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March 28, 2024, 10:01:01 pm

Author Topic: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings  (Read 1734604 times)  Share 

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hums_student

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #735 on: June 24, 2019, 02:31:29 pm »
+5
Subject Code/Name: ECON10005 Quantitative Methods 1

Workload:
   • Lectures: 2 x 1 hr per week
   • Tutorials: 1 x 1 hr per week

Assessment:
   1. 2 x Mid-semester tests (7.5% each)
   2. 2 x Assignments (7.5% each)
   3. Tutorial attendance (10%)
   4. Final exam (60%) - hurdle

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture

Past exams available: A lot of past exams in the library, plenty more posted on LMS.

Textbook Recommendation: Principles of Business Statistics by any author is adequate.

Lecturer(s): John Shannon, Wasana Karunarathne

Year & Semester of completion: 2019 Semester 1

Rating: 3.5 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1 (94)

Comments:

There are already a number of reviews for QM1, but I thought I’d offer the perspective of a mathematically inept arts major who did it as breadth:

QM1 has a nasty reputation and it’s notorious for being one the hardest subjects you’ll ever do. It allegedly has a 30~40% fail rate, and is compulsory for BCom students.

Despite that, QM wasn’t as bad as what people make it out to be. It started off dull, but got better and better, even (dare I say) fun. A lot of concepts, particularly for excel, were also applicable to real life.

QM's difficulty is exaggerated as it's straightforward as long as you do the work. Having only done methods in VCE (which was my worst subject),it was overwhelming at first. But the learning modules gives you plenty of practice and it was easy to catch up.

Key topics in QM1 include: probability, data analysis, statistical inference, hypothesis testing, confidence intervals, and linear regression.

Lectures

They weren't the most interesting, and a lot of the earlier ones were also confusing. John was very monotone. Zoning out (or falling asleep) in lectures was easy - I had a friend who showed up to the lectures just to use John's voice as a lullaby.

BUT, they got better in the later weeks for hypothesis testing & confidence intervals. This might just be my own opinion though as I personally prefer statistics. In the final weeks everything came together and the content went from disjointed to complementary topics.

In the final 2 lectures, John went through a practice exam. The structure of the exam was changed recently and is very different from past exams, so the last lectures are definitely worth going to.

Tutorials

It's essential to do the pre-tute work on LMS, or you'll be incredibly lost. (Also, you should be doing them anyway as they contribute to your final mark). I found the tutes really helpful in consolidating concepts and topics. Go into tutes with questions on your mind so you can follow along and fill the gaps in your knowledge.

I had Adam as my tutor. He seemed half-asleep most of the time BUT when it came to explaining concepts he was amazing, very clear and made things very straightforward. Also, he's a pretty chill dude.

Assessments

There are 2 assignments, each weighing 7.5%. Both are group work but you can do them individually too. I did assignment 1 in a group, but assignment 2 by myself.

The reason: everyone did their fair share of work for assignment 1, and so I didn't bother learning the parts that weren't assigned to me. This backfired later on as I couldn't keep up, so I went solo for assignment 2. While the workload was insane (it was designed for 4 people), it pushed me to really understand all the concepts. I got a lower mark from doing it by myself, but it also helped me have a stronger grasp of the content overall.

I'd recommend doing both assignments individually if you can. If you must work in a group, attempt all questions by yourself anyway.

The two midsems both weigh 7.5%. Midsem 1 focuses on data analysis and probability, while midsem 2 looks at hypothesis testing. The best way to study for them is to work through all learning module exercises on LMS.

Final exam

The structure of the final exam changed this year. Instead of MCQs, you get three extended response questions (split into smaller parts). Q1 (32 marks) looks at probability and data analysis; Q2 (40 marks) mimics Midsem 2 and includes multiple hypothesis testing questions; finally, Q3 (30 marks) looks at regression, with a few confidence intervals thrown in there.

Final thoughts:

In a nutshell, QM is far better than what most people make it out to be. It was an intimidating subject at first but as long as you stay on top of your work, it's not too scary. I even found this subject enjoyable in later weeks, even though maths is far from my strength. Overall, I liked QM1 — it's not an easy subject, but I think it's worth the workload.

Finally, I thought I'd end this review with the lecturer John's favourite catchphrase:
"How do you avoid making mistakes? By never making a decision."
« Last Edit: July 04, 2019, 11:01:32 pm by hums_student »
2019-21: Bachelor of Arts (Politics & Int'l Relations / Economics)

Bunjil

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #736 on: June 27, 2019, 11:13:22 am »
+3
Subject Code/Name: ANAT30007: Human Locomotor Systems

Workload:  3x 1 hr lectures a week and 11x 3hr pracs (no pracs in first week)

Assessment:  2x MSTs (10% each) Theory exam (40%) Practical Exam (40%)

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture. Although it's useful to attend and Varsha generally brings in bones/models for her lectures and discusses them and these aren't on the lecture capture

Past exams available: No, Varsha uploads a few sample questions before each MST and before the prac exam

Textbook Recommendation:  Drake Et Al (2009) 'Grey's Anatomy for students' and Moore et al ' Clinically oriented anatomy'

Grey's is given for free on the LMS but didn't really use it or any other resources, lecture notes and Anatomedia are sufficient

Lecturer(s):

- A/Prof Stuart Mazzone - Neuroanatomy (3 lectures)
- Dr. Varsha Pilbrow -  Bones and muscles of arm, forearm, hand, hip/thigh, leg and foot. Shoulder Complex. Elbow complex, wrist and hand joints, hip and thigh joints, knee complex, foot and ankle joints. Evolutionary anatomy (16 lectures)
- A/Prof Quentin Fogg - Lumbar Spine and back,, cervical spine and neck, nerves/vessels of upper limb, nerves/vessels of lower limb, clinical anatomy of the back (7 lectures)

Clinical Lecturers
- A/Prof Martin Richardson - Surgical Repair of the Upper/Lower limb (2 lectures)
- Dr David Ackland - Bioengineering the musculoskeletal system (1 lecture)
- Dr Alex Rhodes: Imaging the Musculoskeletal system: Upper/Lower limb, back (3 lectures)
- Dr John Bui - Imaging the musculoskeletal system 1: principles (1 lecture)

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating:  4.5/5

Your Mark/Grade: (Optional) TBD

Comments:

Thought I'd give a more updated review of this subject as a few things have changed since the last review not that long ago. Human locomotor systems is basically just a continuation of some of the 2nd year prequisite subject, but you go into a lot more detail. Before I say anything else my biggest warning about this subject is it can get full on. if you don't have a good memory DON'T do this subject as it's basically just rote memorising a lot of structures, their origin insertion and function, with a little bit of clinical signifiance. If this sounds boring or unappealing to you then turn away now because this subject won't be kind to you.

Basically, the lectures can be roughly broken into 5 topics - Neuroanatomy, back/neck, upper limb, lower limb and evolution. Throughout the semester you also receive clinical lecturers from actual clinicians/researches. These are themed generally on surgical approaches and radiology and clinical applications of the anatomy you learn. More on these later.

So you start the semester relatively easily with Stuart in neuroanatomy. This is basically just a continuation of the neuroanatomy covered in 2nd year but with a greater emphasis on the neural interface that enables us to locomote (aka move). The content is very interesting, and Stuart teaches it at an amazing pace and makes it pretty easy. As mentioned in previous reviews, if you're doing/ have done Principles of Neuroscience you'll be advantaged during this section as you do a whole lecture series on movement in principles. Questions for this section were fair and reasonable and nothing seemed untoward. A great start to the subject!

Next comes the back/neck with Quentin. The lecture on the back is extended from last year but the lecture on the neck is new (and imo a very confusing concept). Quentin is unfortunately the reason i deducted -0.5 for this subject as I found him a confusing and bad lecturer. Firstly instead of taking the time to review concepts before going into more difficult stuff he just says 'this should be familiar from last year' and then jumps into it. He also seems way more interested in anatomical research than teaching the content (he seriously spent 25 minutes talking about Pub Med in his back lecture...) and to cap it all off his lecture slides are just pictures with no headings/organisation and just jumps around so it's hard to follow. Quentin's one saving grace is his questions on assessment were generally fair and reasonable, just make sure you take the time to review your anatomy from 2nd year as its all assumed knowledge and he won't review it. Again in terms of content, the back lecture was fairly simple (know your structure of a vertebrae like the back of your hand, seriously) but the neck lecture was a nightmare for be as it was very confusing and poorly taught. Anatomedia and google in general are great resources to supplement your knowledge with these topics.

