monologues of a mathematician: third year

hello!!
well, turns out you can't get rid of me for very long. i'm back for the 6th year running, lol

sorry, who are you?
uh so yeah i'm niamh, i’m 20 and i'm from yorkshire. most of you probably know me as protostar. but i wanted a change :tongue:

you're a mathematician?
by definition, i guess i am. i'm a third year maths student at newcastle university, but this isn't my final year as i'm doing 4 :headfire:

. i'm also the publicity officer for our maths society for 2020/21!

what are your grades like?
not as high as i'd like, hence me trying to grow em. because i know people care, my academic history looks like this
a levels: abc
first year: 70.9 overall

by module

second year: 69.7 overall

by module

what are you studying this year?
we chose our modules in august. because of covid-19 they paired up 10 credit modules to create 20 credit modules of which we had to choose 6. january exams have been cancelled and we'll be sitting exams on all of the year's content next june, which is terrifying. the modules i've chosen are:

mas3710 group theory, graphs and symmetry (required to specialise in pure maths in 4th year)
mas3711 linear analysis and topology (also required for a pure specialism)
mas3712 matrix analysis and representation theory

mas3810 methods for differential equations and partial differential equations (required to specialise in applied maths in 4th year)
mas3811 quantum mechanics and classical fields (also required for an applied specialism)
mas3812 advanced fluid dynamics and computational modelling (also required for an applied specialism)

so my year will be 50% pure and 50% applied maths, as i'm currently so undecided on what i want to specialise in in my 4th year :colondollar:

leaning more towards applied atm but i wonder how that'll change this year...

what are your goals and aims for 3rd year?
honestly with covid and everything my main aim is to just complete the year lol. but beyond that i'd really like to push myself back up to a first, not getting one for second year really stung despite all the disruptions

what's this blog all about then?
i'm gonna try and grow my grades essentially. i'll be talking about how i find my modules, all the work i do for each of them and anything extra i do. will also be for how uni is going as a whole, basically documenting yet another year of my life lol. i do love reading these back i can't lie

so join me through this year, or don't, i accept i'll probably be talking to myself a lot in here so i'm okay with that. but yeah if you wanna be tagged just lemme know

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(edited 3 years ago)

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Reply 160

absolutelysprout

congrats on the tap and winning as the publicity rep :gah:

good luck with your exams :h:

Reply 161

zetamcfc

Original post by niamhdoesmaths

yeah relativity is applied, it'd be my 1 non-pure module. is galois theory any good? i have no choice but to do it haha
yep, just 6 exams between me and summer now

Best undergraduate module going.

Reply 162

niamhdoesmaths

Original post by zetamcfc

Best undergraduate module going.

i know absolutely nothing about it, might have a brief look before starting it

Reply 163

Muttley79

Original post by niamhdoesmaths

i know absolutely nothing about it, might have a brief look before starting it

I studied that but can't remember much about it!

Reply 164

niamhdoesmaths

update #21: tuesday 15th june 2021
and just like that, 3rd year is over?

heyyyy guys, sorry it's been a hot second since i last posted! wanted to wait until all my exams were done but i've been so busy since then i haven't got round to it! anyway this is (hopefully!) the penultimate update of this blog, i can't BELIEVE that this mad year of online uni is over tbh

anyway, i've now finished all my exams and here's roughly how each of them went

mas3712 matrix analysis and representation theory (26/05)
this exam was HARD. way to throw me in at the deep end lmao. i did expect it to be tricky despite this being my best module by a long way. there were a lot of proofs in the matrix analysis half, a couple of nicer ones which i managed to get, and a really nasty one i managed to make absolutely 0 progress with sadly. representation theory was a lot more standard except from the last question which i've done a really poor job with, it's a GREAT question to test who properly understood the proofs of maschke's theorem but sadly i was not one of those people. i even wrote an apology at the end lmao. in the end i answered about 85% of the paper, i'd say about 80% confidently answered, but the vibe i got from others on the course was that it was stupidly hard so it'll hopefully get scaled up. i spent about 18 hours on it in total lol whoops

mas3710 group theory, graphs & symmetry (28/05)
this paper was actually quite nice, which was good for me. i found the group theory half very accessible apart from a bit at the end on sylow's theorems (which i never actually did the lectures for so that was pretty dumb of me but hey). i know quite a lot of people struggled with this half though so maybe it'll get scaled up, though a lot of it was easy to find online so probably not. i liked it though. the graphs half was lovelyyyy, which worked in my favour as i really haven't found graphs & symmetry easy whatsoever. the 12 mark foldings question took me a good few attempts but i think i got there in the end, the only parts i struggled with were showing a homomorphism was injective and surjective (as ngl i've never really understood how to do that looool). the majority of people found this half dead easy so it's definitely getting scaled down but hopefully i'll have still done alright! overall i answered 93% of the paper and i'd say around 80% i'm confident with. spent roughly 16 hours on this one? did not set myself up well for 3810 in terms of sleep lmao

