MATH 170A
Probability Theory
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Requisites: courses 32B, 33A, 131A. Not open to students with credit for course 170E, Electrical and Computer Engineering 131A, or Statistics 100A. Rigorous presentation of probability theory based on real analysis. Probability space, probability and conditional probability, independence, Bayes' rule, discrete and continuous random variables and their distributions, expectation, moments and variance, conditional distribution and expectation, weak law of large numbers. P/NP or letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
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Most Helpful Review
Firstly, my evaluation of Professor Effros pertains only to 170A – Probability Theory Class. I received an A in this class and quite frankly, this was the easiest A I have ever gotten at UCLA. My attendance in this class was sporadic (because of conflict with another course), nevertheless, the lectures that I did attend were worth it. Every little bit of material on midterms and exams had been covered in the class during lectures. There was only one midterm exam and it took me (& most of the class) about 45 minutes to finish it and the final exam was about 100 minutes long for me. If passing the class (and not necessarily learning) is your major concerns, here is the formula: I) Most of the time Professor Effros will assign homework from the book, however, occasionally he will make up a problem or two on homework assignments, make sure you can do these, THEY WILL BE ON EXAM! II) Make sure you can do his review sheets for the midterms and finals, 80% OF THE PROBLEMS FROM REVIEW SHEETS WILL MAKE UP 90% OF THE EXAMS. III) If you follow the first two steps you can get an easy B+ in the class. In addition, if you know how to do homework assignments you are guaranteed an A in class. If you are a self learner and do not like going to lectures, following the aforementioned steps should assure an easy A for you in the class. Best of luck!
Firstly, my evaluation of Professor Effros pertains only to 170A – Probability Theory Class. I received an A in this class and quite frankly, this was the easiest A I have ever gotten at UCLA. My attendance in this class was sporadic (because of conflict with another course), nevertheless, the lectures that I did attend were worth it. Every little bit of material on midterms and exams had been covered in the class during lectures. There was only one midterm exam and it took me (& most of the class) about 45 minutes to finish it and the final exam was about 100 minutes long for me. If passing the class (and not necessarily learning) is your major concerns, here is the formula: I) Most of the time Professor Effros will assign homework from the book, however, occasionally he will make up a problem or two on homework assignments, make sure you can do these, THEY WILL BE ON EXAM! II) Make sure you can do his review sheets for the midterms and finals, 80% OF THE PROBLEMS FROM REVIEW SHEETS WILL MAKE UP 90% OF THE EXAMS. III) If you follow the first two steps you can get an easy B+ in the class. In addition, if you know how to do homework assignments you are guaranteed an A in class. If you are a self learner and do not like going to lectures, following the aforementioned steps should assure an easy A for you in the class. Best of luck!
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2018 - Many don’t like Greene but I think he is a brilliant professor. Although his 170A was more like 170B, he explains the material extremely well. He’s really trying to teach you the core thinking behind all the theorems and concepts instead of making people memorizing proofs. He makes handwritten notes on even the little things that he deems helpful and he really cares about student learning the material. He makes jokes every now and then to keep his lectures entertaining as well.
Fall 2018 - Many don’t like Greene but I think he is a brilliant professor. Although his 170A was more like 170B, he explains the material extremely well. He’s really trying to teach you the core thinking behind all the theorems and concepts instead of making people memorizing proofs. He makes handwritten notes on even the little things that he deems helpful and he really cares about student learning the material. He makes jokes every now and then to keep his lectures entertaining as well.
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Winter 2016 - Professor Heilman is a very organized and engaging instructor. All lecture notes are posted online before the first day of class. All relevant topics are carefully discussed, and practice problems are well designed to help students master the material. Lecture notes and homework problems are very helpful when preparing for exams. In office hours, Professor Heilman is very willing to clarify concepts and answer questions regarding homework problems. Even though the exams are a little challenging, Professor Heilman will provide a very generous curve for the class. I would highly recommend taking any math class with him!
Winter 2016 - Professor Heilman is a very organized and engaging instructor. All lecture notes are posted online before the first day of class. All relevant topics are carefully discussed, and practice problems are well designed to help students master the material. Lecture notes and homework problems are very helpful when preparing for exams. In office hours, Professor Heilman is very willing to clarify concepts and answer questions regarding homework problems. Even though the exams are a little challenging, Professor Heilman will provide a very generous curve for the class. I would highly recommend taking any math class with him!
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2021 - *Also for 170E* If I can sum up this class and this professor in three words it'll be: easy but tedious As the other reviewer stated, be prepared for hours and hours and hours of homework. In fact, I noticed that the professor simply assigns EVERY SINGLE ODD IN THE BOOK for the homework. Since every single odd is assigned, the hw sets will almost always include some of the stupidly hard proof problems that you have no choice but to look up the solution for. I didn't find lectures to be that helpful for the hw as Professor Needell gives fairly simple examples that do not help at all for the more difficult problems in the book. In addition, every now and then a coding problem is assigned IN ADDITION TO EVERY SINGLE ODD IN THE BOOK, but I didn't find them to be that hard, and they were actually pretty fun to do. The tedious part of the coding is that if you don't know Matlab, you have to figure out how to do the equivalent in the language of your choice. The reason there is so much hw assigned is due to the fact that there are no exams in this class. Instead of exams, you have two projects to do that replace both the midterm and final respectively. This sounds great until you get the project and realize its just a take home exam. The take home exam was long and tedious, with some coding problems. Sometimes I wished that we just had exams instead, as I would much rather take a 24 hour exam (COVID) than an exam that I have to do over a course of a couple weeks. That being said, the projects weren't hard, just tedious. Overall, my review may sound like a lot of complaining, but I'm just saying it how it is. It's easy for me to look back and say "oh the class wasn't that bad" but in reality, I and probably every other person in my class had to spend way more time on this class than is necessary for 170E. So yeah, easy class, most people probably got A's, but it comes at a huge time committment. So you decide if it's worth it or not. TLDR: EASY BUT TEDIOUS
Spring 2021 - *Also for 170E* If I can sum up this class and this professor in three words it'll be: easy but tedious As the other reviewer stated, be prepared for hours and hours and hours of homework. In fact, I noticed that the professor simply assigns EVERY SINGLE ODD IN THE BOOK for the homework. Since every single odd is assigned, the hw sets will almost always include some of the stupidly hard proof problems that you have no choice but to look up the solution for. I didn't find lectures to be that helpful for the hw as Professor Needell gives fairly simple examples that do not help at all for the more difficult problems in the book. In addition, every now and then a coding problem is assigned IN ADDITION TO EVERY SINGLE ODD IN THE BOOK, but I didn't find them to be that hard, and they were actually pretty fun to do. The tedious part of the coding is that if you don't know Matlab, you have to figure out how to do the equivalent in the language of your choice. The reason there is so much hw assigned is due to the fact that there are no exams in this class. Instead of exams, you have two projects to do that replace both the midterm and final respectively. This sounds great until you get the project and realize its just a take home exam. The take home exam was long and tedious, with some coding problems. Sometimes I wished that we just had exams instead, as I would much rather take a 24 hour exam (COVID) than an exam that I have to do over a course of a couple weeks. That being said, the projects weren't hard, just tedious. Overall, my review may sound like a lot of complaining, but I'm just saying it how it is. It's easy for me to look back and say "oh the class wasn't that bad" but in reality, I and probably every other person in my class had to spend way more time on this class than is necessary for 170E. So yeah, easy class, most people probably got A's, but it comes at a huge time committment. So you decide if it's worth it or not. TLDR: EASY BUT TEDIOUS
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