Following this, you move into the real meat of the subject with Varsha when she takes you through the upper and lower limbs. The limb lectures are generally broken down into bones/muscles of a region (e.g. arm/forearm) and joints (shoulder/elbow/hand/knee/hip/leg/ankle/foot). This section of the course is information rich, and probably the most overwhelming part for a lot of students. The content is very interesting and Varsha does a good job at bringing in a lot of clinical applications for the anatomy she teaches (e.g. about fractures of a bone and the implications this has on endangering nerves/vessels) - my advice would be to understand these clinical applications as a lot of them appear in MSTs! Expect to memorise ~ 100 different muscles, their origin, insertion action and nerve supply over the course of this section as well as many different ligaments, joint types and clinical applications during this section of the course. Even though this section is tough, Varsha has a way of making it seem bearable. She is a genuinely lovely human and it seems shes listened to past cohorts and has slowed down her speaking when delivering lectures. Her coordination is a real highlight of this subject, and I was surprised to hear that the coordination of this subject was critiqued in the past. Varsha was always very prompt in responding to emails, and kept us duly informed and was always receptive to us during the semester. As mentioned before, it's probably best to attend Varsha's lectures in person as she brings in bones/models and talks about them and you can get a bit lost if you're watching online as it isn't captured.

Quentin jumps in between the transition to upper and lower limb to deliver 4 lectures on nerves and vessels of the upper and lower limbs. Again, nothing changes here with respect to his previous lectures and I even think he replaced Jenny Hayes who used to teach this part... anyway the content here is not too hard and Quentin does present a nice table of the Nerves at the start of his lectures (memorise this!)

The final block of lectures are delivered by Varsha and cover evolutionary anatomy. This is either hit or miss depending on your interests, I personally found it very interesting and it was a nice way to end the semester. Varsha is clearly passionate about evolutionary skeletal biology as this is what her resarch is on. Nothing left of field here and the assessment questions were again fair.

Throughout the semester there are also external clinical lecturers delivered by clinicians and researchers. The topics of these are radiology, surgery and bioengineering the musculoskeletal system. These were interesting but it was hard to know what to take away from them (and this thought was definitely echoed by the cohort). Varsha stressed to 'know the anatomy' of the content rather than the details. There was quite a few hiccups from the radiology lectures as they were cancelled/moved around due to personal circumstances from the lecturer but Varsha was very prompt in letting us know and trying to fix it. The cliicians were very nice people and even offered for us to view them in surgery/ visit their research lab! My only piece of advice in terms of assessment would be to know the pros/cons of the imaging modalities and the radiology lectures well in general as these seemed to be the main clinical lectures emphasised on in assessment.

Now the part everybody's been waiting for - the practicals. The practicals in this subject are probably the best part of this subject and the amazing resources the university gives undergraduates the access to is a great privilege and really makes you feel like you've acquired a unique experience and knowledge. There are 11 practicals throughout the semester (none in the first week), and these can either be Workshops or dissections.

Workshops (5 of them) are generally done before dissections and are basically the exact same as 2nd year anatomy practicals. You're assigned to a group and rotate around 5 stations looking at prosections and discussing them with demonstrators. The demonstrators are clearly quite knowledgeable (and I believe they're all doctors/med students) but I found a lot of them quite hard to understand due to accents and their quiet voices. Sometimes these workshops can feel like a baptism by fire because of the vast amount of knowledge they expect, but Varsha stresses that the workshops and dissections are at a level above of the required knowledge of the subject. Demonstrators were happy to receive any questions and were generally quite helpful. Dissections (6 of them) are everybody's favourite and the reason most people do this subject. For 6 weeks you dissect the upper/lower limb muscles and joints (anterior/posterior) with each dissection broken up into a region that you get to do with a partner (e.g. muscles of the anterior forearm). These are overseen by demonstrators, who oversee 2 cadavers (So two groups). These are really brilliant and it's super helpful to see the anatomy in 3D and actually 'do' the cutting yourself to see what structures lie where. At the end of dissections, the demonstrators label structures with flags and ask you to identify them. Very helpful. You get a chill workshop on evolutionary anatomy at the end of semester where you look at skulls/ other parts of our ancestors/apes. Really cool and Varsha brings in some findings from her own research. Very interesting and a nice way to end the semester.

The two MSTs are pretty straightforward as long as you review your stuff and know it pretty well. The first MST covered Neuroanatomy, back/neck and upper limb whereas the second MST covered the lower limb.

There are two exams at the end of semester, a theoretical exam covering lecture content and a practical exam. The theoretical exam consists of 30 MCQ (10 of which were on evolutionary anatomy) and 6x long answer questions (15 marks each). Varsha let us know what topics the 6 long answer questions would be and this year they were neuroanatomy, upper limb, lower limb, back, nerves/vessels and evolutionary. Thought this exam was very reasonable and pretty fair. Hand hurt at the end though. The practical exam was a bit more difficult to prepare for. This was 100 MCQ with images of prosections/disections with various labels. Throughout the semester Varsha stressed that the practical exam would be more 'identify the functional relevance' rather than just identify but I found a lot of it was 'identify structure 1' lol. Easier than i was expecting but unsure of how I went

All in all, a really great, interesting and rewarding subject. The access the university gives you to cadavers is pretty much unparalleled and almost stands a standalone reason to do this subject. Be warned of the immense workload and memory-intensive content. Good luck! :)







Sutanrii

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #737 on: June 29, 2019, 04:04:50 am »
+3
Subject Code/Name: MAST10008 Accelerated Mathematics 1

Workload:  For each week: 4x 1-hour lecture, 1x 1-hour tutorial, 1x 1-hour lab

Assessment:  6 Assignments (3 Online, 3 Written, 15% total equally weighted), MATLAB Test (5%), 3-hour Final Exam (80%)

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture (document camera)

Past exams available:  Yes, Final Exam 2009-2018. Short answers (excluding proofs) provided only for 2017 and 2018. As well as one practice MATLAB test.

Textbook Recommendation:  You're provided with a textbook (Elementary Linear Algebra, Applications Version (H. Anton and C. Rorres), 11th edition, Wiley, 2013.) and a problem booklet + short answers on the LMS. But tbh the lecture slides and the problem booklet are sufficient to prepare you for the exam.

Lecturer(s): Dr. Alexandru Ghitza

Year & Semester of completion: 2019 Sem 1

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1 (95)

Comments:
This subject covers the entire Linear Algebra, and a bit of Real Analysis (Introduction to Number Sets and Techniques of Mathematical Proofing) and Calculus 2 (Two-Variable Calculus). However, this subject will serve as an alternative subject to only Linear Algebra as a prerequisite. While the subject pace is fast as the content goes from week to week, I find the pace of each lecture to be pretty standard.

Lectures
Alex released the lecture slides every week on the LMS with empty spaces left for us to fill in as Alex wrote on them during the lectures. Everything that Alex wrote on the empty spaces was recorded with the doc camera so it isn't essential to attend the lecture in person.

Considering that Alex used to teach Calculus 1, I believe he's knowledgeable in explaining arcane mathematical terms to most of us that have just finished high school, and I do feel that he delivered the lectures with great clarity. He usually explained each concept slowly to make sure everyone understands. Moreover, I also find Alex's lecture to be enjoyable as he occasionally cracked some jokes. The atmosphere of the lecture overall is light-hearted. "Time flies when you're having fun" - Alexandru Ghitza 2019

I'd recommend doing the problem booklet after each lecture to reinforce the understanding of the concepts taught in lectures, which will be useful in the preparation for the final exam, especially since the exam is worth 80%.

Tutorials / Problem Solving
We received a tutesheet from our tutor, sit in groups of 3 or 4 and solve the problems on the whiteboard. The tutor will go around the class to check on our workings and give feedback. At the end of each tute, we received the solution to the problems, which would also be up on the LMS at the end of the week.

MATLAB / Practical
After the tute, we would walk with our tutor to the computer lab, where each of us was given a lab sheet. We'd then work on the lab sheet using MATLAB while exploring ways we can use MATLAB to solve numerous LinAlg problems. One thing to note about AM1's MATLAB test rather than LinAlg's is that there will be one extra question requiring us to write an 'm-file'. This can be either beneficial (for those with prior programming background) or hellish (for those who don't). But overall, I don't find the MATLAB test to be hard if you're familiar with MATLAB's functions and commands, even if you don't have a prior programming background.

Assignments
I find this aspect of this subject to be the hardest and the most stressful. In this semester, we have 3 online and 3 written assignments. The online assignments were a breeze as long as you understand the content. The written assignments especially the first one, however, are much harder. Often the questions will require you to ponder for quite some time before you'll have the slightest idea of how to start. My tips in doing these questions are to write down everything you know that is relevant to the question and work your way from there.

