MAST20029: Engineering Mathematics

3 assignments worth 5% each, the mid-semester test worth 15%, and the final exam worth 70%.

I was originally not going to review this subject, since there are already a few reviews already. However after reading through them and noticing they were mostly positive, I decided that I should review the subject since my review comes from a different perspective.

I did not take this subject because it is a core part of my major. Unlike the other Engineering Systems majors, Engineering Maths isn't required for Comp/Sci. I took this subject as an elective, purely out of interest for higher level and more applied maths than what I was exposed to in Calc1/Calc2 and Linear Algebra. That was a big mistake. More on this later. First, onto the actual subject.

This subject is apparently supposed to introduce the mathematical concepts and methods used by engineers. I say "apparently" because not once were we told how engineers actually use the things we were learning. The concepts and methods in question fell under the following topics:

1. Vector Calculus
2. Systems of ODE's and the Phase Plane
3. Laplace Transforms
4. Sequences and Series inc. Taylor and Maclaurin series
5. Fourier Series
6. Second Order Partial Differential Equations.

I found vector calculus to be most challenging. Mainly because it is such a large topic and the lecturer had to rush through the slides and examples without really stopping to explain the key concepts and ideas. Systems of ODE's was by far the most enjoyable, mainly because I like sketching and the entire topic is basically focused on sketching systems of ODE's. It also gave a new and interesting way of looking at ODE's in general. Laplace transforms I found to be the most straight-forward topic. Everything is there in the formula sheet and as long as you know basic "tricks" like partial fraction decomposition and completing the square, you should be fine. Second Order PDE's, while being touted by the lecturer as the most challenging topic, I actually found to be the easiest. I just rote-learned the technique and was fine with every form of problem.

The assignments throughout the semester were not super hard, but they weren't very easy either. I found it extremely difficult to get full marks on any of them. Some questions were marked quite harshly. Overall they are manageable so you shouldn't worry too much.

The mid-semester test basically destroyed me (and most of my tutorial it seemed - one girl was on the verge of tears after finding her results). It covered the first two topics. Unfortunately for me, my favourite topic was only allocated one question while the rest was on vector calculus. Suffice to say I didn't do very well.

The exam however was the saving grace. I found it to be relatively straight forward (granted I made the decision not to study for vector calculus at all) and I breezed through all the non vector calculus questions pretty easily. This was all made possible by the ample amount of practice exams posted on the LMS.

"So what was wrong with the subject!?" I hear you ask. "The content seems as challenging as expected, and the assessment fair, so what's your problem?". My problem is that this subject is a mess of poor coordination, and tries to cram too much into the semester.

For the first week and a half, we were hit with constant last-minute venue changes, which placed our lectures at the most ungodly times (one was moved to 5:15pm on a friday, another was moved so as to clash with another of my subjects). Even throughout all this, the coordinators refused to record lectures. Wtf? Another thing that personally pissed me off was that the students that passed the midsemester test got their tests back before the students that failed. So essentially, if you failed the test, everyone in your tutorial knew about it. This may not be a big deal to many students but I personally felt it was entirely unnecessary to name and shame students in this way.

I would be happy to forget about these things if the content was better. My biggest regret in my time at the University of Melbourne is taking this subject rather than both of Vector Calculus and Differential Equations. Make no mistake, the content of this subject isn't bad. I'm sure what they taught are used by engineers in ways that elude me, but this subject tries to cram the content of the two aforementioned subjects into one semester, and IMO, it fails to do so in any good way. I feel if I had taken the other two subjects, I would have had more time to do well, and also have gained a deeper understanding.

In summary/my advice:

If you're a Engineering Systems major, you have to take this subject. Might be good to not forget everything the moment you walk out of the exam room just in case (and I hope this is the case) your final year subjects teach you how the concepts are used in engineering.

If you're taking this as an elective/breadth, my advice is to stay away. Don't make the same mistake I did. If you're considering taking this as an elective you obviously have a pretty big interest in math. This is not the subject you're looking for. Take both Vector Calculus and Differential Equations instead. You'll have more time to do well and more time to really understand the concepts and their applications.

No. This was a great frustration to many students especially due to the lecture times.

Antoinette Tordesillas.

Yes, 9 of them. All with answers but NOT solutions. There were also a few practice mid-semester tests.

1.5/5

The recommended textbook is E Kreysig, Advanced Engineering Mathematics, 10th Edition, Wiley, USA 2011. I found a PDF of it online, didn't really use it much during semester.

However I did use Haberman, Applied Partial Differential Equations: with Fourier Series and Boundary Value Problems, 4th Edition. This book is VERY useful for the latter parts of the course. The ERC has multiple copies.

