Bored of Studies

University of Sydney
Subject Reviews
Updated Version for 2016

Board of Studies 2006-2015. The opinions expressed in this document are those of the authors and not of Bored of

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Studies or the University of Sydney.

Foreword
This document compiles reviews of University of Sydney units of study contributed by
members of the Bored of Studies community. Apart from formatting they are reproduced
verbatim.

The reviews canvas a broad cross-section of faculties across the university and give a unique
insight into student opinion of subjects. These firsthand accounts from the student body offer
a scrutiny of subjects that are absent from the official materials published by the university.
Units of Study (UOS) have been organised in alphabetical and numerical order by unit code.

Most contributions give marks and opinions on 4 areas: Ease, Lecturers, Interest, and Overall
remarks.

Be mindful that these reviews are merely individual opinions. Some subjects have received
very consistent reviews while reviewers have had conflicting views on others. Read, digest
and use this document to inform yourself and aid your decision making process. Do not
however solely rely on these reviews to make your UOS selections.

Always remember that there is a lee-way period at the beginning of each semester to enrol
and withdrawal from a subject.

Don’t hesitate to post questions in the forum or PM members for more details. The original
posts can be found at this link. Your reviews are welcome at the same location.

James (Rafy)
Bored of Studies Administrator
University of Sydney

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 Preface for the New Edition
In this new edition, it is worth noting that a number of the reviews in this document have
been for subjects which have since been discontinued. These reviews have been kept, and
where possible, separated from the currently offered units for the convenience of the reader to
retrieve the most relevant information. Many of these units can be found in the “Discontinued
Units” section at the end of the document.

While these subjects are no longer offered, it is hoped that the reviews will still serve as a
way of providing general insight into the content and teaching quality of the departments.
Otherwise, multiple reviews for specific units are ordered with the more recent reviews
placed first.

Below is a list of discontinued units which have reviews in this document, and the equivalent
(or nearest equivalent) subject the University offers as of 2016. All other units not listed
below are currently offered.

Pre-2015 Subject 2015 Subject

ACCT1001 BUSS1030
ACCT1002 ACCT1006
ACCT1003 BUSS1030/ACCT1006
ACCT1004 BUSS1030/ACCT1006
AFNR1002 AGEN1001
ANHS1003 ANHS1600
ANHS1004 ANHS1601
ANHS2604 ANHS2610/2618
ANHS2607 ANHS2610/2618
ANHS2608 ANHS3632
ANHS2691 ANHS3635/HSTY2691
ARHT2642 ARHT2640/2646
ARNE1001 ARCA1000/ARCA1001
ARPH1001 ARCA1000/1001
ASNS1002 ASNS1101/1601/1602
ASNS2676 Any 2000 or 3000 level ASNS subject
BIOL2011 BIOL2021/2921
BIOL2012 BIOL2021/2921
BIOL3011 BIOL3045/3945
CLAW1002 CLAW1001
COSC1002/1902 COSC1003/1903
ECMT2110 ECMT2150/2160
ECMT2120 ECMT3150
ECMT2620 QBUS2310
ECMT2630 ECMT3130/QBUS Management subjects
ECOF1001 BUSS1001
ECOF3001 BUSS3500
ECOP1002 ECOP1001/1003
ECOP1004 ECOP1001/1003
ECOP3018 ECOP2612

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 EDUF3024 Any EDSE units
EDUF3030 EDSE2001/3072
ENGL1000 WRIT1001
ENGL1002 ENGL1007/1009/2611/2657
ENGL1005 ENGL1007
ENGL1015 PHIL2633/ENGL1XXX/ENGL2605/3655
ENGL1020 ENGL2657
ENGL1025 ENGL1011
ENGL2613 Any ENGL units
ENGL2627 Any ENGL units
ENGL2632 ENGL3603
ENGL2649 ENGL2657
ENGG1804 ENGG1800/1805
ENVI2112 GEOS2115/2915
FINC2192 Any FINC units/BUSS4XXX
FINC3194 Any FINC units/BUSS4XXX
GCST2601 Any GCST units
GCST3601 GCST2607/3631
GOVT1406 Any GOVT or IBUS units
HSTY1022 HSTY1025
HSTY1088 HSTY1089
HSTY2601 Any HSTY units
HSTY2655 HSTY2676
HSTY2678 HSTY2624/2676
HSTY2765 HSTY2628
LAWS3403 LAWS3424
LNGS1005 LNGS1001
MATH1904 MATH1004
MKTG1002 MKTG2113
MKTG2010 MKTG3118
PHAR4618 Any PHAR units
PHAR4819 Any PHAR units
PHIL1010 PHIL1012/1013
PLNT2003 BIOL3043/3943, Any PPAT or HORT units
SCLG3601 SCLG2609
SCLG3602 Any SCLG units
SLSS1002 SLSS1001/1003
SOFT1001 INFO1XXX
SOFT1902 INFO1XXX
WORK1001 WORK1003/2203
WORK1002 WORK1003/2205

Last Updated July 2016

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 Table of Contents
Foreword..............................................................................................................................................1
Preface for the New Edition................................................................................................................2
Table of Contents.................................................................................................................................4

Aeronautical/Aerospace Engineering (AERO)................................................................................16

AERO2703 - Aircraft Performance and Operation..........................................................................16

Aeronautical, Mechanical & Mechatronic Engineering - General (AMME)................................16

AMME2301 - Mechanics of Solids.................................................................................................16

Accounting (ACCT)...........................................................................................................................17
ACCT1006 - Accounting and Financial Management.....................................................................17
ACCT2011 - Financial Accounting A..............................................................................................17
ACCT2012 - Management Accounting A........................................................................................17
ACCT3011 - Financial Accounting B..............................................................................................17
ACCT3012 - Management Accounting B........................................................................................18
ACCT3014 - Auditing and Assurance..............................................................................................19

Agricultural Genetics (GENE)..........................................................................................................20

GENE2001 - Agricultural Genetics 2...............................................................................................20

Agriculture and Environment (AGEN)............................................................................................20

AGEN1001 - Shaping our Landscapes............................................................................................20

Analytical Thinking (ATHK)............................................................................................................20

ATHK1001 - Analytical Thinking....................................................................................................20

Anatomy and Histology (ANAT).......................................................................................................21

ANAT2008 - Introduction to Histology...........................................................................................21
ANAT2009 - Comparative Primate Anatomy..................................................................................21
ANAT2010 - Concepts of Neuroanatomy........................................................................................22
ANAT3004 - Cranial and Cervical Anatomy...................................................................................23
ANAT3006 - Forensic Osteology.....................................................................................................23
ANAT3007 - Visceral Anatomy.......................................................................................................23
ANAT3008 - Musculoskeletal Anatomy..........................................................................................24

Ancient History (ANHS)....................................................................................................................25

ANHS1600 - Foundations for Ancient Greece.................................................................................25
ANHS1601 - Foundations for Ancient Rome...................................................................................26
ANHS1602 - Greek and Roman Myth.............................................................................................27
ANHS2601 - Ancient Imperialism...................................................................................................28

Anthropology (ANTH).......................................................................................................................29
ANTH1001 - Cultural Difference: An Introduction.........................................................................29

Asian Studies (ASNS)........................................................................................................................30

ASNS1601 - Introduction to Asian Cultures....................................................................................30
ASNS2618 - Remaking Chinese Society, 1949-Present...................................................................31
ASNS2661 - History of Modern Indonesia......................................................................................32
ASNS2663 - Social Activism in South East Asia.............................................................................33
ASNS2670 - Mass Media in East Asia.............................................................................................33

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Biochemistry (BCHM).......................................................................................................................35
BCHM2072/2972 - Human Biochemistry (Regular/Advanced)......................................................35
BCHM3071/3971 - Molecular Biology & Biochemistry - Genes (Regular/Advanced)...................35
BCHM3081/3981 - Molecular Biology & Biochemistry - Proteins (Regular/Advanced)................36
BCHM3082/3982 - Medical and Metabolic Biochemistry (Regular/Advanced)..............................37
BCHM3092/3992 - Proteomics and Functional Genomics (Regular/Advanced).............................37

Biology (BIOL)...................................................................................................................................38
BIOL1001 - Concepts in Biology....................................................................................................38
BIOL1002 - Living Systems............................................................................................................39
BIOL1003 - Human Biology...........................................................................................................40
BIOL1902 - Living Systems (Advanced).........................................................................................41
BIOL1911 - Concepts in Biology (Advanced).................................................................................42
BIOL1993 - Human Biology (Special Studies)................................................................................43
BIOL2016 - Cell Biology................................................................................................................43
BIOL2021 - Zoology......................................................................................................................44
BIOL2023 - Botany.........................................................................................................................45

Business Core Subjects (BUSS).........................................................................................................46

BUSS1001 - Understanding Business..............................................................................................46
BUSS1002 - The Business Environment.........................................................................................46
BUSS1020 - Quantitative Business Analysis...................................................................................47
BUSS1030 - Accounting, Business and Society..............................................................................47
BUSS1040 - Economics for Business Decision Making..................................................................48

Business Information Systems (INFS)..............................................................................................49

INFS1000 - Digital Business Innovation.........................................................................................49
INFS2001 - IS for Performance Improvement.................................................................................50

Chemical Engineering (CHNG)........................................................................................................52

CHNG1103 - Material and Energy Transformations Introduction...................................................52

Chemistry (CHEM)...........................................................................................................................53
CHEM1002 - Fundamentals of Chemistry 1B.................................................................................53
CHEM1101 - Chemistry 1A............................................................................................................53
CHEM1102 - Chemistry 1B.............................................................................................................54
CHEM1611 - Chemistry A (Pharmacy)...........................................................................................56
CHEM1612 - Chemistry B (Pharmacy)...........................................................................................56
CHEM1901 - Chemistry 1A (Advanced).........................................................................................56
CHEM1902 - Chemistry 1B (Advanced).........................................................................................58
CHEM1903 - Chemistry 1A (Special Studies Program)..................................................................59
CHEM1904 - Chemistry 1B (Special Studies Program)..................................................................60
CHEM2401/2911/2915 - Molecular Reactivity and Spectroscopy (Regular/Advanced/SSP)..........60
CHEM2402/2912 - Chemical Structure and Stability (Regular/Advanced).....................................64
CHEM2403 - Chemistry of Biological Molecules...........................................................................67
CHEM2404 - Forensic and Environmental Chemistry.....................................................................68
Third Year Chemistry Advanced Seminars......................................................................................69
Third Year Chemistry Practicals......................................................................................................69
CHEM3110/3910 - Biomolecules: Properties and Reactions (Regular/Advanced)..........................72
CHEM3111/3911 - Organic Structure and Reactivity (Regular/Advanced).....................................73
CHEM3112/3912 - Materials Chemistry (Regular/Advanced)........................................................74
CHEM3113/3913 - Catalysis and Sustainable Processes (Regular/Advanced)................................74
CHEM3114/3914 - Metal Complexes: Medicine and Materials (Regular/Advanced).....................75
CHEM3115/3915 - Synthetic Medicinal Chemistry (Regular/Advanced).......................................76
CHEM3117/3917 - Molecular Spectroscopy and Quantum Theory (Regular/Advanced)................77

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Chinese Studies (CHNS)....................................................................................................................78
CHNS1101 - Chinese 1A (For Beginners).......................................................................................78

Commercial Law (CLAW)................................................................................................................80

CLAW1001 - Foundations of Business Law....................................................................................80
CLAW2201 - Corporations Law......................................................................................................83
CLAW2205 - Competition and Consumer Law...............................................................................83
CLAW2207 - Business, Ethics and the Law....................................................................................84
CLAW3201 - Australian Taxation System.......................................................................................84
CLAW3202 - Tax Strategies for Business........................................................................................84

Computer Science (COMP)...............................................................................................................85

COMP2129 - Operating Systems and Machine Principles...............................................................85
COMP3520 - Operating Systems Internals......................................................................................85

Econometrics (ECMT)......................................................................................................................87
ECMT1010 - Introduction to Economic Statistics...........................................................................87
ECMT1020 - Introduction to Econometrics.....................................................................................89
ECMT3110 - Econometric Models and Methods.............................................................................90

Economics (ECON/ECOS)................................................................................................................91
ECON1001 - Introductory Microeconomics....................................................................................91
ECON1002 - Introductory Macroeconomics...................................................................................94
ECOS2001 - Intermediate Microeconomics....................................................................................97
ECOS2201 - Economics of Competition and Strategy.....................................................................98
ECOS2901 - Intermediate Microeconomics Honours......................................................................98
ECOS2902 - Intermediate Macroeconomics Honours.....................................................................99
ECOS2903 - Mathematical Economics A........................................................................................99
ECOS3002 - Development Economics..........................................................................................100
ECOS3003 - Hierarchies, Incentives and Firm Structure...............................................................100
ECOS3006 - International Trade....................................................................................................101
ECOS3010 - Monetary Economics................................................................................................101
ECOS3011 - Public Finance..........................................................................................................101
ECOS3019 - Capital and Dynamics...............................................................................................101
ECOS3901 - Advanced Microeconomics Honours........................................................................102

