How do I know if Maths is right for me at uni?
i.e. how do I know that I am good enough?
Cus I feel it might be a bit out of my depth if I go to a good uni. How can I found out whether I'll cope with it?
Cus I feel it might be a bit out of my depth if I go to a good uni. How can I found out whether I'll cope with it?
Scroll to see replies
Bump.
Maths is my favourite subject and I have no career plans. But I'm not sure this is the only prerequisite :/
Original post by cybergrad
If you like Maths you will do fine, if you are going there because you think it gives you many career options and because you like maths you will suffer.
Explain?
(edited 13 years ago)
Original post by jit987
Explain?
The explanation is in the quotes, "like". Some people study something for all the wrong reasons, because somebody told them that it is the best option, because it has good career prospects, because it will give you a lot of money etc etc So after the brainwashing they start thinking, "Oh yeah, I want to do this, I like it". In my first year at university I became friends with a girl that was also study engineering. I asked her why engineering and she said, "I like it because it has good career prospects". She failed the first year, she had no interest in engineering whatsoever, so the assignments, coursework and revision was just a chore for her. If you really like something you don't see it as a chore, you take pleasure from reading about your subject.
I see what you mean. Anyone studying a maths degree - what do you wish you had known (that you didn't) before embarking on your degree.
Maths is what I have my heart set upon but if I'm paying £36k for the degree I want to know that it's 100% the right choice.
At the moment I'm trying to prepare myself for a degree in Maths, just want to be sure I'm following the right path..
Jack
Maths is what I have my heart set upon but if I'm paying £36k for the degree I want to know that it's 100% the right choice.
At the moment I'm trying to prepare myself for a degree in Maths, just want to be sure I'm following the right path..
Jack
Original post by cybergrad
The explanation is in the quotes, "like". Some people study something for all the wrong reasons, because somebody told them that it is the best option, because it has good career prospects, because it will give you a lot of money etc etc So after the brainwashing they start thinking, "Oh yeah, I want to do this, I like it". In my first year at university I became friends with a girl that was also study engineering. I asked her why engineering and she said, "I like it because it has good career prospects". She failed the first year, she had no interest in engineering whatsoever, so the assignments, coursework and revision was just a chore for her. If you really like something you don't see it as a chore, you take pleasure from reading about your subject.
isnt this true for all subjects? or is it ten times worse for maths courses?
Original post by Jack Dolan
I see what you mean. Anyone studying a maths degree - what do you wish you had known (that you didn't) before embarking on your degree.
Maths is what I have my heart set upon but if I'm paying £36k for the degree I want to know that it's 100% the right choice.
At the moment I'm trying to prepare myself for a degree in Maths, just want to be sure I'm following the right path..
Jack
Maths is what I have my heart set upon but if I'm paying £36k for the degree I want to know that it's 100% the right choice.
At the moment I'm trying to prepare myself for a degree in Maths, just want to be sure I'm following the right path..
Jack
I wish I had known that STEP is nothing like university mathematics.
Original post by IrrationalNumber
I wish I had known that STEP is nothing like university mathematics.
I thought STEP was meant to be a bit closer to uni maths? Whats your experience of university maths and also can you state the university in question?
Original post by cybergrad
The explanation is in the quotes, "like". Some people study something for all the wrong reasons, because somebody told them that it is the best option, because it has good career prospects, because it will give you a lot of money etc etc So after the brainwashing they start thinking, "Oh yeah, I want to do this, I like it". In my first year at university I became friends with a girl that was also study engineering. I asked her why engineering and she said, "I like it because it has good career prospects". She failed the first year, she had no interest in engineering whatsoever, so the assignments, coursework and revision was just a chore for her. If you really like something you don't see it as a chore, you take pleasure from reading about your subject.
I'm sorry to break it to you but this is the case for most students. You don't need to be in love with your subject to take it at degree level.
OP you should find A level maths relatively easy.
If you want an idea of what university maths is like buy a first year text book. In fact I can tell you right now, this is a good starting point and was the recommended textbook for first year Analysis.
If you want an idea of Y1 calculus check out this book. Although I would recommend an Analysis textbook - the biggest difference between A level & university is the introduction of proofs and more rigorous ways of thinking.
(edited 13 years ago)
Original post by Jack Dolan
i.e. how do I know that I am good enough?
Cus I feel it might be a bit out of my depth if I go to a good uni. How can I found out whether I'll cope with it?
Cus I feel it might be a bit out of my depth if I go to a good uni. How can I found out whether I'll cope with it?
I guess if you get an offer from a particular university you'll be good enough for them and other people on the course will hopefully have similar abilities.
