<p>I registered for Math 31L because I got a 4 on Calc AB. Could I still take Math 32 instead even if I didn't place out of Math 31L? And would it be advisable to take Math 32 instead?</p>
<p>Regarding Duke math classes: don’t take them, skip/test/place/whatever out of them as soon as possible. Take the least amount of math you can at Duke. To answer your question, figure out if you can take 32. If yes, then take it.</p>
<p>thanks, i guess. haha</p>
<p>Noobcake, what are you implying about Duke math classes?</p>
<p>According to the Math department website,
</p>
<p>So yes, you can enroll in Math 32 if you would like. There are a few things to keep in mind. Just because you choose to go right into 32, you DO NOT get credit for the course you skipped (Math 31L in this case). If your major requires Math 31L, you will have to ask the DUS of your major department to waive the requirement. According to the math department, most other departments will waive the requirement if you receive a C or better in Math 32. The question then arises as to whether you can receive a C or better. In general, the advice that noobcake gave is correct - DON’T take more math at Duke than you have to. However, you may or may not know that Math 32 is considered the most failed class at Duke - mainly because students come in having had inadequate calc instruction in high school. If you feel like your calc instruction was good and the 4 on the AP was just a hiccup, you might be okay in 32. If you feel like your AP score represents your skills in calculus accurately, you probably should stick with 31L. Just my opinion though. Only you know how comfortable you are with calc. </p>
<p>Also, I’m not a pre-med so I’m not 100% sure how the requirements work, but if you are pre-med you might want to be careful. I’m not sure if those med schools that require 2 semesters of calc will recognize your AP Calc as one semester since Duke didn’t give you credit for it. If that’s the case, I’d much rather take 31L and 32L for my two semesters rather than 32 and 103.</p>
<p>No no no, if you can take 32, take 32. Don’t take 31. By taking 31, you still have to take 32 eventually.</p>
<p>Reason why math at Duke sucks: </p>
<ol>
<li>Most “intro” class (up until Math 108, the last math class for engineers) have a B- average, sometimes B.</li>
<li><p>For most of these classes, the number of A’s on the final = the number of A’s in the class. This may seem contradictory to statement one, but the finals are structured so that the final average grade is roughly a B-. If there are 4 sections of the same class taught by 3 or 4 different professors/sometimes one or two graduate students (The only graduate teachers I have had at Duke has been from the Math department), the A’s are NOT distributed evenly. If you have a poor teacher (not implying that graduate students are worse at teaching than actual professors or teaching assistant professors), your section only got 10% A’s on the final. Only that number of people in your class are awarded with an A. If you had a B+ average coming into the final and got an A on the final, you MAY not get a A if there are students with A average and B+ final, which basically means that your A on the final helped someone else get an A. Having a strong section can adversely affect your grade, and no one can guarantee that the student composition of a section can closely reflect the student composition of all the sections.</p></li>
<li><p>Grading is largely nontransparent. Out of the Math 32, Math 103, Math 107, and Math 108 that I have taken at Duke, I only found out my final exam grade from two of those classes (not saying that you can’t find out by contacting your professor… just that finding out your final exam grade won’t change your final grade). To make the situation worse, my Math 108 class had a C average curve and had NO grading rubric (my teacher can’t tell us how our final grade will be calculated precisely, it is not written on the rubric).</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Just to offer a slightly less critical opinion than noobcake, my experience with Math 103(x), 107, and 108 was relatively painless (didn’t do 31 or 32). Yes I suppose I got B’s in all of them, but I’m not sure that makes the entire department suck.</p>
<p>The teaching face of the math department could be considered sucky if 95% of the students at Duke do not take any math classes beyond Math 108 or equivalent.</p>
<p>I’m sure there are lot of fine math professors are Duke, and many are truly passionate about teaching. This doesn’t excuse the poor **** excuse of an departmental grade policy toward intro level math classes.</p>
<p>If you read the Math Department/Math Major brochures that can be found in Physics building, it evens mentions though intro level grading and assures any prospective math majors that higher level math classes will be much easier, grading wise.</p>
<p>Yeah but at the end of the day, can you say that you know calculus/lin algebra/diffEQ pretty well? I think most people can. </p>
<p>95% of students have little to no use for math beyond partial differential equations in their future life/career, so I think that stat is understandable.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure everyone who passed math knew the material to a certain extent. Pretty much everyone was amazing at math in high school.</p>
<p>It is about difficulty of class and (lack of) fairness of grading.</p>
<p>thanks. this thread was really helpful. I think I’ll talk to my academic adviser once I get to campus.</p>