Education - Foundations.................................................................................................................103
EDUF1018 - Education, Teachers and Teaching............................................................................103
EDUF1019 - Human Development and Education........................................................................104
EDUF2006 - Educational Psychology...........................................................................................107
EDUF2007 - Social Perspectives on Education.............................................................................108

Education - Secondary.....................................................................................................................111
EDSE2001 - Craft Knowledge and Professional Practice 1...........................................................111
EDSE3040 - Teaching History 1....................................................................................................112
EDSE3042 - Teaching Drama 1.....................................................................................................113
EDSE3044 - Teaching English 1....................................................................................................113

Electrical Engineering (ELEC).......................................................................................................115

ELEC1601 - Foundations of Computer Systems............................................................................115
ELEC2602 - Digital Logic.............................................................................................................115
ELEC3305 - Digital Signal Processing..........................................................................................115
ELEC3404 - Electronic Circuit Design..........................................................................................116
ELEC3610 - E-Business Analysis and Design...............................................................................116

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Electron Microscopy (EMHU)........................................................................................................117
EMHU3001 - Electron Microscopy and Imaging/Theory..............................................................117

Engineering - General (ENGG).......................................................................................................118

ENGG1800 - Engineering Disciplines (Intro) Stream A................................................................118
ENGG1801 - Engineering Computing...........................................................................................119
ENGG1805 - Professional Engineering and IT..............................................................................120

English (ENGL)...............................................................................................................................121
ENGL1002 - Narratives of Romance and Adventure.....................................................................121
ENGL1007 - Language, Texts and Time........................................................................................122
ENGL1008 - Australian Texts: International Contexts...................................................................123
ENGL1009 - Reading English Texts..............................................................................................124
ENGL2603 - Imagining America...................................................................................................124
ENGL2607 - Drama: Classical to Renaissance..............................................................................124
ENGL2611 - Jane Austen, Then and Now.....................................................................................125
ENGL2613 - Literature, Politics and Modernity............................................................................125
ENGL2617 - Postmodernism.........................................................................................................126
ENGL2627 - Screening Sexuality..................................................................................................127
ENGL2639 - Literature and Cinema..............................................................................................128
ENGL2650 - Reading Poetry.........................................................................................................128
ENGL2653 - Western Theories of Language.................................................................................129
ENGL2657 - Myths, Legends and Heroes.....................................................................................129
ENGL2660 - Reading the Nation: American Literature.................................................................130
ENGL3603 - Contemporary British Literature..............................................................................130
ENGL3623 - The 18th Century: Scandal & Sociability..................................................................130

Entomology (ENTO)........................................................................................................................131
ENTO2001 - Introductory Entomology.........................................................................................131

Environmental Statistics (ENVX)...................................................................................................131

ENVX1001 - Introductory Statistical Methods..............................................................................131

Environmental Studies (ENVI).......................................................................................................132

ENVI3111/3911 – Environmental Law and Ethics (Regular/Advanced)…...................................132
ENVI3114/3914 - Energy and the Environment (Regular/Advanced)...........................................132

Finance (FINC)................................................................................................................................133
FINC2011 - Corporate Finance I....................................................................................................133
FINC2012 - Corporate Finance II..................................................................................................134
FINC3011 - International Financial Management..........................................................................135
FINC3013 - Mergers and Acquisitions...........................................................................................135
FINC3015 - Financial Valuation: A Case Study Approach.............................................................135
FINC3017 - Investments and Portfolio Management.....................................................................136

French Studies (FRNC)...................................................................................................................138

FRNC1631/1632 - Junior French Advanced 5/6............................................................................138

Gender and Cultural Studies (GCST)............................................................................................138

GCST2610 - Intimacy, Love and Friendship..................................................................................138

Geosciences (GEOS)........................................................................................................................139
GEOS1001 - Earth, Environment and Society...............................................................................139
GEOS1902 - Introductory Geography (Advanced)........................................................................139

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 GEOS2111 - Natural Hazards: A GIS Approach............................................................................140
GEOS2115 - Oceans, Coasts & Climate Change...........................................................................140
GEOS2121 - Environmental and Resource Management..............................................................141

Germanic Studies (GRMN).............................................................................................................142

GRMN1111 - Junior German 1......................................................................................................142
GRMN1122 - Junior German 2......................................................................................................142
GRMN1311/1322 - Junior German 5/6..........................................................................................143

Government and International Relations (GOVT).......................................................................144

GOVT1101 - Australian Politics....................................................................................................144
GOVT1105 - Geopolitics...............................................................................................................146
GOVT1202 - World Politics..........................................................................................................149
GOVT2119 - Southeast Asia: Dilemmas of Development.............................................................152
GOVT2221 - Politics of International Economic Relations...........................................................153
GOVT2226 - International Organisations......................................................................................154
GOVT2445 - American Politics and Foreign Policy......................................................................154
GOVT2552 - Policy Analysis........................................................................................................155

Health Sciences (BIOS/HSBH/REHB)...........................................................................................156

BIOS1168 - Functional Musculoskeletal Anatomy A....................................................................156
BIOS1170 - Body Systems: Structure and Function......................................................................156
BIOS2115 - Embryology...............................................................................................................157
HSBH1003 - Health, Behaviour and Society.................................................................................157
REHB3064 - Alcohol and Drug Misuse Rehabilitation..................................................................158

History (HSTY)................................................................................................................................159
HSTY1025 - The Middle Ages......................................................................................................159
HSTY1031 - Renaissance and Reformation (1498-1648)..............................................................159
HSTY1044 - Twentieth Century Europe........................................................................................160
HSTY1045 - Modern European History 1750-1914......................................................................161
HSTY1076 - American History from Lincoln to Clinton...............................................................162
HSTY1089 - Australia: Conflict and Transformation.....................................................................163
HSTY2614 - Living in Modern Australia......................................................................................164
HSTY2670 - New York, New York................................................................................................164
HSTY2692 - International and Diplomatic History.......................................................................165

History and Philosophy of Science (HPSC)....................................................................................166

HPSC1000 - Bioethics...................................................................................................................166
HPSC2100 - The Birth of Modern Science....................................................................................167
HPSC2101 - What Is This Thing Called Science?.........................................................................168
HPSC3107 - Science, Ethics and Society.......................................................................................168

Immunobiology (IMMU).................................................................................................................169
IMMU2101 - Introductory Immunology........................................................................................169

Indigenous Australian Studies - Koori Centre (KOCR)...............................................................169

KOCR2600 - Indigenous Australia: An Introduction.....................................................................169

Industrial Relations and Human Resource Management (WORK)............................................170

WORK1003 - Foundations of Work and Employment...................................................................170
Information Technology (INFO).....................................................................................................171
INFO1103 - Introduction to Programming.....................................................................................171
INFO1903 - Informatics (Advanced).............................................................................................172
INFO2820 - Databases 1 (Advanced)............................................................................................173

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 INFO3220 - Objected Oriented Design..........................................................................................174
INFO3402 - Management of IT Projects and Systems...................................................................174

Information Systems (ISYS)...........................................................................................................175

ISYS2140 - Information Systems..................................................................................................175
ISYS3401 - Analytical Methods and Information Systems............................................................175

International and Global Studies (INGS)......................................................................................176

INGS1001 - Power and Money in Global Society.........................................................................176

International Business (IBUS)........................................................................................................177

IBUS2101 - International Business Strategy..................................................................................177
IBUS3101 - International Business Alliance..................................................................................177
IBUS3102 - International Risk Management.................................................................................178
IBUS3103 - Entrepreneurship and Innovation...............................................................................178

Japanese Studies (JPNS).................................................................................................................179

JPNS1611 - Japanese 1..................................................................................................................179
JPNS2621 - Japanese 5..................................................................................................................179
JPNS2622 - Japanese 6..................................................................................................................181

Jewish Civilisation, Thought and Culture (JCTC)........................................................................182

JCTC2606 - The Holocaust : History and Aftermath.....................................................................182

Korean Studies (KRNS)..................................................................................................................183

KRNS1621 – Korean 1..................................................................................................................183

Law (LAWS).....................................................................................................................................184
LAWS1006 - Foundations of Law.................................................................................................184
LAWS1012 - Torts.........................................................................................................................184
LAWS1013 - Legal Research I......................................................................................................185
LAWS1023 - Public International Law..........................................................................................185
LAWS3412 - Australian Income Tax.............................................................................................185
LAWS3413 - Banking and Financial Instruments..........................................................................185
LAWS3436 - International/Comparative Jurisprudence.................................................................186

Linguistics (LNGS)..........................................................................................................................187
LNGS1001 – Structure of Language..............................................................................................187

Marketing (MKTG).........................................................................................................................188
MKTG1001 - Marketing Principles...............................................................................................188
MKTG2002 - Consumer Behaviour...............................................................................................189
MKTG3114 - New Products Marketing.........................................................................................189
MKTG3116 - International Marketing...........................................................................................189
MKTG3117 - Services Marketing..................................................................................................190
MKTG3120 - Building and Managing Brands...............................................................................190
MKTG3121 - Advertising: Creative Principles..............................................................................191

Mathematics (MATH).....................................................................................................................192
MATH1001 - Differential Calculus................................................................................................192
MATH1002 - Linear Algebra.........................................................................................................194
MATH1003 - Integral Calculus and Modelling..............................................................................196
MATH1004 - Discrete Mathematics..............................................................................................198
MATH1005 - Statistics..................................................................................................................200
MATH1011 - Applications of Calculus..........................................................................................202

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 MATH1013 - Mathematical Modelling..........................................................................................204
MATH1014 - Introduction to Linear Algebra.................................................................................204
MATH1015 - Biostatistics.............................................................................................................205
MATH1901 - Differential Calculus (Advanced)............................................................................206
MATH1902 - Linear Algebra (Advanced).....................................................................................208
MATH1903 - Integral Calculus and Modelling (Advanced)..........................................................210
MATH1905 - Statistics (Advanced)...............................................................................................213
MATH1906 - Mathematics (Special Studies Program) A...............................................................215
MATH1907 - Mathematics (Special Studies Program) B...............................................................216
MATH2061 - Linear Mathematics and Vector Calculus.................................................................216
MATH2065 - Introduction to Partial Differential Equations..........................................................216
MATH2069/2969 - Discrete Mathematics and Graph Theory (Regular/Advanced) ......................217
MATH2070/2970 - Optimisation and Financial Mathematics (Regular/Advanced).......................218
MATH2961 - Linear Mathematics and Vector Calculus (Advanced).............................................219
MATH2962 - Real and Complex Analysis (Advanced).................................................................220
MATH2965 - Partial Differential Equations Intro (Advanced)......................................................221
MATH2968 - Algebra (Advanced).................................................................................................221
MATH3061 - Geometry and Topology..........................................................................................222
MATH3063 - Nonlinear ODEs and Applications...........................................................................222
MATH3066 - Algebra and Logic...................................................................................................223
MATH3962 - Rings, Fields and Galois Theory (Advanced)..........................................................223

Mechatronic Engineering (MTRX)................................................................................................224

MTRX1701 – Introduction to Mechatronic Engineering...............................................................224

Media and Communications (MECO)...........................................................................................225

MECO1001 - Australian Media Studies.........................................................................................225
MECO1003 - Principles of Media Writing....................................................................................225

Molecular Biology (MBLG)............................................................................................................226

MBLG1001 - Molecular Biology and Genetics.............................................................................226
MBLG1901 - Molecular Biology and Genetics (Advanced)..........................................................228
MBLG2071 - Molecular Biology and Genomics...........................................................................229

Music - Arts Faculty (MUSC).........................................................................................................230

MUSC1503 - Fundamentals of Music 1.........................................................................................230
MUSC1507 - Sound, Screens & Speakers: Music & Media..........................................................230

Performance Studies (PRFM).........................................................................................................231

PRFM2601 - Being There: Theories of Performance.....................................................................231
PRFM2602 - Performance: Production and Interpretation.............................................................231

Pharmacology (PCOL)....................................................................................................................232
PCOL2011 - Pharmacology Fundamentals....................................................................................232
PCOL2012 - Pharmacology: Drugs and People.............................................................................233
PCOL2605 - Pharmacology for Pharmacy.....................................................................................233

Pharmacy (PHAR)...........................................................................................................................234
PHAR1811 - Foundations of Pharmacy.........................................................................................234
PHAR1812 - Basic Pharmaceutical Sciences.................................................................................234
PHAR1821 - Social Pharmacy.......................................................................................................234
PHAR1822 - Physical Pharmaceutics and Formulation A.............................................................234
PHAR2811 - Drug Discovery and Design A..................................................................................235
PHAR2812 - Microbiology and Infection......................................................................................235
PHAR2813 - Therapeutic Principles..............................................................................................236

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 PHAR2821 - Drug Discovery and Design B..................................................................................236
PHAR2822 - Pharmacy Practice....................................................................................................237
PHAR2823 - Physical Pharmaceutics and Formulation B.............................................................237
PHAR4812 - Integrated Dispensing Practice.................................................................................237

