The very mention of physical chemistry causes a sense of anxiousness and profuse sweating in most chemistry students.  They have been programmed to fear the topic.  What other subdiscipline of chemistry has a bumper sticker that proudly states “Honk if you passed PChem!”?  How do we fight the stigma that surrounds physical chemistry?  How do we engage and excite the students into this realm of theoretical chemistry?  At Stephen F. Austin State University, we have been working to answer these questions over many years by; changing textbooks; altering exam types; changing experiments; modifying lecture; and flipping the classroom to name but a few.  Our current curriculum of the two semester physical chemistry sequence focuses heavily on the laboratory to help solidify topics introduced in lecture.  We have incorporated research projects into the second semester to emphasize the importance of physical chemistry in most any area of research.  Students help in modifying existing experiments to, hopefully, improve results and understanding.  A brief summary of the current curriculum, a couple of experiments, and student perceptions will be presented.<br/>

Exaltation of physical chemistry: Reversing the stigma

255th National Meeting (2018)

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