Lynmarie Posey

School: Michigan State University
Department: Chemistry
Location: East Lansing, MI
Overall Rating
rated by 21 students
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I loved Dr. Posey! She was complicated at times but answered questions well.
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Pros: Engaging
Really cares
Very open to questions
Homework similar to tests
Cons: Lectures are complex
Dr. Posey really does care if you learn the material, but I think the problem sometimes is that she is too smart to be a professor because what makes sense to her sometimes does not make sense to a lot of the class. I really enjoy that she has the class do the in-class assignments at the end of the lecture period to make sure the lecture sank in. Very available for help in her office hours and the recitations/ta's are extremely helpful.
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Pros: Help room and recitation makes the connect problem sets easy to complete
Cons: Studying is ESSENTIAL to do well on the exams
Pretty easy class since I already took AP chemistry in high school, the only hard stuff is the last part after the second exam but before the final. There are two exams and then the comprehensive final exam with material from the first two exams and then additional information after the second exam. Do the homework sets, because they will save your grade. I got a 3.5 and I missed a 4.0 by five points, which would have worked out to be a question on an exam or one recitation. Go to class, and recitation, and do the homework and study.
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Pros: NONE
Cons: Very Condescending
Makes everything more complicated than what it really is
Posey is the SHITTIEST teacher I have ever had! Her lectures make you more confused than if you were to just read the book yourself. I HIGHLY recommend NO ONE TAKES her! Try to find some way around it!!!!! If you absolutely have to, best of luck to you, and read the book Pollock wrote! It is far more clear than anything Posey will tell you.How Posey is a professor at MSU continues to baffle me. She is the WORST teacher ever!!!!!
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Pros: Very helpful examples, and plenty of them
Cons: Lot's of material, teaching style is hard to understand, minimal visual aides
Lecture is long and boring. Monotone rambling on and on, talks really slow. Lot's of material, be prepared to teach yourself. Slides are black text, graphs, diagrams on a white background, minimal pictures or visual aides, which are necessary for full understanding of chemistry. You could attend every lecture and still not understand anything.
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Pros: She DOES care about the success of her students. If you have questions, she always has good answers, and if you tell her to get to the point in terms of what you actually NEED to know for the exams, she'll help you out.
She almost always works through example problems throughout her lectures that relate to exams; going through 141, I can tell you that she does this more than any other Gen. Chem professor.
Cons: Her presentations aren't the most exciting and about half of her lecture slides contain junk that you don't really need to know for exams. Also, she will occasionally make some mistakes when going through problems, but it really isn't that big of a deal.
The lectures are an hour and twenty minutes long as opposed to fifty minutes like 141, so I'd suggest bringing candy or something to keep you awake through her monotonous slides.
I went to Koofers right before my semester started for this class and freaked out from all of the negative reviews. I tried very hard to avoid this lecture and I couldn't, but after having Posey for the first few weeks, I realized she wasn't that bad at all. I honestly would try to get first Pollock because I had her for 141 and I like her style better, but if you have to get Posey like I did, don't worry about it!
So long as you attend the lecture and recitation, look over notes, do OWLs, and study the previous exams, you will do fine in this class. If you had 141, this class is almost identical, but the OWLs and exams for 142 are easier in my opinion.
Do NOT buy the textbook. I never used it. The previous exam book is a must though, and the lecture notes help too. I also printed the example exam problems off of Posey's lecture slides and those helped a lot in actually applying the chemistry.
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Pros: I learned the material really well.... Because i had to teach it all to myself
Cons: She outright said that she does not care about teaching... research is her priority. And it showed. She talked so sciencey and never related things in a way that was understandable
Dont take the class with her if you can help it!!!!!
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Pros: None
Cons: Extremely difficult exams
Overcomplicates everything
Tries to get through more material than what is possible
Condescending
Terrible teaching skills
Posey was (hands down) the worst teacher I have ever had. I didn't do horrible, I got a 3.0 in her class, but it definitely wasn't because of anything she did! I should have gotten a 4.0, there was no reason for me not to, especially since I understand that I need good grades for med school. My TA for recitation and my knowledge from AP classes is high school basically saved my grade. She overcomplicates everything to the point where it's pointless to go to lecture. I went to every single lecture and copied down every verbal and written note she had and studied them every night. I redid every problem on old exams (from like 1999 until now) twice and OWL problems before exams. She's condescending (hopefully not on purpose...) and never has time to talk to you. The OWL homework and problems in recitation didn't mirror the exams at all. They were extremely difficult and I felt like I'd never seen half the material on them before sitting for the exams. A lot of the problems are the kind where if you get one part wrong, you'll get the next four wrong as well. I'm fairly sure she curved the shit out of the class at the end in order to have at least a few people pass... I think 60% of the class failed completely. If she's the only teacher to take 142 with and you care about your GPA like I do, take it another semester. Dealing with her is not worth the hassle. She might be better off teaching higher level students, but absolutely not ones that are trying to get a basic understanding of chemistry.
