This is a supplement to the course syllabus for Math 131 specific to Section 8.   

Instructor: Dr. Farshid Hajir.    Office: Lederle Graduate Research Tower 1118.    Phone: 545-6015. e-mail: hajir@math.umass.edu
I encourage you to use the email address above to send me questions about the homework or to set up an appointment.

Homepage URL: http://www.math.umass.edu/~hajir You can find a link to this course information sheet from my homepage.

Teaching Assistant: Caroline Papachrysostomou     Office: Lederle Graduate Research Tower 1325     e-mail: papachry@math.umass.edu

Meeting Time and Place: TuTh 11:15-12:30, LGRT 113. TA extra hour: M 11:15-12:05.

Office Hours: Wed and Th 2:00-3:00 in LGRT 1118. You are always welcome to set up an appointment to see me by e-mail or phone.

Reading Assignments:    Before each class, review textbook materials as indicated in the course syllabus. It is a very good idea to try your hands at some problems before coming to class, as this will help you formulate questions you can raise in class.

Written Assignments: Homework will be assigned weekly BUT IT WILL NOT BE COLLECTED. You are responsible for knowing how to solve the problems, and we will go over them during the TuTh lectures or (more likely) during the Monday sessions as needed, but you are not required to hand in your solutions. Instead, there will be SHORT QUIZZES every week, consisting of one or two questions DIRECTLY FROM THE ASSIGNED HOMEWORK PROBLEMS. Anyone who attends the lectures, participates in the class discussions, and does the homework (seeking help when difficulties arise) should have no difficulty getting a perfect score on every quiz.    The purpose of the quizzes is to help you assess your understanding of the material and to give you practice for the Exams. Attendance and class participation are important. If you are not in attendance when the quiz is administered, you will receive a 0 for the quiz given that day. If you walk in to class once the quiz is in progress, you may take the quiz, but you will have to turn in the quiz with the rest of the class.   

Grading: As explained in the syllabus, 80% of your course grade stems from Exams. Your quiz average will contribute the remaining 20% (see below for how the quiz average is calculated).

Policy on Missed Quizzes: If you happen to be absent when a quiz is administered, you will receive a zero for it.    There will be no make-up quizzes.    However, occasionally one has to miss class for one reason or another. Therefore, the lowest 2 quiz grades will be dropped from consideration when calculating the 20 percent of your grade which does not stem from the exams.

Advice for Success This course is fast-paced; some of you may have seen some of this material before, but at least some of the material, will be unfamiliar to you. The most important strategical advice I can give you is: do the reading and work on problems every day so that you do not fall behind. When you get stuck, seek help - that is why we (your Instructor and TA) are here. I also recommend that you work with your fellow students in groups. If you are stuck on a problem and seek help from an instructor or a fellow student, you owe it to yourself to aim for an understanding of the concepts and ideas that come up in the discussion (do not just memorize the series of steps leading to the solution). Then, go home and reconstruct the argument for yourself in the privacy of your own brain, to make sure you are not merely reproducing mindlessly something you have not thought through.    Remember that during tests and quizzes, you will have to rely on your own understanding of the material.