Placement Examinations

 

FALL 2012

 

(Room 138)     Analytical/Physical    Monday, August 20, 2012        8:30 - 10:30 a.m.

                        Inorganic/Organic       Monday, August 20, 2012      11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

                  

All incoming graduate students are required to take Placement Exams that are designed to evaluate their background in the traditional areas of Chemistry.  The information obtained from these exams will be used to establish a coursework plan that will help prepare each student for research and to make initial teaching assignments.  Placement exams will normally be administered at the start of orientation week in the Fall semester.  Three exams will be given.  Two will cover undergraduate training in synthetic chemistry and focus on material traditionally taught in Organic and Inorganic chemistry.  The other will test background knowledge in Analytical and Physical chemistry.

 

Placement exams may consist of ACS standardized exams, exams written by faculty members in the areas being tested, or a combination of both.

 

Descriptions of these exams prepared by the faculty are given below.

 

  1. Analytical/Physical Placement Exam

 

Analytical Chemistry.  Typical areas of emphasis include solution chemistry (acid-base, precipitation, complex formation, and redox equilibria); instrumental methods analysis (chromatography, spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, and electrochemistry); kinetic methods; and simple electronics.  Analytical chemistry placement examinations are written at the level found in textbooks such as:

 

            Analytical Chemistry.  An Introduction, 5th edition, by Skoog, Holler, and Nieman

            Principles of Instrumental Analysis, Current edition, by Skoog and Leary.

 

Physical Chemistry.  Placement Exam questions in Physical Chemistry consist of problems that generally fall into three subject areas:  thermodynamics, chemical kinetics and elementary quantum mechanics.  The student should be able to manipulate, solve and apply differential and algebraic equations, provide straightforward derivations, and occasionally explain significant physical techniques or theories.  A list of equations and constants is provided and calculators are necessary.  The level of coverage is no higher and often lower than that found in textbooks, such as the following:

 

Physical Chemistry, Current edition, by Atkins

Physical Chemistry: A Molecular Approach, Current edition, by McQuarrie and Simon.

 

  1. Inorganic Placement Exam

 

Inorganic Chemistry.  The placement examination in synthetic chemistry will contain questions designed to test a student’s knowledge of inorganic chemistry at the undergraduate level of an ACS accredited program.  Such programs usually include courses in inorganic chemistry at the freshman/sophomore and junior/senior levels; the content of these courses normally span both descriptive chemistry and physical principles and methods.  There are many appropriate texts that will prepare the student for this portion of the examination including the descriptive chemistry sections of most introductory chemistry texts, and more advanced texts such as:

 

            Basic Inorganic Chemistry by Cotton, Wilkinson, and Gaus

            Inorganic Chemistry by Shriver and Atkins (3rd Edition)

 

  1. Organic Placement Exam

 

Organic Chemistry.  The organic chemistry portion of the synthetic chemistry placement examination is designed to verify that each student has retained a basic knowledge and understanding of the organic chemistry of functional groups, as well as synthetic methods, reaction mechanisms, and spectroscopic methods of characterization.  Questions are based on information contained in, and at the level found in, textbooks such as:

 

            Organic Chemistry, Current edition, by McMurry

                  Organic Chemistry, Current edition, by William Brown