First year engineering summary

Apologies for reposting this from last year and I REALLY hope I'm not breaking reddit rules here but for those of you going into engineering, I made a summary for first year engineering. Also, if you haven't already, there is a Facebook group for the incoming first year engineers here:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1834458926856584/

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*Please do keep in mind that this is only accurate as of the 2017-2018 academic and may possibly change from the 2018-2019 academic year. However, most of this information should be fairly accurate unless someone tells me otherwise.

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***ENGG 130 (Engineering Statics):***

- Study of how to analyze objects at rest

- A lot of people say this is the hardest course in 1st year. Most of this course is new stuff and many of you will struggle with it (Friction!).

- Labs are just a 2 hour session where you solve a set of questions. It's a good idea to work in groups since you can solve the questions faster.

- Bring a Stapler to the labs!

How I studied: Textbook problems, Office hours and LOTS of practice along with the midterm/final exam review from MASC.

Good professors in my opinion: Mustafa Gul, Zhang Jianmin, Carlos Cruz Noguez

Help room: NREF 2-022

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***MATH 100 (Calculus I):***

- If you did school in Alberta, it's a more difficult version of Math 31.

- NO CALCULATORS ALLOWED IN MATH COURSES (Make sure you know your trig).

- DO NOT underestimate the difficulty of the course just because you did well in calculus in high school. The online assignments are easy but the written assignments can be very, very challenging and will take a significant amount of effort to solve them.

- The Math labs are 50 min sessions where you go and solve a few question in the given time frame.

How I studied: MASC (Math and applied science center [Google it]) seminars and the midterm/final exam review hosted by them. The textbook is not bad either IMO. Pauls calculus notes, MIT, KHAN academy and PatrickJMT is good too.

Good professors in my opinion: Vladimir Troitsky, Vladaslav Yaskin, Dragos Hrumic, Eric Woolgar, Venera Hruimic

Help room: Decima robinson Center (CAB 528).

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***CHEM 103 (Introductory Chemistry):***

- Probably the easiest course in First year and definitely a possible GPA booster.

- This, ENCMP 100 and Chem 105 are the only classes (Not including ENGG 100/101) that have different exams depending on the professor (PHYS 130 has different midterms depending on the prof but the final is the same).

- Fairly simple class provided you make the effort.

- You need a Lab manual (Which can be purchased in the chemistry building store) a lab coat, and safety goggles (Which can be brought at the same location or the University bookstore). You MUST wear the lab coat and goggles to the lab or you will get a 0 on that lab (Glasses are not a substitute for the lab).

- If you have a Lab coat and goggles, you can just bring those from home. (Chem West W1-32 is the exact location).

- Back in my first year, the lockers where all your lab components are were free but I guess now you all have to start paying for those so that's mandatory.

- You need to complete the prelab BEFORE the start of the first lab, rip the pre lab pages out of the lab manual, stapled and hand it in to the TA who is supervising your lab (Yoram Apelblat is the Laboratory coordinator, he is not the person supervising your lab [The name in beartracks for the CHEM 103 labs]).

- Make sure you finish the lab withing the time given, make any required observations as outlined in the lab manual, record them and have the TA who is supervising your lab sign off on it.

- Complete the postlab and hand it in by the deadline given by your TA/Lab manual (It was 2 days back in my time).

- At the end of the labs, you have a lab exam which tests your understanding of the laboratory material worth 9.5% of your total grade.

How I studied: My professor gave me problem sets which I found really useful and he also posted practice exams which I found helpful.

Good professors in my opinion: Sarah Styler, Sai yu, Keshwaree Babooram, Arthur Mar

Help room: Chemistry east E2-34A

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***PHYS 130 (Physics of energy: Waves, optics and light):***

- Definitely lots of practice is needed as you would in general for any applied science course. Still doable provided you put in some serious effort. I do think the online homework helps a lot.

- The labs require a lab manual (Which can be purchased in SUB) but you do not need any other equipment except perhaps a laptop to record information if you wish. (There are computers in the room though which you can just record observations and send it to your self).

