MA 351 Fall '24 Syllabus

Instruction Personnel

Textbook and Online Notes

"DISCRETE MATHEMATICAL MODELS with applications to social, biological, and environmental problems"
Fred S. Roberts
Prentice-Hall, Inc.

"Excursions in Modern Mathetmatics (5th Ed.)"
P. Tannenbaum
Pearson Education Inc., Prentice Hall 2004

On-line information: All information on courses that I teach (except individual grades) is now accessible via html browsers, which includes this syllabus. My web page listing all my courses' is at

../../courses/courses/courses.html

Grading and General Information

There will be five homework assignments of with the last two of lesser weight, two mid-semester examinations during the semester, and a term paper and a short presentation of it at the end of the semester.

I will check who attends class. You get credit by either A. signing the attendance sheet in class or B. go to Moodle and mark your attendance ``P'' (present). You have until 11:59pm on each day of each lecture to do so for that lecture. If you sign the attendance sheet, I will mark you "P". You will forfeit 5% of your grade if you miss 3 or more classes without a valid justification. I you miss a class because you are sick, etc., please let me know. I may require you to document your reason.

For a term paper, you are asked to select and read a mathematical paper or a chapter/section in a book, whose topic is in discrete mathematical models. You can select a section in DMM that was not covered in class.
Form of term paper: The term paper is a 3-5 page summary and review (typed, single spaced), with a title, author, page numbers and the citation to your selected material (paper, book chapter, internet document). The citation style can be any, like AMS alpha. You can include figures, tables and displayed mathematical formulas.
Content of term paper: Your text should not only be a transcript of your talk. You can assume that your reader knows the material. After summarizing the topic by pointing to the main new ideas in the material (1-2 pages), your paper reviews the content and writing (1 page): how well the ideas are described; what is done well and what might have been done better. You may also give your impression on what you have learned: eg, whether the ideas are surprising.
Due date of term paper: please uploaded on Moodle by Tue Dec 12 at 4pm.

Presentation: Your talk will be on Zoom at the time reserved (see above). My Zoom meeting ID is a the top of the Moodle class site. You should speak 10-12 minutes with 3 minutes for questions and transition to the next talk. In your presentation, you should assume that your audience has undergraduate mathematical knowledge but has not seen the material. Your talk should explain the modeling problem and how it is solved. You may leave out some material. Your explanation should give sufficient detail, like my lectures in class. My evaluation of your talk takes into account the manner of your speech, but also the form of your document (proper title page and end page, etc.). Please rehearse your talk with another person for feedback and try to speak somewhat freely.
Due date of talk document (powerpoint, pdf, ...): Please upload your talk document (powerpoint, pdf, ...) on Moodle before your talk. You will screen-share your document on Zoom; if there is a problem, I can screen-share your document and you can tell me when to forward please uploaded on Moodle before your talk.

Grade split up
Accumulated homework grade	40%
Term paper + presentation	20%
First mid-semester exam	17.5%
Second mid-semester exam	17.5%
Class attendance	5%
Course grade	100%

Grade distribution of Fall 2023.

If you need assistance in any way, please let me know (see also the University's policy).

Academic Standards

Collaboration on homeworks: I expect every student to be their own writer. Therefore the only thing you can discuss with anyone is how you might go about solving a particular problem. You may use freely information that you retrieve from public (electronic) libraries or texts, but you must properly reference your source.

Late submissions: The following penalties are given for (unexcused) late submissions:

• up to 1 day late: 20% reduction
• up to 2 days late: 50% reduction
• after 2 days: no credit (= 100% reduction)

©2010, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2022, 2023, 2024 Erich Kaltofen. Permission to use provided that copyright notice is not removed.