Allen Broughton

First, this professor is hard to contact outside of the classroom. He has regular office hours only during one period of the day and many of us have classes then.

Second, while I expect to get lower grades than I did in high school, I know how to do math and have never received a grade lower than an A in a math class besides this one, including Calc I with a different teacher here. On one test problem we were told to “show all work” which several others and I did. Our teacher had intended for us to use a certain method to obtain the answer, but didn’t tell us specifically to use that method on the test. Yet, because we did the problem with another method, we were counted wrong, despite using a valid method, and not even partial credit was given despite the correct answer.

More important than grading is teaching style. The materials in the course are presented so out of order it will make your head spin. I have noticed that other teachers have gone more in order with the book, jumping around less. What I do know is that example problems are not enough. As a student, I need to understand why something works, not just how. This teacher shows a great fondnessfor example problems in this class; however, there is not much else. I do not think it is the best idea to do example problems before the method behind them is explained. This lack of communicating new material to us makes me worry about my class’s preparation for the final. Somehow, it feels as if all life that was once in math has been sucked out of the subject. I know some of this material from calculus in high school; that which I do not know I have had to teach myself from the book.

In summary, I feel cheated in this part of my education. If one believes that the primary reason students are here is for schooling, then each class would be worth a certain portion of tuition, room and board. Given that this basis, costs for a quarter are roughly $10,000. I believe that each credit should be worth at least $550 dollars, since students can take 18 credits. I chose to attend this school for its quality and, in most cases, I have found the quality of courses to be great. This class, though, disappoints me. This class is worth about $2800 of my money and my scholarship money. Since this class is so expensive, I demand a lot from it. However, I do not feel that I have received this quality of education. I feel if I would have bought the book and studied it on my own that would be equivalent to this course. Basically, I paid 28 times over the value of the book to learn calculus.