grade didn't get put in until after grades were due AND he didn't announce the curve until a few days after that. I wouldn't recommend him per se as the class average was around a 66.5% and many others barely scraped by, but if you put in the effort with him you should be fine.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 01/15/2026	You can tell he's REALLY passionate about chemistry, but this course is so fast paced so you will need to be studying and reviewing notes after pretty much every lecture to make sure your actually understand what's happening. He definitely has an issue with pacing. He explained the first half of the course, which is significantly easier than the second half, in about 9 weeks, which only left 5 weeks for him to rush the last couple of chapters which are way harder to understand. He actually wasn't able to finish a chapter, but he did leave that off the final. The final was fulllll of info from the second half though. His exams are also extremely difficult, and the practice exams don't really match that. He is very quick responding to emails and can explain questions in depth either over email or during his office hours and is super nice. The class has 580 points total. 80 points come from homework. The homework has like three attempts on each question and 3 attempts on the entire homework so it's free 80 points. The other 500 come from the exams. Three midterms - 100 points each and the final - 200 points. He will say throughout the entire semester that he's prob not going to curve, but right before our final he did change the grade system to a 13 point scale. Also if you pass the final he will allow you to pass the class no matter your grade. He's a great prof it's just a terrible evil class.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 01/10/2026	Great lecturer who kept the hall of ~330 people engaged every lecture, but the class itself is so quick in its content. Some is easy, some is hard, and it really helps if you have taken AP Chemistry in high school, it's nearly identical with a little bit more content. You will need to study for every test, and pay attention very well in lecture; there is so much he talks about that doesn't end up on the lecture notes he posts. The homework is easy and an 80 free points, just do them and it's solid practice for midterms and the final. Overall good dude, but the class itself frustrates many people due to the amount of content and its difficulty. Great curve at the end as well.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B Anonymous 01/09/2026	I want to make this short and sweet but I also want to start off by making a disclaimer. If you read through these reviews you can see a pattern between the CHEM131 and CHEM135 reviews. First I think the difficulty of 135 is already common knowledge. Dr. Lascio was one of those professors that I will never forget given I took his class my freshman year fall semester. He responds to emails insanely fast and is not trying to get you. If you go to office hours and show him you care I think you’ll do alright in the end. In class he actually explains and gives examples on the practice problems. Also a notecard was given on all midterms + final. The reason this was a 4 star review was because you’re in the dark for the entirety of the semester with Lascio changing his mind about curves. I was worried I wouldn’t even pass the class after the final but I ended up with a B. TLDR: Chem dept at UMD is terrible and I think this is the best professor for gen chem across the board.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 01/06/2026	This course is very fast paced and challenging, but I don't think Professor Lascio could have done a better job. While he was a little misleading about how challenging the final exam was going to be, he was very communicative throughout the whole semester, and was very accommodating when he was asked. He's very good at responding to individual emails. Additionally, he ended up giving a pretty big curve, so that helped out a lot, even though he was kind of set on not giving too heavy of a curve during the semester. Overall, very difficult course, but he is the best professor to teach it in my opinion.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 01/05/2026	Take him, he is a great teacher.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/04/2026	YES this is a difficult class, it's known as the engineering weed-out class for a reason. However, if you give a good honest effort you will be able to succeed. This is a very fast paced class, but as someone with no prior chemistry experience Lascio breaks it down the best he can in his allotted time and gives plenty of practice examples with increasing difficulty. The average for each exam is pretty low, around 65-70%, but there is a large curve at the end of the semester (For our class I finished with an 86 which was an A, I believe the cutoff for an A- versus an A was around 81-82). This is difficult material but if you are willing to put in effort you will do well. He has office hours twice a week and I usually went once every two weeks or so to ask questions, and sometimes he will drop hints about exam questions. The most important thing to do well in this course is to do the weekly discussion worksheets BEFORE your discussion section. Even though the TAs go through the worksheets, putting in this extra effort beforehand is the best way to catch mistakes and what topics you are struggling on. This also makes for a great review resource for the cumulative final, because you have written documentation of all the practice problems completed and what mistakes you have made in the past. The weekly ALEKS homework isn't too difficult but can be confusing and time consuming, but the actual discussion sheets are much more indicative of exam materials because he does not make the ALEKS himself, so focus your time on the review sheets.