Philosophy (PHIL)...........................................................................................................................239
PHIL1011 - Reality, Ethics and Beauty..........................................................................................239
PHIL1012 - Introductory Logic.....................................................................................................241
PHIL1013 - Society, Knowledge and Self......................................................................................243
PHIL2600 - Twentieth Century Philosophy...................................................................................244
PHIL2606 - Knowledge, Reason and Action.................................................................................244
PHIL2610 - Exploring Nonclassical Logic....................................................................................245
PHIL2617 - Practical Ethics...........................................................................................................245
PHIL2620 - Probability and Decision Theory................................................................................245
PHIL2622 - Reality, Time & Possibility: Metaphysics..................................................................246
PHIL2623 - Moral Psychology......................................................................................................246
PHIL2634 - Democratic Theory....................................................................................................246
PHIL2642 - Critical Thinking........................................................................................................247
PHIL2643 - Philosophy of Mind....................................................................................................248
PHIL2644 - Critical Theory: From Marx to Foucault....................................................................248
PHIL2645 - Philosophy of Law.....................................................................................................249
PHIL2647 - Philosophy of Happiness............................................................................................249
PHIL2649 - The Classical Mind....................................................................................................250

Physics (PHYS)................................................................................................................................251
PHYS1001 - Physics 1 (Regular)...................................................................................................251
PHYS1004 - Physics 1 (Environmental & Life Science)...............................................................251
PHYS1500 - Astronomy................................................................................................................251
PHYS1901 - Physics 1A (Advanced).............................................................................................253
PHYS1902 - Physics 1B (Advanced).............................................................................................253
PHYS2911 - Physics 2A (Advanced).............................................................................................254

Physiology (PHSI)............................................................................................................................256
PHSI2005 - Integrated Physiology A.............................................................................................256
PHSI2006 - Integrated Physiology B.............................................................................................257
PHSI2601 - Physiology for Pharmacy...........................................................................................258

Political Economy (ECOP)..............................................................................................................259

ECOP1001 - Economics as a Social Science.................................................................................259
ECOP1003 - International Economy and Finance..........................................................................263
ECOP2011 - Economic Theories of Modern Capitalism................................................................264
ECOP2911 - Political Economy Honours II...................................................................................265
ECOP3014 - Political Economy of Development..........................................................................266
ECOP3017 - Human Rights in Development.................................................................................267

Psychology (PSYC)..........................................................................................................................268
PSYC1001 - Psychology 1001.......................................................................................................268
PSYC1002 - Psychology 1002.......................................................................................................272
PSYC2011 - Brain and Behaviour.................................................................................................276
PSYC2012 - Statistics and Research Methods for Psychology......................................................276
PSYC2911 - Brain and Behaviour (Advanced)..............................................................................277

Social Policy (SCPL)........................................................................................................................279

SCPL2601 - Australian Social Policy............................................................................................279
SCPL2602 - The Principles of Social Policy..................................................................................279

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Socio-Legal Studies..........................................................................................................................280
SLSS1003 - Law and Contemporary Society.................................................................................280

Sociology (SCLG).............................................................................................................................281
SCLG1001 - Introduction to Sociology 1......................................................................................281
SCLG1002 - Introduction to Sociology 2......................................................................................282
SCLG2601 - Sociological Theory..................................................................................................282
SCLG2602 - Social Inquiry: Qualitative Methods.........................................................................283
SCLG2603 - Sociology of Health and Illness................................................................................283
SCLG2604 - Social Inequality in Australia....................................................................................284
SCLG2605 - Social Justice, Law and Society................................................................................284
SCLG2606 - Media in Contemporary Society...............................................................................284
SCLG2607 - Social Movements and Policy Making......................................................................285
SCLG2611 - Welfare States: A Comparative Analysis...................................................................285
SCLG2631 - Sociology of the Environment..................................................................................286
SCLG4011/4012/4013/4014 - Sociology Honours A/B/C/D..........................................................286

Spanish and Latin American Studies (SPAN)................................................................................288

SPAN1621 - Level 1 Spanish.........................................................................................................288

Statistics (STAT)..............................................................................................................................289
STAT2011 - Statistical Models.......................................................................................................289
STAT2012 - Statistical Tests..........................................................................................................289
STAT2911 - Probability and Statistical Models (Advanced)..........................................................290

Studies in Religion (RLST).............................................................................................................291

RLST1002 - A History of God, Deities and Demons.....................................................................291

Writing (WRIT)...............................................................................................................................292
WRIT1000 - Writing: Style and Method........................................................................................292
WRIT1001 - Writing and Rhetoric: Academic Essays...................................................................292
WRIT2002 - Advanced Writing and Rhetoric................................................................................294

DISCONTINUED UNITS...............................................................................................................296

Accounting (ACCT).........................................................................................................................297
ACCT1001 - Accounting 1A.........................................................................................................297
ACCT1002 - Accounting 1B..........................................................................................................299
ACCT1003 - Financial Accounting Concepts................................................................................301
ACCT1004 - Management Accounting Concepts..........................................................................301

Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources (AFNR).......................................................................301

AFNR1002 - Climate and the Environment...................................................................................301

Ancient History (ANHS)..................................................................................................................302

ANHS1003 - Foundations for Ancient History: Greece.................................................................302
ANHS1004 - Power and Persuasion in Rome................................................................................303
ANHS2604 - Pagans and Christians in the Roman World..............................................................304
ANNS2607 - Rome 90BC-AD14 - Making a World City..............................................................305
ANHS2608 - The World Turned Upside Down..............................................................................305
ANHS2691 - Ancient Historians Rethink History I.......................................................................306

Archaeology - Near Eastern (ARNE).............................................................................................307

ARNE1001 - Archaeology of the Near East...................................................................................307

Page | 12
Archaeology - Prehistoric and Historical (ARPH)........................................................................308
ARPH1001 - Introduction to Archaeology.....................................................................................308

Art History and Theory (ARHT)....................................................................................................309

ARHT2642 - Art in the Age of the Samurai...................................................................................309

Asian Studies (ASNS)......................................................................................................................310

ASNS1002 - Modern Asian History and Cultures 2.......................................................................310
ASNS2676 - Gender in Modern Asia.............................................................................................310

Biology (BIOL).................................................................................................................................312
BIOL2011 - Invertebrate Zoology..................................................................................................312
BIOL2012 - Vertebrates and Their Origins....................................................................................312
BIOL3011 - Ecophysiology...........................................................................................................313

Computational Science (COSC)......................................................................................................314

COSC1002/1902 - Computational Science in C (Regular/Advanced)...........................................314

Econometrics (ECMT)....................................................................................................................315
ECMT2110 - Regression Modelling..............................................................................................315
ECMT2120 - Analysis of Discrete Choice Data.............................................................................315
ECMT2620 - Management Science...............................................................................................316
ECMT2630 - Managerial Decision Making...................................................................................316

Economics and Business Faculty - General (ECOF).....................................................................317

ECOF1001 - Communication & Critical Analysis.........................................................................317
ECOF3001 - Business Strategy......................................................................................................317

Education - Foundations (EDUF)...................................................................................................318

EDUF3024 - Adolescent Development..........................................................................................318
EDUF3030 - Australian Secondary Schooling...............................................................................318

Engineering - General (ENGG)......................................................................................................319

ENGG1804 - Engineering Disciplines (Intro)................................................................................319

English (ENGL)...............................................................................................................................320
ENGL1000 - Academic Writing.....................................................................................................320
ENGL1005 - Language and Image................................................................................................322
ENGL1015 - Inventing Modernity.................................................................................................322
ENGL1020 - Literary Mythologies................................................................................................323
ENGL1025 - Fiction, Film and Power...........................................................................................323
ENGL2632 - British Romantic Literature......................................................................................324
ENGL2649 - The World of Fantasy...............................................................................................324

Environmental Studies (ENVI).......................................................................................................326

ENVI2112 - Atmospheric Processes and Climate..........................................................................326

Finance (FINC)................................................................................................................................327
FINC2192 - Finance Honours........................................................................................................327
FINC3194 - Finance 3 Honours (Securities Markets)....................................................................327

Gender and Cultural Studies (GCST)............................................................................................328

GCST2601 - Introducing Media and Culture.................................................................................328

Page | 13
 GCST3601 - Gender, Race and Australian Identities.....................................................................328

Government and International Relations (GOVT).......................................................................329

GOVT1406 - International Business and Politics..........................................................................329

History (HSTY)................................................................................................................................330
HSTY1022 - Europe in the High Middle Ages..............................................................................330
HSTY1088 - Australian History: An Introduction..........................................................................330
HSTY2601 - Religion and Society - Conversion and Culture........................................................331
HSTY2655 - Race Relations and Australian Frontiers...................................................................332
HSTY2678 - Race Around the World.............................................................................................332
HSTY2765 - A House Divided: The American Civil War..............................................................333

Industrial Relations and Human Resource Management (WORK)............................................334

WORK1001 - Foundations of Industrial Relations........................................................................334
WORK1002 - Foundations of Human Resource Management......................................................334

Law (LAWS).....................................................................................................................................334
LAWS3403 - Advanced Corporate Law.........................................................................................334

Linguistics (LNGS)..........................................................................................................................335
LNGS1005 - Structure of English..................................................................................................335

Marketing (MKTG).........................................................................................................................336
MKTG1002 - Marketing Research................................................................................................336
MKTG2010 - Marketing Channels and Logistics..........................................................................336

Mathematics (MATH).....................................................................................................................337
MATH1904 - Discrete Mathematics (Advanced)...........................................................................337

Pharmacy (PHAR)...........................................................................................................................337
PHAR4618 - Integrated Pharmacy Practice...................................................................................337
PHAR4819 - Drug Development and New Drug Technologies.....................................................338

Philosophy (PHIL)...........................................................................................................................339
PHIL1010 - Society, Knowledge and Reason................................................................................339

Plant Science (PLNT)......................................................................................................................340

PLNT2003 - Plant Form and Function...........................................................................................340

Political Economy (ECOP)..............................................................................................................341

ECOP1002 - Economy and Policy.................................................................................................341
ECOP1004 - Economy and Society...............................................................................................342
ECOP3018 - Economic Policy.......................................................................................................343

Socio-Legal Studies (SLSS).............................................................................................................344

SLSS1002 - Law as a Language, Culture and Performance...........................................................344

Sociology (SCLG).............................................................................................................................345
SCLG3601 - Contemporary Sociological Theory..........................................................................345
SCLG3602 - Empirical Sociological Methods...............................................................................345

Software Technology (SOFT)..........................................................................................................346

SOFT1001 - Software Development 1...........................................................................................346
SOFT1902 - Software Development 2 (Advanced).......................................................................346

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 Aeronautical/Aerospace Engineering (AERO)

AERO2703 – Aircraft Performance and Operation

NOTE: The following review was for the AERO2703 unit when it was called “Aerospace
Technology”

Semester 1 2006

Page | 15
Lecturer - 9/10
Ease - 7/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall: 7/10
The assessment structure is debateable with the tutor seeming to make more on how you do it rather
than if it is correct and you showed how you did it.

Aeronautical, Mechanical & Mechatronic

Engineering – General (AMME)

AMME2301 – Mechanics of Solids

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
Lecturer: 1/10
Interest: 1/10
Overall: 1/10
The lecturers were both terrible, tutorial structure was fucked, I'll probably do bad
because I couldn't bring myself to attend the lectures partially because of the lecturers but because
Engineers to be are generally fuckwits. Although Attendance vs mark should be high.

Accounting (ACCT)
NOTE: Reviews for the first fundamentals accounting unit, BUSS1030, can be found in the
Business Core Subjects section.

ACCT1006 - Accounting and Financial Management

Semester 2 2012

Page | 16
Ease – 8/10
It would’ve been a 9 without the practice set; easier than BUSS1030.
Lecturers – 8/10
Better lecturers than BUSS1030.
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 8/10

ACCT2011 - Financial Accounting A

Unknown Date
Ease: 0/10
Lecturers: 2/10
Both were as boring as batshit.
Interest: 2/10
Zero stimulating material
Overall: 1/10
My least favourite subject ever

ACCT2012 - Management Accounting A

Semester 2 2005
Overall: 6/10
Gay but not as gay as ACCT1002

Lecturer: 5/10
Ease: 8/10
Interest: 3/10
Overall: 5/10
Pretty boring

ACCT3011 - Financial Accounting B

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Some people might find consolidation tough
Lecturer: 5/10
Various. Indra is shit doesn’t know what he is doing - mistakes in his lecture slides, tells us to study
wrong examples for final etc. Matthew Egan is good but.
Interest: 7/10
Pretty interesting deals with corporate groups and how they are accounted for
Overall: 7.5/10
Like 2011, if you study hard you won't likely fail. It's one of the subjects where if you study a lot you
will do well. The essay was a bit tricky, though. The lecturers are really nice and approachable.
Semester 1 2008
Like 2011, if you study hard you won't likely fail. It's one of the subjects where if you study a lot you
will do well. The essay was a bit tricky, though. The lecturers are really nice and approachable.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8.5/10

Page | 17
Much easier than Fin A, it's been toned down a lot since the credit point adjustments I’m told.
Consolidation is challenging but is only covered in the mid semester. One test, one group assignment
and a final with no workshop participation required. 3rd yr accounting subjects are easier
Lecturers: 7/10
Straight forward, 1hr short. Pretty much all on the net.
Interest: 8/10
Kind of getting into the nitty gritty of financial reports, how they're constructed etc as
well as the theory behind accounting standard setting (critical analysis/reflection about accounting)
Overall: 8/10

Unknown Date
Ease: 5/10
Cunt of a subject. Financial accounting is the worst set of courses in the economics and
business faculties. Fuck AASB standards up the ass.
Lecturer: 7/10
Indra's best lecture was his first where he made no sense, all downhill from there. the Jewish guy was
actually really good, 8/10 for him.
Interest: 2/10
Fuck intra-company transactions and consolidation accounting in general right up the coight.
Overall: 4/10
Shit course, lock and ban.