Final Exam
This will probably be the most daunting aspect of this subject for the cohort due to its weighting being 80%.

I think different people have different methods of studying for a maths exam, but I find grinding the past papers to be the most useful and efficient. I find the exam itself to be straightforward as most of the questions have a similar style as past exam papers and the problem booklet (which justifies my reasons for doing past papers and the problem booklet).

Conclusion
As part of the accelerated stream, this subject covers 4 lectures per week (instead of the typical Maths subject being 3). So in total, there will be 48 lectures throughout the semester. If you're considering whether to take this subject or LinAlg, I think it depends on how much you like Maths and how willing are you to dedicate one extra hour of lecture per week for this subject. Difficulty wise, this subject isn't much harder than LinAlg. We did cover the same topics and the exam questions I believe were similar. The difference in the difficulty would only come in the assignments and the MATLAB test.

The additional lecture per week and the additional contents from RA and Calc2, however, will require you to put more time into studying for this subject. But I don't find them to be particularly difficult compared to the LinAlg contents.

With that being said, I'd recommend this subject for those who enjoy maths and are up for a challenge. While this subject has a higher workload and requires additional effort, the satisfaction of completing this subject is rewarding. (If you're planning to take Accelerated Mathematics 2, I would highly, highly encourage you to take this subject).
« Last Edit: December 09, 2019, 02:57:59 am by Sutanrii »
University of Melbourne 2019-now: Bachelor of Science (Electrical Systems)
Higher School Certificate (HSC) 2018: Maths Extension 2, Maths Extension 1, Physics, Chemistry, SDD, ESL

M909

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #738 on: July 02, 2019, 08:47:30 pm »
+1
Subject Code/Name: ECON30001 International Trade Policy

Workload:  2 × 1 hour lecture per week, 1 × 1 hour tutorial per week

Assessment:
2 × 50 minute within semester tests (At the approx 1/3 and 2/3 mark of the semester), 15% each
1 × 1000 word essay, 20%
2 hour end of semester exam, 50% (Hurdle)

Lecture Capture Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture, but did not capture extra writing on the white/blackboards

Past exams available: A sample exam with the same format as the final was provided with solutions. I was also able to get the 2017 and 2015 exams from the library website without solutions.

Textbook Recommendation:  Formal recommendation is International Trade, 2nd Edition by Robert C. Feenstra and Alan M. Taylor. Not at all compulsory and only recommended if you're really struggling with the maths/derivations in the lecture slides.

Lecturer: Reshad Ahsan

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating: 4.5 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H2B (71)

Comments: Even though I'm writing this after finding out I somewhat bombed the exam (Got a H1 grade in both tests and the essay), I found taking this subject to be a really positive experience and have no regrets ,although I've already got the WAM needed for entry into the masters I want to do so long as I pass everything, so I'm probably currently a lot less stressed about marks than others... - Really well organised and interesting subject. Also, keep in mind that despite this being a "policy" subject, most the content was maths based, with not as much discussion on real world events as you might expect. That being said, you still get a great opportunity to apply the theory to the real world in the essay.

The first part (a bit over half) of the subject was pretty much all about the 3 major models covered, Ricardian, Specific Factors and Heckscher-Ohlin, with a few other concepts like terms of trades introduced. The second half of the subject involved smaller concepts/models covered at a quicker pace, such as Offshoring, the Increasing Returns to Scale model, Economic Geography, Import Tariffs, Politics and Trade and the Environment. Your knowledge of the prerequisite subject Inter Micro/ECON20002 is also very important so be sure to revise the major concepts like utility, comparative advantage, MRS, MRTS, PPF ect. if it's been a while.

Ultimately, if you enjoyed Inter Micro, was comfortable with the maths in it, and also have some interest in trade (even if it's just for a specific issue), I would highly recommend this subject.

Lectures
Pretty standard experience. Lecture slides contained the theory, explanations and examples/discussions. Reshad explained things well, and generally wrote a few things on the boards to help illustrate the content better. This was not captured, so in person attendance was required for the full experience, however you could get by without it.

Tutorials
While there were no participation marks and full solutions were released, I definitely got benefit from attending and found my tutor explained things really well. You get the tute questions beforehand, and will probably get the most out of the session trying them beforehand, but it's not the end of the world if you don't. The tute questions were not too difficult once you were on top of the content.

Tests
The assessable content for each test would be narrowed down to a set number of lectures/tutorials about a week before (basically just a range based on where we were at in the subject), and a practice test with solutions was also provided for the second test. This assessment was honestly very helpful for me personally, because when I was falling behind at the end of the semester the second test pretty much forced me to finally understand the Specific Factors and Heckscher-Ohlin model. Overall I found the tests to be very fair (Pretty much 70% or so on the basics, then the rest on harder extension type questions). Full questions/solutions were provided after each test was marked, as well as an extensive feedback report was outlining the mark distribution and common mistakes. Marks were also scaled if overall results were below the usual average (Everyone got +2/30 for the first test). The distributions for both were somewhat unusual, and had a peaks of around 25-30% of people getting H1s and another 25-30% of people getting Ps.

Essay
As mentioned above, this is the main opportunity to apply the content in this subject to the "real world". Although I'm not super political and mainly did this subject because I got the impression it'd be "mathsy", you can pick pretty much any trade topic of interest, so I was able to find something I was interested in and able to engage with. You're also able to complete this essay individually or in pairs.

You're asked to email your/your group's topic and what you intent to discuss to Reshad by the start of 6 week, and after that date he will begin to email replies assessing the suitability of the topic and making suggestions. I found his reply really helpful, and appreciate that he obviously put thought/research into his response. You're also provided with a rough template, example and detailed guide including a criteria, so there's plenty of great resources even if you're not entirely sure how to approach it. Research and referencing are required too, but most ITP students would have most likely already done OB, so the referencing wasn't too much of a learning curve.

Exam
Definitely a lot tougher than the overall standard of the tests, especially the extension type questions. There were still enough of the basics so that you'd comfortably pass the hurdle if could do the tutes (plus a 50% weighted exam is relatively low), but expect a fair amount of new/challenge questions to pop up. There were also some worded questions (mainly based on the models), as well as references to theorems from lectures you needed to know.
« Last Edit: July 02, 2019, 08:51:16 pm by M909 »
VCE, 2015-2016
BCom (Econ) @ UniMelb, 2017-2019
MCEng (Elec) @ UniMelb, 2020-?

M909

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #739 on: July 03, 2019, 10:32:24 pm »
+3
Subject Code/Name: ECON30005 Money and Banking

Workload: 2 × 1 hour lecture per week, 1 × 1 hour tutorial per week

Assessment:
Tutorial Participation, 10% (5% attendance, 5% actual participation)
2 × Assignments, 10% each
End of semester exam, 70% (Hurdle)

Lecture Capture Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture

Past exams available:  Yes, 4 recent ones with full solutions

Textbook Recommendation:  A few listed in the handbook, not needed at all unless you’re really keen on monetary policy I guess. Extra reading notes by Mei are also placed one the LMS if you feel you need more of an explanation.

Lecturer: Mei Dong

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating: 4 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1 (81)

Comments: While I honestly didn’t enjoy this subject that much for most of the semester, objectively it was well run, and would be a great choice for someone with an interest in monetary policy. Most of the actual models were highly stylised and hard to relate to the real world, but there was some discussion and questions on real events, systems, and empirical evidence. The first half of the subject focused on money, then capital, lending and banks were introduced in the second half. A lot of the models stemmed from the Overlapping Generations (OLG) Model, which helped the learning process. There was also a standalone lecture on Cryptocurrency, as well as a special lecture by Dr. Gianni La Cava from the RBA which I felt was a great addition.

Although this is a macro subject, knowledge of micro is important too (particularly utility and the substitution effect), hence both Inter Macro and Micro are prerequisites for this subject.

Lectures:
Most of us already knew Mei from Inter Macro, who is a great lecturer who explains things well. Slides were helpful in the learning process too.

Tutorials:
Tutorial questions were (usually) released a few days before the lecture, and you were encouraged to try the questions beforehand. Tutorial sheets (as well as assignments and exams) followed a very set structure of 5 True/False/Uncertain questions (explanations were more important though, and some answers could be both uncertain and true or false depending on the justification), then 2-4 longer calculation and/or worded questions. Most of them weren’t too bad once you knew the content. My tutor was really good too.