- You work in groups but you all have to individually write your own lab reports.

- The lab report is due the day after the lab was done (Except Friday where it would be due after the weekend on Monday) at a time that will be specified by your TA (It was 5 PM for my year).

- The exams are all multiple choice. Each professor has a different midterm but every 1st year student writes the same final.

How I studied: The textbook was really good for questions! I also found it very helpful to do the online homework questions which really forced me to think and how to solve some of the questions.

Good professors in my opinion: Maya Wheelock, Kim Chow

Help room: CCIS L2-181

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***ENCMP 100 (Programming for engineers):***

- Probably the most boring and useless lecture to go to in 1st year in my opinion lol.

- Coding language used: MATLAB.

(It's free to download for all university students. Go here: https://ualberta.onthehub.com/)

- Exams are all Multiple choice and mostly test what a piece of code would do if you were to run it. (This may have changed as of last year. The exam is now professor dependent(if you take it in fall)).

- The labs were optional and you did not need to attend them in my year since they did not actually do anything in the lab. You only went to them if you needed help with your assignments.

- There are 5 assignments which test your knowledge about a particular section of the course and how you would solve a programming problem.

- You do not need any previous coding experience. Many people in my year got an A without any experience at all.

How I studied: I just did the practice exams which was enough in my opinion. I also read the entire textbook, cover to cover which REALLY helped me a lot.

Good professors in my opinion: Dileepan Joseph, Roger Zemp, Quin Zhao

Help room: Your lab room. There are TA's who will help you out as well as the Lab instructor

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***EN PH 131 (Engineering Dynamics):***

- Pretty nice course in my opinion. Very interesting and I really enjoyed learning things. For those of you in Alberta, this course combines Physics 20, ENGG 130 and calculus. It sounds scary but it really wasn't that bad.

- Make sure you do lots of practice. The EN PH 131 seminars really helped for that and so did doing all the practice exams available at that time.

- Its really useful if you get a good professor. You will do a lot better.

- The difficulty of the exams really depends on the year. In 2013, the midterm average was a 56%, but in Winter 2014, the midterm average was a 76%. However, In winter 2013, the final was very easy. In Winter 2014, the final exam average was a 33% so it really can vary in difficulty.

- An EN PH 131 seminar is like your ENGG 130 labs You go in, solve a few questions and hand it in on time. It's a bit rushed since you have less time to do the questions.

- Labs are the same as PHYS 130 except you do different experiments of course. Same rules and regulations apply.

How I studied: I did every single practice exam available to me, I redid all seminars and tried my best to keep up with the assignments (Back in my year, assignments were optional.).

Good professors in my opinion: Tang Tian, Kim Chow, Don Raboud

Help room: MEC 3-21 (This may change)

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***CHEM 105 (Introductory chemistry II):***

- This is similar to CHEM 30 for those of you who took it in high school (Electrochem, O-chem, Thermo, Acid base Equilibria) but more difficult.

- Like CHEM 103, the exams vary from Prof to prof.

- Labs are the same as CHEM 103 except you do different experiments of course. Same rules and regulations and you have a lab exam in the end.

How I studied: My professor gave me problem sets which I found really useful and he also posted practice exams which I found helpful.

Good professors in my opinion: Sai yu, Keshwaree Babooram, Arthur Mar

Help room: Chemistry east E2-34A

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***MATH 102 (Applied Linear Algebra):***

- I found this to be the hardest course back in my first year since it was so abstract. I definitely have to go over this course by myself again to properly learn it since I just barely scraped by last time.

- The first part, upto the midterm is fine and really simple. The second part is where is starts getting wild and freaky :P.

- Again, NO CALCULATORS ALLOWED.

- I think having a good prof matters a lot for this course since it can be hard for many students (I certainly found it hard).

- You definitely have to know your definitions for this course (What is an Eigenvector? What is an adjoint matrix? What is a Orthonormal basis?) to be able to do well in this course.

- Those written assignments are NOT easy. PLEASE start on them early since they will require a lot of thinking and a fair amount of effort.

