Syllabus
MAC 3474, section 3130
Honors Analytic Geometry and Calculus III
Spring 2002--MTWF 8th period

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Professor David Groisser
418 Little Hall
392-0281 extension 261
groisser@math.ufl.edu

Office Hours: Tentatively Tuesday 4th period , Wednesday 5th period, and Friday 4th period. Please come early in the period or let me know to expect you later. See my schedule for updates. You can also see me by appointment any weekday except Thursday .

Text: Stewart, Calculus: Early Transcendentals, 4th edition. We will cover chapters 12-16 (with some omissions). Topics will include:

• vector algebra
• equations and graphs of lines, planes, and quadric surfaces
• vector-valued functions and their applications to motion and curves in space
• limits and continuity of functions of several variables
• partial derivatives
• maxima and minima of functions of several variables
• multiple integrals
• vector fields and their derivatives
• integral theorems for vector fields

Exams and Grading: Your final grade will be determined by the following

• Three midterms (hour exams), each counting 20% of final grade. Tentative dates for the midterms are Feb. 4 (Mon.), Feb. 27 (Wed.), and Apr. 1 (Mon.).
• Cumulative final exam, counting 40% of final grade. This will be given in this room (MAT 006) on Tues., Apr. 30, beginning at 5:30 p.m.
• Small bonuses (< 3%) may be given for exceptionally good classroom participation.

There will be no make-up midterms. If you have a valid, documented reason for missing a midterm, I will re-adjust the weights of your other exams.

See more about grading below for additional information.

Calculator Policy: Calculators are not allowed on exams. Occasionally a homework problem may be assigned that requires a calculator; in the book, these problems are indicated with a graphing-calculator icon (for example p. 564 #34). You should not use a calculator on any other problems.

Homework: will be assigned daily and is due by the next class, but will not be collected. It is critical that you keep up with the homework daily. Far too much homework will be assigned for you to catch up after a several-day lapse, even if you think from your past experience that you will be able to do this. Students who do not keep up with the homework frequently receive D's or worse (or drop the class to avoid receiving such a grade), even in an honors class.

The assignments will be posted on the homework web page . You are responsible for checking this page frequently, since the dates more than one day in advance are estimates and there will be frequent updates. Assignments may also be modified in class according to how far we get on a given day.

On most days I will not answer homework questions in class. Roughly once a week we will spend some time going over homework.

Workload: On average, in order to receive an average grade (C or C+), students with good preparation for this class should expect to spend two to two-and-a-half hours outside of class for every class meeting (8-10 hours per week). This time estimate is an average, not a maximum--some students will require more time, some less; some weeks the workload will be heavier, some lighter. Some circumstances that may increase your workload are:

• You did not study 8-10 hours per week in your previous calculus classes.

• You cannot do algebra quickly and accurately without a calculator (this may be the case if you did not do a large number of exercises in your pre-calculus classes, or have relied heavily on calculators in the past).

• You want to get an A.

Attendance policy. I expect students to be in class every day and on time, paying attention for all 50 minutes of the period. Coming late to class is disruptive both to your instructor and to your fellow students. If another time commitment (e.g. a prior class in a distant location) forces you to be late on a regular basis, you should not take this class.

Currently I plan to take attendance but not to factor it into your grade directly. However, students without good attendance should not expect the same consideration in office hours that students with good attendance will receive. Be aware that the University of Florida Attendance Policies contains the following paragraph:

The university recognizes the right of the individual professor to make attendance mandatory. After due warning, professors may prohibit further attendance and subsequently assign a failing grade for excessive absences.

More about exams. Most exam problems will be similar to homework, but on most exams I try to put at least one problem that you won't have seen a clone of before. Such problems will involve no new concepts , but may, for example, combine concepts from different parts of the syllabus. I do this to see whether you've gone beyond memorizing a bunch of formulas and rules, and have achieved a real understanding of the material--which you'll need for an A.

More about grading. I don't have a predetermined grade curve or predetermined percentages for letter grades. I decide the grade scale for each exam and homework according to the philosophy A = excellent, B = good, C = satisfactory, D = unsatisfactory but passing. At the end of the semester, I use the cutoffs from the exams and homework and to determine the final grade cutoffs on a 1000-point scale. For example if the cutoff for a B is 72% on the first hour exam, 69% on the second hour exam, 76% on the third hour exam, and 74% on the final, to get a B for the course you'd need .20 x (72%+69%+76%) + (.40 x 74%) = 73% of the total number of points in the course, i.e. 730/1000.

Since I don't determine the exam-grade cutoffs ahead of time, I can't tell you in advance exactly how many points you'll need to get a particular grade for the course. However, for an example of past grade scales, see the grade scale page for the last time I taught this course (Spring 2001), but ignore the quiz-related scales since I do not plan to give the homework-quizzes that I gave last year. Also note that there is no guarantee that this semester's grade cutoffs will be close to last semester's ; they could be higher or lower. If you want to see a wider variety of grade scales from calculus courses I've taught recently, then go to the link above, and in the URL replace "3474_s01" with any of the following: 2313_f00, 2312_f01, 2312_s00.

Student Honor Code: Students are expected to abide by the the Honor Code:

We, the members of the University of Florida community, pledge to hold ourselves and our peers to the highest standards of honesty and integrity.

Religious Holidays: The following is part of the University of Florida Policy on Religious Holidays . "Students, upon prior notification of their instructors, shall be excused from class or other scheduled academic activity to observe a religious holy day of their faith."

Accommodations for students with disabilities: Students requesting classroom accommodation must first register with the Dean of Students Office. The Dean of Students Office will provide documentation to the student who must then provide this documentation to the Instructor when requesting accommodation.

Miscellaneous:

• Unless I say otherwise, you are responsible for knowing any material I cover in class, any subject covered in homework, and all the material in the textbook chapters we are studying.

• If you miss class the day I return an exam, you'll have one week to pick your quiz or exam up from my office, after which I may discard your paper.

• Cell phones should be off while you are in class. Please also avoid other disruptive noises, such as the zipping and unzipping of backpacks several minutes before the end of class.