Marek Biskup
Department of Mathematics
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2.3
Overall Rating
Based on 43 Users
Easiness 1.3 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Clarity 2.4 / 5 How clear the class is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Workload 1.4 / 5 How much workload the class is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Helpfulness 2.7 / 5 How helpful the class is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

TOP TAGS

  • Tough Tests
  • Tolerates Tardiness
GRADE DISTRIBUTIONS
24.6%
20.5%
16.4%
12.3%
8.2%
4.1%
0.0%
A+
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
C-
D+
D
D-
F

Grade distributions are collected using data from the UCLA Registrar’s Office.

ENROLLMENT DISTRIBUTIONS
Clear marks

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Reviews (30)

2 of 3
2 of 3
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Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
May 12, 2017

During one of his earlier lectures Professor Biskup did one of the simplest calculations he did during the entire class. If yearly tuition at UCLA is ~$12,000 and you take 4 classes per quarter, you are spending about $1,000 on each class. His goal, he said, was to ensure that you get your money's worth. This he truly did. His lectures and homeworks make you think and think hard. The goal is to make you actually come to office hours, so you can discuss the problems and different ways to solve them with your TA, or Professor Biskup himself. One thing that I regret about this class is that it wasn't the only class I was taking. I took this class with three other time consuming classes and was not able to really focus on it as much as I would have liked. Every problem is intended to, as Biskup said, "address a different issue". Nothing is excessive work or tedious practice. Everything will push you to the limits of your mathematical ability and you will find yourself doing problems you thought were nearly impossible by the end of the course.
The path to an A is straightforward and reliable, but requires a huge amount of time.
1. Do every homework
2. Understand every homework problem
3. Go to office hours for the homework (if you think you solved the problem on your own, you should still see how the professor intended you to solve it, or the way one of the TAs solved it)
4. Before exams, put aside 3 hours to reread your notes from the portion of the class he will be testing and as I said before, UNDERSTAND THE HOMEWORK PROBLEMS.
If you put in the 15+ hours a week this takes, you will be in good shape.

The homework and exams in this class were extremely fairly graded and if you lose points, you deserved to.
All of that being said, you should not decide to take this class lightly. Only take it if you really want to understand math and are willing to devote a lot of time to that undertaking.
A lot of people drop this class during the quarter. By the end, the only people left are people who missed the drop date or who actually want to learn. This makes for a dangerous curve, but those who put in the most time will be the ones to get an A.
Now with this review and all the others, it should be pretty clear what you are in for. Either get to work or don't take this class. How well you do is in proportion to the work you put in. Please don't be one of the people who complains that the class is impossible just because they didn't put in the effort.

Helpful?

1 5 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2020
Grade: N/A
May 21, 2020

I am currently selling the Calculus: Single Variable 3rd edition loose-leaf textbook by Rogawski/Adams (ISBN **********397) for $30.

If interested, feel free to contact me at *************

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
Nov. 10, 2017

This is a class for people who are genuinely interested in math. If this is a requirement you are not necessarily looking forward to taking, Biskup in NOT the professor for you. However, if you are a math major or you if you really enjoy math and want to understand everything (not superficially learn how to solve trivial problems) then TAKE THIS CLASS! It will be a challenge, but you will learn if you are willing to work harder than you would for a usual lower division math class. He encourages you to think, rather than memorize solutions. He does his best to explain why things work; basically, he teaches real mathematics, not a 101 on solutions. I definitely recommend this class to everyone who likes to think and enjoys a challenge.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: C+
Sept. 11, 2017

So Biskup stresses on office hours as being the key to doing well in this class because without going to them you can't answer any of the homework questions which the midterm/final questions are taken from. Hey Biskup how about you teach it right the first time?

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
May 30, 2017

Gaand phat gayi but bahut maza aaya.

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
May 4, 2017

This class was very challenging for me, but in the end I learned so much, and I learned a proper way of thinking about math. The homework problems are very tricky, and take a lot of time to figure out. The best way to do these problems and succeed in this class is to read the textbook and do the HW by yourself. Study groups may save time, but in order to understand the material on the level necessary to do well on the hard tests you need to think through the problems yourself. By trying and thinking through the problems on your own you will actually understand the material and not just get the right answer for the HW problem. You will also have to study less for the tests because after spending so much time thinking about the "why" behind the problems on the HW you will easily remember the problems and apply the same reasoning on the tests. This class requires a lot of work, but at the end you will be happy with the logic skills you learned and apply these to other classes in the future.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: N/A
April 8, 2017

DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS IF YOU ARE ONLY "GOOD" or "AVERAGE" at math. To pass this you have to be OUT OF THIS WORLD AMAZING.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: NR
April 5, 2017

Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. He teaches well, don't get me wrong but he does NOT teach the questions he tests. He explains well but his expectations and methods of teaching are ineffective. In class he will give easy examples with a relatively decent explanation but in his compulsory homework worksheets the questions are very very difficult. He does not prepare you for those questions during lectures but expects you to be able to do them for homework.

