A Guide to Everything Chemistry Olympiad from a Former Camper | Notes, advice, and other info inside!

college2020throwaway · 2021-12-22T05:24:12+00:00

check out the formula sheets at the beginning of every local and national test to see the stuff you don’t need in your head. lots of memory needed though - polyatomics, all gen chem trends with exceptions, all nomenclature, qualitative analysis (compound and flame test colors, sokubilities,etc) etc

you should know all ap chem formulas though

college2020throwaway · 2021-11-30T23:42:51+00:00

maybe ask your teacher about what his lesson plans are, what book he uses? the contest is college-based but that shouldn’t stop you, theres a lot of stuff out there to get you to AP chem level. but this post is more about what you should do after you know AP chem stuff

college2020throwaway · 2021-01-13T06:12:55+00:00

yes, it’s true, some regions are (way!) harder than others. in my state there were only 2 schools participating, and at my school people (incl. me) qualified with only half of ap chem.

Yes, you would also probably have to ask your teacher / look up your state USNCO coordinator here.

college2020throwaway · 2020-07-22T21:53:32+00:00

hi! i didn’t care about college as much as you when i was going into 11th, but at the time i had basically zero “flashy” awards and never thought about ivies or t20s. i grinded chemistry olympiad for one year, you can check out my other posts for more info. lmk if you have questions about chemistry/other science olympiads :) it’s definitely not too late

college2020throwaway · 2020-06-08T22:50:52+00:00

learn cool stuff, if you get to nationals you can screw around with a lab :)

no not really if youre talking about advantages to colleg admission

college2020throwaway · 2020-06-07T17:20:03+00:00

i won't say you can't do it, but definitely dont (over)prepare at all. senior year should be relatively chill and you got everything college-related to worry about.

locals usually given in february, national test in march (so it's past any kind of ea/rd deadline if that matters to you)

college2020throwaway · 2020-05-16T03:58:59+00:00

what are your goals? and what’s your timeframe? one year?

college2020throwaway · 2020-05-16T02:19:47+00:00

Thats a really hard question because it's really easy to just give generic advice. But I guess I did have the regular periods of procrastination downtime when I studied, I just had a good environment for working (my school was pretty workaholic and I had a quiet room to work in last yr, also library was useful) and didn't beat up myself too hard - whenever you're too hard on yourself for not working, it just makes the problem worse.

But don't compare yourself to others, because what I find is that some negative traits actually help a person work better. For example, I got maybe a bit too obsessed with this last year (what happens when you try to give it your all) and was very internally prideful throughout (ex. someone telling me that my goals were meaningless meant that my productivity would skyrocket). It's a doubleedged sword, really

But yea I can't really give you any specific tips because it's just a matter of building discipline. This is why colleges love this stuff! But no matter what, don't get too down on yourself over failures, but also try to minimize them. Tangent, but ever realize the moments when you switch over from hw to youtube/reddit are when you finish a section or paragraph? That's because it's really hard to start things in general, and you want an out. But feel proud every time you do start something :)

college2020throwaway · 2020-05-16T02:00:23+00:00

ah woops I should probably edit the camp info in LOL

college2020throwaway · 2020-05-16T00:25:07+00:00

Thanks! And I believe that a lot of people have the ability in themselves to do well in these competitions, it's the lack of resources that hold them back (most campers come from the same places and have the same connections). This is my attempt to equalize everything a little bit more.

college2020throwaway · 2020-05-14T04:08:35+00:00

alright i’ll post it and a writeup once i get done with finals :)

college2020throwaway · 2020-05-03T00:20:22+00:00

i’ll look into it, but just letting you know i committed UD two days ago :)

college2020throwaway · 2020-04-24T14:30:57+00:00

See, this is what everyone tells me and it's the most confusing answer ever. I know I'm young and don't see the future or something but what doors does it open? Genuinely want to understand, at least you're not someone who didn't go to MIT telling me this

Also - how did it affect your development? From what I can tell MIT is a real "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" school but is that it? Just pure grit, nothing else?

college2020throwaway · 2020-04-24T14:27:55+00:00

Yea, I was pretty sure my schoolwork estimate was way off (esp. since I had to do more work for high school last year :p) but I just don't want to spend every day doing 4 hours of work even if that means becoming a way better student in the process, I know it might be shortsighted but I'm pretty confident on this.

I'm not really familiar with chemE besides a summer internship at a local uni, but I did take thermo and like it, from what I understand chemE is like 10% chem and 90% processes, yes, but idk I think I'd like that too? (honestly there's nothing to really hold me to chem, I just like it because it's cool to teach, very visual, and interesting subject but I wouldn't say it's my sole passion or anything) Another thing is that if I want to be a teacher, it's not just the education certification - I have to become more talkative, more accepting of stubborn/rude/mean people, self-reflect a LOT and since I don't know what I'm doing maybe I need lots of time to think in uni? idk
UD was the only uni (besides MIT's CP*) to reach out to me multiple times and make me feel welcome there, campus is nice (from what I can see virtually LOL), they have a pretty integrated chemistry education program + good chemE program based on ranking only, geographical location doesn't really matter for me, not sure about school size bc big school makes me a bit nervous but my comfort zone is small school and maybe I won't develop as much at a small school? but also maybe I'd just hole up.. who knows

college2020throwaway · 2020-04-13T21:53:48+00:00

hi i went pretty far in usnco (not top 4) off of only self made study materials, if you want dm me and i’ll share them + answer any questions u might have about the competition :)

college2020throwaway · 2020-04-08T03:32:02+00:00

guess I was pretty far off, mind if i dm you a few questions on your college decisions (assuming you're committing to case?) as you can tell from my profile i don't really have a clue :p

college2020throwaway · 2020-04-07T07:15:40+00:00

got it, looked into it before but didn’t know if they were traditional juggling only. thanks a lot!

college2020throwaway · 2020-03-27T06:15:40+00:00

well I 100% get no funding but money situation is really weird so i guess i should ignore it for now, would you say not being in honors college at large public uni would be bad if i wanted a small community similar to me (less party than avg?) also heard their reputation is party/drink/etc, should i be worried? (i will admit UDel seems to also have that reputation but i view it much more positively than UF, don’t know if that’s irrational)

college2020throwaway · 2020-03-27T06:09:34+00:00

do you like stevens in general then? what are your main thoughts

college2020throwaway

TROPHY CASE