Assignments:
The first was individual, but for the second you could work in groups of 1-3 people within your tutorial. However, both assignments were pretty similar in terms of difficulty and quantity, although it helps having more people to check/confirm. Despite the 2000 word total listed in the handbook, there were no word limits imposed, and you just had to answer the T/F/U and extended questions. Assignments also required a tiny bit of research. Were a bit harder than the tutorial stuff overall. The feedback provided was helpful, explaining why I’d lost marks/how to gain full marks, and even extras for some questions I did get full marks for.

Exam
At least from what I saw/heard, a lot of us found this year’s exam quite tough, and I honestly think they scaled it based on my final score. The exam requires you to be familiar with and able to use the models presented (Standard OLG, Lucas, Random Reallocation ect.) and systems (E.g. The Central Bank), as well as knowing particular key results for the T/F/U questions. There was also a question on Cryptocurrencies and the special lecture. A thorough review of lectures, tutorials should be enough to get you a decent score. The past exams helped consolidate my knowledge and refocus my study too.
VCE, 2015-2016
BCom (Econ) @ UniMelb, 2017-2019
MCEng (Elec) @ UniMelb, 2020-?

dankfrank420

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #740 on: July 04, 2019, 12:17:14 pm »
+2
Subject Code/Name: CVEN90049: Structural Theory and Design 2
https://handbook.unimelb.edu.au/2019/subjects/cven90049 

Workload:  1 2hr lecture, 1 1hr lecture and a 1hr tute per week

Assessment: 
3 smaller assignments totalling 20%
Design assignment worth 10%
Exam worth 70%

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture

Past exams available:  Yes, going back all the way to 2012 – with full solutions!!!

Textbook Recommendation:  No textbook, but you’ll need to print out AS3600, AS4100 and the OneSteel sheet.

Lecturer(s): Elisa Lumantarna and Tai Thai

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating: 4 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1

Comments:

The subject is split up into three sections – reinforced concrete (slabs, beams, columns and pre-stressing), steel structures (beams, columns and connections) and structural analysis (direct stiffness method, moment distribution method and influence line diagrams).

Having come from STAD 1, you should be familiar with some of the preliminary concepts of the reinforced concrete and steel sections. STAD 2 steps it up a notch and teaches you how to go about solving questions using the standards (which brings it in line with industry practise). The lectures for these sections were uninspiring - not a slight on the lecturer as Elisa was pretty engaging, more in the sense that the content itself was pretty dry. They basically entailed Elisa going through the physical principles that underpin various phenomena, then pointing you to the part of the standards that you’ll have to employ to answer questions. Not much “understanding” is actually required here, it’s more of a case of knowing how to work through the mechanical process.

The analysis part of the course (taken by Tai Thai) was much more difficult in my opinion. It required the memorisation of some pretty esoteric stuff and the processes to solve for bending moments and shear were quite involved. The only real way to learn is to smash out tonnes of practise questions. Thankfully, the lectures and tutorials are stuffed full of worked examples so you should be able to figure it out eventually.

A huge positive for this subject is how well coordinated it is. Tutorial questions align well with the content taught in lectures, the assignments assist in learning, and the teaching staff are more than willing to help you learn. Abdallah (who you’ll remember from STAD 1) seemingly monitors the discussion boards 24/7 and is very helpful with answering questions relating to content or assignments. I’ve had some shockingly taught classes over my time so it’s nice to have ample resources and support there when you need it.

Tutorials:

Tutorials were pretty standard. A tutor will solve a question infront of the class while most of the students struggle to keep up. Tutors rarely to finish on time (particularly the final portion of the course), and only covered certain portions of the assigned tutorial sheets, leaving you to figure out how to do the rest with the aid of the solutions. I reckon having two hour tutorials to go over the tutorial sheet comprehensively would be much better, considering the amount of students I talked to who struggled to absorb the content at times.

Assignments:

Probably the only reason I have to give this subject a 4/5 is the assignments.

The three smaller assignments (you work in a pair) were kind of annoying, there’s a lot of work to get through for just 20% of your grade (particularly the direct stiffness one which was needlessly difficult imo). The instructions weren't that clear and there was no marking rubric, so we were unsure as to what to include. For some reason, they also seemed to mark the "discussion" questions very harshly.

The design assignment was veeeeeeeery long. You work in groups of 6, but I had some pretty useless group mates so it was up to me and another person to smash out most of the 50 page submission. Moral of the story - choose carefully who you work with. It’s only worth 10% too, which I felt was a bit unfair considering the amount of work you’re required to put in. However, like STAD 1, they’re pretty lenient with the marking though so you should do alright.

Exam:

One thing I’m grateful for is the fact that the STAD exams are relatively standard in terms of difficulty. This isn’t calculus 2 where they’ll try and trick you up, for STAD 2 you pretty much know what every single question is going to be asking you before you open the booklet.

My one complaint with the exam this semester was its length. I normally finish most exams with heaps of time to spare, but this one I was writing the whole time and knowingly had to write down wrong answers just so I could move on. They cover absolutely mountains of content in the semester (probably most I've ever done in a single unit) and they include pretty much every aspect of it in the exam. However, they’re very lenient markers in this subject as they’re more interested in your method instead of getting the “right” answer.

Overall:

A tough (and sometimes arduous) but well taught and well supported subject. You’ll be working pretty hard all semester, but the staff are there to help. Assignments are a pain in the ass but the exam is very fair.
« Last Edit: December 05, 2020, 05:02:55 pm by dankfrank420 »

clarke54321

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #741 on: July 04, 2019, 09:47:25 pm »
+2
Subject Code/Name: BLAW20001 Corporate Law 

Workload: x1 2 hour lecture, x1 1hour tutorial

Assessment: x2 online 30 minute multiple choice quizzes (5% each), x1 written assignment (15%), 2 hour written exam (75%)

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes

Past exams available:  Yes

Textbook Recommendation: Hanrahan, Ramsay, and Stapledon, Commercial Applications of Company Law

Lecturer(s): Helen Anderson

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1

Comments:

Unfortunately, the low rating has little to do with the actual course content. As an Arts student, who knows little about shares, capital maintenance, the difference between companies, and the roles of directors, this subject taught me all I needed to know within the scope of 12 weeks. The tute exercises, in conjunction with the assignment and the final exam, were practical problems that could sensibly be extended to a 'real life' scenario. I appreciated this aspect of the subject.

One of the biggest issues with this subject is the calibre of tutors. I honestly had to attend three different tute classes within the first 1.5 weeks to find a tutor that would help answer the tute questions properly. Knowing how to interpret and apply the law to these tutorial questions is absolutely vital to succeeding in the assignment and the final exam. So, it is important to find a tutor, who is more interested in solving the problems at hand rather than listening to the sound of their own voice.

My second issue with this subject was the marking. For the written assignment, I spent a fair bit of time fleshing out the issues and writing a proper legal response. However, when I received my mark it was a P. If it hadn't been for the encouragement of those around me to appeal this mark, I probably would have conceded to my essay as being an 'average' attempt. But I eventually contested the score to find that an error had indeed occurred. This took my mark to an H1. So, essentially, don't be afraid to question a mark if it seems off.

Compared to PBL and Free Speech and Media Law, this subject is treated very similar to an actual law subject. Therefore, the amount of content is quite a shock. However, if you dedicate a few hours every week to sorting out the law and issues, you should be able to build up a firm foundation. This isn't a subject that you can cram for with a written exam worth 75%. A proper understanding of the Corporations Act is needed to pick up on the issues embedded in the factual scenarios.

Ultimately, it's a real shame that the internal workings of this subject were poor. Put that aside, and the content was presented clearly and the LMS page offered various resources (ie. past exams, sample assignment and a subject guide) that were quite helpful.
« Last Edit: July 04, 2019, 09:52:42 pm by clarke54321 »
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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #742 on: July 05, 2019, 12:27:53 am »
+2
Subject Code/Name: KORE10001 , Korean 1

Workload: x2 2 hour lecture

Assessment:
Written work in Korean, 600 words (25%),
Two oral assessments, total 800 words (20%),
A cultural discovery project, 800 words (15%),
A 2-hour written examination, 1800 words (40%),

Lectopia Enabled: No

Past exams available: No

Textbook Recommendation: Ewha 1-1 Korean textbook and workbook

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H2B

Comments:
Okay, if you're wanting to do Korean just because you're interested in Kpop or Korean dramas do NOT do this subject. This is honestly not an easy subject and you really have to spend time and effort in order to do somewhat well. Personally, I found that it was crucial to be able to write in Korean before starting Korean as from the second lesson onwards you're already forming sentences and learning heaps of vocabulary. So I'd recommend having a solid foundation of the Korean alphabet and being able to read and write Korean before starting this subject. Also as Korean is an alphabet- the writing system is much like the English spelling system so it honestly would take only a day max to do the above suggestions.