<p>Please don’t listen to noobcake about math at Duke. With that attitude toward math, it’s no wonder that he has had such a bad experience. He complains about the difficulty of the class; well, I would hope dearly that you are coming to Duke to challenge yourself, not to just coast. </p>
<p>Also, with respect to the fairness of the courses, I think that this is more of an issue about student expectations and preparation for college-level math than it is a real issue. Firstly, most students were straight-A students in high school. Thus, they expect the same at Duke.</p>
<p>Secondly, math at Duke is not like math in high school. Unfortunately, American high schools tend to water down math heavily. Thus, it is substantially harder, but if you were qualified enough for Duke to admit you, then I have no doubt that you can handle it. You may just have to work harder. One of the biggest myths perpetuated about math is that it’s all about innate ability–you either get it or you don’t. This is not true. You can definitely become better through hard work.</p>
<p>Furthermore, most people straight out of high school expect that all the knowlege required will be delivered in the lecture. You should not expect this, and should regularly use your textbook as a resource. Many people aren’t use to reading math. It takes a lot of practice. I’m a math major, and I often have to read things multiple times before it makes sense to me, but this process of working through the material yourself helps greatly.</p>
<p>Anyway, noobcake’s experience is somewhat forgivable. I do believe Duke needs to reform their two engineering math classes, Math 107 and Math 108, which do seem to favor calculation ability over understanding of the material.</p>
<p>Now, as for your choice between Math 31 and 32, I think that you should choose Math 31. Calculus at Duke is harder than anything on the AP test, so to me, a 4 indicates that your background is a little weak (you may have very well been a star at your high school, but like I said earlier, most American schools teach math, poorly). Furthermore, if you take a math class that you are unprepared for, you risk developing an attitude toward math that is similar to noobcake’s. That type of aversion towards math will do great harm in the long run. I have met many people that simply panic at the sight of numbers, and because of their refusal to think about a problem critically, they have made some stupid decisions.</p>
<p>My attitude did not shape my experience; my bad experience shaped my attitude. I complain about the fairness of math grading, not about the difficulty of the classes. </p>
<p>Everyone has to learn the same material, but two students in two different sections can be awarded vastly different grades purely based on the luck of the draw (with the same midterm performance and time devotion). Mind you, I did ‘fairly’ well in my 4 math classes overall, three A’s and a C</p>
<p>Edit: I’ll just leave this subject as it is. I’ve had my share of bad experiences with the Math department at Duke. I recommend that every prospective non-math major get out of taking math as quickly as possible.</p>
<p>For what it’s worth, one of my best friends is a math major and she HATES the math department.</p>
<p>And I’ll agree with the sentiment that you should take as little math as you can.</p>
<p>I also have a question about this. I took calc AB and BC in highschool and got a 5 on both. I’m pre-med, so should I take more math at duke or not? I hear ap credits are a bad idea for med school but then again I hear the opposite so im not sure.</p>
<p>I would not take math in your situation. If you must, don’t repeat 31/32, take 103 multi-variable calculus.</p>
<p>I would not even take math 103 at all unless you have to.</p>
<p>I’ll chime in with my $0.02, do not take math if you can avoid it. I’m not some bitter former student who watched his GPA tank because he was an engineer and took all those math courses blah blah blah. I did fairly well in those math classes and understood the materials being taught. There is nothing wrong with the content of the courses. It’s just that for the intro classes, there is absolutely no coherence, continuity, or even standard grading practices across sections, semester, professors, and classes. I basically taught myself math 107 and 108 by reading the textbooks. </p>
<p>One professor’s style might be completely opposite that of another teaching the another section of the same course at the same time. And in the end, you can be majorly screwed by that. Case in point, my 108 professor heavily emphasized proofs. Other sections didn’t do them at all because the professor said they weren’t important to know. Guess what kind of questions showed up on the final and screwed many people over? This problem isn’t helped by the fact that intro classes are often foisted onto whichever unfortunate professor is unlucky enough to get them (many times visiting or new-hires) so the professor teaching probably hasn’t had recent experience lecturing the course. </p>
<p>Anyway, it’s just a crapshoot for the intro courses. Because so many people have to take them, competition is fierce and curves can be punishing.</p>
<p>I second SBR, and I got A+'s in Math 103 and 108. Your experience is mostly based on who you have, but the only sure way to do well is to teach yourself straight from the textbook. For Math 103, I printed out all the sample tests (about 9) and did them all. Each professor gets to write one question for the block final, so you can’t rely on one prof’s interpretation of the material.</p>