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This is the first time I have actually been compelled to write one of these. The best way to describe Posey is awful. If you think you will learn from going to one of her lectures you're in for a real treat... your 5 year old cousin has a better shot at teaching this material than Posey. I got a 3.5 in this class only based on my recitation teacher and studying the old exam booklet. You might as well skip every lecture if you're unfortunate enough to land yourself in her class
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I rarely rate profs on here, but I felt the need to do so with this woman. I have never had such a terrible professor. The exams are impossible, the lectures are overcomplicated and the grading is unfair. I learned much more in my recitation than I ever did in her lectures. I'm a good student- I went to every lecture, corrected her on the board when she messed up, went to every recitation, studied hard, redid every previous exam for the last four years, etc., and I only BARELY 3 pointed the class. This is absolutely ridiculous. IF YOU ARE TAKING HER CLASS, RUN AWAY! Get a different professor or expect your G.P.A. to drop.
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worst teacher ive ever had. i cannot believe that i actually paid for a class that had a teacher this bad. Going to lecture is absolutely pointless. she cannot explain anything worth shit. she makes the exams 1000 times more difficult than they need to be. I only needed a 50% on the final for a 3.0 in the class and somehow that still didnt work out. all of the problems were unecessarily hard and did not test me on anything i learned in the semester. ive understood every concept and still the exam was undoable. You know a professor is bad when the class grades average was a 2.1. Do not take this class with Posey unless you want to have a miserable semester.
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Absolutely horrible, the worst teacher i have ever had. She is such a bitch, I didn't even go to class because when i went i left more confused. going into the final her class average was 55%, and I was on track for a 4.0, she told her TA's that because the average was so low her final was going to be exactly like exam 1 and 2 and that the questions were going to be verbatum. well that was a lie. I got to the exam and i got questions that i had never seen in lecture, owls, or recitation. my grade went from a 4.0 to a 2.0. she is the worst teacher ever and most people in her class probably failed. IF SHE IS THE ONLY TEACHER DO NOT TAKE IT. she is the absolute worst Prof at MSU. absolutly horrible, i would rather kill myself than take a class with her again.
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WORST.PROFESSOR.EVER. She told everyone what the final was going to be over because she needed so many students to pass. Well we all studied the said material and went into the final knowing my shit. After the final I realized she only cared about screwing over the students. The final was over things I didnt even knew was in the curriculum for CEM 142. Serioulsy take this class with Hunter or Pollock. Also get Sean Bruno as a TA he's amazing and should probably replace Posey as a chem prof.
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Absolutely awful. Told us at the beginning of the semester that she wasn't here to teach and that her main priority was research, so she wouldn't have time for us outside of class. Other than that, she overcomplicates everything. Recitation is the only time I ever learned anything. If you have to take it with her, get Bruno as your TA. He's the reason i got a 3.5
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Terrible. Take it with someone else if you can.
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I did okay in her class (3.0), but it wasn't because of anything she did. A lot of what people have said is true-- she overcomplicates concepts and equations, really sucks at explaining thing, and often lost track of herself during problems she was doing on the board. I think the only reason I did as well as I did is because I'm a self learner and taught myself the material outside of class. I took her class a few semesters ago, and didn't realize just how bad she was until I began studying for the MCAT-- I learned way more about the topics taught in CEM 142 in the MCAT review course I took than I ever learned in this class. If you can take it with someone else, like Hunter, do it, or else be prepared to do everything yourself.
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This class is pretty fair. Based purely on the lecture, it's boring as all get out, and if you can stay focused and get anything out of it, you deserve a 4.0. The final study guide was basically just "Know every single concept from every single lab," which, as you might imagine, was about as helpful as the lectures. She's a nice lady if you talk to her one-on-one, and clearly very intelligent, but as far as a lecturer goes, she's not very good. Plus this class eats up a disproportionate amount of you time [but if you're this far in chemistry, you should know that already.]
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Hey! If you cannot manage to get a decent grade in this class you are a complete idiot..! Apparently you people have no time to study and devote time to this class like you need to! If you did, you would not be sitting there commenting on how she's stuttering. It's not even really stuttering, it's like she either talks too fast at times and stops because she is trying exactly what she wants to say. Get a life everyone, this prof isn't bad.... I learned loads more from her than Sweeder and LaDuca! If you would've put the effort in her class, maybe you would've enjoyed it more, instead of moping about how unfair she is.....
Posey isn't bad, really.... do you work, study and take notes in class and you can easily get a 3.5.... put in a little more effort and you can get a 4.0....
You're all just bitter because she isn't blowing shit up everyday like Sweeder did, but it was stupid, he never bothered to teach us the concepts like Posey did.
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A little shaky here and there at first, but not a bad prof at all. She was very intelligent and knew the concepts perhaps even a little too well. Sure she worked us hard in her class, but she never worked us harder than we could handle. Even though her lectures were a bit monotone, and she was strict while in class, she was very nice if you ever encountered her outside of the classroom. Also for some reason, she had all of our names memorized, that startled me a little at first when she knew my name without me telling her, but I guess its not a bad thing.
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Honestly, she is not that bad. She just expects a lot out of her students. Let's face it here people, you are no longer in highschool where you can pull easy grades with little effort. You actually work a lot for her class, and yes it is a challenge ... but as long as you put in the decent effort, there is no excuse as to why you should not be earning a good passing grade. I openly admit that Posey's lectures can be a bit dull and monotone at times, but she really does know what she is talking about. She is a very intelligent professor and seems really nice if you encounter her outside of class. So she works you hard... she never works you harder than you can take, I promise that. She wants to see you struggle a bit and be challenged, but at the end of it all, be very successful. If you enjoy a nice intellectual challenge, I say take her course and you won't regret it. If not, you should never be in the LBS or Honors Chem class in the first place.

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