MATH 131A
Analysis
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Requisites: courses 32B, 33B. Recommended: course 115A. Rigorous introduction to foundations of real analysis; real numbers, point set topology in Euclidean space, functions, continuity. P/NP or letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
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Most Helpful Review
Winter 2018 - Disclaimer: I have not received my grades and have not taken the finals yet. Totaro is extremely helpful, especially during his office hours. Halfway through the course, I realize I was missing out on many of the points he was saying because I was busy copying the board (he writes like, real fast. Idk how his wrist is taking it). So I recorded every lecture and added in what he said into the notes - helps a lot in tackling a tough class like this.
Winter 2018 - Disclaimer: I have not received my grades and have not taken the finals yet. Totaro is extremely helpful, especially during his office hours. Halfway through the course, I realize I was missing out on many of the points he was saying because I was busy copying the board (he writes like, real fast. Idk how his wrist is taking it). So I recorded every lecture and added in what he said into the notes - helps a lot in tackling a tough class like this.
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Most Helpful Review
He makes concepts really clear and nearly write all his explicit oral explanation on the board. He likes to use graphs and easy-to-understand imagination to shape our perspective to the conceptual and proof-based course. The Midterm1 is relatively easy, Midterm2 is relatively hard, and Final is about the middle, more like Midterm2. And he gives study guide before each exam which really helps. Moreover, he is definitely not a procrastinator, you will see you grade posted late in the day you take the exam...including final. I am wondering next quarter which undergraduate course he will be teaching, no matter which one, I will take it!
He makes concepts really clear and nearly write all his explicit oral explanation on the board. He likes to use graphs and easy-to-understand imagination to shape our perspective to the conceptual and proof-based course. The Midterm1 is relatively easy, Midterm2 is relatively hard, and Final is about the middle, more like Midterm2. And he gives study guide before each exam which really helps. Moreover, he is definitely not a procrastinator, you will see you grade posted late in the day you take the exam...including final. I am wondering next quarter which undergraduate course he will be teaching, no matter which one, I will take it!
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2017 - Took him for 131A. Avoid this professor at all costs. The midterms and final are doable. However, the material itself is already very difficult and this professor did a horrendous job of teaching it. All of the lectures were him mumbling incoherently, and it is extremely hard to understand him through his accent, making it basically impossible to learn from lecture. In addition, after writing something down on the board, he will often erase it immediately rather than erasing something he wrote earlier. Out of the ~40 people who were in this class from the beginning, only 9 people, including myself, were showing up consistently during the last few weeks. That's not a typo. Several of them dropped out, as evidenced by the grading distribution of the final showing a paltry student count of 22. The averages for the midterms were around 50-55%, and presumably the only reason the average for the final was higher was because of the lower student count. The only reason why I managed to pull a reasonable grade in this class was because of the TA's much more helpful discussions, though unfortunately one discussion a week doesn't make up for 3 whole days of inefficient lecturing. If you're a self-learner, you may do well in this class. But otherwise, choose a more well-known, competent lecturer instead of this guy. He is the absolute worst lecturer I have had at UCLA and doesn't deserve to be teaching at all.
Spring 2017 - Took him for 131A. Avoid this professor at all costs. The midterms and final are doable. However, the material itself is already very difficult and this professor did a horrendous job of teaching it. All of the lectures were him mumbling incoherently, and it is extremely hard to understand him through his accent, making it basically impossible to learn from lecture. In addition, after writing something down on the board, he will often erase it immediately rather than erasing something he wrote earlier. Out of the ~40 people who were in this class from the beginning, only 9 people, including myself, were showing up consistently during the last few weeks. That's not a typo. Several of them dropped out, as evidenced by the grading distribution of the final showing a paltry student count of 22. The averages for the midterms were around 50-55%, and presumably the only reason the average for the final was higher was because of the lower student count. The only reason why I managed to pull a reasonable grade in this class was because of the TA's much more helpful discussions, though unfortunately one discussion a week doesn't make up for 3 whole days of inefficient lecturing. If you're a self-learner, you may do well in this class. But otherwise, choose a more well-known, competent lecturer instead of this guy. He is the absolute worst lecturer I have had at UCLA and doesn't deserve to be teaching at all.
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