This post was drafted in December 2016.
- EC3332 <Money and Banking I>
Lecturer: Dr Seet Min Kok
Unrestricted Elective/ 2nd major requirement
Workload: Tutorial participation- 15%, Mid-term test- 35%, final examination- 50%. (Midterm and finals are closed book examination)
What I like about this module: Learn more about Monetary policies and strategies by banks in the financial sector. In depth analysis of the initiation of the global financial crisis in 2008. How the various decision makers in the sector can make rational (or sometimes irrational ) decisions that can affect the economy. Basic Banking strategies for asset and liabilities management.
What I dislike about this module: Content heavy!!! Need to memorize 10 lectures worth of content. The questions in the midterms (open-ended questions) and the finals are not very straightforward like those in the tutorials.
Advice/ recommendation: If you have no/ little interest in Money and Banking or you have little prior knowledge in the topic, please don’t take this module. Or else it will be a dread to study the module for midterm and final exams. It seems that the lecturer has changed his style of testing his students for the exam. It used to be a very easy module as mentioned in other module reviews written before this semester.
Grade: B-
:((((((
2. MA3110 <Mathematical Analysis II>
Lecturer: Dr Graeme Wilkin
Major requirement
Workload: Mid term test-25%, 4 home works due fortnightly from week 4- 20%, tutorial participation- 5%, Final examination- 50%
What I like about this module: Analysis module that go in depth of the theories mentioned in calculus.
What I dislike about this module: Tricky true/false questions; tough assignment questions; unclear lecture notes.
Advice/ recommendation: Try to take this module under the other prof. Under this prof, he tends to test whether you truly understand your understanding and you can only do well if you can really do so.
Grade: B
3. MA3220 <Ordinary Differential Equation>
Lecturer: Professor Yu Shih-Hsien
Major requirement
Workload: Final Examination- 45%, Mid-term test- 25%, 4 take-home assignments- 20%, Tutorial presentation- 10%
What I like about this module: Concepts are relatively easier to understand. Questions tested skew towards calculations, which are tedious, but not difficult to do.
What I dislike about this module: The prof. Prof Yu is simply one of the most disliked prof in the department. Ask the seniors. Read other module reviews. He is able to teach, but his accent is hard to comprehend. If you understand what he is trying to teach, you can see that his methods are more concise. But he has this weird and inconceivable attitude that many students cannot accept.
He would randomly pick a question for a student to present for tutorial. And ALL students must present their answers during the tutorial. This means that you would have to do ALL his ~10 tutorial questions he assigns each week. Yes, you can definitely reap the rewards of doing his tutorial, but it becomes unbearable when he insists that you use his methods. This is especially true if you cannot understand him.
Advice/ recommendation: You can try taking this module if you already have a very good CAP. Erm… not very sure whether this is true, but all of us who took this module have a feeling that he “anyhow” calculate our final grade. Students who did well for midterms had no reason to obtain a grade of only B or B- as the finals was not that unmanageable.
Most of us scored B or B- for the module. Not very sure what happened.
Grade: B
4. MA3264 <Mathematical Modelling>
Lecturer: Dr Liu Jie
Major requirement
Workload: Final examination- 50%, Mid-term test- 20%, 4 Homework Assignments- 25%, Tutorial attendance- 5%
What I like about this module: Interesting to see how DE works in real-world context- in fields such as Biology (the logistic model) and Physics. Questions in finals were modifications of questions that the prof taught in lecture and tutorials. Just do them diligently.
What I dislike about this module: –
Advice/ recommendation: No point recommending because Professor Liu Jie left NUS at the start of 2018.
5. SSA2209/PS2249/GEK2003 <Government and Politics of Singapore>
Lecturer: Assoc. Prof Bilveer Singh, Tutor: Assoc. Prof Bilveer Singh
University Requirement- Singapore Studies
Workload: Tutorial participation- 20%, Essay assignment- 30%, Final examinations- 50%
What I like about this module: The module is very “live” and talks about political issues of Singapore. The lectures are very engaging and it analyses the current political landscape of Singapore. There were 4 guest lecturers for this modules and they are MPs in the Singapore Parliament. These lecturers gave great insights to what is going on “behind the scenes” of policy making and what drives the decision to be made. Professor Bilveer Singh is very encouraging and does not dictate how we write our essays. He appreciates our analysis of the topic in the assignments.
What I dislike about this module: For tutorial participation, depending on your tutor, you may be required to comment on the political issue brought up during class. If you don’t, then you may be marked down on your participation. To make things worse, there may be students from Law who are very outspoken and hog up the entire discussion. Thank goodness I was in Prof Bilveer’s tutorial class as the class participation was graded based on a group project that he assigned to us.
Advice/ recommendation: If you are interested in politics and you have maxed out on your level 1000 limit, you can try taking this module. You just need to be aware of what is going on in the Singapore Political landscape to do well. Professor Bilveer is also kind enough to give obvious hints (in the last few lectures) on the topics that will be tested in the finals.
19tots 