As there are 2 spoken assessments-  I'd recommend singing Korean songs whilst reading the lyrics in hanguel (not romanisation pls). Also, doing this as you start Korean will really help, because the pronunciation is so important and its very easy to slip up. Reading the lyrics in korean is also very beneficial, as especially in the exam there is ALOT to read, so if you increase your reading speed it'd help you greatly with time. I'd also recommend watching Korean tv shows just to get the hang of how the sentences are structured and how the words are pronounced. Additionally, as there's just so much vocabulary, I'd recommend making a quizlet for all the topics covered.

Classes: Honestly the content was relatively interesting, but pretty fast paced. However I found that too much time was spent on learning about the significant historical Korean figures, it would've been better to utilise that time to practice our speaking skills.

Assessments: Most were hard but doable, as long as you understand the grammar and vocabulary it's honestly not that difficult to pass at the least. However, one of the orals in particular would be incredibly difficult to score well in if there was no assistance given, as we had to write a whole paragraph on a Korean historical figure. The thing is, you have to remember that this is meant to be beginner Korean, but this assessment was asking us to talk about warships, or in my case turtle ships, weaponry, shields which are NOT covered in the textbook.

Exam: Okay, the exam was difficult. The amount of vocabulary that we were expected to know was more than what was included in the textbook and as no dictionary was permitted; let's just say that there were quite a few unknown words. Basically, what I'm saying is that you need to know about basically every word that is mentioned in class, because they can put anything into that exam so just keep that in mind. Also for the exam you really have to know your sentence structures well, because well, in this years case, we had to write a whole whopping paragraph (300 characters) on a significant Korean historical figure. Although we had to do that in one of the orals, I personally think that it was a bit unfair as we were not given any warning and was told that the most we had to write would be 2 sentences. Yeah, its safe to say that I'm pissed.

tldr: do this subject only if you have a genuine passion for Korean because the workload is substantially heavy.

« Last Edit: July 06, 2019, 09:50:55 am by walnut »
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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #743 on: July 05, 2019, 02:00:44 am »
+2
Subject Code/Name:
COMP10001 Foundations of Computing

Workload: 
Three one hour lectures and two non-mandatory tutorials of one hour each. Tutorial one is in a class setting where lecture content is revised. Tutorial two is going through course content with tutors roaming around in a computer lab.

Assessment: 
30% Projects (x3)
10% Mid-semester test
10% Grok worksheets (A tailored version of khan academy)
50% Final exam

Lectopia Enabled:
Yes, with screen capture

Past exams available:
Yes, 7 exams with solutions and a few more without.

Textbook Recommendation:
None needed.

Lecturer(s):
Tim Baldwin and Nic Geard as well as some guest lecturers.

Year & Semester of completion:
2019 Semester 1

Rating: 
5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
93

Comments:
This is a very well taught subject.
Lecture content is useful and engaging, however, most of the actual LEARNING of python is likely to be done through the grok website.
Every week, two "worksheets" will be assigned online to be completed. Some have questions that are likely to take time to think about or wrap your head around, so try to get them done well before the deadline.
Projects are also to be completed through the grok website, in a similar vein to the worksheets. The difference being that project's questions will all relate and lead into one another to eventually form a bigger system.
This subject does ramp up in difficulty quite quickly, the first time you're introduced to a project, it'll probably seem really intimidating, but with enough time committed, they can all be done well.
As long as you've been keeping up to date on the worksheets, the mid-semester test should pose no problem.
Going through old papers for the exam and brushing up on python syntax on grok is also very useful.
2018 ATAR: 97.55
2017: Biology [37] | Chinese SL [36]
2018: English [40] | Methods [40] | Specialist [33] | Physics [36]

clarke54321

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #744 on: July 05, 2019, 02:17:36 pm »
+1
Subject Code/Name: LING20011 Grammar of English

Workload: x2 1 hour lectures, x1 1 hour tutorial

Assessment: x2 problem solving assignments (worth 25% each), x8 tutorial exercises (worth 10% in total), x1 written exam (worth 40%)

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes

Past exams available:  A sample exam was provided.

Textbook Recommendation:  Student's Introduction to English Grammar, Huddleston & Pullum, 2005 Cambridge University Press

Lecturer(s): Peter Hurst

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating:  4.5 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1

Comments:

Whether you are a Linguistics major/minor student, Arts student, or a student from a different faculty altogether, Grammar of English is an excellent subject choice. While the Secret Life of Language might help you for the first week or two of the subject, no previous linguistics experience is necessary to score well in this subject. What I did find helpful, however, was the background knowledge of a second language. If you are a native speaker of English, learning the grammar fundamentals can be such an abstract process. Therefore, if you have something concrete to compare the grammar to (like a second language), the content is made much easier to digest.

Peter is a highly knowledgeable lecturer. He explains the concepts in an understandable manner, and is willing to stop and answer any questions during lectures and tutorials. While his 'spontaneous questioning' approach to teaching the content may seem confronting at times, it really does force you to question whether you have understood the content.

The assignments, tutorial questions and exam are all intimately related. In terms of difficulty, the tutorial questions provide the fundamental basis for what are quite difficult assignment questions. While the exam felt more like the tutorial questions, the multiple choice questions were very tricky (about 8 different options, where more than 1 answer might apply). The good news is that all assessments correspond nicely with the lecture content. This means that if you diligently attend/listen to lectures, there should be no surprises.

One of the biggest keys for success in this subject is learning how to justify your answers. There are several 'tests' that are applied in this subject to identify forms/functions, which are important across all the assessments. While Peter repeatedly goes through these tests in the lectures and tutes, it is essential that you learn how to formalise your explanations. The tutorial answers provide great templates for this. So, after every tutorial check to see whether your answers are similar to those posted on the LMS.

The only thing I can really fault with this subject was perhaps a lack of clarity with what was expected in the first assignment. I lost several marks for not being detailed enough in some explanations. However, this was corrected in the second assignment, where examples were provided.
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clarke54321

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #745 on: July 05, 2019, 03:56:22 pm »
+2
Subject Code/Name: GERM20007 German 5 

Workload:  x1 2 hour language seminar, x1 1 hour conversation class, x1 1 hour cultural studies class

Assessment: x1 MST (15%), x1 oral presentation (5%), x1 written vocabulary work (5%), x1 in-class test for cultural studies option (12.5%), x1 presentation for cultural studies option (12.5%), x1 written exam (40%)

Lectopia Enabled:  NA

Past exams available:  None

Textbook Recommendation:  Anne Buscha and Szilvia Szita, B Grammatik. Leipzig, Schubert Verlag.

Lecturer(s): Daniela Mueller is the subject coordinator.

Year & Semester of completion: Semester 1, 2019

Rating:  4 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: H1

Comments:

Contrary to previous reviews, German 5 was a very enjoyable subject. The reasoning behind this difference probably comes down to the changes made to the subject in 2019. There are no more lectures for this subject, but instead a conversation class and a cultural studies option. The cultural study options all seemed extremely interesting. They consisted of Deutsch lernen durch Deutsch lehren, Tragic Heroines in German, Intensive Grammar, and Road Movies.

In relation to the language seminars, a new theme packet would be released every 3-4 weeks for every new topic. Every week you cover a new text, which you read as a class and answer comprehension questions about. There is also a new grammatical concept that is introduced. Unfortunately, the grammatical concepts are fairly fundamental; leaving little scope to improve your written German. The grammar includes adjective endings, prepositions, and different clause types.

The conversation class provides a break from the abstract and less conversational notions of German culture. During these classes, you are exposed to a range of everyday, conversational contexts and accompanying discourse markers. The practical nature of this class is therefore useful if you are planning to finish at German 5 and travel to Germany to work or study in the future.

For the cultural study options, I chose the Learning by Doing option. You essentially learn the different teaching methodologies and pedagogues behind teaching German as a foreign language (all in German, of course). After developing this theoretical knowledge, we were then able to prepare and conduct an actual teaching session in front of the class. While it seems daunting, you are only teaching for 10 minutes. The student-driven focus in this class therefore made for very entertaining teaching sessions. And while this option is great if you intend to become a German teacher in the future, it is equally as valuable if you are wanting to learn more about your own preferred learning methods.

The exam for German 5 is fair. It tests all the weeks of the language seminar, focussing predominantly on the texts studied, the grammar introduced, and the relevant vocabulary.