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 01/03/2026	Prof. Lascio is a nice guy and he genuinely does a good job of breaking down hard concepts to make them more intuitive while also trying to be engaging with us. That being said he often yaps and can go on side tangents when it would probably be better if he just moved on to the next topic (hence why we were behind for like the entire second half of the course). Personally I never bothered looking at the textbook or the discussion worksheets, I just went over the homework problems on ALEKS and used the retake/review features to get the content down. Imo the exams are harder than the worksheets but easier than the ALEKS so you should be set with enough review of the ALEKS problems. He did take what felt like forever to announce the final curve and put in final grades but the cutoffs seemed fair enough ig. Overall an alright prof but a million times better than the other options for 135.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B Anonymous 01/03/2026	I am a person who hates chemistry as a subject, so when I was told I had to take it, I was terrified, especially since CHEM135 is 2 semesters worth of material put into 1 semester. Due to this, I will say it moves extremely fast and it is rough to learn. Considering all this, Dr. Lascio does a pretty good job. Honestly with what he was given, he taught the subject pretty well, and the curve at the end definitely helped. He tries to make it interesting throughout as well which helped me at some times when I was struggling to lock in at lecture. He also ALWAYS posted the lecture notes which made me very happy as he went quite fast in lecture and I struggled to keep up with writing all the notes, so referencing what he did in class later made my life easier. Overall, CHEM135 as a class sucks but Dr. Lascio did pretty good with what he was given to teach.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/30/2025	He's a really nice guy and actually cares about you as a student, responds to emails fast, and is helpful in office hours. However, course is lwk paced badly (slow for most of the semester then a TON of info crammed in the last midterm + final). Gives a lot of helpful materials (study guide, practice tests, discussion worksheets, ALEKs problems). However, did us SUPER dirty on the final (he said it would be surface level questions and the class average was a 116/200). The final dropped by grade 5%, but then he did a major last-minute curve that changed my raw C- to a B. Slow grader for sure, and this class was awful, but he's not a bad lecturer at all. Really glad I got him compared to the other Chem135 profs. Taking off one star for that final + his inability to set a grading scale till the very last minute.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/29/2025	He is a really good professor especially when compared to other ones you'll eventually come across. He is super down to earth and a very nice funny guy. You can email him and he'll response typically fast. The class is VERY hard though. Dr. Lascio understands this and tries to accommodate. If the class performs poorly he will curve GENEROUSLY.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/29/2025	The best professor for CHEM135. He's very responsive and communicative, thinks through all of his decisions about tests, grading policies, etc., is exceedingly fair if you talk to him, and is an overall nice guy. As a lecturer, his strength is creating analogies to make new topics seem simple. The midterms were very fair in terms of difficulty, and while the final was harder than the students were prepared for, Lascio corrected for this with a very friendly curve. In a class that many find annoying, Lascio left me with zero complaints. Study the content and he'll give you every opportunity to do well.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/29/2025	rough. too much content. insane curve saved my life at the end.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/29/2025	Great, great professor. He is down-to-earth and cares about students doing well and learning. His lectures are solid, they are interesting, and helpful. 100% need to attend to do well. I barely used the textbook because he only tests based on lectures. Grading is ~10-15 long, hard online HW assignments that have many attempts, so you are guaranteed a 100%, 3 manageable midterms that, if you study, you can get a solid grade, and a hard final. In the tests and final, you can use a flashcard!! I attended every lecture and discussion, did all the HW and discussion worksheets, and studied heavily and got a natural B- in the class. BUT he curved HEAVILY so I ended with an A-. This is because gen chem is a HARD class. This does not mean he is a bad professor. Overall, TAKE THIS PROFESSOR!
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/28/2025	Dr. Lascio is the definition of an understanding professor. For starters, the guy is pretty young for a professor, so he can resonate a little more with college students than other professors. Second, he loves what he does, he enjoys it, and there is nothing better than a professor who actively shows his interest in the subject because it honestly makes the learning better for all. Third, he is hilarious, he knows when to make a joke, and sometimes even cracked jokes in the pin drop silence of an exam just to lighten it up a bit (he came dressed in an all black suit and Santa hat for the final). Fourth, he understands the difficulty of CHEM135; he knows that it is rigorous and understands that we were trying our best, which is why he allowed a single notecard for all exams, where you could write anything. The ALEKS homework was helpful, but sometimes took longer than estimated. The TA was helpful and very well-informed on the subject. Before the final exam, he changed the grade cut-off by almost a whole letter grade. I am glad I passed this class; it was hell, it was fast, it was a requirement for the school of engineering, but Dr. Lascio made it a bit better. I would definitely consider taking him over other professors (Cough Cough Dr. Minerey, which my friend took and said it was horrible).