ACCT3012 - Management Accounting B

Semester 1 2008
For most people, it's not as hard as 2012 and it's kind of like WORK2218 to me. I can see how some
of the stuff we learnt can be "applied" in real life as well.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 9/10
Mid semester not too bad, major essay is long but is doable. Open book 40% final was piss easy.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Peter Edwards and others)
Peter Edwards is a legend, the other guy is a bit of a bore.
Interest: 7/10
Kind of like business studies in yr 12, very little straight accounting focus.
Overall: 8.5/10

Unknown Date
Ease: 10/10
Piss easy
Lecturer: 4.5/10 (Peter Edwards 7/10, Rodney Coyte 2/10)
Pete Edwards was a funny cunt; Rodney Coyte was fairly boring.
Interest: 5/10
Nothing special
Overall: 7.5/10
Alright subject, I'll pay it

ACCT3014 - Auditing and Assurance

Page | 18
Unknown Date
Ease - 7/10
One of the easier Accounting subjects I've done but I think it's marked pretty harshly.
Lecturer - 6/10
She's good...but the material is so dry and she's not that good at making it interesting. Had a great
tutor though.
Interest - 0/10
So so so so so boring. Dunno how anyone can find auditing interesting.
Overall - 5/10
Meh not good, not bad. Hopefully D in it then I'll be happy as a pig in mud.

Agricultural Genetics (GENE)

GENE2001 - Agricultural Genetics 2

Page | 19
NOTE: GENE2001 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 7/10
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 6/10

Agriculture and Environment (AGEN)

AGEN1001 - Shaping our Landscapes

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 9/10
if you failed this unit you are really dumb
Lecturer: 4/10
Interest: 6/10
It’s all about dairy farm
Overall: 7/10

Analytical Thinking (ATHK)

NOTE: The subject listed here is compulsory for the Bachelor of Liberal Arts and Science. It is
administered by the Department of Psychology

ATHK1001 - Analytical Thinking

Semester 1 2012
This unit is a genetic combination of English and Mathematics (Statistics). The unit material is boring
– my god you would probably fall asleep and not realise that you ended up sleeping through a French
lecture as well. However, despite the unsatisfying quench for engaging lecture materials the
assessments and examinations are not difficult. As long as you have the knack to keep up with this
unit you will not just pass this unit but gain credits and above. [Ease: 7/10 | Overall: 8/10]

Anatomy and Histology (ANAT)

Page | 20
 ANAT2008 - Introduction to Histology

Semester 1 2013
Like BIOL1003, you touch upon many different organ systems but at the microscopic level rather
than the anatomical level. The unit requires an objectification to classification style of learning eg.
bile is made by a specialised cell in the liver – hepatocytes. The final theory examination and theory
quizzes are also objectification to classification tests similar to multiple choice except for the multiple
correct classifications. The practical requires more in depth understanding and memorising as many of
the organs seem to be quite similar except for the specialised cells eg. small intestine and large
intestine. The final practical exam occurs in two parts and you will be required to analyse some slides
under a microscope or recognise their EM images on a computer. This unit is highly recommended for
those wishing to undertake HSTO units in 3rd Year. [Ease: 6/10 | Interest: 7/10 | Lecturer: 7/10 |
Overall: 6.5/10]

ANAT2009 - Comparative Primate Anatomy

Semester 2 2014
Ease 7/10
There are a lot of things to remember (obviously, it's anatomy) and you might be taken aback by the
amount of detail you have to memorise for all the structures. I could never remember the different
morphologies in the apes and fossil hominids compared to the human though. Final prac exam (worth
40%) was a bitch, but the theory exam (50%) was quite easy.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Richard Ward)
Richard Ward is a bit hit and miss for some people - some people love him, some people can't stand
him. He's very funny, but his lectures are quite old fashioned (and by that, I mean he has no lecture
sides). He uploads very detailed .pdf notes on Blackboard, but they can be quite overwhelming to read
through. Definitely pay attention in lectures and take your own concise notes down.
Interest 10/10
It's incredible how humans evolved so specifically to maximise our ability as bipeds, and especially to
manipulate objects with our arms - this unit really opened my eyes to just how amazing evolution is.
The pracs are a lot of fun, don't miss any or you'll be in trouble for the final prac exam.
Overall: 7/10

Semester 2 2013
This is a medical science and history unit in one. The human anatomy will be compared to the
chimpanzee anatomy/casts during practicals. It is important that you understand why the human and
chimpanzee anatomy are either very similar or entirely different (e.g. our hands are used for
manipulation whereas the chimpanzee is for brachiating) and there are numerous casts for you to
examine during practicals. ANAT2009 is a very interesting unit and is recommended if you plan on
doing the general ANAT units in 3rd Year. You will also be given a chance to watch documentaries on
human evolution outside classes which can be used in your essays. There are only two quizzes worth
10% in this unit so it is best you try to maximise all marks as the final exam worth 90% can either be
easy or very difficult. [Ease: 6/10 | Interest: 9/10 | Lecturer: 9/10 | Overall: 8/10]

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10

Page | 21
The subject matter is quite simple with only a few concepts underpinning everything. That being said
there are around 600 muscles/bones/features you are expected to know and be able to identity on wet
specimens (cadavers). So if you struggle with nomenclature this might not be for you.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Denis Dillon, Richard Ward, Kevin Keay)
Unit coordinator is Denis Dillon who delivers around 25% of the lectures, good lecturer and is a
forensic osteology guru (she is frequently called away when police/airforce etc. discover skeletal
remains. Most of the lecturers are by Richard Ward slightly eccentric and a little too fond of acronyms
but good lecture style. One lecture of delivered by Kevin Keay (head of department).
Interest: 9/10
I was really disinterested in the primate part of the course but ended up loving it. Usyd has an
extensive collection in the Shellshear museum of skeletal and fossil remains not to mention the wet
specimens and Wilson museum. Unit has really well done tutorials/prac classes once a week.
Overall: 8/10
Interested in musculoskeletal anatomy? Then this is the unit for you; really enjoyable class, great
lectures, well run department. Can be also be done in first year (BSc) if you choose your units right.

ANAT2010 - Concepts of Neuroanatomy

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 5/10
SO MUCH CONTENT. The prac classes are a little bitchy, in that the lecture diagrams make
everything look so demarcated, but in reality it's very hard to differentiate between different parts.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Karen Cullen)
Karen is a goddess, she's so nice and friendly, and an excellent course co-ordinator. One of the best
lecturers I've ever had, very clear and forward.
Interest 10/10
The brain is a masterpiece, definitely take this opportunity to learn about it.
Overall: 8/10

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 6/10
Assessment items are quite straightforward however it does require are reasonable amount of work.
Concepts are not difficult to follow, basic neurophysiology, psychology etc. As with ANAT2009 there
are a large number of structures, tracts and landmarks you are required to learn and understand the
function of.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Karen Cullen, Vladimir Balcar)
Numerous lectures covering the different topics. Karen Cullen is the unit coordinator and is...strange
but approachable. Karen and Vladimir Balcar both delivered reasonable lectures but some of the post
docs were a little bored and it showed.
Interest: 8/10
As with ANAT2009 there are once weekly tutorial/prac classes with wet specimens which are really
enjoyable. Large list of essay topics covering all the research topics currently going in the department
(and marked by the researcher accordingly).
Overall: 7/10
Really good course let down in some ways by a slightly insane unit coordinator. Classes are generally
quite large too as this is a prerequisite for most of the further neuroscience units.

ANAT3004 - Cranial and Cervical Anatomy

Semester 2 2014

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Anatomy based on the head and neck of the human body. Fortunately you will not be touching much
on the cerebrum itself (if you would like to study neuro anatomy it is best you take on a NEUR unit of
study). This unit will require you to know in depth the blood supply/drainage, lymphatic supply and
drainage and sensory innervation for most of the muscles and organs in the head and neck. You will
also study the actions of the muscles of the head and neck. Overall, this is a unit that is well tailored to
potential dentistry students. This unit also has a practical component and an applied anatomy session
where you will study the MRIs of the head and neck. This unit has an advanced option where you will
be able to partake in dissection opportunities. Extra material are online to help you. The tutors are also
friendly and approachable. [Ease: Theory - 5/10 ~ Practical - 5/10 | Lecturer: 7/10 | Interest: 7/10 |
Overall: 6/10]

ANAT3006 - Forensic Osteology

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
Although the content of the course is not particularly difficult, the volume is large and parts are quite
dry. Some of the practical methods are highly subjective e.g. feeling the surface of the pubic synthesis
to determine age. Assessment is one 1.5k word critical review of a published paper in forensics, two
5% quizzes, theory and prac exam, and a group case study where you are given a box of bones had
have to determine sex, age, stature etc. and submit a report.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Denise Dolon and others)
Very similar set up to comparative anatomy (second year subject) in that it is run by Denise Dolon.
Guest lectures for specific topics, forensic odontologist, barrister, coroner police officer etc. Handouts
always provided ahead of time
Interest: 8/10
Quite cool to be able to tell age, sex, and race by simply looking at a few bones. Enjoyable twice
weekly prac and tutorial.
Overall: 7/10
Enjoyable class if a little dry at times. Archeology people tend to do this and enjoy it. Class is
probably a good segway into second semester musculoskeletal anatomy with Richard Ward. Worth
mentioning that you now need to have a credit in comparative anatomy and have done ANAT2008.

ANAT3007 - Visceral Anatomy

Semester 1 2014
This unit entails the study of the different organ systems within the human body (but not in great
detail). The lectures follow the same structure set out in the course book you buy which contains both
theory and practical material. You will get a chance to apply your theory knowledge in the practicals
and also have the opportunity to interpret CTs, X-Rays and at times MRIs. [Ease: 7/10 | Interest:
7/10 | Lecturer: 8/10 | Overall: 7.5/10]

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
I found this course quite easy but I would give it a 5 simply due to the amount of content. there are no
learning out comes and aside from 6 quizzes (best 5 of which go towards 10% of your mark) its
entirely assessed by a theory and prac exam.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Robin Arnold)
Some people hate her but I really liked the lecture (Robin Arnold). Course booklet includes
everything you need to know and lectures although dense do illustrate what she is likely to asses you
on. Two lectures for the autonomic nervous system are by Kevin Keay.
Interest: 9/10

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If you like blood and guts then this is the course for you. Covers the anatomy of the thoracic,
abdominal and pelvic cavity in great detail. Pracs are standard anatomy set up.
Overall: 9/10
Hugely enjoyable course covering some of my most interesting anatomy in my opinion. This is newly
a prerequisite for Cranial and cervical anatomy in second semester and results from this course
determine admission to the 10 advanced places which have weekly dissections.

ANAT3008 - Musculoskeletal Anatomy

Semester 2 2014
This unit was interesting overall. It is pretty much an advanced version of ANAT2009 with focus on
the neurovascular supply. This unit may prove to be a heavy burden on some students so it is best you
read up on extra material to maximise marks in the final exam essay. Extra material and study tutorial
videos are generally online. [Ease: 7/10 | Lecturer: 10/10 | Interest: 9/10 | Overall: 8.5/10]

Page | 24
 Ancient History (ANHS)

ANHS1600 – Foundations for Ancient Greece

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Not too difficult, but there is a lot of content. Assessment is pretty basic: 40% essay, 20%
participation and 40% final. The exam was alright, would have been pretty easy but I really didn't put
much effort in
Interest: 7/10
Most is pretty interesting, although there were a few dull moments. I didn't find it as interesting as
Roman Foundations
Lecturers: 8/10 (Alastair Blanshard, Ben Brown, Margaret Miller, Rick Benitez)
Alastair is really good, definitely entertaining. Also had the more interesting topics.I liked Ben, but I
think a lot of people didn't. His lectures were very text heavy, but he made them interesting - you
could tell he's really passionate about what he teaches.Meg was a bit boring for me, although I
personally don't enjoy her area (material culture) which may have something to do with it. Rick was
alright, although his lectures all seemed kind of irrelevant to the course. Was good for a change
though
Overall: 7.5/10
A pretty good course, although I much preferred Roman Foundations. My biggest complaint is that
our tute was very quiet, with almost no discussion taking place. I reckon they could have fixed this by
putting more secondary sources in the readings, which would have given us something to talk about.
Other than that, a good course

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer 8/10 (Alastair Blanshard)
Alastair is an amazing unit co-ordinator!
Interest - 7/10
Some topics were a bit boring
Overall - 8/10

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
Lecturers: 7/10 (Julia Kindt 9/10, Ben Brown 7/10, Margaret Miller 6/10)
I can't comment on the rest because I can't really remember showing up to any of their lectures.
Interest: 6/10
Overall: 7/10
Read your textbook. That's the best advice for this course. Other than that, Ben's pretty cool but never
finishes his lectures. Julia is just awesome and will reply to your emails ASAP (within like, 2 hours
honestly). Maggie is the cutest old lady ever but she writes essays and reads them so I generally can't
follow her lectures. She's really sweet though.