In conjunction with the somewhat rudimentary grammar tested, my only other issue with this subject was the vagueness surrounding assessment. At times, the LMS failed to make it clear what was exactly expected of you.
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beaudityoucanbe

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #746 on: July 06, 2019, 10:21:05 am »
+2
Subject Code/Name: BLAW10001 Principles of Business Law

Workload: One 2 Hour Lecture

Assessment:
On-line Quiz (1) Multiple Choice Individual 10%
On-line Quiz (2) Multiple Choice Individual 10%


End-of-Semester Exam Multiple Choice 80%

Lectopia Enabled: yes

Past exams available: no, youre given 1 practice exam with solutions, not a past exam

Textbook Recommendation: Recommended: Lambiris and Griffin, First Principles of Business Law, 2017/10th edition (‘FPBL’)
Must buy - you are required to learn cases which are only available in the text book, there can be as many as 20 in a week or as few as 5
You might be able to get a second hand copy (just dont rely too heavily on the textbook, just use the cases)

Lecturer(s): Tanya Josev (Lecturer) and Will Phillips ("tutor")

Year & Semester of completion: 2019 Semester 1

Rating: 3.5/5
I hated not having tutorials, youre left in the dark not knowing what you know cause youre given no questions. Other than that a 5/5 subject

Comments:
Subject Outline:
First few weeks give you background info, the very basics of the origin of law, how law is made etc
Focus of the subject is contract law, you spend 4 weeks on this (how its made, whats in a contract, breaches, remedies)
Then you get into Tort Law - specficially negligence

Lectures:
Brilliantly taught, Tanya is extremely knowledgable and explains everything very well. Great lecturer.
She goes through content for, usually, the first hour and also links it back to cases in the textbook (which you should buy)
After the break, youll go through a "tutorial". You have a very short fake case and she will ask questions about it linked with the content you just learnt. There was a decent bit of participation (2 or 3 people wanting to answer, and theyre always different)

Tutorials:
This is what i hated about this subject. There are none. To be fair, since all assessment is multiple choice, i see how theres no need for them. I personally like to have questions to complete and get feedback and see how well i am understanding the content rather than waiting for the assessment to see if im doing well or understand nothing.
That being said, you have access to Will, the PBL Tutor. You can send him questions about anything but he wont respond to questions like "hows a contract made?" - you have to ask "specific" questions like "whats thw dofference between x and y". He will give you incredibly detailed answers and is very usefull. He also wants you to explain what you understand/think.

Assessments:
1st quiz - 100% theory. All questiona have 4 answers and can be easily answered, especially with good notes. Some questions were based on legislation. I finished with about 20 minutes remaining

2nd quiz - 20% theory, 80% casee. This was hard. Read all the cases you have learnt so far before starting. Have all the cases easily accessible (in word document). Majority of questions are longer, giving y9u a short scenario and will ask "which case will the defendant (or plaintiff) rely on?" And 4 cases are listed. If you dont know them, you will struggle with time. I had a word document of all cases summed up in 2 lines of facts, 1 of the judgement/outcome. Searching for cases made it easier and quicker. The time constraint makes this hard and sometimes wording can be tricky. Some questions were based on legislation. I JUST managed to finish in time

Exam
Mixture of questions based on legislation, theory and cases.
I found the legislation questions the harded because you really have to focus on the wording. The answers look identical but are vastly different, the first 5 were legislation so i skipped them and finished it later.
Questions were similar in style to the quizzes, some were cases, some theory etc.
You get to bring in a double sided typed or handwritten "cheat sheet". 4 size font is actually very easy to read. I managed to squeez my cases on one side and my notes on the other side. You may refer to it a decent bit (to make sure youre thinking of the correct case) but the notes side was pretty much left untouched. There were a few tricky questions to distinguish h1s, but if you can make solid notes you'll be fine.
You also are able to mark the question booklet in reading time. Threres no point in reading, just answer straight away (you couldnt shade answers in thr answer booklet though so please be careful and dont rush shading the 10 or so answers you have cause i made a mistake and realised i straight up skipped the first answer and shaded q2 as q1, q3 as q2 so on so that wasted a bit of time trying to fix it.

Mark 85% overall, not an overly difficult subject - incredibly interesting though


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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #747 on: July 07, 2019, 09:09:44 pm »
+2
Subject Code/Name: ECON10004: Introductory Microeconomics

Workload: 2x 1 hour lectures and 1x 1 hour tutorial per week

Assessment:
1) Online MCQ 5%
2) Assignment 1 10%
3) Assignment 2 15%
4) Tutorial participation 10%
5) Exam 60% (hurdle to pass)

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture

Past exams available:  Yes, many. The course has changed a lot over time though (it got a lot harder in my opinion) so don't bother doing anything more than 2 years back. The course was also changed in 2019 to include/exclude some topics, so make sure you double check with the tutors/lecturers before going on a wild goose chase.

Textbook Recommendation: There were textbooks but I didn't buy it? (it was my breadth lol)

Lecturer(s): Phil McCalman, Tom Wilkening

Year & Semester of completion: 2019, Semester 1

Rating: 3 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
Overall grade: 65 (H3)
Assesment marks: MCQ 7/8 (H1), Assignment 1 53/60 (H1), Assignment 2 47/60 (H2A), Tutorial 10/10 (TBC), Exam 30/60 (TBC) - yes I bombed the exam, more on that later

Comments:
This is my breadth so I put very minimal efforts into it (I do science, way too many contact hours with my core subjects to have time for it) but regardless it was still quite an enjoyable subject. I did VCE Economics and there was indeed a LOT of overlap, but the exception was that there is a LOT more maths involved. The hardest level of maths involved I'd say would be derivatives and understanding graphs.

Content
Topics covered were:
- Demand and supply (and market equilibrium)
- Elasticity (includes cross-product elasticity)
- Welfare (consumer and producer welfare)
- Government intervention (taxes, quotas and property rights)
- Externalities
- Firm theory (short and long run)
- Different types of markets (perfect, imperfect, monopoly, monopsony)
- Price discrimination
- Game theory (simultaneous and sequential games)

If some of these sound familiar to you then you're probably right - yes they're exactly the same as VCE Economics. For those of you who didn't do VCE Economics (or have forgotten) the first part of the course is basically just teaching you that in a perfect world everyone is rational and seeks to gain the most economic benefit for themselves. From this, basic economic models of demand and supply are formed and consumers/producers react accordingly to different events (e.g. if the price is higher there would be less people wanting to buy and more people wanting to sell - most follow this simple logic).

The next part of the course teaches you how to measure the collective benefit of consumers and producers, and how the government 'intervene' with the market in order to produce a more desirable outcome or boost welfare. The reason why they do this is because of externalities - or spillover costs or benefits to third parties who were not originally involved in the trade (e.g. pollution).

The second last part is firm theory (yuck). I found this part the hardest and dryest part of the course - most of it hinges on the fact that firms wants to maximise profits, but there were so many graphs involved which made it really confusing. At the end of the day, the concepts all made logical sense but there was a lot of drawing and interpreting graphs and it is really easy to get them mixed up (e.g. AVC and ATC sounds very similar, but they mean different things - average variable cost and average total cost) The only interesting bit about this part was price discrimination, which is where firm charge different prices for different consumers. Really makes you think about the world and how it operates.

The last and my favourite part of the course would have to be game theory. If you've ever heard of the prisoners' dilemma it is basically that, but explored in depth. My absolute favourite part of the course because it is without a doubt applicable to other areas in life, and it does help you think more strategically and clearly in situations of doubt.

Lecturers
I had Tom and never went to any of Phil's lectures. Tom has an engineering background so he does an absolutely brilliant and methodical job of explaining concepts, and even tells when you don't really need to learn something (because it is only a secondary explanation for the concept being taught, and that if you don't understand it you can just 'throw out' the second explanation).

Assessments
I found the assignments to be fine, though typing up mathematical calculations were a massive pain. They were both based on concepts covered in lectures. The second assignment was a lot harder than the first, but the lecturers gave a lot of helpful hints about it. There were also assignment 'consultation' sessions that you can go to if you are stuck.

There was also a practice text for the online MCQ, and also a lecture-style review session before the actual test. I found the review session particularly useful as not only was it explained why a/b/c/d/e was the right answer, but also why the other answers were wrong. For the actual test I highly recommend doing a 'cheat sheet' because I found it extremely helpful to just have one page of crucial information right in front of me.

Tutorials
Huge pain in the backside having to attend them. While they were easy marks, I felt that most of the time they were extremely slow and because NO ONE wanted to answer any questions there was no actual discussions involved. I think you could miss one or two tutorials before it affects your tutorial marks, and you could also do a 'replacement' tutorial but would have to discuss it in advance with your regular tutor.