I have to keep telling myself that, as I fail Physics at school
Original post by pappymajek
I thought STEP was meant to be a bit closer to uni maths? Whats your experience of university maths and also can you state the university in question?
I am at Warwick university. STEP mathematics is a very guided approach to maths - each question gives you a hint at each step towards a solution to a bigger problem (usually the last part of the question). You do clever things (the exams show you which clever things) with small machinery. University mathematics is not like that. Instead, you look at an object (for example, a smooth function) and you find out what you can from that (turns out if a function is smooth on the real numbers, if a<b and f(a)<f(b) then for all y between f(a) and f(b) there is a point x with f(x)=y!) Then you try to generalize that (What happens if we move to the rational numbers?). From that you establish what properties are important (The rational numbers aren't complete (they have 'holes' in some sense), so that conjecture doesn't hold anymore. Can we do something similar with the complex numbers? But complex numbers don't have a natural ordering on them - maybe we could consider the modulus of the function?) Sometimes the results get very general. It becomes using big machinery to kill small problems/build bigger machinery.
Original post by Jack Dolan
I see what you mean. Anyone studying a maths degree - what do you wish you had known (that you didn't) before embarking on your degree.
Maths is what I have my heart set upon but if I'm paying £36k for the degree I want to know that it's 100% the right choice.
At the moment I'm trying to prepare myself for a degree in Maths, just want to be sure I'm following the right path..
Jack
Maths is what I have my heart set upon but if I'm paying £36k for the degree I want to know that it's 100% the right choice.
At the moment I'm trying to prepare myself for a degree in Maths, just want to be sure I'm following the right path..
Jack
Just to expand on this topic, all of my friends from the course chose maths because they fulfilled one of the following criteria:
a) They got an A at A2, and didn't want to pursue any of their other 2 or 3 subjects and chose mathematics, because (as stated above) it has 'good career prospects' or 'teachers told me it was good' or 'I was good at it and I "liked" it'.
b) They quite simply could not face the alternative, which is getting a job.
I've thought about this over and over, and I've found that there seem to be (for the people that I know) certain correlations between their disdain for mathematics and other factors.
Ie, the people that I know who hate their course have one or more of these things in common:
a) They "like" rote learning, and do not like or see the greatness in proofs and theorems. At A level, they simply went through exam papers and liked maths because of its mundane repetitiveness.
b) Calculus, mechanics, group theory and other aspects of maths which require you to love the subject and try and find its "logic" (as opposed to topics that could be learnt simply through repetitive practice like stats, A level material), literally made these people shut off, and begin to blame the lecturers and the topic rather than their sheer disdain for mathematics in general.
Probably a lot more points but now I'm getting all riled up.
IMHO, if you're in A level and you're thinking about doing maths at uni, then I would give you one piece of advice:
If you ignore proofs and understanding then seriously reconsider. As an example, if you don't care why, differentiating and equating it to 0 gives you stationary points but you simply have fun doing this over and over again with like 16 different questions, then stop for a second and think about doing it at uni.
Original post by wanderlust.xx
If you ignore proofs and understanding then seriously reconsider. As an example, if you don't care why, differentiating and equating it to 0 gives you stationary points but you simply have fun doing this over and over again with like 16 different questions, then stop for a second and think about doing it at uni.
If you ignore proofs and understanding then seriously reconsider. As an example, if you don't care why, differentiating and equating it to 0 gives you stationary points but you simply have fun doing this over and over again with like 16 different questions, then stop for a second and think about doing it at uni.
+rep, I wrote something similar in another thread and agree wholeheartedly.
If you generally are excited about why things happen then you may like university mathematics. By "things happens", yes the differentiating example above it true, however there are other parts of mathematics. Can we categorise knots (a knot: take a piece of string, make a knot, then tie the ends together)? Can we be sure our integration from -N to N converges to the int from -infty to infty if we send N to infty? (e.g. Fourier transform). Why is it that matrices are a natural way to express things? (Presentation theory).
However you need more than just excitement. To enjoy maths you will need to understand that the first 2yrs are a slog. There is SO much to learn because of the way it is taught at A level. Expect to work 9-9 weekdays, 10-4 weekends. And U will get upset by this as ur non-maths friends will do a fraction of that work. And at the end, ur maths degree is as employable as a econ degree, but u did twice the work load.
Ull also have to understand uni is aobut learning urself. Get some books, get reading, get exploring, do examples, and a think. U do not get spoon fed like at a-lvl.
