Student Survey Responses - Unofficial Report

For Spring 2004 course: MATH 4581 AG - Math Methods in Engr
Instructor: Metcalfe, Jason   CRN: 24271   Class Size: 24   Final Survey

Student Comments about the Class or Instructor

I had two issues with this course. The first is mostly whining, but I feel like this course should be titled differently. Although Classical Mathematical Methods in Engineering doesn''t really promise that it will have much to do at all with engineering itself, I initially was under the impression that it would have some aspects that favored engineers. It did not; there was almost no practical application of any concepts. All homework and tests were purely theoretical math work with proofs and the like. While I can objectively see the benefit in knowing how a lot of engineering knowledge is derived, I get overwhelmed by pure mathematics easily. The second issue I had was that the instructor made himself very unapproachable. This should not have happened-- personality wise, he was very approachable. But he made it clear at the beginning of the class that homeworks were essentially take-home quizzes and that we were not to ask questions about it. This was very demotivational to me and I wasn''t inclined to ask questions as much after the assignment had already been handed in and graded. I spent too much time mired in simple misunderstandings of the material that could have been cleared up had I felt like I could ask the professor about my confusion. Otherwise the course was pretty good. It moved too fast for me at times, but I generally reached understanding of the material given enough time with it. The professor had a good teaching style, enunciated clearly, and seemed genuinely concerned about the students despite the problems I mentioned earlier. The sheer amount of material, however, dictated the pace and I personally found it easy to fall behind.

Overall, it was a wonderful course, I learnt a lot from it. Just a few suggestions for improvement, It would have been nice to solve some more complex problmes with Laplace Transforms. After all Laplace transforms are used much more in engineering than most other mathematical tools. Also I think, a long challenging mathematical problem could have been assigned instead of one of the mid term exams. In my opinion such challenges help in obtaining a better understanding of the subject. Thanks.

Best math class/teacher I have ever had, by far the most interesting, well presented material. teacher did great job, always explained everything, was availble for help, and was considerate in grading.

Complex ideas were not always well explained. I think this class was definitely geared more towards math majors than the non-math major graduate students. Additionally it would be extremely benificial to have additional problems WITH STEP BY STEP ANSWERS, to go through, in addition to homework problems. This helps beyond having to go to office hours and ask individual questions.

The first midterm was a bit of a ''curveball'' but once I got used to the teaching style, I knew how to study for the second midterm. Some of the homework assignments took a considerable amount of time to complete.

As a teacher, your methods are excellent. You effectively conveyed a substancial amount of information that I had never previously encountered (Bessels, Legendre, multi-dim heat transfer) My only request for the future is a more thorough conveying of the knowledge expectation for the first exam. (Not that sample exams are necessary, but I underestimated the level of understanding expected based upon the review and what was said). Your eagerness to help the learning process is quite admirable.

You are great!! You are the first teacher who gives me the pleasure of mathmatics. Thank you very much!!!

The class was taught well. Learned alot. Good Job

Since I worked for sometime before coming back to grad school I was dreading taking a Math course as I had not taken one in 6+ years. But within a few weeks into this class I began feeling comfortable with Math again mainly due to the fact that all the course material was well explained by Jason. I think he is an excellent and effective teacher. The subject matter was pretty involved but Jason made it easier and when necessary went back and explained basics that I had not seen in years. The exams and the assignments had a certain level of difficulty and dealt with things in class plus mathematical tricks. It was pretty hard sometimes. Overall this is an excellent class and I would strongly encourage all engineers to take the class especially if it is taught by Jason.

Overall this was a good class. At first it felt like it was going way to fast, but once you realize that it is just the same material over and over again (and you get used to never putting your pencil down in class :) it gets a little better. I appreciated the regular hw assignments that helped us stay up to date with the material. Also I felt that the exams were the correct degree of difficulty and tested what we had learned. Thanks for being available to answer questions etc outside of class - you showed that you cared about us understanding the material. 2 suggestions: Consider occasionally doing less examples in a class, but covering the same material - that way you could slow down just a bit. For me I often learn just as much from one example done slowly (so that I can think it through while it is being written on the board) as from 2 examples that I hastily scribble down and have to go back to later to figure out what happened (I can look at the examples in the book if I need to see more examples). Also make the hw a bit shorter or consider weighting it such that good test grades can overcome poor hw grades. I was very busy this semester, so I did not have the time to do the hw assigments completely (thus my hw grade was a little below average) but after doing them I understood the material well and demonstrated this on both exams. I believe that I know the material well enough to get an A, and will be disappointed if I get a B just because I didn''t have the time to complete lengthy hw assignments.

Level of dificulty of final exam greater if compared with the given mid-terms. Overall good instructor!!!!

The course title is very misleading. This was not ''Math Methods for Engineers'', it was ''Methods for Solving PDEs''. I am a graduate student in Manufacturing Engineering and in three years of research I never had to solve a single PDE. Undoubtedly, PDEs and Fourier Series are useful in SOME engineering areas. However, forcing all engineering students to go through a course like this, which focuses on so many details and special cases, is just a torture. How would Math graduates would like being REQUIRED to seat (and study their * off) through a semester of advanced manufacturing technology? Simply not fair - don''t you think?

I enjoyed the class (the one I missed the fewest lectures for!). youre a good teacher and seem very organized. you also seem like you care about us and that you want us to learn the material, which is rare. my only complaint is that i felt that the tests didnt accurately cover what was emphasized in the lecture. for example, i think it was the third problem on the first test. it was just a variable substitutions/algebra problem, but it was worth 20 of the test grade. sure, we covered the proof techniques in class, but i didnt feel like the 20 was good because it wasnt what we focused on. it''s like, even if you know PDEs really well, an algebra or proof problem could ruin your grade. sometimes your brain just goes blank for those kinds of problems, no matter how easy they are. other than that, i enjoyed the class and wish you best of luck.

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