You were also assessed on whether or not you attempt the pre-tute questions on Top-Hat (doesn't matter if you get it correct or not). Top-Hat was an online platform newly introduced this year, and I disliked it very much. You have to pay for it in order to access it at home, but there some free-access zones like Ballieu, FBE and The Spot. Don't spend any money on it and just do the pre-tute questions before class like I did. Pre-tute questions takes about 30 minutes if you actually try, and 2 minutes if you just put in random answers. Just make sure that the pre-tute questions aren't actually closed when you're doing them, because this means that it will show up as 0% attempted and you will lose tutorial marks for it (I had to email my tutor because she kept closing them the day before my tute and when I did them before my tute my attempts were not counted).

Exam
The exam was extremely hard this year and it ended being scaled up. The MCQs were reasonable, but the short and long answer sections covered topics that were only touched on in one lecture (for example, monopsony, competitive fringe). Even if you really enjoyed this subject and had a solid understanding of most of the concepts in this subject, you will just have to pray to the Gods that the exam covers what you're good at. Looking at past exams you will understand what I mean - it really is a mixed bag in regards to what they focus on, and it heavily depends on the year. But like I've said at the beginning, don't go back any further than 2 years because the scope of this subject has really changed. I think I did a 2016 exam and it was mostly about concepts and explaining concepts, as opposed to what it is now which is drawing graphs and interpreting graphs.

Final Thoughts
I have always liked economics and this subject certainly didn't ruin my love for it. However, if you are looking for a WAM booster breadth, this is NOT it. If you are doing this because it's a prerequisite, pray to all of your God(s) that your exam will not be hard (but it most likely will be hard). If you are just genuinely curious/interested in economics, I would recommend just googling some of the topics I mentioned and satisfying your curiosity that way instead of ruining your WAM.
2016-2017: VCE - Vietnamese | Chemistry | Methods | Specialist | Literature | Economics

2019: Bachelor of Science @ University of Melbourne
SM1 - ECON10004, BIOL10004, MAST10007, CHEM10009

huy8668

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #748 on: July 10, 2019, 11:49:28 am »
+2
Subject Code/Name: MAST30020 Probability for Inference

Workload:  Weekly lectures x 3, tutorials x 1, assignments x 1 (total of 10 assignments). Assignments consist of problems to complete and a summary sheet to write up.

Assessment:  30% Assignments and 70% Exam

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture etc.

Past exams available:  Yes, 2 past exams with solutions. We were given the 2012 and 2013 while the lecturer discussed the 2017 with us together.

Textbook Recommendation:  Alan Karr - Probability. It is ok, it gives a different perspective and aid with independent learning.

Lecturer(s): Konstantin (Kostya) Borovkov

Year & Semester of completion: 2019 Semester 1

Rating:  5 Out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: Wow wow hold your horses man, we just met? Jk jk, marks are discussed later, please keep reading!

Comments:

This review is aimed towards those who have completed MAST20004 Probability or MAST20006 Probability for Statistics. I will try inform readers as much as possible regarding the content of the subject while attempting to keep it relatable (I reckon just bombarding you with abstract and possibly unfamiliar terms is not so helpful). After all, this is also an opinion piece as well as an objective review so my opinion and experience in the subject will be ubiquitous throughout the review, too.

You will find that the words ‘rigor’ or ‘rigorous’ will be used very often to signify how the author simply has poor vocabulary and knows no better word. More importantly though, it is to emphasise the fact that Probability for Inference is much more rigorous than Probability and really should not be taken lightly as a ‘repetition of Probability but a bit harder’. Please also note that the word ‘probability’ is used in many different ways: Probability is the subject MAST20004 Probability, probability can also be a field of mathematics or a function. It should be obvious to readers what the author means though (hopefully).

   An intuitive feel for what the subject is about
Probability for Inference (PFI) can be thought of as a more (surprise surprise) rigorous and ‘purer’ (in a mathematical sense) of MAST20004 Probability.  Though both are introductory courses to probability, one focuses more on the computation and ‘applied’ side in second year Probability while in third year PFI, topics are rigorously constructed from the ground up. Proofs are also the main focus of the subject, instead of computations. As a result, students often find PFI much more difficult due to the rigor that they are not used to seeing in a seemingly very ‘applied’ maths course. In terms of topics covered, some covered in Probability like Moment generating Functions will not be covered in PFI and conversely, PFI will introduce some new topics such as Characteristic Functions. Of course, there are still overlapping topics as they are both introductory courses, just taught from different perspective but do not be fooled in thinking that you won’t have to spend a good amount of effort for the topics you’ve already done in Probability, as the newly introduced rigor will really catch students off-guard on these seemingly elementary topics.

   Some informations on the topics covered in PFI
   Probability spaces: Here we introduce the tools required to quantify a random experiment such as different type of sample spaces, indicator functions, σ – algebra, events. A few items in this list are familiar to students of Probability though most are new. We then rigorously introduce the function P⁡(⋅) which we call a ‘probability’ and discuss its elementary + advanced properties like continuity, monotonicity, Borel – Cantelli Lemma.
   Probabilities on R: Now that we know what the function ‘probability’ is, we can talk about a specific probability, one defined on R (it’s actually defined on B(R) but I’m guessing you probably don’t care, yet, right?).
   Random Variable/Vectors: arguably, one could say that probability is the study of random variables (RV) and random vectors (RVec). This is why we introduce it here, in a rigorous fashion of course as it is what this subject revolves around. We will look at different properties of RV’s and Rvec’s (which are just the higher dimensional version of RV’s). Once done, we can introduce the concept of independence between events. Now, this is probably the right time to introduce order statistics as this subject. After all, this is Probability For Inference (meaning there will be statistics will be built on the probability foundation we’ve laid) and this is where statistics start to enter the game.
   Expectation: This is the first tool for playing around with RV’s (and Rvec’s of course).
‘Of course, it is just a repetition of expectation in second year probability and so students should probably just not worry about it and chill. Hey, maybe it’s the perfect time to catch up on other subects’ – is what I would like to say. Except that… SORRY!! DO NOT MAKE THIS MISTAKE. What you’ve been introduced to in Probability are just computational formula, not the definition of expectation. Here, we rigorouly define expectation and discuss its properties and applications.
   Conditional Expectation: Similar to expectation, one should be very careful as this is a very different animal compare to one introduced in Probability. In fact, the problems you see here in PFI regarding conditional expectation is completely different from those in Probability.
Oh and conditional expectation has a nice geometric interpretation as well, btw.
   Some applications to Statistics: Now that we’ve got all the tools we need, it is time to apply them and application to statistic is our first stop. Topics from MAST20005 Statistics like Sufficient Statistics, Neyman – Fisher Factorisation, Maximum Likelihood Estimators will be introduced (don’t worry, you do not need to have done MAST20005 Statistics before hand). Here though, we will prove them, instead of just focusing on the computational side of things. Other topics introduced include Bias Estimators, Efficient Estimators and its uniqueness, Rao – Blackwell Theorem.
   Convergence of random variables: To those of you who did not enjoy MAST20026 Real Analysis (it is a prerequisite), this topic can be a nightmare. This is probably the most ‘analysis’ part of the course. Meaning, we analyse RV’s as a function just like how we did with ‘regular’ functions in MAST20026 Real Analysis. Basically, one can have a sequence of RV’s which will converge in different ways to something as the sequence goes on forever. This is however, just a tool. The main focus are the applications of these, namely the LawS of Large Numbers, the Law of Small Numbers.
   Characteristic functions: If you enjoy computations then this topic is for you. Oh but do not forget the rigor in your computation 😊 (whatever that means). Here we are introduced to the powerful tool of Characteristic Functions (ChF) which are the older brother of Moment Generating Functions (MGF) and Probability Generating Functions (PGF). These ChF guys are guaranteed to exist (unlike MGF) and works even if the RV is not discrete (unlike PGF). The purpose of introducing these guys is to aid us in proving convergence of RV’s as the RV’s are very much married to these ChF. They go hand-in-hand together, almost.
   Further applications to Statistics: Finally, we revisit the MLE, introduce a new concept of Empirical Distribution Function (EDF) and discuss its properties. Not much to say here other than the fact that the last few slides aren't examinable.