How? By going to his office hours. I think the fact that office hours are compulsory is ridiculous. Why give lectures where you do not explain questions you're testing but expect all students to come to office hours? In addition, there is a NO NOTES policy in office hours, so you cannot write his explanation of the homework questions down. I personally went to 3 experienced tutors who struggled and were even unable to answer some of the homework questions he gave. How do freshman/ sophomores answer those questions?! What if students cant go to office hours because the timing doesnt work? None of this is accounted for. Homework is important because he asks the same questions in the midterm and final. If someone cant answer the homework questions how do you get a good grade in the midterm and final? If we cant go to office hours, what is even the point of the lectures if it doesnt prepare us for what we'll be tested on?

Biskup expects students to be math prodigys. If you expect a good grade, high GPA, great understanding of integral calculus in an organized, clear manner DO NOT take his class.

I am not a bad math student and struggled with this class. If you do enroll in this class and find it difficult in th beginning DROP it or you will regret it immensely. Biskup needs to calm down and get his head back down to earth from whatever super intense math planet he's on. He has no sympathy or empathy.

Helpful?

4 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: N/A
April 4, 2017

He's a nice guy, but he's not fit to be a professor. I learned a lot, his questions were challenging, and the material was really cool. However, the workload is definitely not fair. I know people who would get 100% on the midterms, and people who would barely get half. The class was based solely on your understanding of the homework rather than your understanding of the material, which obviously sucked.

He had a lot of faith in his class. It was really sweet, but he couldn't understand why half the class was failing. Also, when you didn't understand something, he would just explain it to you one way over and over again instead of attempting to explain it in a different way. He's a genius and a genuinely sweet guy, but not a good teacher. For those coming in to the course, I recommend you memorize the procedures of the homework, and make sure you understand it just enough to solve a problem with the same numbers.

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: C+
March 25, 2017

Great instructor, but hard class. If you're not too worried about GPA take this class. You will learn a lot! Biskup cares about his students and he is quite funny. 3 midterms, if you do the HW and you understand it you should be fine. I would take his class again if I could.

Helpful?

1 2 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
May 12, 2017

During one of his earlier lectures Professor Biskup did one of the simplest calculations he did during the entire class. If yearly tuition at UCLA is ~$12,000 and you take 4 classes per quarter, you are spending about $1,000 on each class. His goal, he said, was to ensure that you get your money's worth. This he truly did. His lectures and homeworks make you think and think hard. The goal is to make you actually come to office hours, so you can discuss the problems and different ways to solve them with your TA, or Professor Biskup himself. One thing that I regret about this class is that it wasn't the only class I was taking. I took this class with three other time consuming classes and was not able to really focus on it as much as I would have liked. Every problem is intended to, as Biskup said, "address a different issue". Nothing is excessive work or tedious practice. Everything will push you to the limits of your mathematical ability and you will find yourself doing problems you thought were nearly impossible by the end of the course.
The path to an A is straightforward and reliable, but requires a huge amount of time.
1. Do every homework
2. Understand every homework problem
3. Go to office hours for the homework (if you think you solved the problem on your own, you should still see how the professor intended you to solve it, or the way one of the TAs solved it)
4. Before exams, put aside 3 hours to reread your notes from the portion of the class he will be testing and as I said before, UNDERSTAND THE HOMEWORK PROBLEMS.
If you put in the 15+ hours a week this takes, you will be in good shape.

The homework and exams in this class were extremely fairly graded and if you lose points, you deserved to.
All of that being said, you should not decide to take this class lightly. Only take it if you really want to understand math and are willing to devote a lot of time to that undertaking.
A lot of people drop this class during the quarter. By the end, the only people left are people who missed the drop date or who actually want to learn. This makes for a dangerous curve, but those who put in the most time will be the ones to get an A.
Now with this review and all the others, it should be pretty clear what you are in for. Either get to work or don't take this class. How well you do is in proportion to the work you put in. Please don't be one of the people who complains that the class is impossible just because they didn't put in the effort.

Helpful?

1 5 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2020
Grade: N/A
May 21, 2020

I am currently selling the Calculus: Single Variable 3rd edition loose-leaf textbook by Rogawski/Adams (ISBN **********397) for $30.