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 8/10
Lectures are (mostly) easy to understand, readings not so much. The essay was fairly easy, they are
very understanding of first-year problems. TURN UP TO YOUR TUTES. They constitute 20% of
your total mark.

Page | 25
Lecturers - 8.25/10 (Julia Kindt, Margaret Miller, Rick Benitez, Peter Wilson, David Pritchard)
JK - 9/10. Clear & interesting lectures, with lots of WebCT backup. Approachable, very sincere.
MM - 8/10, only because I find archaeology to be boring.
Philosophy guy - 9/10. Very interesting, although not very useful.
BB - 7/10. He's great fun in tutes - if you start him ranting about America and Iraq, you can keep him
happily occupied for half an hour at a time. Unfortunately he only has one lecture style, involving
text-heavy slides and many incomprehensible five-syllable words, often in ancient Greek.
The two guest lecturers on drama, democracy & women in Athens were quite dull.
Interest - 8 /10
Lecturers are quite good. Guest lecturers, however, boring.
Overall - 8/10
The exam short answer questions were needlessly pedantic - too many meaningless
names and dates - but the exam essay questions were nice and broad.

ANHS1601 – Foundations for Ancient Rome

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
Most of the exam was pretty good, had to do one out of 11 essays, then a bunch of short
answers. I found one of the sections (material cultures) really hard though, as it required a lot of
specific information, and had a lot less choice than the other short answer section. Besides that
though, the exam was good. Also had 20% tute participation, and a 40% essay which you have two
chances to hand in. I'd strongly recommend anyone doing this subject to hand it in for the first
deadline, because we got great feedback, and I spent less than an hour fixing it up, and ended up
getting an extra 12 marks for it.
Lecturers: 8.33/10 (Jeff Tatum 10/10, Paul Roche 9/10, Ted Robinson 6/10)
Jeff was absolutely fantastic, extremely funny and knowledgeable, I think everyone doing the course
loves him. His topics also tended to be the more interesting ones, and he was able to make all of his
lectures interesting.
Paul is also really great. He explained things really well, and provided great notes on WebCT. His
topics (mostly the literary ones) were also fascinating.
Ted was quite a dry lecturer. Not as bad as everyone says, he had some interesting things to say, but
his topics (material culture) were by far the least interesting.
Interest: 9/10
I found it mostly very interesting
Overall: 9/10
Definitely recommended for anyone interested in history.

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 8/10
It was pretty easy, none of the ideas, or concepts, or anything, really, was hard to
understand or grasp. Though the list of assignments questions were pretty hard, I found that I could
only answer 1-3 of them without having to go the extra miles to get all the info you would need. The
exam was fine, though the material culture section was a bit of a bitch - it required very specific
knowledge.
Lecturers: 7.33/10 (Jeff Tatum 10/10, Paul Roche 8/10, Ted Robinson 4/10)
I think I’ll just copy and paste what Spence said, since it's exactly how I feel about Jeff: "Jeff was
absolutely fantastic, extremely funny and knowledgeable, I think everyone doing the course loves
him. His topics also tended to be the more interesting ones, and he was able to make all of his lectures
interesting." (thanks Spence!)
I enjoyed Paul, even though I know a couple of people who found him dull; he did put up all his
lecture notes on webct. There's not that much bad things I can say about him.

Page | 26
I couldn’t stand Ted's lectures - boring, dry, uninspired; but then again, he did do all of the material
culture lectures, so there wasn’t much he could do for them - he just didn’t seem to have any passion
or enthusiasm for what he was doing.
Interest: 7/10
I probably found about 2/3rds of the course interesting; some of it though was pretty
dull - it also made me realise all the specific, and dull, knowledge you would need to know if you
ever wanted to major in ancient history (well, Rome anyway).
Overall: 7/10
It was a good course, recommended for anyone interested in Rome.

ANHS1602 - Greek and Roman Myth

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 6/10
A lot of names and places that are all very similar. You have to absorb a lot of information. There were
weekly quizzes, which I detested at the time, as I'm very much a 'learn the whole syllabus the week
before the exam' type person. The quizzes ended up being pretty good. There were a lot of people who
didn't give a stuff and got like 5/20 but because I was consistently getting over 15 it really dragged my
mark up I think. There was only one essay where they let you do basically whatever you want and the
final exam was in the last lecture.
Lecturers: 8/10
6/10 for Csapo, 10/10 for Fran. Professor Csapo obviously knew what he was talking about but I just
couldn't get into his lectures. I consistently fell asleep until I just stopped going. If I'd been there I'm
sure I would of got some amazing notes. Fran on the other hand, as a tutor, was amazing. She's
exactly as you'd imagine an ancient history teacher, kind of psycho. But she really was great, you
needed anything and she was there.
Interest: 10/10
Everyone thought I was wasting my time studying this at uni but it really was rewarding. After doing
this course I see Greek mythological symbolism everywhere.
Overall: 9/10
May sound like a joke, but it was the best subject I did at uni.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10
There were a lot of myths/names to remember. After a while you start getting confused/muddled by
them. There were weekly quizzes during tutorial periods on the week's readings and they can get
annoying, but you will get used to it. On the up-side though, the quizzes really helped jog my memory
and thus I wasn’t it so much of a panic come exam time.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Eric Csapo)
Professor Csapo seemed very very into his area. His lectures were intense and detailed in my opinion,
and I found it hard to concentrate during his lectures. The lecturer for the Roman part was much more
easier to follow. I didn't feel obliged to attend this lectures since the textbook was king for this
subject. You *need* the textbook for this subject.
Interest: 10/10
I love Greek myth and I really enjoyed this subject. Anyone who finds Greek/Roman myth fascinating
should definitely give this one a go.
Overall: 9/10
It was a lovely, well-thought out subject. If you persist throughout the semester, keep up with all the
readings and what not you will definitely have a fun time.

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 ANHS2601 - Ancient Imperialism

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
WAY too much reading. However I reckon the course was very well structured anyway. Essay
questions were pretty good (both the tute papers and for the exam), by which I mean, well thought
out. Again with the resource listing, which I appreciated very much!
Interest: 7/10
Again with the skipped lectures. Kids, don't do this.
Lecturers: 9.5/10
Your mileage may vary in small amounts depending on whose style you prefer. Still, great stuff. (I
*did* listen to them on WebCT eventually.)
Overall: 8/10
WAY too much reading, but still good solid stuff. The concept of imperialism, and the political
structure of Rome, was a teensy bit hard to grasp, but yeah, the lecturers clearly know their stuff when
it comes to actual lecturing, not just the course content.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
The content for the most part wasn't terribly complicated, it is divided into two halves, the first
focussing on Greek empires (Athens, Sparta, Alexander) and the second half focussing on Rome with
mentions of some others (Carthage, Seleucids). The first half didn't have a course reader or a text
book, we just had to print out some primary sources from WebCT, which I think unfortunately left us
with mostly facts rather than theories or interpretations and that was insufficient to me for exam
preparation, so it is encouraged to look at the secondary sources on the tutorial lists because otherwise
you'll end up just describing rather than analysing things in the exam. The Rome half did have a text
book (Roman Imperialism edited by Champion) which was very useful because it covers a wide
variety of sources and ideas, though it is sometimes dry and boring.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Alastair Blanshard, Dexter Hoyos)
Alastair Blanshard (first half of the course - lecturer and tutor): He's quite a favourite among ancient
history students, and I understand why, he is engaging and entertaining and makes history interesting.
However, I felt that a lot of his lectures were straight facts, like tribute tables or coinage descriptions,
and this was not entirely useful for the exam because memorising facts is great, but it won't lead to
any sort of analysis if all you do is just describe all the facts you know. His tutorials were a bit quiet
because we had no ideas to bounce off because all the readings were primary sources only.
Dexter Hoyos: (second half of the course - lecturer and tutor): Definitely amusing for the most part,
you can tell he really knows his stuff, even if he sometimes gets so off topic you sit there wondering
how on earth he'll get back to the point. There were more ideas in this half of the course rather than
just numbers and lists and I appreciated that as I found it a lot easier to study for the exam. The
tutorials were also a bit more lively because he focussed on what people had written in their essays
and then people had things to say.
Interest: 4/10
I personally didn't find this course particularly exciting. With the Greek half it seemed like just a more
in depth version of the first year course. The Roman half deals with a part of Roman history that the
first year course completely misses and I appreciated learning about the Punic wars because it was
completely new to me. Otherwise it was not greatly enlightening, it did not change my perspective on
anything, it just gave me a broader knowledge of the historical narrative. If you are looking for new
theories and interpretations, I think this course is somewhat lacking, except maybe right at the end
when we learnt about how Rome itself was changed because of its imperialism.
Overall: 6/10

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This course is not terrible, but it is also nothing exciting. It's a good foundation but I expected more
than that from a second year course. However, I'm glad I did it just for the extra knowledge of periods
I had never studied.
Anthropology (ANTH)

ANTH1001 – Cultural Difference: An Introduction

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 9/10
By far the easiest unit I did. I put the least work of all my subjects into it and got the best mark. They
cover a few different areas, but you really only need to know two. There's a fair bit of reading, but in
reality I didn't do the majority of it and it was fine. I did the major essay in two hours the night before
and got a D.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Gaynor McDonald)
Gaynor was lovely, she really was. She gave us packets of PK gum in the last lecture because it
symbolised a part of the course. And even though some of the information was extremely dry, she'd
try really hard to engage you with things you'd remember. I'll never forget her comparing
anthropological theories to shells she brought in.
Interest: 6.5/10
Some was interesting. Some really wasn't. Simple as that
Overall: 7/10
Biggest wank of a subject I’ve done at uni. It was extremely easy, the tutorials were fun, and I met
heaps of people, but it was so much of a joke I couldn't justify doing anthropology again the next
semester.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 8/10 (Daryl Feil 9/10, Gaynor McDonald 7/10)
Interest: 6/10
Overall: 8/10
Course is a-okay. Lots of readings to do though, most of which required concentration to understand
(aka if you can be bothered). Concepts are pretty easy to follow and understand. Daryl Feil is an
awesome lecturer, he's really funny even if his teaching style seems a bit all over the place. Gaynor's
good too but intimidating!

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
Not too difficult, just an overview of general anthropological ideas and concepts, and the
amount of tards doing the course because it’s the first one on the list in Arts means that if you are even
half intellectual you will get really good marks.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Daryl Feil)
Daryl Feil is by far the best lecturer I had at USYD in my first semester here. Energetic, humorous
and knowledgeable made listening and going to the lectures a shitload easier.
Interest: 9/10
For some reason I was intrigued by the concepts in the course, absolutely and utterly
intrigued at the different ways of thinking people all around the world have. They present you with
some material that really makes you wonder about our own society.
Overall: 9/10
It’s fuckin awesome, definitely hit that shit up, if you’re considering it.

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 Asian Studies (ASNS)

ASNS1601 - Introduction to Asian Cultures

Ease: 8/10
A pretty straightforward course, if you pay attention and take notes you'll be fine. Easy as shit 15%
quiz, mid term was pretty easy, got 75%. Final was fine, questions not that hard, I passed the course
before it and didn't study for it though. I'll update with marks when I get them.
Lecturers: 6/10
Retarded mandatory online pre-recorded lectures were boring, and not-recorded mandatory Q&A live
session was not bad, boring at times. The live sessions were loosely planned with some pre-prepared
questions and then just questions from students, and so often were vary varied in terms of content they
covered, some felt quite all over the place, little structure to be found.
China: Sean Moores (5/10). Not bad but 90 minutes of this soft-spoken Irish man's voice over a
powerpoint would put anybody to sleep. Most interesting of the regions, agricultural shit was cool.
Korea: Su-Kyoung Hwang (7/10). Not bad, didn't watch all her online lectures though. Fairly
interesting lectures, but not that good.
Japan: Matthew Stavros (9/10). Very enthusiastic guy, he took the online section only. Lionel
Babiscz (7/10) for the Q&A was pretty enthusiastic too, kind of rambly though.
South Asia/India: Mark Allon (6/10). Didn't watch his online stuff, didn't pay that much attention at
live session. Kept talking about Buddhism which I don't care about so was kind of boring. Knows his
shit though, just wasn't personally interested.
SEA: Adrian Vickers (8/10). Pretty good, interesting enough area and interesting enough guy.
Tutor was Tomoko Horikawa (6/10), nice but clearly didn't know that much about the regions other
than Japan. Had some good resources some tutes, others was pretty boring. Some decent discussions,
but she couldn't contribute that much.
Interest: 4/10
I didn't realise it was as much of a history subject as it is. Too much focus on religion/cultural beliefs
for my liking, I don't care at all about that, the civilisational aspects are a lot more interesting, but you
can't ignore either unfortunately. Interest severely dropped later on due to boring lectures/live
sessions, not taking next semester unit.
Overall: 6/10
Not the worst but not that interesting. I don't like the online lecture component at all (everyone always
says how online recorded lectures aren't substitute and then they go and make it fucking mandatory).
Pretty straightforward course though, I just lost interest once I got 51%.

