WAINWRIGHT B
Third class with Wainwright, super chill, lecture not required but helpful as he explains nuance and is responsive to lecture questions. Go to office hours with actual questions and you should be set for exams. Homework can be done with a partner which makes them super manageable.
Brian can be very charismatic in his lectures, and explains the content well enough. The course contains a lot of difficult content to cover but his grading scale is very lenient, however the exams (particularly the midterm) were very nitpicky on the particular content used, and covered 50% of the final grade; section attendance was also required.
No curve at all. The exams are straightforward but covers an insane amount of content, so it's really hard for you to memorize every detail clearly. However, those things that you fail to notice are highly likely to appear on the exam. Afterall it's a tough course and the professor is not good.
Lectures were fairly engaging, although there's way too much information on the slides and it gets impossible to follow at times. HW is a free 50%. But final was absurdly difficult based on everything else he assigned; it brought my grade down an entire letter. You'll be fine as long as you study MUCH more than you think you have to for the final.
Professor is fine, but his lectures are not interactive and a lot is gone over very quickly. The class was curved generously at the end because of the midterm and final being somewhat challenging. Homework and grading are both very lenient: scored a mediocre 89 on both midterm and final, but I originally thought my grade was going to be much worse.
Lectures were nothing special but sufficient to learn material. Easy midterm, harder final. Gave us extra credit for filling out a survey. Generous curve on lower end (63% turned into a passing C). Most people have difficulty with the material, not the professor. HW is harder than both midterm and final and serves as good prep.
He's just okay, boring lectures, he moves fast and skims over a lot. TAs were a lot more helpful. Exams were very difficult and incomparable to HW/practice exams, despite him saying they would be similar. The difference between what he gives us to prepare and the actual exam is genuinely laughable.
Very great professor, but a structurally flawed class. You'll likely not have enough time for the difficult exams. I was one of those and that really demotivated me for the rest of the quarter. Definitely focus on this class if you want to succeed. He goes fast too so be sure to pay attention. 40% HW/section, 60% tough exams. Edit: Brutal final.
The final was absolutely brutal, and the Canvas & CLAS resources were definitely not enough to prepare us for the type of exam he gave us. The midterm average was about 65%, with just a few people scoring full credit. Lecture/HW were helpful but only concept-wise because the problems were nowhere similar in difficulty compared to the final.
Exams were hard; I had never had such a low grade before on an exam. There was no curve for any of the tests. Class average for the midterm was a 65%. Homework is a free A, but the final was nothing like he said it was gonna be. Decent lecturer but really boring.
Wainwright is a nice guy, but as a professor, he's okay. However, his exams were extremely difficult and felt unfair. The midterm had an average score of 30% in my section, and the final was even harder, stuff I had never encountered before. The disconnect between the coursework and the exams was significant. I also never worked harder in a class
Exams are extremely unfair. I saw a lot of people saying his final is easy, well he changed. His final is even harder than the midterm and the example tests he gave us for practice is useless. It's not about putting in effort anymore, I spend so much time for this class and going to tutors and he decided to make questions tricky to mess you up.