I really enjoyed having Harrop-Griffiths for 32B. I was pretty nervous going into 32B since 32A was pretty hard for me (I had Filipazzi for 32A), but Harrop-Griffiths made everything incredibly clear. He made extremely hard topics such as Green's Theorem and Stokes Theorem much less intimidating than they first appear. He used Slack for student questions and replied to almost all questions very promptly.

The grading is 30 percent final, 20 percent each midterm, 25 percent homework, 4.5 percent discussion worksheets, and 0.5 percent surveys. He stressed the importance of instructor evaluations and surveys, and its clear he really values student input as a way for him to enhance his already amazing teaching skills. The homework load was reasonable and a typical homework assignment took me about 5-7 hours to complete. His tests are fair in difficulty and there were no weird/trick questions, unlike 32A.

I thought the midterms were pretty easy (got 100 percent on both) and resemble the sample problems he goes over in lecture. I was a bit nervous about his final since apparently people who took his class in Winter 2019 complained about the difficulty of his final (like the average was a 65 percent). He gave out his Winter 2019 final exam for practice, and the last problem was pretty hard! In contrast, the final I took this quarter was very reasonable in terms of difficulty, harder than midterms but fairly resembled the content in class and the practice finals, with no surprises.

Edit: I got an A in the class :)

Highly recommend Harrop-Griffiths for 32B!

32B is hard. Really, really, really hard. Do not under any circumstances underestimate this class. Don't fall behind. Don't ease up halfway through like I did. This class is hard from week 1 to week 10 ,if you're struggling in week 2 things WILL NOT get better. The material leans heavily on 31B (only the integration part not series) and 32A, if you did not fully learn both of these you are starting off at a disadvantage so enjoy playing catchup. Obviously, 1st quarter coming back from Covid it's hard to honestly gauge, but this was without a doubt the hardest course I've taken in my life, and it's really not even close.

To get an A you need to do the homework, and I mean DO the homework. Don't copy. Don't halfass. Sit down and do each question and actually understand the entire process before moving on to the next one. Then a week before the test relook over the homework and do other problems in the book similar to the homework problems, then do the practice exam(s) the day before the test. I would say go to lecture but I actually probably only attended about half of them, but I don't think they would hurt lol. If you don't wanna attend next best thing is Khan Academy. Not only do you need to know the math but you're going to have to have somewhat of knowledge of what is physically happening , which is hard in 3D space.

Anyway, Harrops. He's alright. Not out of this world amazing as some claim. Not horrible. Just good. Good lecturer. Good enough test maker with the exception of Midterm 2 which was infamously awful (pretty sure the class average was an F). Test advice is 1) the midterms are short if a problem looks like it will take too long you're 99% chance you're doing it wrong there is some shortcut somewhere you missed go back and find it 2) Put down something, anything, I didn't get 0 credit for a problem all year and believe me there were I knew 0.

Ok, anyways this class is going to suck, but you might as well do it with a solid professor like Harrops.

14.5% - Homework
20% - Midterm 1
20% - Midterm 2
45 % - Final
.5% - Surveys

Professor Harrop-Griffiths is one of the best math professors I have ever had. You can tell he cares about his students and makes sure we are all understanding. His exams were fair. They require you to put in the work which is expected for any math course in the 30 series. He was practically available 24/7 to answer any question we may have through Slack which I truly appreciated because not many professors make it as easy for us to contact them about small homework problems or lecture questions. During office hours he was always excited to answer any and all questions and never made any student feel like their question was stupid (many math professors and TAs do). Overall, he is an amazing professor and I hope he realizes that his efforts do not go unnoticed. His teaching is great (explains every concept thoroughly), his exams are fair (if you take the time to study all the material), his grading is fair, and he listens to his students and takes note of ways he can improve. Definitely recommend!!

Leaving this class felt like 1776. I was glad to be free of the British, but at what cost?

Jokes about his nationality aside, I will say that Harrop-Griffiths is very charismatic and quite funny. He also is a very solid lecturer. However, the way he approached the second midterm put the majority of his students under extreme and unnecessary pressure.

He does not make this class an easy A. He doesn't even make this class an attainable A. I honestly think the only people who got an A after the curve were those genius whiz students (or that kid who kept mansplaining to the prof in class all quarter). I am a math major and I absolutely love the content of 32B, however, despite the fact that I ate, slept, and breathed this class 24/7, I scraped by with a B+ after the 10 pt curve at the end.

His slides are pre-written, so rather than focusing on his approach to the problems, many of us spent class time trying to jot things down as fast as humanly possible. Also, the questions on the exams are harder than homework questions, so you really need to spend hours doing tons of practice problems that may not even help you come exam time.

The real nightmare was the fallout after the second midterm. While the first and the final were pretty fair, a large portion of the students in this class failed the second exam. Despite recognizing that he made the test too difficult, he told us that he never curves and that he would only curve if we *magically* did very well on the final.

This class is difficult. The content is extensive. Rather than recognizing that, he expected us to have graduate-level comprehension of the subject and made absolutely no changes or accommodations to make this class manageable. He created a culture that incentivized cheating and that did not allow students to fully engage with the material out of stress and anxiety.

In the end, he did award us a generous curve. However, it was completely unprecedented. We all expected a final with the difficulty of the second midterm, so we spent half the quarter stressed out of our minds. After all, we were told that a curve would only be awarded to those who managed to score well on the final.

Overall, I don't believe I would take another class with him. However, I would also not be miserable if I were forced to. The key is emotional detachment and the acceptance that your grade will likely tank no matter how much effort you put in.

I got a C+ in this class, and got my butt kicked. But, if I could go back in time and take a different teacher, I would't. He was an amazing professor, and I would highly recommend him. His midterms are thorough and sometimes touch on stuff from earlier on in the class and the final was difficult, but everything was fair. He is the best math professor I have had at UCLA, and highly recommend, even though I got a C. THAT shows how good of a teacher he is.

Harrop-Griffiths is an absolutely incredible professor. I had heard various horror stories about 32B and also did horribly in 32A, but his clear lectures and very reasonable (although not easy) tests made this class a breeze in comparison. Snazzy British accent, too.

He could explain the concepts very clearly. Highly recommended.

Benjy is a legend and a god. Even apart from his neck beard and tight pants, he is an excellent teacher. He made this class so easy to understand, and I hardly had to study outside of class. He's very good at helping you understand what each integral actually means, and I was a huge fan of how he structured the class. A lot of the teachers started off with triple integrals and disgusting equations, but Benjy starts with one variable and helps you progress to three variables. With all the practice with the different integrals, even the most disgusting equations were very doable. Highly recommend this teacher.

Ben gives some of the most clear lectures I've ever had in a math class. His midterms are very fair, and while I did very well on them (near perfect scores), the final was a completely different story. The final was HARD and I did pretty badly on that, so I walked out with an A-. Beware that a lot of things that you learn in 32b are very similar and thus very easy to get confused with (Green's theorem, Stoke's theorem, Divergence theorem, etc) so make sure to spend that extra time to get everything clear. And lastly - go to class since his lectures are worth going to.

Ben gives really clear and organized lecture, and his explanation for abstract concepts are very understandable. He organizes the course material in a special way to help us understand. His final is harder than the midterms, but they always follow the structure of the practice exams and are not tricky, so it's pretty manageable if you put in a decent amount of time.