mas3810 methods for differential equations and partial differential equations (29/05)
well if i thought 3712 was hard then 3810 humbled me to new levels. this paper was absolutely bloody DEMONIC. i didn't start it immediately cos i had to go & buy paper and caffeine sources but once i did i regretted it immensely. it took me ages to do question 1a never mind anything else. eventually i managed q1, parts of 2 and 4, and i guessed something for 3a but couldn't get any further. i expected section ii to be better as i've done pretty well in PDEs but it was somehow just as awful :bawling:

i managed q5 but it was an absolute trainwreck from there, i made stuff up for 6 and parts of 8 but i couldn't get anywhere with 7 at all. in the end i think i answered maybe 40%, 25% confidently, so unless there's some serious scaling involved i've deffo failed. horrific paper, i only spent 12 hours on this one cos i gave up out of sheer exhaustion

had a LOVELY week off after those 3 exams in which i went to a pub quiz, played some rounders, & even went on a date. much needed time off!! then the 5th came & hit me like a truck

mas3811 quantum mechanics & classical fields (05/06)
holy mother of god what an awful half of the exam quantum mechanics was. i mean to say that my average in that module pre-exam was 3.33% i had pretty low expectations lmao. i think i managed to do q1, q2 was horrific and i got nowhere with it, 3a was nice but the rest was vile, and 4 i couldn't even start. i don't think i answered enough to pass lmao but i really don't deserve to pass it. many many tears were shed in this exam. i thought classical fields was awful as well and i couldn't stop bawling my eyes out, but i took some time away and when i came back it wasn't actually nearly as bad as i thought. i answered everything in this section and about 95% of it i'm confident with. i'd say overall i answered about 75%, 55% confidently. so fingers crossed i'll pass the module overall, thank god they were joined up honestly. spent about 15 hours or so on this one but a good chunk of that was just me crying lmao

mas3812 advanced fluid dynamics (07/06)
FINALLY an exam that went well!!! there were only 3 questions as this one was only worth 40% of the module (as comp modelling was 100% coursework) so i thought i might finish it early-ish but boy was i wrong. i just couldn't be bothered to do it lmfaooo. it was SUCH a nice paper, or at least i thought it was, though i do really like fluids. i answered everything and i'm confident with maybe 85%. it was so nice. there were lots of sketches though so that's where i think i may have dropped marks as i'm awful at sketching. and also a 10 mark question discussing validity of assumptions which i completely made up as i'm terrible at those types of questions. i'm hoping this doesn't get scaled but it probably will. i ended up spending around 12 hours on it but spread out throughout the day & night cos i was too lazy to sit there and power through lmao

mas3711 linear analysis and topology (11/06)
and finally the exam i've been dreading this entire academic year. i always thought & expected this to be my worst exam but in the end i think it was okay. the linear analysis half was actually LOVELY, i really didn't expect to be able to do much of it but i got an answer for every part?? absolutely mind boggling. the first 10 marks were true or false as well which was just lovely. i reckon i've probably got like 45/50 on section i which is way more than i ever thought i'd get so i'm buzzing already. however topology was, as expected, horrific. i managed to do most of 8a but completely guessed 8b (yes there were 7 questions in linear analysis :s-smilie:

), guessed 9a and couldn't do b at all, found 10 in the notes, couldn't even start 11 and then found 12 online lmao. LUCKILY, q10 and q12 were worth 10 marks each so provided i've got both of those completely correct (which i should have lmao), then that's my 40% for topology so i should have PASSED??? i literally haven't got higher than 15 in this module so that's just wild. can't believe i'm really about to pass a module called topology while having 0 idea what a topology is. spent about 13 hours on this before submitting it at 1:30am and thus finishing 3rd year!!

i'm so buzzing to be done honestly. since finishing, i've been to the pub, the beach & a pub quiz, had a lazy day today which was so needed. very excited to have an amazing summer!!

if i had to guess my results, my optimistic predictions would be
mas3710: 73
mas3711: 64
mas3712: 83
mas3810: 55
mas3811: 61
mas3812: 86
which would put me at 70 for the year, so it's VERY optimistic hahahaha, but hopefully this means ive got the 60 i need to get into stage 4. i'd already written off getting a 1st so anything between 60 and 70 i'll be absolutely over the moon with

anyway yeah i'll update when i get my results which will be in about 2-3 weeks time eeeeeek

thanks everyone for helping me get through this crazy year and keeping me sane, big love to you all :heart:

have a fabulous summer
niamh xx

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Reply 165

absolutelysprout

congrats on finishing third year! :awesome:

Reply 166

Muttley79

Good to hear you have survived a diffiicult year :smile:

Reply 167

Sinnoh

I think you've had a tendency to underestimate how you did on past blogs so who knows what could happen :tongue:

Well done getting to this point!!

