[bozekp]

Astronomy 2B03 – The Big Questions, which means that it covers broad topics such as star formation to habitable conditions for extraterrestrial life.


Professor Rating: During the Fall 2011 course, the professor was Dr. Laura Parker and the head T.A. was Robert Cockcroft (or something like that). Parker was a very enthusiastic lecturer and this helps keep you awake during lectures. The lecture material is very interesting during most of the term, however there are some lectures that are very dry and some of the guest lectures were unbearable.


Marks: 35% Final exam
16% Mid-term test
24% Project (Sign-up 1%, Proposal 2%, Peer Eval. 1%)
15% Participation in tutorials
10% Individual journal

Tutorials: The first 5 involved an open discussion based on questions posted on the course home. An example is...
“Should a scientist make a discovery public if it could lead to future trouble? In the 1930's, before World War II, the Danish physicist Niels Bohr published a paper offering an explanation of nuclear fission. Einstein wrote a famous letter to US President Roosevelt explaining that according to his equation E=mc2 , a new and vastly more powerful type of bomb could be built.
Should scientists make a discovery public if they can foresee that it could lead to future trouble?
What about other examples (good or bad)?”
If you actively participate, offer your opinion, you can achieve most of the 15%.
The rest of the tutorials were 2 group presentations every week. You sign up for a date with a partner, choose a topic and present it. You’re marked on how well you cover the content (5%), the presentation (10%) and the handout you provide (5%). If you prepare for it well, you can get a pretty high mark.
The midterm was fairly straight-forward, which a few questions designed to throw you off or get you thinking. There were only 30 M.C. and Dr. Parker provides you with some practice examples before the midterm.


Individual Journals: These began the 3rd week of September. It is hard to explain what it is, but all you needed to do was write a ½ - 1 page about something relating to astronomy or your opinion on a particular lecture’s material (such as extra dimensions). If you do 10 of these journals, submit them online during the course of the term, you can get more of the 10% depending on your T.A.


Easiness: This course does require some work, but not much effort. There is no math involved even though this is considered a physics course. Physics students will love this course because it really is an easy 12 as long as you do your work and study a little before the midterm and final. The material was very interesting and was an enjoyable course, definitely recommend it.

The only potentially bad thing about this course is if you were unlucky enough to have a bad TA. The project (which is not hard at all) is marked by your TA, which is where you would probably lose marks, but mostly they were in the 80s. The TA also marks your journal entries (which are also easy to do). Try to switch tutorials if you realize you have that strict TA, it can mean the difference between a 10 and an 11, or an 11 and a 12. When I took this course I heard of a really bad TA who marked the journals and project badly.

But I can't rate this course high enough It's probably my favourite course of undergrad so far.
Content is extremely interesting, prof is really nice and a good teacher, no math involved, tests and exam are easy as long as you study a bit. I now love origins!

Three words...

TAKE THIS COURSE!

I agree with the post above though - get a terrible TA and you'll hate life. My TA was... well, not very pleasant whatsoever. She was very hard on us, even though she should've understood that maybe less than a handful of people in each tutorial actually had a science background.

Aside from that, the material is extremely interesting, and Dr. Parker is a great prof. Definitely not dry material of any sort. It's hard to get bored in this class!

I took this course in Fall of 2012.

Professor: Dr. Laura Parker. Knows her stuff very well and is enthusiastic and engaging. Knows it is an open course and doesn't go too much into detail of any topic (this can be good or bad depending on what you want out of this course).

Marks:
4% iClicker (some are participation marks, some are based on correct answers)
10% Journals - depends on your TA but I found submitting one a week was enough (total 11)
22% Project - do research on interesting topic and give tutorial presentation
14% Tutorial - participation marks, just contribute to the discussions each time and you'll get perfect
15% Midterm - very easy, just go over the slides (class average was low 80s)
35% Exam - don't know how I did but seemed straightforward enough, nothing tricky

Overall, this is a fairly easy course that requires less work than the average course. The journals can get a bit annoying and your TA might mark you a bit hard on your presentation but other than that, should be an easy 11+.

is the project and presentation done individually or in groups?

Originally Posted by fatcat

is the project and presentation done individually or in groups?

Done in pairs.

Can anyone post a more updated review of this course? It would be useful to have a recent course outline with Wilson has the instructor.

I took this course in Fall 2014 with Wilson. The content was interesting, and the course overall turned out okay (a 10) BUT that being said there are some pitfalls. I'll just sort them into pros and cons to keep it brief.