3 one hour lectures per week, and a one-hour tutorial per week. One of the lectures took place at 5:15pm on Fridays

2015, semester 2

TBA

15% MST, 3 x 5% Assignments, 70% Exam.

Hancock has already given a great review of this subject so I won't say too much. I actually really enjoyed this subject. I felt like I could really see the usefulness of the application of what we were learning, and whilst I do agree that a lot of it was just punching numbers into formulas and integrating, I still liked the fact that I could really see how what we were doing was applicable in the future as an Engineer. I also was grateful for a bit of a break from the more abstract/conceptual subjects like Linear Algebra in first year. It was fun to just do maths and be able to understand it and understand why.

It should be noted that my lecturer Marcus was pretty average, and I heard Christine was much better. Marcus basically just read what was on the slides, which you can essentially learn yourself (like Hancock did). Although seeing him work through the answers to the exercises I found helpful. They would really benefit from taking one lecture per chapter to kind of explain why we are doing what we are doing and how it is applicable in the 'real world'. For example, when doing PDEs, most people just rote learn the process and don't actually understand at all what they are doing. Even 5 minutes to explain La Places equation would have been great - but perhaps this is assumed knowledge, I don't know.

Maybe I also enjoyed it a lot more because Engineering Mathematics marks the end of core maths subjects for my major, and now I get to actually integrate it into Level 3 subjects... hopefully. Anyway, I quite liked this subject, and even though my tutor was kind of strange, she was also pretty nice and helpful and liked explaining things to us. The tutorials are actually great and helpful (I had a particularly good little group as well).
The exam was VERY fair and predictable - almost too much so, but hey I'm not complaining! Do 4 or 5 of the past exams and you'll know exactly what to expect from your final exam. They didn't throw any curveballs or try to trick you. It was very satisfying

Not during semester, but lecture recordings are released during SWOTVAC.

Marcus Brazil or Christine Manglesdorf

Yes, a whole bunch (about 12) available from the online library resource and the LMS.

4.5 out of 5

There is one, but you don't need it. Everything you need is in the lecture slides that you buy from the Co-Op.

3 x 1hr Lectures per week, 1 x 1hr tutorial per week.

Semester 1, 2014

Will post after results released

3 x 5% assignment, 15% mid-semester test, 70% final exam

As an engineering major, this should be your last required mathematics subject in your Bachelor's course. If you're doing Electrical Engineering, you'll need to take "Probability and Random Models [PaRM]" in fourth year, but that's another issue. The problem with this subject (and why I've given a mathematics subject at 3.5 instead of a 5) is because it's approach is very formulaic and their isn't much creativity with the content. Basically, my friends and I agree that once you've done one problem, you should be able to do all of the same type, given you have the formula sheet and what not. Coming from Calculus 2 and Linear Algebra, this was a little disappointing, which is why I stopped going to lectures around week 2 and just learnt from completely notes on my laptop (queue socially awkward penguin meme right now).

In the first lecture, the lecturer basically said that your Calculus 2 mark has a large correlation to the way you will perform in MAST20029. This is because ALL of the knowledge from Calculus 2 is extended, so if you, and I quote "just passed Calculus 2, you'll have to put in a lot more work that those who achieved a H1". Another issue with this subject, and why I like the Monash approach to this mathematics subject is that all engineering discipline undertake this course. That means that some mathematics that is more required in Elec Eng, such as complex analysis and fourier transforms, are taught to Civil students who, to the best of my knowledge, would have little use of those techniques. Splitting this class into Mech, Civil, Chem and Elec, Comp, Biomed would be a little better in my opinion, but that's another topic of discussion.

In this course, you'll cover 6 topics:
- Vector Calculus (extension from Calc 2)
- Ordinary Differential Equations (extension from Calc 2)
- Laplace Transforms (new topic)
- Sequences and Series (new topic for those who completed Calc 2 pre-2013)
- Fourier Transforms (new topic)
- Second Order Partial Differential Equations (new topic)
The topic I found people had the most issue was PDEs and Fourier Transforms, both of which are towards the end of the semester. PDEs had around 4 lectures on them, and it was worth 20/120 marks on the exam. Da fuq? All in all, it was an ok subject, however it got very formulaic very quickly and lacked some of the creativity that was found in first year mathematic subjects.

No

Assoc Prof Marcus Brazil, Dr Christine Mangelsdorf

Yes, ~8 from the library if I remember.

3.5-4 Out of 5

Don't need to buy any books, just the lecture notes

3x1 hour lectures, 1 hour tutorial per week.

Semester 1, 2013

92 [H1]