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 9/10
I really enjoyed this unit It was a great intro into the history of different Asian civilisations and their
ways of life. Was able to get a distinction in this unit without much work. This was mainly due to the
easy nature of the course structure, where they provided weekly study questions that related to the
week 5 quiz and final exam. Would've given it a 10/10 for ease, if it weren't for Adrian Vickers who
made it so hard to study for the South East Asia component of the unit.
Lecturers: 5.625/10 (Eileen Walsh: 5/10, Matthew Stavros 9.5/10, Mary Nasr 7.5/10, Adrian
Vickers 0.5/10)

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Eileen covered the China component of the unit and really wasn't too bad. She got through the
coursework, but wasn't really engaging and so I stayed home and just listened to her lecture
recordings (saved me 2 hrs of boring lectures)
Matthew Stavros is a brilliant lecturer! He is engaging, funny and extremely intelligent. Easily the
best lecturer I had all semester. Would've given him a 10, but I found some of the stuff he discussed
was, at times, a little off track (still fascinating stuff though!)
Mary covered the Korea part and during the semester I thought she went way too fast and I really
wasn't able to keep up with a lot of the stuff she was saying. However, when it came to the final exam
it benefited me greatly as she had discussed so much that I was able to listen to the recordings take
some notes, and breeze the final exam
Adrian Vickers is a terrible lecturer! Not a dick like Whelan, but was simply a shockingly bad
lecturer. He never discussed anything to do with the study questions and spoke utter rubbish when he
went off track. Attended the first hour of his first lecture and simply decided after that that I would
wing the South East Asia part of the course.
Interest: 9.5/10
Very interesting subject that I would definitely recommend
Overall: 8.5/10
Great unit. Could've been better with some better lecturers, but all in all an enjoyable subject and I
will be definitely continuing on with ASNS1602

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 8/10
If you went to just some of the lectures, wrote notes for the study questions you'll on your way to a
credit easily. The questions for the final exam are literally given, aiding the ease of the course. They
don't provide feedback or classes on how to write essays, so for those who are not familiar with
writing a strong essay will struggle (as I did - but sitting on borderline C/D without much effort).
Lecturers: 4.25/10 (Matthew Stavros 10/10, Eileen Walsh 5/10, Mary Nasr 1/10, Adrian Vickers
1/10)
Matthew Stavros was AMAZING - he was the coordinator and the life and soul of the Japanese
lectures (with other smatterings of India). If it weren't for him I would have dropped the subject. He is
so engaging and a true story teller - I wish we had him for all the lectures. Eileen Walsh was 'ok' for
China but her setting out of her PowerPoints were terrible and so confusing, even if you had a copy
beforehand. Mary Nasr, a PhD student for the Korea component read off slides and did nothing
enriching. Adrian Vickers for South East Asia should not have a job at USYD. He degrades the entire
Asian studies department and even the Arts faculty itself. He talked about irrelevant details, when the
study questions focussed on the bigger picture, of which he would waft over saying: oh it happened
but we don't know how... Rather he'd spend his time looking at statues of sandstone vaginas and other
Buddhist monuments. I didn't turn up to 2/3 of his 2 hour lectures. Looking back - you really didn't
need to attend lectures...just attend tutes (Dallas Peterson was a great tutor - went through things
swiftly and was good at presenting it).
Interest: 10/10 + 1/10 (no, not 11/10, you know what I mean)
I was fully engaged in the Japan component (Matt Stavros), somewhat engaged in the China
component, knew parts of the Korea component, and knew literally nothing of the South East Asia
parts. I am so disappointed in the Asian studies department for serving up some of the worst teachers
I've had. If the others could only be 1/2 of what Matt Stavros was, it would have been a fascinating
course. I was looking forward to Asian culture and history, but many parts just became a series of
memorisation acts and I didn't enjoy this.
Overall:
Amazing + Biggestshitasticdisplayofteachingever. The bottom line is: there is only 1 good lecturer.
The rest are so bad that it left an appalling impression of the Asian studies department on me that I am
discontinuing this subject (Not doing ASNS1602 - Modernity in Asia).

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 ASNS2618 - Remaking Chinese Society, 1949-Present

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
Not sure how well the rest of the cohort did, but if you've done some social or critical theory, and
epistemology, this is a remarkably easy course. It's fairly interdisciplinary, and so would suit a range
of academic backgrounds. Even so, the assessment structure makes it a cinch. Tute participation is
15%, a 'critical reading' assignment (1000 words, 20%The final exam is a noteworthy mention - an in-
class test in Week 8, one-hour, 2 questions, 20%, which you can ace so long as you've merely done
tute readings. In the exam I'd managed to completely misconstrue the author of the mandatory
textbook, but still managed to only just miss on an HD.
Lecturer: 9/10 (David Bray)
Dr. David Bray knows his stuff well. Lectures included videos in some weeks. Basic lecture-slides,
but lecture recordings were also posted. Hongwei Bao took tutes, and was quite a character, but also
had plenty to offer.
Interest:9/10
This course provides an overview of from China's Maoist past to its transition to a so called market
economy. Was highly relevant, particularly during the heightened interest in Tibet, and especially with
the focus on China during the upcoming Olympics.
Overall: 10/10
Easy marks, coherent course structure, reasonable readings, and lectures that were regularly
interesting and insightful.

ASNS2661 - History of Modern Indonesia

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
During the semester, the course seemed more difficult than what my marks suggest - there were just
so many complex issues to cover (much like the country itself), and each weeks topics and readings
opened up a Pandora’s box of more considerations. Indonesian history is so complex and anarchic that
one is often forced to completely discard what they've learned thus far. But it's still reasonably easy to
do well. The exam was weighted heavily at 45%, but topics were given beforehand (2 questions, and
one was able to take the course reader in). Most people barely studied for it. Again, I don't know
about class averages, but I managed to HD by my calculations. The other marks come 30% from the
essay 15% on a tute presentation based on your essay topic, and 10% on tute participation. This
assessment structure will probably change as Adrian Vickers has professed a dislike for exams.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Adrian Vickers, Liz Jackson)
A remarkable character (much like the rest of the Asian Studies staff), Dr. Adrian Vickers would
often meander through his talks and talk off the cuff without lecture slides, as if he was telling stories
rather than giving a proper lecture. This made for some fascinating lectures (with exception of the
week on Indonesian historiography, in which Adrian systematically listed all universities and key
academics on Indonesia). Half of the lectures were also taken by Liz Jackson, whose structured
lectures (complete with power-point slides) complemented Adrian's old-school style. Eve Warburton
took my tute instead of the lecturers (though she's not teaching it next year). Lectures were also
recorded.
Interest: 10/10
Readings often reflected the lecturer's personal interests and were skewed towards Indonesian social
and cultural histories. Despite the randomness of some readings (short stories, and plenty of first-hand
accounts), the course nonetheless covered colonial, post-colonial, Islamic, political, economic and
regional Indonesian histories. The class perhaps reflected the general interest in Indonesia, or perhaps
lack thereof - there were less than 30. In some ways it was disappointing to see such apathy towards
Indonesia, but it made for nice a small class (and only 8 people in my tute, though there were about
15 in the other).

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Overall: 10/10
I recommend this course at the risk of letting everyone else on a hidden gem of a course. If you're
doing some sort of arts or social sciences (history, Asian studies, government, political economy), it's
a refreshing change.

ASNS2663 - Social Activism in Southeast Asia

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8.5/10
No final exam in the block, but a small in-class test, 1 hour, 4 questions, a cinch. Readings were
heavy, but they were also very generous with tute participation marks. Essay heavily weighted at
45%, but assessment and several lectures were devoted to better help us write decent essays. Themes
were explicitly consistent, so easy to keep on track even with minimal effort. That said, I would've
given it a 9/10 but my raw mark of 86.2 was scaled down to 82, stupid bell curve.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Michele Ford)
Since the class was pretty small, lectures were pretty interactive and interspersed with group
discussion. They try to learn names as well since it's so small (only ever 20-30 in a lecture most
weeks), plus most were recorded. There was a spate of guest lecturers for about 4 weeks towards the
end of the course, but Thushara or Michele would actually explain at the end how guest-lecture
material fit into the course.
Interest: 10/10
Lots of variety in topics and teaching methods, with lots of eye-opening, dramatic, even haunting
videos on refugee, nationalist, environmental and even gay movements, actual NGO work in
Southeast Asia.
Overall: 9/10
Am slightly bitter that they scaled down my raw HD mark, but it remains the most enjoyable unit for
the semester, and one of the best organised and taught courses around (which is impressive for its
inaugural year).

ASNS2670 - Mass Media in East Asia

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
The learning objectives were quite clear, as well as the topics being covered. A presentation with
essay, and major essay making up most of the marks, though a final exam will be worth 40%, it
always seems excessive when two hours can make the difference between a fail and high distinction.
It was a bit irritating that by week 12 we’d completed only about 30% worth of assessments, which
hadn’t allowed for much feedback. The unit was unexpectedly technical and dry, with very little on
the social and cultural side of things, so things could be very boring at times, and the countries being
covered often blurred together, with only endless lists of acronyms to differentiate them.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Ki-Sung Kwak)
Ki-Sung Kwak seems like a pretty nice guy, and the points he was making were usually pretty clear.
He went through a lot of PowerPoint slides, which were not provided on-line, so it was sometimes a
matter of copying them down before he moved on, and what was there was rarely elaborated on.
There was a strange tendency to avoid ending classes early if he finished his prepared lecture early,
and seeming unable or unwilling to think of anything more to tell us about than what was on his
slides. Tutorials were also extremely awkward, after presentations it was usually a matter of the class
being asked questions followed by long silences, and again never ending tutorials early when nobody
had anything to say. Readings were many, and usually far too dull to read.
Interest: 3/10
All of the content was extremely dry, the subject was really about listing when different broadcasting
technologies entered Japan, Korean, HKSAR and Taiwan, who they are run by, and how they are

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regulated. Attempts to connect these to the history or culture of each country were quite weak, it was
really a matter of memorizing dates, regulatory principles, and acronyms, god, the acronyms. There
wasn’t much substance on actual programming content or the experiences of ordinary people with it,
it was really just about the bodies running the different mediums, so there wasn’t much of a sense of
learning about „Asia’ as opposed to generic companies, and having done previous Asian Studies units
won’t prepare you for the technical nature of this unit. It was interesting though to have a Japanese
journalist guest lecturer who expressed support for systems that earlier classes had shown to be quite
detrimental.
Overall: 5/10
Only really recommended if you’re interested in the political and administrative side of broadcasting.
Dr. Kwak is easy to understand, but there just wasn’t much of a way to bring the content to life. There
was a constant feeling that the course being set in Asia was irrelevant. It would also be a good choice
for anyone who really, really likes acronyms.

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 Biochemistry (BCHM)

BCHM2072/2972 – Human Biochemistry (Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2006
Lecturers: Gareth Denyer, Simon Easterbrook-Smith
This is an excellent course. This course is based on metabolic biochemistry. You will learn about
glucose oxidation, fatty acid oxidation, what metabolic processes occur during starvation (like how to
replenish glucose in the blood), diabetes and a little on exercise. Unfortunately there will be four
lectures based on cell signalling, though.
The main lecturer for this course is Gareth Denyer. He is absolutely fantastic. He will draw figures on
the board, take photos of it, and post them up on WebCT. He also provides recordings of his lectures
and narrated PowerPoint slides. This guy has a lot of passion for what he does. His lectures are very
engaging, and the lecture theatre is always full!
The other four lectures are by Simon Easterbrook-Smith. His lectures notes that he posts up on the
web aren't very detailed so I suggest you turn up to all four lectures (not that his notes a fantastic there
either, but at least he draws the processes up, which he doesn't provide on the pdf).
I'm not entirely sure if the advanced lectures will be exactly the same as this year, but every fortnight
(if you choose BCHM2972), you will have separate lectures. This year, we learnt the stuff we learnt
with Gareth in more detail (the molecular side of things). We also did some case studies, which
involved patients who suffer from certain symptoms, and determining what is wrong with them
(what's wrong with the metabolic pathway).
The labs aren't too bad. You'll have 5 hours of lab per fortnight, but usually you'll finish between 4.30
and 5. The first lab was colorimetry (boring). The next two labs were based on determining the rate of
glucose oxidation in yeast cells by the incorporation of radioactive glucose into them. The last three
weeks involve designing your own assay kit (you pretty much design your own company and all).
Overall: 9/10

Semester 1 2006
Human Biochemistry is da bomb with Gareth Denyer!! If you decide to do this subject you'll love his
lectures and never ever want to miss them. He records his lectures too & even takes photographs of
the blackboard he writes on. The downside are the pracs, run by MBLG demonstrators who are insane
crabby bitches most of the time. If you get Andrea I am extremely sorry for you, never bother asking
her for help, go straight to Debra if possible. The pracs are nowhere as exciting as first sem.. but you
tolerate it in the end. And assignments are doable, just ensure you have a good lab group.
Overall: 10/10 lectures... 4/10 for prac

BCHM3071/3971 – Molecular Biology and Biochemistry - Genes

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10

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Many of the things that are taught in this course would have been taught in MBLG2071/2971., such as
DNA damage, transcription factors, etc. It's not exactly difficult, but there
is a lot to learn.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Merlin Crossley, Hannah Nicholas, Tony Weiss, David Gell)
Merlin Crossley is awesome, as always.
Hannah Nicholas is lovely and her stuff on DNA methylation and imprinting is quite interesting. Her
lecture notes are very thorough.
Tony Weiss' stuff is interesting, but he pretty much just copies his lecture notes from the Genes VIII
textbook, which is annoying.
David Gell is okay.
Practical Course: 8/10
Did reverse transcriptase PCR, southern blotting to identify a transgene and restriction enzyme
digestion to identify which lambda phage fragment was inserted into an e.coli. plasmid. Pretty
interesting. There are a lot of practical reports (mainly in-book ones, but one scientific paper).
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting. Learnt about X chromosome inactivation, Imprinting (how either the
maternal or paternal allele is silenced), DNA methylation, chromosomes/chromatin, intron splicing
and autosplicing, DNA damage and repair, homologous recombination- all very interesting.
Advanced Course: The advanced course required 3 additional seminars in which we learnt about
amyloids and protein aggregation. We had to do a presentation on amyloids as well.
Overall: 8/10
I definitely recommend it.

