• Quality Matters Certified!
  • The HOL Chemistry suite is Quality Matters certified. Click here to access the official certificate.
• Digital Experiments
  • There are currently 25 fully digital lessons available for Chemistry. A comprehensive list of digital lessons can be found in the FAQ section.
• Beyond Labz
  • Among our digital labs, 9 utilize Beyond Labz digital lab bench.
  • For more details on the benefits and features of Beyond Labz, please review the Beyond Labz Cheat Sheet.
• Set-Up Videos
  • Set-up videos are incorporated into experiments to guide students through complicated techniques or orient students to utilizing various assets.
• Safety
  • An updated safety overview is required in all courses, and includes a safety video, safety contract, and all relevant information for students ahead of beginning their experiments.

• Cloud is WCAG 2.1 compliant.
• All videos are closed captioned.
• All images use Alt Tags.
• Interactives, including digital experiments, are all designed to be screen reader compatible.

• Carolina
  • Lessons
    • 52 total chemistry lessons listed on website (8 digital/dry labs)
    • Many of the digital/dry labs are duplicates - digital labs involve a digital component, dry labs require student to source their own materials.
    • Carolina combines their Organic and Biochemistry lessons with their standard chemistry lessons. Nine lessons would be considered exclusively organic or biochemistry lessons.
  • Standard Kits
    • General Chemistry 1 (12 Labs; $169)
    • General Chemistry 2 (10 Labs; $191)
    • Introduction to Chemistry (8 Labs; $140)
    • Introduction to Organic and Biochemistry (4 Labs; $130)
    • Organic and Biochemistry (8 Labs; $200)
    • Organic Chemistry (6 Labs; $180)
  • Competitive Information
    • Chemicals - Carolina takes a very different approach to chemicals than SI/HOL does. For some labs, Carolina provides the chemicals as a part of the module. Most chemicals range in volume from 5 mL - 120 mL, versus the microscale chemical approach that we take. Additionally, some chemicals used across multiple labs are included in two chemical sets. The volumes of these chemicals range from  15 mL to almost 500 mL. Because of the large volumes of chemicals, this certainly could cause concerns around chemical disposal for excess chemicals.
    • Content Delivery - Carolina provides a printed or PDF lab manual that has procedures and a few questions. They do not have digital content or student portal platform/cartridges.
      • They do offer their content through Odigia, but this is a simple drop-in of their PDF manuals.
    • Content - Carolina offers limited introductory content and experimental support. The introductory content is majority text, very few images, and no interactives. Their experiments do not include set-up images and have very few support videos, leaving students to guess at how to set up their experiments correctly. Small number of assessments with no ability to customize or autograde.

• Labster
  • Lessons
    • 77 lessons on their website are considered Chemistry, but encompasses all chemistry topics (ranging from general chemistry, to biochemistry, to organic chemistry)
      • In total, only 64 would be considered Chemistry or General Chemistry
    • Includes a mix of tutorials, experiments, and concept overviews, so not all of the items listed above would be considered experiments/labs.
  • Standard Kits
    • Labster offers various packages that vary in length of access time and number of interactives that can be accessed. Pricing is not readily accessible on their website but is generally cited online as less than $100.
  • Competitive Information
    • Content Coverage - Labster generally has good coverage of major chemistry topics. In some cases, there are multiple digital modules covering the same topic (acid-base chemistry; lab safety). Many of the labs under the chemistry heading are a much higher level than would ever be taught in a general chemistry class (NMR spectroscopy, ion exchange chromatography).
    • Lesson Duration - The estimated time required by Labster for their lessons ranges from 15 - 40 minutes. To meet the requirements for most colleges (2.5-3 hours per week in lab), students would need to perform multiple modules. In places where there is only a single interactive covering a topic, this could cause major problems for the instructor.
    • Pedagogy - Labster's content is highly gamified with overarching storylines that can distract from the lesson at hand. We take a more straightforward approach, presenting background content with critical information students need to complete the experiment, followed by the experiment, which takes an approach more comparable to on campus.  

• McGraw Hill
  • Lessons
    • 33 total chemistry lessons
    • In a number of topics, we cover in one lesson what McGraw Hills covers in multiple modules. For example, basic laboratory measurement techniques  and testing for starch, sugars, fats, and protein are generally single lesson topics in our content vs. McGraw Hill having each as a single asset.
  • Standard Kits
    • No standards per se. Labs can be bundled with textbook in packages.
  • Competitive Information
    • Content Coverage - McGraw Hill only has 33 lessons available. Six of these cover basic measurement techniques and one covers safety, so they ultimately have 26 experiments. They are missing a number of key chemistry concepts, including redox reactions, chemical vs. physical properties, general acid-base chemistry, chemical structures, etc. They also have no coverage of organic chemistry topics, and limited biochemistry content (enzymes; macromolecules).
    • Content - The McGraw Hill lessons have limited introductory content. They include a list of key concepts and an overview, which are meant to provide introductory information. A "before you start" section with key techniques may also be included. There are no obvious learning objectives within the lesson. The overview is brief, and is likely developed under the assumption the student is pairing this with textbook reading.
      • For the demo lesson reviewed, the introductory content was eight sentences long.
    • Assessments - The McGraw Hill lessons include minimal assessments automatically, typically pertaining to creating a hypothesis, an experimental strategy, and a conclusion. Students can have multiple attempts to answer these correctly. If instructors want additional questions, they must be developed by the instructor (although McGraw Hill does provide a question bank to pull from).
    • Experiments - Experiments are set up in a point and click format with minimal opportunity to make mistakes. It appears that they are set up such that all students get the same answer. In contrast, our most recent digital developments have multiple possible answers to prevent students from cheating.
    • Graphing - Graphs are automatically generated by the McGraw Hill system. Given the key role of graphing in the basic sciences, this is a major missed opportunity for students to grasp the fundamentals of data analysis.

Is this content Quality Matters certified?

• Yes! Chemistry was QM certified in July 2022. It will retain this certification for three years. Click here to access the official certificate.

What level course is this for?

• This curriculum can be used for non-majors and majors chemistry courses, as well as one semester and two semester courses. The chemistry content can also be customized with our GOB and Organic Chemistry lessons to offer a General, Organic, and Biochemistry course or an Organic Chemistry course.

Is it possible to perform chemistry labs safely at home?

• Yes! Our kits are designed are designed with safety in mind. This includes extensive safety information in each lab, a lab safety lesson with safety contract, using minimal volumes of chemistry to avoid spills and disposal issues, and multiple resources for students (videos, images, etc.) to ensure they are performing the experiments correctly. We also offer liability coverage on our kits in the event a student is ever injured in the process of performing experiments.

How do you package your chemicals?

• We take a microscale approach to chemistry, supplying students with sufficient chemical to perform each experiment twice. All chemicals are packaged in ChemBags, which includes all of the chemicals required for one lesson. This way students are not searching through their kit for multiple bottles and bags, and can focus on the experiment at hand.