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a D Anonymous 12/24/2025	He is a nice guy but teaches really fast and does not curve anything. How do you not curve any exams in this class... feels like he wants everyone to fail. What he teaches is nothing like what he puts on his exams. Some questions even TAs didn't know how to do when looking over exams. good luck if you take him
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/23/2025	Horrible at lecturing. most of the important stuff is skimmed over. Don't expect an easy time, most professors teaching chem will be better.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/23/2025	Pros: - Lascio really cares about his students and wants them to succeed. He's very nice, and responds to emails quickly. He was flexible when I needed an exam date moved. Compared to the horor stories I've heard of other 135 professors, he's definitely the CHEM135 teacher you want to have. - Tests are typically pretty similar to the practice tests he gives out before hand. He also made review sheets and study guides which were helpful. Tests were still hard though, averages for all of them were in the 60s. Cons: - CHEM135 has a lot of new material quickly. Lascio tries to cover everything well, but sometimes I didn't fully feel I got the concepts from lecture and needed the textbook. Especially near the end of the course he needed to rush through the last few chapters.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/22/2025	Lascio is a great, engaging lecturer, but his exams are incredibly difficult and not related to the material covered in lecture at all, which makes his style of teaching relatively unhelpful when preparing for exams. On top of this he's mentioned in lecture that he does not feel it's his job to teach us, which I guess is fair at a college level, but I feel like if I'm paying this much money to go to college I want a professor who wants to help us learn in lecture, not one who just expects us to learn everything on our own. The homework, lecture notes, and practice exams are all significantly easier than what he puts on the actual exams, so its difficult to prepare for them, and he also does not drop questions if the majority of the class gets them wrong. On our second midterm there was a problem that only three people got right in a 260 person lecture, but he did not drop the question or curve the exam. One of the best parts of taking him, however, is the curve at the end of the semester. Like most chem classes, it's based on your peers so it will change year by year, but it allowed me (and many others) to pass the class. He's the kind of prof that I wouldn't recommend, but I also wouldn't break down into tears having, as he's very approachable and responsive. I believe he's moving to a lab coordinator position, which I feel is a better fit for him anyway. Quick helpful tip if you have him for 131! If he teaches you an exception to a rule, write it down because it'll be on the exam almost every time.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/21/2025	Chem135 is a BRUTAL course. Dr. Lascio is funny, his office hours are very useful, homework help, provides practice midterms that are similar to his midterms, and provides a flashcard for exams (including the final). Probably the best chem135 professor
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/20/2025	This class is super hard and has SO much content, so no matter who your professor is you WILL need to put a lot of time and effort into this class. Great professor, super nice + approachable, great with responding to emails, and pretty accommodating. He also is great at explaining the topics quickly and somewhat clearly. His lectures are okay, he sometimes goes on tangents about stuff you don't need to know for the exam, just because he loves chemistry so much lol. went super slow in the beginning, but this kind of caused my section to end up behind on content so we had to speed through like 5 chapters in the last 2 lectures. (and then those chapters were HEAVILY on the final but whateverrrr) Practice exams are useless as they are WAY too easy in comparison to his actual exams, his exams are pretty similar to Mignerey's, but definitely a little trickier especially the calculation portions. Your best bet for the exams are gonna be the weekly discussion worksheets. Make sure you know how to do EVERY problem on those and try to train your brain to do them intuitively. Overall, shitty course, good professor, TOUGH exams.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/20/2025	I love the dude. He’s a funny guy and easy to talk too, and lectures are fine. The only reason why I gave him such a low review is because of the final. It wasn’t necessary too hard considering this is chem135, it was just the fact that he made about half the final focused on the last two chapters we learned when he told us that those were going to make up a “small” portion since it was so much content given to us in only about a week. I could have actually passed this class if I knew how significant those chapters would be. Ofcourse i understand that the material was presented and it’s my responsibility to study and learn it, it was just not on my mind as much as it should have been because of what we were told. But overall he is a pretty good professor
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/19/2025	i love lascio