Pros:
- The midterm was easily 12able
- No text, only slides testable
- iClicker is literally free marks
- Participation is almost literally free marks (just show up, be loud and debate and guaranteed 100% here)

Cons:
- The final was a different beast, much more difficult than the midterm.
- The project seemed to be marked pretty haphazardly. Many in our section weren't happy with their presentation mark and bringing these concerns to the physics department seemed to be equivalent to yelling at deaf ears.
- Wilson has a friendly exterior, but will bear teeth when pressed. I proved her wrong once, citing sources to indicate that she was wrong. Her response? a red face, a raised voice, and kicking me out of her office. Hmm. Seems that as a scientist, or even as a mature adult, the least you can do is deal kindly with your students and admit that you can't always be right. Science is about learning you're wrong, and moving forward with new knowledge. Sigh.
(as another example, she deterred students from viewing their midterm by calling it a "waste of time")

Overall, its possible to get a 10 or 11, but MUCH more difficult to get a 12 because the presentation and final will drag you down and Wilson is difficult to deal with.

Yeah I've heard bad things about the project. Thanks for your review! I'm sorry that you had a bad experience with those situations. You always hope the department will act on feedback about the course, so hopefully improvements have been made...

I just finished this course yesterday (Fall 2015). The course was great until about the last few weeks...

Professor: Dr. Wilson. She definitely knows what she is teaching and is very invested in the material and using as many images and diagrams to teaching. I found nothing wrong with her style of teaching BUT this doesn't exactly reflect her outside of the classroom. When I tried discussing some of my marks with her, the hierarchy is to contact your TA, then the head TA, THEN her. By that point, she will already have a decision anyway (as she waits to talk to the head TA first) and you will most likely NOT receive a higher grade. The journal marks were highly subjective from the TAs but they are only worth 10% so its not bad. Regardless, the content itself is VERY interesting and I do recommend if you are interested in the scientific discoveries of the early universe and space in general.

Marks:
4% iClicker - Easy marks, sucks that it was a morning class but whatever
10% Journals - This HIGHLY depends on the TA you get. Don't wait to submit more than half at the end or else you lose half your marks. Unfortunately this IS NOT stated in the outline and I was unfairly penalized. Simply put: submit half-assed journals every week and you'll be good. Even submitting amazing journals at the end won't do shit.
22% Project - There's a list to choose from and overall average was an 80%, my TA Alex Cridland was a dick and decided to give below the average in most cases. He even states how it's "hard to argue with him as he keeps notes on everything".
14% Tutorial - Participation marks, easy 14/14 if you come to tutorial
15% Midterm - Pretty easy, although I don't get why my class average was 23/30 or 76%
35% Exam - More difficult than the midterm, but not too hard in my opinion

You won't get get your project/ journal marks until after the course feedback deadline but I would have given my TA Alex Cridland a 0. Hope someone would do this for me in the future.
Overall, great course content, bad and subjective TA-ing in certain cases, meh professor whos fine in the classroom but I'm not so certain elsewhere.

I also just finished the course in Fall 2015.

Lectures - very interesting, Dr.Wilson is easy to listen to
Journals - my biggest criticism for this course. Literally no instructions on journals were given so it slipped my mind when I had other important projects and tests to study for. The journals are such a waste to this course unless they are meaningfully assigned.

The project was not bad at all, my TA was very fair and I had a good group. However, tutorials were pretty boring before the project presentations. Nonetheless tutorial participation is easy marks.

Midterm - fair. I got a 70 but thought I would do way better. Only out of 30.
Exam - also fair, just study the content even though you're most likely taking this as an elective.

Lectures are interesting sometimes and boring sometimes; guess it depends how interested you are in the topic of astronomy itself. iClicker marks are based on whether or not you get them right - which is pretty bullshit imo, as the stuff that Dr. Laura Parker asks in class is stuff that we have no way of knowing if she hasn't taught us yet. The test was easy, but the exam was a lot harder. Got a 93 on the test but somewhere in the 60s on the exam (and I studied for the exam probably 4 times longer). Bulk of your mark (around 50% of it) depends on your TA's marking - this 50% is constituted of a presentation in partners, tutorial participation, and journals that must be submitted. I happened to get unlucky and my TA would only give out 70s and very occasionally 80s for certain things, while my friends in other tutorials got 90s on a regular basis for presentations and journal entries. This course is VERY TA-dependent, so keep that in mind before enrolling in it. If you're looking for a bird course this is really risky, as it could get you the mark you want or it could result in a grade you aren't too happy with. Overall I did learn a decent bit about the universe from this course but I wouldn't be able to give it more than a 6/10 for its structure and organization. Recommend if you have a passion for Astronomy - if you don't, then I don't recommend this.