   Lectures and lecturer
The lecturer, Kostya has written his set of slides for the entire course which he makes available at the beginning of the course. This means that we have access to the whole course lecture material from the beginning of the semester. The slides are quite informative and really, almost all of what you need to know is on there.
The lectures follow a conventional format of the lecturers going through and discussing his slides. Recordings were available, fortunately and I made extensive use of it.
Personally, I find that Kostya is a quite humorous and knowledgeable lecturer and he stands out from the other lecturers thanks to this humour that he provides in the lectures. I also quite enjoy his philosophy on studying, which I was luckily able to find out about through our conversations in his consultation. Both he and Ai Hua enjoy sharing their philosophies with students. Generally, they’re pretty cool people to be around, especially for students.

   Assignments and tutorials
There are 10 weekly assignments in addition to the weekly tutorials.  Regarding tutorials, some of the questions require experience to tackle from scratch while some are more manageable. Unlike most other maths subjects, tutors go through all the questions during tutorials from start to finish. Regarding assignments, each assignment consists of a couple of questions, which were not too lengthy. Together, the assignments account for 30% of the subject marks. Opinions on the difficulty were mixed, some students find to be rather arduous to work through while others find it ok. Depending on your style, you may wish to tackle the assignment alone or in a group. Together with the assignments, you also need to complete a summary sheet, which you have to summarise the weekly content of the lectures.
In saying this, I acknowledge that there is a popular opinion where students find the sheer volume of the assignments to be too much work. There are just too many assignments that students need to complete and some even say that one assignment in Probability (which there were only like 4 for the entire semester) did not take as long as one assignment in PFI to complete. I personally find the bolded opinion to be almost always true, though in Probability, we have to attempt problems from the booklet as well and there are no booklets in PFI so it equals out. I think it is just Kostya's way of making sure that students work on the material regularly. Now, do these 10 weekly assignments really prove to be a huge workload for students? I honestly find that this is not the case. Tutorials are provided with solutions so it is only a couple of questions per week that we have to complete. Most of the work comes from understanding the lecture material, I reckon, not the assignment question.
   Exam
The exam is quite a typical pure maths exam, with lots of proof questions and some computation questions. I hate to say this but one cannot really judge the difficulty of the exam because it really depends on the amount of resources you’ve put in during the semester. All the topics are examinable, except for the last maybe 5 – 10 slides. The first three questions follow a certain format and the questions get unpredictable onwards. It is a lengthy exam and of course, you need good speed and accuracy in order to finish it without making too many silly mistakes.
One could find the exam quite fair if one spent quite a bit of time studying the material while others may find it extremely difficult as they could not give a fair share of their time to the subject. Long story short, the harder + smarter you study, the better you do. Question is, what is studying smart?
I’ve been trying to answer this question for a very long time now, and to avoid making this review too long, the short generic answer I can personally give is that do not spam exams and learn exams for revision. Revise the lecture notes and tutorials and assignments, rather. Exams should be employed but only as a ‘sharpening tool' and not a replacement for the knife making machine – lecture notes, tutorials, assignments. In addition, please do not make the mistake of predicting exams. I’d love to go on but this is digressing. Please shoot me a pm should you like to discuss these studying techniques. I’m very interested!
   Final thoughts
All I can really say is that PFI is a very similar animal to Probability and yet, incredibly different. One could say that PFI is much more difficult but it is best left for the current students of the subject to judge it for themselves. Like most subjects, if you spend resources and have good studying strategies, you’ll find the subject ok. On the other hand, if you do not have a quite strong maths background nor studying strategies, for example, you’ll find that this is a nightmare. To do well in PFI, you’d need to put in a lot of work but this is also the case for Probability. Likewise, it is not too difficult to score above a 70 in PFI either, provided that you put in an honest effort. Of course, one might initially find PFI to be seemingly more difficult due to the rigor but like most things, one eventually will get the hang of it and things become much more manageable.
Personally, I put in quite a bit of effort into this subject and in hindsight, I found everything to be quite fair. Frankly, I knew the material (lecture slides, tutorials, assignments) quite well. However, it took me the first few weeks to get the hang of everything which made my few initial assignments suffered quite a bit. Thankfully, things eventually clicked and I worked even more diligently as the semester progresses, putting me at a 27/30. On the exam, although frankly, the questions were doable if given enough time, my lack of exam experience did not allow me to complete them all within the given constraint, giving me a final grade of 88/100.
« Last Edit: July 18, 2019, 03:08:29 pm by huy8668 »

tiffanylps09

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Re: University of Melbourne - Subject Reviews & Ratings
« Reply #749 on: July 17, 2019, 05:59:39 pm »
+3
Subject Code/Name: PHYC10005: Physics 1 Fundamentals 

Workload: 
3x 1 hr lectures & 1x 1 hr problem based per week,
8x 2.5 hr pracs & 10x weekly homework assignments throughout the sem

Assessment: 
Practicals 25%
Ten weekly assignments (10 x 1.5% = 15%)
3-hour written examination in the examination period (60%)

Lectopia Enabled:  Yes, with screen capture.
** the lecturer does demonstrations during the lecture that you might not get to see if you watch at home

Past exams available:  Yes, 11 past year papers, however for some of the older exams we were only provided short answers w/o the explanation

Textbook Recommendation: 
Textbook : Optional /
Green Handbook : Used for Pracs & Tutes (or you could just print them yourself) /
Blue Lab Book : They make you buy it to write your reports in.

Year & Semester of completion: 2019 Semester 1

Rating:  2 of 5

Your Mark/Grade: One mark away from a H1  >:(

Comments:
**This subject was compulsory for my major (Animal Health) / I have a love-hate relationship with Physics having dropped it in Year 11 thinking I'll never have to do it ever again. HAH.  :'(

Lectures: I went to the first few but then towards the end of the semester I just couldn't be bothered.
Some of the lecturers try to make it exciting with demonstrations and stuff which are funny to watch at times.

Tutorials: They were okay. I attended most of them to catch up on stuff since I didn't really go to lectures.
I had Jame as my tutor, he was cool and funny. He does a short explanation at the start of the tute then let's us just do the exercises on our own. So if you want help with a specific question, ASK cos he doesn't explain any of them unless someone asked.
**the guy also baked us cookies one time, it was nice

Assignments: Easy with the help of google and the option to practice until you get it right.

Practicals: The worst part of the whole subject.
Firstly, out of the 12 weeks in the semester, 8 weeks you'll have a Physics Prac. Compared to the 5 in Biol 10004 and 6 in Chem 10003, just that alone made a lot of people hate it so much. Including me. The Pracs are draining and most times the content of the Prac has not even been touched on in lectures. So, you go in knowing close to nothing and if your demonstrator wasn't great at explaining the concept, you and your partner(s) are on your own. This was what happened to me. My demonstrator was new and very inexperienced. My partner and I had to just refer to the handbook and try to work out how the concept worked. Having to do that AND physically do the experiment (which it tends to consist of multiple sections) AND write out a report AND draw diagrams AND print out results AND identify limitations etc. I dreaded each Prac and my scores started off pretty bad, but hey, it got better towards the end. My advice would be to really look at the experiments before going in and understand how to explain the physics behind each of them. OR you could just get a demonstrator that really helps you out with the concepts.

Exam: So back to the point I made about me not really catching up with lectures. (I ended up only reading lecture slides)
Physics had really dropped to the bottom of my priorities. I was spending all my time studying for other subjects that by the time it came to 2 days before the exam, I had my first uni burnout. Looked at the practice exam and just couldn't be bothered with them. I ended only actually completing 1 out of 11 of the past years (all by myself, no peeking at answers). The day of the exam, I had to wake up before dawn sit a 8:30am exam. At that point, I had completely given up. But, when I opened the exam paper to attempt the questions, my first thought was "Damn, this is easy". Now, I'm not saying that not studying for an exam is good but, I honestly was so surprised. I was expecting to be completely screwed over but I ended up being able to answer every question to an extent. My advice would be not to aim to complete all the past years as some of the questions are basically repeated over and over. I think determining what kind of questions that always appear will really help. Also, the physics department had revision sessions during swotvac which I did attend to at least make an effort to not fail the subject. It was basically a crash course that summed up the whole semester. That was useful.

Final Words:
I definitely did not enjoy this experience. But I guess the exam made up for it. To whoever who attempts this subject, I wish you all the best. And if you're like me and don't have a choice, don't stress, you'll meet loads of people who are the same and you guys can become friends through the mutual hate for the pracs YAY. If you need more detailed advice, feel free to message me.  ;D

« Last Edit: July 17, 2019, 06:02:56 pm by tiffanylps09 »
2018 : VCE
EAL | Maths Methods | Chemistry | Biology | Environmental Science | Indonesian 2nd Language
2019 : BSci @ UoM
CHEM 10003 | BIOL 10004 | PHYC 10005 | MGMT 10002
CHEM 10004 | BIOL 10005 | BIOL 10001 | ANSC 10001