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/18/2025	He's a pretty good professor. As a Lecturer, he's really good at keeping the class engaged, but the speed that CHEM135 goes at makes sure he's always going really quick through the material, but if you ask him to explain in more detail he'll make sure you'll understand(at the cost of being behind in the curriculum). He's really good at answering emails relatively quickly. His exams are particularly hard compared to the other CHEM135 professors, from what I've heard. Expect to be tested on things that you just finished going over. It's gen chem for engineers, the rush to study feels like you'll need to be working at light speed. If he finishes a chapter on Tuesday, expect to be tested on it on Thursday.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/18/2025	First off, loved his class. He's a great professor and explains things well verbally, but you will have to attend his lectures if you want to get much out of his class. He doesn't post recordings unless he's sick or the lecture was virtual, and there's a lot he elaborates on out loud that you'll miss out on if you only read the lecture notes. His tests are pretty straight-forward, but you can't just memorize equations and expect to pass because he specifically constructs the exams to avoid students doing that. He's willing to do regrades and everyone I know got at least a couple extra points from any regrade request they submitted, and the homework assignments combined are worth as much as a midterm so if you don't do well on those, the homework can boost your grade. He even took an entire chapter off our second exam because people complained it was too hard (we hadn't gotten to the chapter in class, but it'd been posted for over a week at the time). The class is hard, duh, it's gen chem, but he's great. If he ever teaches CHEM131 again he's probably one of the best options, but after our class I don't think he's going to teach it again. I know he'll teach CHEM132 and CHEM135 next semester; can't say much about him as a lab coordinator, but I hear good things about his CHEM135. My only gripe with his whole class was that he waits until a week or so before an exam to give you the practice exam and study guide, so if you have a lot going on at the same time as his exam it's hard to space out preparation.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/18/2025	Dr. Lascio is a very kind and approachable professor who responds to emails very quickly (for the most part) and is always willing to help students. His tests were relatively fair. He doesn't curve exams, only your final grade so its difficult to know how you're doing in the class. Overall, I recommend him.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/17/2025	A really great professor who did a great job of making the material understandable and providing many ways to review/practice. He obviously cares about his students, and has been very accommodating in holding review sessions and extending homeworks. However, I will say this class was difficult and his practice exams were not a true representation of how hard the actual exams would be. The average on each exam was usually around 50%, and because he does not put all grades in and apply the curve until the end of the semester it is hard knowing what grade you can expect. Still, the curve for our class was over 10%, so as long as you can get above average on the exams you can get a good grade.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/16/2025	Lascio is a very engaging lecturer and tries to make his class as interesting as chemistry can be. However, he is a petty guy who will blame the entire class for failing and not anything else 😭. I remember that during an exam review session, he spent the entire time arguing with a student who wrote a genuine email about how they were concerned about the exam. He had this email up on the board and literally said “I’m trying to make eye contact with whoever wrote this,” then proceeded to nitpick everything wrong with it. Other times he’s really nice and will answer your questions without condescension (it’s kinda hard to tell what mood he’s in). He curves your grade at the end, and his exams are VERY difficult. Definitely doable, just a very hard subject.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/16/2025	Dr.Lascio is genuinely a great teacher. His lectures are very informative and he’s very accommodating when it comes to scheduling regrades, office hours, and exam reviews. He replies to emails very quickly and actually cares about the wellbeing of his students. Discussion session is optional but has good resources for exam prep. Study by doing the homework problems until you fully understand them and by reviewing concepts in the lectures slides.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/16/2025	Such a great professor. He explains everything really well, and while his exams are quite tough, if you have any questions he is very good at explaining each concept. Chem135 is known to be a really difficult class, but this is one that with Lascio, you will do very well if you take advantage of his resources
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an F Anonymous 12/13/2025	lascio is great!!! he's a great prof i'm just failing because i'm bad at chem lol. anyway yeah idk what grade i'll get but we'll see. lascio is great and chill he's funny. 4 stars because for one lecture which was an exam review right before midterm 2 he was just reviewing a student's email and i was like damn...this is lowk unproductive....but yeah he's a chill guy i'd recommend anyway. just because he's cool. just don't be like me and actually lock in lol...i'm so happy i'm not pre-med....