If interested, feel free to contact me at *************

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
Nov. 10, 2017

This is a class for people who are genuinely interested in math. If this is a requirement you are not necessarily looking forward to taking, Biskup in NOT the professor for you. However, if you are a math major or you if you really enjoy math and want to understand everything (not superficially learn how to solve trivial problems) then TAKE THIS CLASS! It will be a challenge, but you will learn if you are willing to work harder than you would for a usual lower division math class. He encourages you to think, rather than memorize solutions. He does his best to explain why things work; basically, he teaches real mathematics, not a 101 on solutions. I definitely recommend this class to everyone who likes to think and enjoys a challenge.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: C+
Sept. 11, 2017

So Biskup stresses on office hours as being the key to doing well in this class because without going to them you can't answer any of the homework questions which the midterm/final questions are taken from. Hey Biskup how about you teach it right the first time?

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
May 30, 2017

Gaand phat gayi but bahut maza aaya.

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: A
May 4, 2017

This class was very challenging for me, but in the end I learned so much, and I learned a proper way of thinking about math. The homework problems are very tricky, and take a lot of time to figure out. The best way to do these problems and succeed in this class is to read the textbook and do the HW by yourself. Study groups may save time, but in order to understand the material on the level necessary to do well on the hard tests you need to think through the problems yourself. By trying and thinking through the problems on your own you will actually understand the material and not just get the right answer for the HW problem. You will also have to study less for the tests because after spending so much time thinking about the "why" behind the problems on the HW you will easily remember the problems and apply the same reasoning on the tests. This class requires a lot of work, but at the end you will be happy with the logic skills you learned and apply these to other classes in the future.

Helpful?

0 1 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: N/A
April 8, 2017

DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS IF YOU ARE ONLY "GOOD" or "AVERAGE" at math. To pass this you have to be OUT OF THIS WORLD AMAZING.

Helpful?

1 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: NR
April 5, 2017

Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. He teaches well, don't get me wrong but he does NOT teach the questions he tests. He explains well but his expectations and methods of teaching are ineffective. In class he will give easy examples with a relatively decent explanation but in his compulsory homework worksheets the questions are very very difficult. He does not prepare you for those questions during lectures but expects you to be able to do them for homework.

How? By going to his office hours. I think the fact that office hours are compulsory is ridiculous. Why give lectures where you do not explain questions you're testing but expect all students to come to office hours? In addition, there is a NO NOTES policy in office hours, so you cannot write his explanation of the homework questions down. I personally went to 3 experienced tutors who struggled and were even unable to answer some of the homework questions he gave. How do freshman/ sophomores answer those questions?! What if students cant go to office hours because the timing doesnt work? None of this is accounted for. Homework is important because he asks the same questions in the midterm and final. If someone cant answer the homework questions how do you get a good grade in the midterm and final? If we cant go to office hours, what is even the point of the lectures if it doesnt prepare us for what we'll be tested on?

Biskup expects students to be math prodigys. If you expect a good grade, high GPA, great understanding of integral calculus in an organized, clear manner DO NOT take his class.

I am not a bad math student and struggled with this class. If you do enroll in this class and find it difficult in th beginning DROP it or you will regret it immensely. Biskup needs to calm down and get his head back down to earth from whatever super intense math planet he's on. He has no sympathy or empathy.

Helpful?

4 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: N/A
April 4, 2017

He's a nice guy, but he's not fit to be a professor. I learned a lot, his questions were challenging, and the material was really cool. However, the workload is definitely not fair. I know people who would get 100% on the midterms, and people who would barely get half. The class was based solely on your understanding of the homework rather than your understanding of the material, which obviously sucked.

He had a lot of faith in his class. It was really sweet, but he couldn't understand why half the class was failing. Also, when you didn't understand something, he would just explain it to you one way over and over again instead of attempting to explain it in a different way. He's a genius and a genuinely sweet guy, but not a good teacher. For those coming in to the course, I recommend you memorize the procedures of the homework, and make sure you understand it just enough to solve a problem with the same numbers.

Helpful?

3 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Winter 2017
Grade: C+
March 25, 2017

Great instructor, but hard class. If you're not too worried about GPA take this class. You will learn a lot! Biskup cares about his students and he is quite funny. 3 midterms, if you do the HW and you understand it you should be fine. I would take his class again if I could.

Helpful?

1 2 Please log in to provide feedback.
2 of 3
2.3
Overall Rating
Based on 43 Users
Easiness 1.3 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Clarity 2.4 / 5 How clear the class is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Workload 1.4 / 5 How much workload the class is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Helpfulness 2.7 / 5 How helpful the class is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

TOP TAGS

  • Tough Tests
    (24)
  • Tolerates Tardiness
    (17)
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