Semester 1 2006
Very broad at the start, but don't despair... they specialise after a few weeks. Theory work was not too
difficult apart from having 9am lectures. However the notes are online and lectures are recorded for
your convenience. The pracs are fine as well and assignments are easily passable. However Gill
Johnson (the year coordinator) is an immensely bitchy lady who won't help or guide you in anyway.
So try and avoid her at all costs. Oh and by the way, she may seem friendly at first... but BEWARE!
She'll stab you in the back. Overall: 6/10

BCHM3081/3981 – Molecular Biology and Biochemistry - Proteins

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 5/10
Much more difficult especially when the lecture notes are shocking.
Lecturers: 4/10 (Joel Mackay, Jacqui Matthews, Simon Easterbrook-Smith)
None of them are fantastic, particularly Jacqui Matthews. Make sure you turn up to every lecture in
the course, especially for Simon's lectures as he uses the whiteboard/blackboard and only puts up a
summary of the lecture on WebCT. If you miss out on a lecture, make sure you listen to the audios on
WebCT (assuming they'll still do that next year).
Interest: 4/10
It wasn't too interesting. Joel's stuff was pretty bland on Stability of proteins,
chaperones, ways to improve protein stability, etc. Jacqui's stuff on different ways to clone a gene and
to investigate properties of proteins is okay once you begin to understand the stuff. Simon's stuff on
protein import/export and membranes isn't too bad either. Overall, a lot of the stuff you'll learn you
would have learnt in previous years.
Practicals: 7/10
You'll pretty much do one huge experiment over 6 weeks. You'll be looking at the
properties of the protein, Replication Termination Protein (RTP). You'll be overexpressing
the protein, isolating and purifying it, and looking at its DNA binding properties. Be prepared to stay

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past 1 pm for some of the pracs. The Advanced Course does 3 additional seminars learning the
molecular properties of RTP. You'll have to do a report on it as well.
Overall: 5/10
It isn't the best course, but I guess it depends on what you're interested it.

BCHM3082/3982 – Medical and Metabolic Biochemistry

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 3/10
Dr Collyer's section is straghtforward; Gareth's 'critical thinking exercise' involving recently published
research papers (on obesity, diabetes) is tedious, but doable. However, I did the advanced course on
principles of NMR, which was unusually involved (including pract + theory + theory of pract
components). It's a lot of physics, which is bad enough, but the biological interpretation of the
physical results isn't at all obvious. Entirely non-crammable.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Charles Collyer, Richard Christopherson, Dale Hancock, Gareth Denyer,
Phillip Kuchel)
Dr Collyer is a very nervous lecturer, and doesn't get to the point. Gareth is excellent as usual; Prof
Kuchel isn't too bad either.
Practicals: 6/10
Yeast two hybrid system and a computer study of carbonic anhydrase, plus a radioimmunoassay (for
non-advanced) or NMR experiments (advanced). NMR pracs are easy (boring) to do, but you pay for
it later in data analysis in a 10% report.
Interest: 5/10
Dr Collyer's section basically involves memorising lists of drugs, the conditions they treat and the
mechanism. Gareth is a brilliant lecturer, but there's only so interesting fat can be, and the analysis of
the papers was a pain. NMR was ok when comprehension occasionally dawned (the non-advanced
stream did malaria and cancer therapy, which didn't seem too bad either).
Overall: 5/10
NMR is probably the only useful thing to take away from this course, but it's demoralisingly difficult.
I guess the nutrition students would find the drug design/diabetes/cancer content more relevant as it's
one of their core units.

BCHM3092/3992 - Proteomics and Functional Genomics

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 9/10
Genomics will be familiar to MBLG/BCHM2 veterans. Proteomics is based on principles learnt in the
second-year subjects (eg affinity binding, SDS-PAGE) but repackaged as shinier, faster and higher-
throughput. The only really novel aspect is mass spectrometry, which isn't difficult.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Stuart Cordwell, Ben Crossett, Jonathan Arthur, Richard Christopherson)
Dr Cordwell takes most of the lectures and does a decent job of it. Dr Crossett does genomics and
tends to mumble over the important parts. Drs JA and RC only had two lectures each, so it doesn't
matter either way.
Practical: 8/10
Unlike most MMB subjects this unit has 3-hour weekly practicals. It's quite tightly coupled to the
lectures so you'll get to play with 2D gels and mass spectrometry. Proteomics is tends to be rather pre-
packaged and modular so there's usually not that much to do after applying a sample until the data
analysis.

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Interest: 9/10
Some of it does get repetitive after a while - everything goes to mass spectroscopy in the end - but
there's enough to keep both the biologically- (the pathology and human proteomic case studies) and
chemically-inclined (mass spectroscopy, separation techniques) entertained for the semester.
Overall: 9/10

It's an enjoyable unit, though it's probably a good idea to like protein biochemistry in the first place.
The class is smaller than the other BCHM3 subjects, but I'm surprised it's not more popular.
Biology (BIOL)
BIOL1001 - Concepts in Biology

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 9/10
This subject was one of my favourite subjects this semester!! The way in which the assessments are
set out is advantageous to hard working/consistent students because there are many components. In
each component, it is relatively easy to do well provided you put in a decent amount of effort, and ask
for feedback (where applicable). Components like lab book marking and submitting the draft
photosynthesis paper are a great way to secure marks in the course. The enzyme short communication
and the final photosynthesis report are challenging, but with enough time and using the resources
available, especially the piazza forum (extremely helpful because you'll get a reply to any question
really quickly), it is very possible to do well for both. Given that the final exam was 38%, it is also
possible to pass the course before you take the final exam, which takes off a lot of pressure during
finals.
Quizzes: the quizzes in BIOL1001 are efficiently marked, they are all multiple choice questions with
no negative marking and you'll get your marks the same day you take the quiz. PeerWise is a great
platform to prepare for all multiple choice quizzes/components in the entire course.
A lot of students were worried about the negative marking in finals, but really, negative marking will
help you unless you didn't study at all for the course. The only way you'll get a negative mark for a
multiple choice question is if you pick the completely wrong answer. Picking a partially correct
answer may give you 0.5 marks instead of 0, so negative marking is not an issue if you attend the
lectures/listen to the lecture recordings, and make an effort to study for BIOL1001.
Lecturers: Danny Liu: 15/10, Ben Oldroyd: 8/10, Madeleine Beekman: 8/10, Nate Lo: 9/10
Danny is hands down the best lecturer I've had in USYD so far. His lectures are absolutely engaging
and fun (you will never regret attending his lectures) and he uses Socrative during his lectures to ask
questions throughout the lecture, making sure you understand key concepts before moving on. He also
comes up with distinctive analogies for important concepts which makes content so easy to remember.
Revision during Stuvac was a breeze. He's also really friendly, approachable and always willing to
help - you can find him around Carslaw level 5 and basically ask him anything related to the
course/related to studying biology in university. His lecture notes are equally awesome!! Danny
teaches the topics on cellular biology and population genetics.
Ben is a very knowledgeable lecturer, he lectures the topics on genetics, and is generally very clear in
his delivery of lecture content.
Madeleine is a lecturer very passionate about biology. I find her lectures interesting and informative,
and I especially loved her last lecture about Tasmanian devils. Her lectures mostly take the form of a
narrative storytelling style, which makes content easy to remember as well. She teaches the topics on
evolution and biodiversity.
Nate is an extremely engaging lecturer. He only lectured for 2 weeks, on phylogenetics. He uses great
examples in lectures that definitely help with understanding the terms related to the topic.
Interest: 10/10
There was never a boring moment in this course, everything was interesting and a joy to learn I took
this subject just to fill up my study load for semester 1, but now I'm really keen to pursue biology in
second and third year. Awesome subject, highly recommended!!

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Overall: 10/10
A enjoyable subject from start to end. The course is also very well-organised and there are various
ways to clarify your doubts/seek help, from posting on Piazza, to arranging consultations with
lecturers. Moreover, revision lectures are organised throughout the course to help with consolidating
knowledge and there are plenty of opportunities to learn from other students' questions! Lab pracs are
3 hours long but they usually end early and time flies during the pracs anyway I cannot recommend
this subject enough!!

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 7/10
Interest: 2/10
Overall: 4/10

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
The two quizzes during the semester were killers, despite being multiple choice. The final exam was
also multiple choice and just as bad. The report was my saviour, and I think my friends' too.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Greg Sword, Peter McGee and others)
We changed lecturers every week or so. Greg Sword's lectures were actually interesting, as much as I
disliked biology. Peter McGee was good too. He had discussions at the end that kind of forced us to
concentrate. I don't remember much else.
Interest: 5/10
I've never really liked biology but I guess it's bearable. It depended a lot on the lecturer. The better
lecturers made it more interesting even though the content itself wasn't really all that fun.
Overall: 5/10
Content is alright, some lecturers were good which helped. Killer multiple choice quizzes and exams.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 4/10
The final exam really killed. It isn't that fantastic with bad markers along the way. You won't enjoy it
that much if you think it is like HSC biology. It was my HSC biology knowledge that got me pass this
subject. Not one I would recommend if you want easy marks.
Lecturers: 4/10
Some were good. Some were terrible. I really do not like 'discussion' in lectures. I am there to listen
not to talk. Talking is for practicals. Some are so boring that I catch up on my sleep in their lectures. I
rarely met a good lecturer in this for some weird reason. Might be me, but seriously. It was NOT
good.
Interest: 4/10
It is the practicals that made it worthwhile. The prac where the fun parts of this course. Playing with
blood, DNA etc. is probably the best thing. But seriously, this put me off ever liking biology. And for
someone who loved Biology in years 11/12, it is a sad thing. And since I did well in Bio for the HSC
anyway, it was a let down of one of my favourite HSC courses.
Overall: 4/10
Don't do it if you can. If you have to, the grit your teeth and get a pass. That was all I aimed for.
Because it was just so not enjoyable. If you liked it, then good. But for me it was just bad, bad and
more bad. I didn't bother going to lectures after week 6 because I found it was no use coz I didn't get
the lecture anyway! And the text book is not much help, because you don't have a syllabus to show
what is IN the EXAM. Felt like a headless fly when studying for the finals.

BIOL1002 - Living Systems

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Semester 2 2011
Ease: 7/10
Interest: 2/10
Overall: 4/10

BIOL1003 - Human Biology

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 6/10
Extremely content heavy. never memorised so much content, had 100+ pages of notes on my
computer. The issue is that lectures are fine content wise but then you have to add in all the online
crap too which makes it an enormous course. But multi for the final, so it's not all bad. About the
same level as the quizes in labs.
Lecturers: 6.5/10 (Osu Lilje and others)
Big range. Osu is a 4/10. Occasionally difficult to understand, doesn’t put up lecture slides and is just
poor overall. Some of the others are great though. The bald guy especially, although I don’t know
what his deal is with phones. Also another lady for a couple of lectures was great.
Interest: 9/10
Pretty interesting overall.
Overall: 8/10
If you put in the work it’s a doable and very interesting subject. Quite liked it

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 6/10
Bad course, too much content!!!! Lab quiz hard, hard marking on report, case study presentation
(Group slacking off), final exam 75 MCQs (please do the CONNECT quiz online, it’s in the final
exam!!!)
Lecturers: Osu Lilje 8/10, Murray Thomson 10/10
Lilje was great but her voice.... Thomson was perfect. The others were horrible.
Interest: 8/10
Interesting course, good for second year anatomy and physiology
Overall: 7/10
50% final, 50% internal assessment, if you messed up in internal, there is a chance in final!!! So
please do CONNECT REVISION quiz!!!!

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 7/10
I found it very easy to be motivated for this subject as the topic matter was broad and very interesting.
This is a lot of content though and a few difficult pathways that require close attention to do well
Lecturers: 8/10
It was a while ago now so I can’t remember lectures individually but overall they were very engaging.
Interest 9.5/10
Was a space filler that I wasn't overly interested in to begin with but it was a very nice relaxing
subject with some dull topic matters but overall surprisingly interesting.