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/12/2025	Dr. Lascio is a really nice guy. He walks through useful example problems in lecture and he explains topics well. He did have to cram a lot of material in at the end but that's not really his fault, there's just a lot of stuff to cover in the class. The exams were pretty hard but manageable. Overall I would say he's one of the better options to take chem135 with.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/12/2025	Great professor, lectures are very engaging and entertaining, considering the difficulty of the course. But the exams were a bit tricky to get through, so you need to study well to pass the course
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/11/2025	Honestly the biggest problem is that the class itself is just hard. I think Lascio does a great job making the content understandable but it seems like we're always behind on something. The course feels rushed but that's just the nature of the course and not Lascio's fault. He does a good job responding to emails despite how many students he has and the exams are always like the practice exams. Currently though, there is no practice final, which is a little disappointing but manageable. Lascio is always working overtime making sure grades are in quickly and lecture slides posted in a timely manner. He goes above the standard so much so that there have been times he's uploaded annotated slides at around 1am
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C Anonymous 12/09/2025	This class is hard af but Dr. Lascio doesn't really do anything to make it harder than it needs to be. His slides are fun, lectures and discussion are good, and the GSS is pretty helpful. I would give 5 stars but I think the exams are just a little bit too hard. A lot of the questions feel like they're trying to trick you on purpose by asking about super small and insignificant pieces of information, and some of the free response questions are just brutal. I'm pretty sure there was one on our second exam that 3/~500 people got right, so that's about how hard we're dealing with. All that said though, this class is 100% passable since he incorporates a very generous curve at the end where you only need a 50 to get a C and if you pass the final he'll just pass you anyway. Overall, hard class, but Dr. Lascio isn't to blame for that.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/09/2025	I would say Dr. Lascio is very nice, but I’m not sure whether it’s the chemistry curriculum at UMD or his class specifically that is extremely difficult. This is coming from someone who took chemistry in high school and enjoyed it, so I do have some background knowledge in the subject. That being said, even with some foundational knowledge in chemistry, I found this course to be difficult, especially the exams. On our three midterms, the averages were 42, 51, and 43.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/09/2025	Best prof in all STEM
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/08/2025	Dr. Lascio is a solid professor. A lot of people complain that he isn't a good teacher, but I think if you show up to lecture and take notes, he explains everything pretty well. We had 3 midterm exams and the averages were around 50-60% for each. However with his curve for this semester (which is based on the class average), an 80+ is an A and a 70+ is a B. In addition to our midterm grades, we had around 9 homework assignments that added up to be 80 points, the same amount of points as each midterm exam, which really helped people's grades. I'd recommend actually trying to do the homework problems even though they're often way more challenging than the exam questions, because they help you become more familiar with the content. In terms of studying, look through all the slideshows he posts and make sure you can do every single problem he's done in class. He also posts a practice exam for each midterm, which is relatively similar to the real exams, although they seemed to be a little easier. His exams are fair, but for a lot of people time was a challenge. He likes to include trick questions, which can be frustrating, but very simple if you know your stuff. Lastly, he can be a little unhelpful when you ask questions in class, but I truly think he wants all his students to succeed!
