This was a very clear, organized class that was probably the best that I took this quarter (as a freshman). I did take AP Calc BC as a high school junior, so I took this as more of a refresher/easier class as my first math class here.

Prof. Arant is a very clear lecturer and explains concepts really well. I thought my high school calculus teacher was really good too, but Prof. Arant explains things more. If he is showing a proof for something during lecture, he tells you that you don't need to write it down so you're not wasting your time taking notes on something that is not on the quiz. Actually I don't think my class realized how good he was until we had a sub one day.

You do not turn in homework for this class, but you should do it after the lecture so you make sure that you understand the material. The homework is not very long - most can be done definitely under 40-60 mins especially if you just do it the night after or morning after the lecture.

Quizzes are very straightforward (only 3 questions) and very similar to the homework. You have 24 hours to do it (from Friday at 8am to Saturday at 8am) and it's on your own time outside of class. You have 30 minutes to complete the quiz and 15 minutes to scan and upload the quiz. This is more than enough time for most of the quizzes.

The midterms are during lecture time and pretty similar to homework. Most of the midterm questions are just 4-6 integration/series problems and 3 quick conceptual problems. The 2nd midterm is more difficult than the 1st one. Before the first and second midterms, he posted a worksheet of problems to practice on (the first midterm worksheet had a bunch of integration problems, the second midterm worksheet had series problems). He does not post answer keys to these worksheet problems, so just do as many as you can before the midterm and go to office hours if you want to see a solution to any of the problems. He also hosts extra office hours before midterms and the final as well.

His handwriting is very neat and pretty organized during lectures. He also posts notes if you can't make the lecture. Canvas page is very organized by week too.

Discussions have worksheets that review content of the course too. My TA was Calvin who did a quick review at the beginning of the discussion, then let us work on the worksheet, then reviewed the problems. He walked around a lot and checked in with pretty much everyone.

Overall, a really great professor especially for calculus. Never really had a bunch of homework or work outside of class, except when studying for midterms.

Prof. Arant is the better Math 31B professor. During lectures, some people might find his pace too fast. At times, it may feel like he's just solving problems on the board. For each midterm, you are allowed to use a 3-by-5-inch notecard, and you are also given a formula sheet of integrals of trig identities. The midterms are like the homework problems. The final had problems that tested small details that were not covered in the midterms.

Recs:
- Over the course of each lecture (and especially in discussion sections), try to reach a rough understanding of the greater concept (e.g., why we're doing this technique) before writing it down in your notes.
- Each lecture period is 50 minutes long. Leave longer questions during office hours (OHs) or discussion sections. Prof. Arant is significantly more helpful during OHs and takes things step-by-step there.

Advice for mistakes that I made, that I hope no one else repeats:
- Each problem on a midterm tells you how many points it's worth. If a problem is worth a lot of points (e.g., 10 points), make sure the amount of work you do is proportionate to the point value.
- Check over your answers; it's okay to use up all of the test time. It's better to sit there, look at the ceiling, and have your brain think about it than to leave early and regret it.

I took this class Fall Quarter 2025 and received an A. In comparison to the other professors teaching this course, Professor Arant is an absolute gem—you NEED to take his lecture if you want the best shot at doing well. His lectures are a bit fast-paced, and I’d sometimes fall behind on the notes, but his examples and theorem explanations were so clear that reviewing them later + watching a few YouTube videos was enough for me to fully understand the material. I didn’t take Calc BC (only AB, which I got a 5 on), and while BC students definitely have an advantage, most of the content was new to me and I still performed well.

Lectures aren’t mandatory, but people who had other professors would literally come to his lectures because he explains things so well. Homework is assigned but not mandatory—you definitely need to do it if you want to do well. If you’re ever lost in the class, he posts his notes online, there are tons of YouTube videos to help, and both he and his TAs are very helpful in office hours.

We had 5 quizzes, but they’re take-home and you have the whole day to complete them, so they’re pretty chill. There are 2 midterms and 1 final. Midterm 1 was very straightforward and the questions were all fair—class average was around 50/60. Midterm 2 was an absolute trainwreck (class average: 41/60). I got a 100 on Midterm 1 and then a 67 on Midterm 2. It was significantly harder, and some questions required really niche applications of convergence tests to get the correct answer.

This class isn’t easy, but with the right amount of work, an A is definitely achievable. Professor Arant was great and I would definitely recommend!!

Arant is one of the best math professors I have ever had. 31B isn't easy, but Arant is extremely organized, posts notes and lecture recordings, and is very clear about his expectations for his students. If you pay attention in lecture and use all of the resources he makes available, you can do really well in his class.