<p>any one course of the o-chem series (A, B, C) is given at any quarter, year around -- these are not same in difficulty depending on the quarter (well and professor too) - the one where sequence starts in spring (140A in spring) and follows into fall, then winter, should be easier than the one that starts in the fall, then follows into winter and spring -- one prof told me that 140A averages tend to be lower in spring 140A rather than in fall 140A because most people in spring course have either 1) already failed o-chem and are taking it again, or 2) put it off because they were not confident about it in the first place (few freshmen take it in spring as most people have to take a year of general chemistry prior) -- if you take o-chem in fall of your sophomore year, youd be competing with the best of your class as well as the worst of your class, while in spring it is mainly the people who have not fared so well the first time -- so, since the class is curved, it should be easier to get a better grade in spring (unless you're the one who's gonna fail it)</p>
<p>but wouldn't it then be harder to get a good grade in the spring, because you're taking it with people who have already taken it and thus have a leg up in the course? I mean, even though they may not be the smartest people in the class because they have to re-take it, i'd still think that that would definitely give them a good advantage....</p>
<p>no i think it makes sense -- even though they've taken it before, they haven't learned much -- if you opened up a book and did some cursory reading and came to half the lectures, you can get a C, and then you cannot take the class again -- if you failed the class or dropped out this means you haven't learned anything the 1st time -- i've seen distributions for the exams and i've seen the exams -- if one scores 20-50 points out of 200 on a simple exam like that, you are either not reading or reading and not understanding (i.e. you're not very bright)</p>
<p>i dunno exactly what makes it hard -- i think it is all about seeing patterns -- people are used to looking at numbers and seeing patterns -- that's what all that high school math was for -- but suppose you see a bunch of letters connected by lines -- then what you do? -- eventually some people start seeing patterns and remembering those during the exams -- it takes others longer than 10 weeks -- o-chem material is unlike general chemistry that people take prior, it is unlike high school biology, math, or AP chem courses</p>
<p>if you have not taken a hard class yet, then you should have no problems with o-chem</p>