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/08/2025	GOAT. I had a C in Chemistry when I was in 9th grade, and never learned it since then. I really hated this subject until I took his course. Frankly, it's a difficult and challenging class. The pace is really fast, but Prof Lascio always show the class how to solve test-level problems step by step. Also, he doesn't record his classes, which makes the attendance rate much higher than my other STEM classes, and it actually compel me to attend lessons everytime. The practice exams he gave were basically having the same structure and difficulty as the actual ones, which is great if you simply do it before the test.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/08/2025	He’s a great professor. He’s super approachable and friendly and definitely recommend him out of all the other professors in the chem department. Just a chill causal guy. Plus his blazers over his graphic tee shirts that he’d wear is actually so fire: Chemistry is just extremely difficult but he does his best to help you and is a very understanding guy. The curve is pretty big so you’ll probably be okay but go to the gss sessions and his office hours! Going to these and showing up to the lectures will save you. The textbook also helps. There’s only 5 grades this whole semester so everything counts. He also responds to emails really quickly which is absolutely amazing shout out to him. And the memes he puts on the slides are actually funny and up to date. That’s not that important but a great plus. The practice midterm is decently similar to the real midterm but things change so you actually have to go over all the slides and notes because there may be things on there that actually wasn’t on the practice exam. That caught me off on the first exam. The midterms in general are actually awful. But that’s in every class with any professor. Chemistry is just hard, but he really made it bearable.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 12/07/2025	I honestly don't know how Dr. Lascio is getting five star ratings. Although he is a decently nice person and does try to answer questions as best he can, my experience in his class has not been great. Every single exam has had a failing score as the class average. I personally believe that this is a reflection of Dr. Lascio's teaching, as I have heard other chem131 sections having average test scores of at least 70-75%. The only reason I am expecting a C+ is because of the hopes I have that he will curve this class. Also, a girl in my class emailed him about her concerns about our second midterm because everyone did so bad on the first one (average of a 52%), and he pulled up her email in front of the entire lecture hall and picked it apart for a good 25-30 minutes. He claimed she gave him permission but I still found it a little off-putting that he did that and it also wasted time in the class that could have been used for reviewing material for the second exam. He also says that if we pass the final exam, he will automatically pass us with a C-, which infers the final is basically going to be impossible. I study for every exam for at least a week before, and I have only passed one. Praying that I can pass this class.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/07/2025	The fact that this man has a five star review from this semester is absolutely insane to me, and inspired me to write this. Sure, he's an alright guy, one might even argue he's pretty nice outside of grading. I don't view him in that way though, as he spent an entire lecture explaining to us how it isn't his job to teach. I understand reviewing and studying on our own is important, but for someone who's just trying to pass gen chem and is not pre med, the amount of work needed to even pass this class, let alone do well, is unacceptable. The class average is failing, and the most common score on the first exam was a 20/80, and all of the averages so far have been failing and typically around 50%. None of us know if we will pass or fail because he doesn't have a curve built in (which is something many chem professors do). His tests are much harder than the practice problems and practice tests he provides, so it's nearly impossible to do well on the actual exams, which make up around 80 percent of our grades. He might have been a good TA, but compared to other professors he has no idea how to run a class, which is intensified by this being an introductory class that should not be this insanely difficult to pass.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/02/2025	he's honestly a really great professor and a very chill, down to earth guy. the class is just soooo hard but I think I would be doing just as bad with any professor LOL. super hard class but def a great professor. he also responds to emails really quick and thoroughly which is nice.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A abadar 02/16/2024	Prof Lascio was both the TA and the professor for this course. Despite, this he did very well in replying to emails quickly and doing his best to answer student's questions. We went over example questions often and he posted example problem coursework on ELMS. Once in a while he will go off on tangents and talk about random fun-facts. GET THIS MAN SOME HELP, he needs a TA!
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 02/07/2024	This class is very fast. There’s a lot of content but Professor Lascio is very nice and tries to make things really easy to understand. Very easy to talk to, responds to emails fast, and tends to push back hw deadlines if you ask. He is also a good lecturer. However, the homework takes forever. Weekly homeworks took like 6-7 hours usually so don’t procrastinate. Tests are very difficult, the averages were like 30-60%. Final curve was pretty heavy tho like 20%. Good professor, hard class.
Samuel Lascio CHEM135 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/17/2023	Really good professor who goes above and beyond to accommodate students. Extended hw several times, and hosted extra review sessions.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/19/2023	AMAZING TA !!! Not sure if he will be the same TA for Fall 2023 for Mignerey and on, but if so, he will be one of your greatest resource in class. Truly cares about his students and wants everyone to succeed. Never seen a TA go so above and beyond for students before; will always answer emails in a timely, maybe even fast, manner. Super sweet guy as well. Explains concepts thoroughly to help everyone understand. If he's your TA or even your prof, you're in good hands.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/11/2023	Was my TA for CHEM131 and is the goat. Explained the material very well. Mignerey, the professor, made everything very confusing but Sam was able to make everything a lot clearer. Very passionate about the material, and is always there to answer questions in person and over email about anything you're confused about. Would 100% recommend.
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A Anonymous 01/17/2021	great Professor and he cares a lot about his students and whether or not they understand the material (which can be hard to do in such a big class).
Samuel Lascio CHEM131 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/07/2020	Lascio really tries his best to make sure students understand the course material despite it being challenging, he's a great guy! He sometimes puts out-of-touch memes all over the place, but he genuinely wants his students to succeed and make sure they understand the subject matter. He's a very approachable guy and a good professor.