Getting the Most From This Course

Here are some tricks to get the most out of this course. Maybe you already heard some of these, but we hope some are new!

What to Expect With Office Hours

If you are more assertive than most you can walk up to the instructor after class (and he usually will hang out until anyone who has questions gets to ask), and you can talk with your TA during your lab section, but we also have office hours. Most of the time they will be in the lower level of Siebel, but check the Office Hour Page to be sure.

To get the most from them, consider these ideas:

  • Pick a specific office hour and attend it every week. This is especially good if you find yourself struggling with the assignments a lot. It also gives the TA or Instructor a chance to know you, and who knows? You might need a letter of recommendation one day.
  • It’s okay to be a “lurker”. Many students will attend and not ask questions, just to hear what other students are asking.
  • You can get help from other students there too. If there are a lot of people, students often group up and help each other. Just be sure to follow the academic integrity policy (There’s a few things, but in this context it’s basically don’t show your MP code to another student.)
  • Attend from the beginning and leave early if you have to. It is more likely that other students have the same questions and will ask them. If you arrive toward the end your question might already have been addressed and the students who are there will want to discuss other things.
  • Go with a friend!

Don’t Treat Assignments Like Video Games

We see this a lot: a student is trying to get a question right and tries over and over again, not really thinking about the problem but guessing and letting the autograder say if it’s correct or not. Once they get it right (and get their points), they immediately go to the next problem without reflecting on why they got the right answer this time. As a result, they get the points, but not the knowledge. We call this “college as a video game.”

Every single question and every single assignment you get in this class is there because the departments you are in told us that you will need to do these things in your future courses and fall behind if you can’t. So we urge you to really try to learn the material. If you don’t know why the answer is right, ask on campuswire or in office hours.

Using LLMs

We won’t try to stop you from using LLMs. We can often tell if you did though, because they will suggest techniques we don’t cover in class (meaning you didn’t learn the technique that will be on the exam later!). If you ask an LLM for the solution to a homework problem and paste it in, even if you can read it and understand it, your brain will decide that the information is not necessary and you will be more likely to forget it later.

Good Reasons to Email the Prof

There are hundreds of you, and only one instructor. If everyone sends an email the system will bog down. This is the purpose of campuswire and office hours. However, there are situations where emailing the instructor is a good idea.

  • Asking for an extension for a reason covered by the student code. You get an automatic 80% extension, but those are more for your own time management. They are not meant to address emergencies, etc. If something happens please ask us to make arrangements.
  • If you miss your exam or know that you will miss it. It happens, and we usually will give you another opportunity if you tell us right away.
  • You have a concern about your grade or performance in the course. Please email the instructor and arrange a meeting if you think you are falling behind. We want you to succeed!
  • If you have something coming up like travel and need to make arrangements for missed work.

Bad Reasons to Email the Prof

You should not email asking for a policy to be changed just for you. We sometimes have a student realize half way through the course that they are not doing well and then ask if they can turn in all the assignments they missed at the beginning of the semester. We can’t give you special privileges like that. (Again, we are not talking about emergencies and pre-made special arrangements.)

You should not ask for your grade to be rounded up at the end of the term. I’ve been a fraction of a point on the wrong side of a grade cutoff myself, so I know how irritating it is, but in a class this size there will be dozens of students in the same situation. If we rounded grades, we’re really just lowering the cutoff a bit, and now different students will be in the “just missed by 0.03 points” kind of situation.

Letters of Recommendation

If you have any thought that you might want to go to graduate school, you need to start thinking now who will write your recommendation letters. Many faculty will declide a request from a student they don’t recognize or write a generic “they were in my class and got an A” kind of letter. Find a way to get to know some faculty. It doesn’t have to be this course — in fact, later ones are better, but if you can do something like an honors project or attend office hours regularly you increase the chances that the faculty member will have good things to write about you later.