Reply 168

The_Lonely_Goatherd

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay for exams being over! You totally deserve 101 "lazy" days to make up for a hard year. Who would have thought that this pandemic would still be going on eh? :s-smilie:

I really hope you can have a more regular 4th year :redface:

OMG, rounders. That's a blast from the past! Not sure when I last played that. Or even if I remember how to play it :colondollar:

Enjoy the freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeedooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom :yeah:

hey Niamh, I remember your posts as protostar in the maths/physics applicants thread years back. Incredible how quickly time flies, I just finished my third and final year of mathematics at Bristol. just like you, I took a lot of pure modules as well, and im starting a masters in mathematics elsewhere next year.

Reply 171

niamhdoesmaths

update #22: wednesday 7th july 2021
i got my results...

heyyyy everyone, this will be the final update of this blog! yesterday i got my results and here's how it went...

mas3710 group theory, graphs and symmetry

Spoiler

mas3711 linear analysis and topology

Spoiler

mas3712 matrix analysis and representation theory

Spoiler

mas3810 methods for differential equations and partial differential equations

Spoiler

mas3811 quantum mechanics and classical fields

Spoiler

mas3812 advanced fluid dynamics and computational modelling

Spoiler

which means that overall i've finished 3rd year with a stage average of...

Spoiler

once again thanks to everyone who's backed me through this awful year, though i don't always reply i do appreciate every message and word of encouragement :heart:

that's all from me (until next year), peace out
niamh xx

tags

Reply 172

absolutelysprout

congratulations!! :party:

hope you're celebrating :hugs:

Reply 173

The_Lonely_Goatherd

So SO proud of youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu :lovehug:

Reply 174

RDKGames

Study Forum Helper

Original post by niamhdoesmaths

Spoiler

mas3711 linear analysis and topology

Spoiler

mas3712 matrix analysis and representation theory

Spoiler

mas3810 methods for differential equations and partial differential equations

Spoiler

mas3811 quantum mechanics and classical fields

Spoiler

mas3812 advanced fluid dynamics and computational modelling

Spoiler

which means that overall i've finished 3rd year with a stage average of...

Spoiler

once again thanks to everyone who's backed me through this awful year, though i don't always reply i do appreciate every message and word of encouragement :heart:

that's all from me (until next year), peace out
niamh xx

tags

Well done

In my experience, 3rd year really hit me the most but it picked back up in 4th year since you do a project and less modules.

(edited 3 years ago)

Reply 175

Muttley79

You shouldn't be disappointed - read how you were feeling early on and you've ended up with a solid 2i!

With fewer modules you can aspire for a higher classification - we're with you all the way!!

Reply 176

flaurie

Volunteer Team

You’ve made it through the year!! :yeah:

Well done

Reply 177

Yochahine

Good luck for this year

Reply 178

Ghostlady

Original post by niamhdoesmaths

Spoiler

mas3711 linear analysis and topology

Spoiler

mas3712 matrix analysis and representation theory

Spoiler

mas3810 methods for differential equations and partial differential equations

Spoiler

mas3811 quantum mechanics and classical fields

Spoiler

mas3812 advanced fluid dynamics and computational modelling

Spoiler

which means that overall i've finished 3rd year with a stage average of...

Spoiler

once again thanks to everyone who's backed me through this awful year, though i don't always reply i do appreciate every message and word of encouragement :heart:

that's all from me (until next year), peace out
niamh xx

tags

Hey I was on here and thinking about your posts way back as protostar. My eldest (physicsqueen on TSR) is now in 3rd year and has one more exam to go. She did not fair as well in 2nd year due to some personal and health reasons. Now shes in year 3 and has had checking in meetings with her supervisors and head of department. Her coursework this year is on 84% average and her exams she feels that 7 out of 8 have gone really well this time. Its estimated by her dept pre exams she was on track for a 63%. Only trouble is, is the marking boycott, so Im hoping that does not penalise her too much because she really has put in so much this year, and she really wants 4th year.