Jx
However you need more than just excitement. To enjoy maths you will need to understand that the first 2yrs are a slog. There is SO much to learn because of the way it is taught at A level. Expect to work 9-9 weekdays, 10-4 weekends. And U will get upset by this as ur non-maths friends will do a fraction of that work. And at the end, ur maths degree is as employable as a econ degree, but u did twice the work load.
Ull also have to understand uni is aobut learning urself. Get some books, get reading, get exploring, do examples, and a think. U do not get spoon fed like at a-lvl.
Jx
Original post by Sollytear
Expect to work 9-9 weekdays, 10-4 weekends.
Utter tosh. Sure, you might get a couple of people per year who work that hard but most do far less.
Original post by Sollytear
If you generally are excited about why things happen then you may like university mathematics. By "things happens", yes the differentiating example above it true, however there are other parts of mathematics. Can we categorise knots (a knot: take a piece of string, make a knot, then tie the ends together)? Can we be sure our integration from -N to N converges to the int from -infty to infty if we send N to infty? (e.g. Fourier transform). Why is it that matrices are a natural way to express things? (Presentation theory).
However you need more than just excitement. To enjoy maths you will need to understand that the first 2yrs are a slog. There is SO much to learn because of the way it is taught at A level. Expect to work 9-9 weekdays, 10-4 weekends. And U will get upset by this as ur non-maths friends will do a fraction of that work. And at the end, ur maths degree is as employable as a econ degree, but u did twice the work load.
Ull also have to understand uni is aobut learning urself. Get some books, get reading, get exploring, do examples, and a think. U do not get spoon fed like at a-lvl.
Jx
However you need more than just excitement. To enjoy maths you will need to understand that the first 2yrs are a slog. There is SO much to learn because of the way it is taught at A level. Expect to work 9-9 weekdays, 10-4 weekends. And U will get upset by this as ur non-maths friends will do a fraction of that work. And at the end, ur maths degree is as employable as a econ degree, but u did twice the work load.
Ull also have to understand uni is aobut learning urself. Get some books, get reading, get exploring, do examples, and a think. U do not get spoon fed like at a-lvl.
Jx
I dont totally agree with the fact that maths students are the most hard working, have you forgotten there are medics around. I think what you're trying to say is that university Maths is more to do with understanding the concepts whereas you could memorise biology without even understanding it and pass.
Original post by Sollytear
And at the end, ur maths degree is as employable as a econ degree, but u did twice the work load.
From personal experience, the people I know that do straight economics or eco & maths have no idea what they should do for lunch, let alone having the same level of employability as some of the (quite honestly) brilliant minds on the maths course. (In fact, I do recall a guy who just decided not to go to lunch because the walk was too far)
The ones doing economics do, in fact, struggle with some of the easier mathematics modules.
I'd say that the maths degree should be far more beneficial than one in economics, but this is probably debatable.
I also do not (or have done nowhere near) a 9-9 slog in the past two years. Perhaps that's why I'm not up to par...
@wanderlust, @sollyear, @IrrationalSubject
Over 12 years since I posted on this forum, but I'd like to offer a belated thanks for your advice, I seem to remember it was quite formative in my not-choosing of university maths. I ended up reading Engineering Science at Oxford for my undergraduate, and I think your snippets of advice convinced me that I'd probably fall at the first hurdle (the Oxford interview for maths).
Over 12 years since I posted on this forum, but I'd like to offer a belated thanks for your advice, I seem to remember it was quite formative in my not-choosing of university maths. I ended up reading Engineering Science at Oxford for my undergraduate, and I think your snippets of advice convinced me that I'd probably fall at the first hurdle (the Oxford interview for maths).
Quick Reply
Related discussions
- Art a level
- Should I do core maths or normal maths A level in my gap year?
- Is Further maths worth it?
- Can you do Product design / engineering without Maths and Physics ?
- Business and accounting a level difficulty
- Re-doing and taking new A-Levels at 21?
- University of nottingham economics 2023
- Aston Optometry 2023 ~ we’re in💃
- need A level study buddy!!
- Can university take away the unconditional offer they gave me?
- I feel like I screwed up.
- A level Chemistry or Further maths
- Bath vs USYD
- How should I go about clearing?
- which education board and a level should I pick for an extra subject?
- Not sure what to write about in (maths/cs) personal statement
- Business BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma
- lse or imperial
- Geography vs Economics A level choices
- need a level help!!!!! urgent
Latest
Trending
Last reply 3 weeks ago
71 on the MAT, rejected for interview by both Oxford and Imperial.Trending
Last reply 3 weeks ago
71 on the MAT, rejected for interview by both Oxford and Imperial.
