I have a question I've been meaning to post and since it deals with General Chemistry (which many inorganic chemists teach!), I thought I would add it on to Jean-Claude's forum topic.

I am curious to hear from folks who have any experience with one-semester General Chemistry courses...not just for honors students, but for your general population (in our case we group all science and non-science majors together in one course).  This course might precede an early O-chem sequence, an early P-chem course, or an early Analytical course. 

• What are the benefits and drawbacks of this approach in your experience? 
• What is the list of essential topics that fit into 1-semester Gen Chem?
  
• What text do you use?
  
• How do you support students who are weak in their math, chemistry, or general problem-solving backgrounds in what I would guess would be a pretty fast-paced semester of chemistry?
• How do the organic chemists react to dealing with a population of students that might be "less prepared/experienced" when they come to O-chem?

Any feedback would be welcome!  Or if you don't want to post all the gory details, please feel free to e-mail me personally (mgeselbr@reed.edu)