- There is a lab manual which you must buy (Not sure where. It was 6th floor CAB in my 1st year, but last year, it came with the textbook so your prof will tell you). Unlike some of the other labs, if you are determined, you can do the labs ahead of time, hand it in at the start of your lab period and leave right away. Otherwise you must complete the lab in the 50 mins that's given on your lab day.

- If you also desire, you can go to an earlier lab and ask for help from the TA supervising that section there if you want. Ask for permission from the TA first though!

How I studied: I didn't lol. I couldn't do MASC for this course since I had a lab at that time. Most people relied on their professors, went to MASC and watched lots of youtube videos on specific topics. The midterm and final exam review was very helpful.

Good professors in my opinion: Enver Osmanagic, Sean Graves (PLEASE!!), Elizabeth Powell, Eric Woolgar

Help room: Decima robinson Center (CAB 528)

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***MATH 101 (Calculus II):***

- Out of the three calculus courses you take (Math 100, 101 and 209), I found this the hardest out of the three since there is no direct formula for anything. You are given general formulas and generally set up the equation to make it possible to solve something. Of course, there are methods you learn but most of them are general methods which may take some thinking to figure out how to apply. Still it's not too bad provided you practice.

- The Math 101 labs are the same as the Math 100 labs but with different topics.

- Like Math 100, you have assignments in Math 101. DO NOT DELAY ON THE WRITTEN ASSIGNMENTS!! They tend to be extremely difficult and will require a lot of thinking to solve properly.

- Again, no calculators allowed!

How I studied: MASC (Math and applied science center [Google it]) seminars and the midterm/final exam review hosted by them. The textbook is not bad either IMO. Pauls calculus notes, MIT, KHAN academy and PatrickJMT is good too.

Good professors: Vladimir Troitsky, Vladaslav Yaskin, Dragos Hrumic, Eric Woolgar

Help room: Decima Robinson Center (CAB 528)

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***ENGL 199 (Essentials of Writing for Engineering Students)***

- This class is literally a joke although that does vary by professor. In our class we watched movies and played video games. The difficulty of the class does depend on the professor though so keep that in mind!

How I studied: I didn't. I aced the entire course without any studying whatsoever. It was that easy.

Good professors in my opinion: Wayne DeFehr

Help room: Ask your professor (Send him an email)

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***GENERAL INFO:***

- Attendance is not mandatory for any class (Except ENGG 100/101) so if you are having a bad day, sick, don't want to come etc... don't. You won't be hunted down or anything.

- If your Prof for any course (Other than Chemistry) sucks, go to another section that teaches the same course. The reason the you can't do this for Chemistry is because each professor writes their own exam.

- Every first year student submits the same homework, lab, writes the same Midterm (Except PHYS 130, CHEM 103/105, ENCMP 100 (if taken in fall)) and final (Except CHEM 103/105, ENCMP 100(if taken in fall)).

- Labs are worth slightly less in CHEM 103/105 since you only do half the labs.

- All labs (Except Math 102 [If you do it ahead of time and hand it in]) are mandatory to attend.

- Chem seminars actually don't mean anything in your schedule and do not exist. Pretend it's a blank spot. That's just there to let you know there is a Chem help room you can go to (You can go at any time it's open. Your professor will tell you when. If they don't just ask).

- 1st year is hard. Don't give up. You will struggle even if you were a 90's student in high school.

- Take care of yourself. What good is grades if you aren't healthy enough to properly take care of your self?

- Don't cheat. it's not worth it and you can be suspended or even expelled depending on how severe it is.

- Ask for help. Chances are, at some point, you will have questions about something. Ask your professors, your TA, older students or go to the help room. It's okay to ask for help. There is no shame in that.

- Your professors made office hours for a reason. Please use them to ask for help.

- If you're REALLY keen, you can take MATH 117 and MATH 118 (honors Calculus 1 and Honors Calculus 2), instead of MATH 100/101 to get credit for Math 100/101. However, Honors calculus is SIGNIFICANTLY harder than MATH 100/101 and I REALLY recommend you do not do this unless you are absolutely solid on your mathematical background and you want a serious challenge.