Semester 1 2012
If you are eager to study physiology, immunology or anatomy and histology etc. in the second year or
major in any of these areas then BIOL1003 is a definite must have unit of study. It may not be a

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prerequisite for most second year units (if I read correctly) but it is a very engaging unit. The lecture
materials are very easy to understand and on top of this there are weekly online resources which helps
consolidate your learning. Practicals at times may be daunting so make sure you have an awesome
group to ease the burden of finishing later rather than sooner. [Ease: 6/10 | Overall: 9/10]

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Easy as long as you have a good memory and are going to work. I had more work for this than all my
other subjects combined, and there is a hell of a lot of memorisation of anatomy and physiological
function, bit of biochemistry etc.
Lecturers: 7/10
Vast majority were excellent, esp. Murray Thompson, Mike Thomson and Osu Lilje. The lecture on
nutrition was the most boring one I sat through all semester.
Interest: 10/10
What could be more interesting than learning how the body works?
Overall: 8/10
Would be higher except for sheer workload (mainly because of HBOnline, an online learning app that
you have to do every fortnight. Takes hours...)

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8.5/10
Most of the content was straightforward, but the amount of content in the course was HUGEEEE!
Very loaded course. The final exam wasn't bad at all - 60 MCQ.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Murray Thomson, Osu Lilje and others)
Most of the lecturers were pretty good, with a few exceptions. Best lecturer had to be Murray
Thomson. Osu Lilje was also pretty good.
Interest: 9/10
Of course very relevant to the degree - and I found most of the stuff taught quite interesting. But then
again, we are going to go over alllll this again next year in PHSI2601.
Overall: 7.5/10
Could've been much more organised in terms of marks. They 'normalised' my mark for a 20%
assessment by something like 5.5 marks...
Tutorials were not productive, we just sat there watching PowerPoint presentations from other
students, and had to also make our own presentation.

BIOL1902 - Living Systems (Advanced)

Semester 2 2013
Ease – 6/10
It's easy in that it's not 'conceptual' like mathematics or psychology. It's hard because there is an
amazing amount of material to be rote learnt. The quizzes were extremely difficult in comparison to
the exam.
Lecturer– 8/10
I loved the ecology lecturer and Ashley Ward for animals. I personally found the plants lecturer very
drone-like - that's probably because I don't like plants...
Interest – 4/10
TOO MANY PLANTS - I DIDN' T KNOW THERE WAS THIS MUCH. Ecology and animals was
engaging. Labs were a bit boring - though the dissection lab was fun! The field trip was fun.
Overall – 6/10

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It was a lot of material to be learnt - if they'd remove plants + added more of the other two I would
have been satisfied.

Semester 2 2013
Ease – 5.5/10
It's not so much hard, but the outcomes of what you have to learn can be vague at times as well as the
organisation. Especially when there was no practice quiz for plants. The final exam was fine though,
the written part much easier than the MC in my opinion. The quizzes in semester were actually harder
due to a very high degree of specificity though. Just as a comparison, most found it a decent degree
more difficult than Concepts in Biology.
Lecturer – 7/10
Overall, you have a couple and they are all relatively good.
Interest – 4/10
It was probably just an interest thing for me (out of the three major sections of animals, plants and
ecology). I only liked the ecology section, the animals one was fine but the quiz on it was recalling
obscure nomenclature essentially. I hate plants, and it is actually a third of the course (they pass it off
in first semester as having little plants) and if you do Advanced, the major self-designed prac report
will lend itself to be on plants again due to it being on disturbance or pollination. Plants also crop up a
little in ecology. The labs can be boring sometimes, especially when they keep you stuck there for a
discussion when the actual lab only takes 2 hrs. The animal dissection lab is good though and the
ecology lab on the deep sea assemblages. Not a fan of the plant anatomy labs, unless you like cutting
flowers up. Part of doing Advanced is the field trip to Crommelin Field Station which everyone loved-
regrettably I could not go which is a shame because it was probably the nicest part of the course.
Overall – 6/10
I liked ecology-the rest ehhh. I was expecting to like it as much as Concepts and it was just fell a little
flat in expectation.

BIOL1911 - Concepts in Biology (Advanced)

Semester 1 2013
Ease – 8/10
If you did well in HSC Biology, this course should be quite straightforward and a nice extension into
topics. The three main areas covered are Biomolecules, Genetics and Evolution. The prac concepts are
well enforced and explained, concepts are explained well in lectures.
Lecturers – 8/10 (Danny Liu 10/10, Ben Oldroyd 8.5/10, Murray Thompson 7/10, Min Chen
3/10, Madeleine Beekman 9/10, Nate Lo 8/10)
Danny is amazing and you are so lucky if you ever have a lecture with him or he's in your labs. The
most dedicated USYD professor I've met thus far, literally responds to an email in a minute flat.
Ben Oldroyd knows his genetics well, his lectures are very engaging and he was sometimes around
the SSP labs so I got to chat to him for a bit. I hear his personality is either love or hate though, so be
warned, people are very polarised on this front.
Murray Thompson is very enthusiastic, walks around the lecture hall a lot, loves stereogenesis.
Sometimes gets too excited and rushes explanations, plus not much in the way of lecture notes, but
still good.
Min Chen knows a lot about photosynthesis but finds it hard to get this excitement across to the
students or explain things to student, it's like if PSII is not functioning with light excitement in a
chloroplast.
Madeleine is great, funny, knows a lot about population genetics, so passionate about animals.
Incorporated the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster and the Simpsons into her slides so props for
that.
You don't have many lectures with Nate, but explains mtDNA and electrogelphoresis well, knew him
more through the SSP labs.

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Interest – 9/10
I adored this class and it was my fave subject this semester because I had a lovely lab bench crew, labs
were really great and our lab demo was amazing. Also the content of lectures interested me a lot, and
as keen as I was for the genetics part, I actually really loved the evolution/population genetics part of
the course.
Overall – 9/10
If you have the credentials definitely do 1911, or alternatively the SSP in this course 1991 (you can
only do SSP in one bio as your prac classes are combined).
BIOL1993 - Human Biology (Special Studies)

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 6/10
I didn’t do HSC Biology and had never written a science report before.
Lecturers: 7/10
Interest: 8.5/10
I enjoyed the human bio part, but found the labs tedious and boring. I would really only recommend
SSP bio to someone who loved laboratory work, and wanted to major in BIOLOGY (not
physiology/anatomy/etc.) and perhaps become a professional scientist.
Overall: 7.5/10
Pretty disorganised. There was a time when the lecturer actually didn’t even show up. It is a bit
unclear what is actually examinable. The exam itself was not horrible, but I found it quite challenging.
Overall, I’m pretty happy with my mark and I definitely learned A LOT, but I really should have taken
normal biology considering my background.

Semester 1 2013
Ease – 8/10
Again if you did HSC Biology well, you'll be like 'oh yeah, I've touched on the basics of this before
and it's just extending it'. The only reason the ease is lower is that the SSP labs take a bit more reading
and understanding and involvement than the normal human bio labs. You'll need to understand your
stuff to write a good report and do a good group presentation for the prac class. Oh and just a note,
this was the first year they ran SSP in Bio. From what I observed, if you are doing both bios in first
semester like I did, the SSP prac course would probably link better doing 1991. See doing Human
Bio, it's completely separate from the lecture material, you don't reinforce the lecture stuff with
practicals or workshops and we don't have to do HB Online, but then you need to know the lecture
stuff really well for the exam. So yeah, something to consider lol. They may take our suggestions on
board for the next running of this course. Still I assume the scaling accounted for this because this
ended up being my best subject in the end, but just my opinion that I'd probs recommend doing the
prac course through 1991.
Lecturers – 7/10
Oh there were so many for this course, you only had them for 2-3 lectures each. Just refer to above
[BIOL1911 review] for an idea, and I just wasn't a fan of Osu Lilje's lecture style.
Interest – 9/10
Some parts of lecture series mundane, but the prac course was exceptional and I loved it.
Overall – 8.5/10
Getting to do the report on our mtDNA was very open ended and seeing as we hadn't really done prac
reports before, a little daunting but very rewarding in the end. Group work was good in this class,
because like...my cohort was like the comb med kids plus other amazing bio students, state rankers
and the like. Our group research was very like, use what we taught you in the first few weeks to
design and delegate yourselves. It was on wildlife forensics and we got an unknown sample that we
had to identify ourselves and look at quarantine and other implications. I'd highly recommend Biology
SSP to anyone that got the 90+ in HSC bio or the 99+ ATAR Very rewarding and a great cohort.

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 BIOL2016 - Cell Biology

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 5/10
Christ I hate bio. Too much stuff to remember. Luckily this subject is more about processes instead of
names like the other intermediate bio subjects I've taken. Labs are long and exhausting and the
workload is high.
Interest: 4/10
I don't really find any of the stuff interesting except apoptosis, cancer, and the last five lectures on
plant bio.
Lecturers: 5/10 (Jan Marc, Murray Thomson, Robyn Overall)
Mixed bag. Marc is a nice guy with good notes, but he doesn't lecture to the audience so much as to
the computer screen. Murray is an asshole but he's a really good lecturer who crystallises the concepts
fantastically. Overall is alright, but plant bio is always pretty interesting to me.
Labs: 7/10
Damn hard and involved, and long. Marc's labs are easy enough, as you progress through learning
how toxins interact with microtubules in arabidopsis plants. The Murray labs which are the main ones
are mostly about assays, where you have to do a lot of work yourself, determining concentrations and
whatever. Lots of involvement, but pretty interesting in the end. The one where you bring in your own
tissue samples and analyse the protein content is probably the best. The plant ones are pretty standard
plant bio labs: they're all the same.
Overall: 6/10
It's alright. Cell biologists, biochemists and the like would enjoy it. I found it mediocre.

BIOL2021 - Zoology
Semester 1 2015
Ease: 6.5/10
Course content is extremely interesting, but this unit is let down by poor organisation. Assessment
information was only released to students close to the deadline (we only got our final exam format
during stuvac) and some assessments did not seem relevant to the course at all (e.g. invertebrate
collection which took up too much time and effort and was not fun at all). Some prac sessions were
also highly distressing and we were not warned about them until the actual prac started. We had to
pith a toad during one of the pracs. Some final exam questions also did not seem to have been covered
by course content.
Lecturers: 8.4/10 (Dieter Hochuli 8/10, Matthew Greenlees 6.5/10, Stephen Simpson 10/10,
Frank Seebacher 8/10, Ashley Ward 9/10, Murray Thomson 9/10)
Standout lecturers for me were Prof Stephen Simpson (he only gave 2 lectures on animal nutrition but
he explained the content super well), Ashley Ward (lectured on Animal Behaviour, really interesting
stuff) and of course Murray Thomson (though he spoke really quickly).
Interest: 9/10
A very interesting subject! Thoroughly enjoyed all the lectures.
Overall: 6/10
A great unit let down by extremely poor organisation.

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 7/10
Content is easy, final exam easy, but everything is marked quite hardly
Lecturers: 8.2/10 (Wilder 6/10, Clissold 9/10, Thomson 10/10, Seebacher 6/10, Ward 10/10)
Absolutely excellent!
Interest: 8/10

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An extremely interesting course! Everyone will have different preferences for the different
components though
Overall: 4/10
To be honest despite the good ratings for interest etc. it is very poorly organised! Includes a mass
invertebrate collection which is irrelevant and stupid, labs are boring and irrelevant, presentation was
horribly marked and GROUP WORK, group work is absolutely horrible and no consideration is given
to those in bad groups, HOWEVER the final exam was very easy.

BIOL2023 - Botany
Semester 1 2015
Ease: 7/10
Online quizzes were part of the assessment but you could also use them for revision. The virtual
slidebox was really handy for revising for the prac exam, in addition to all the other online material.
There were plenty of resources available to us for revision and all the lecturers were happy to answer
any additional questions we had. I felt very loved in this subject
Lecturers: 8.25/10 (Murray Henwood 8/10, Deborah Barton 9/10, Rosanne Quinnell 8/10,
Charles Warren 8/10)
All lecturers were clear in lecture delivery and explained course content in an engaging manner.
Interest: Started 6/10, ended 8/10
What I enjoyed most about this unit were the plant anatomy pracs which started from week 8 of the
sem. There was a lot to do in the 3 hours but it was really fun sectioning plant material and looking at
them under a microscope.
Overall: 8/10
A highly-organised subject (opposite of BIOL2021) with great lecturers and exciting prac sessions!
Would recommend this unit.

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 Business Core Subjects (BUSS)
BUSS1001 - Understanding Business

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 6/10
This unit is an extension of HSC business studies. While the content is easy, getting a good mark is
hard (and might depend on how lenient your tutor is).
Lecturer: 2/10
Interest: 1/10
It's basically a subject that teaches you to reference and apply critical analysis.
Overall: 2/10

BUSS1002 - The Business Environment

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 6/10
As a Business School subject, there is no scaling and your final mark is just the sum of all your raw
marks. This makes it harder to do extremely well overall. Personally I find that subjects that require
developing a critical point of view never easy, and since BUSS1002 is one of those subjects, it was
not easy. It is, however, a LOT better than BUSS1001, largely due to more regular assessments (3 x
MSAs) during the semester, which bumped down the weighting of the final to 38%, and the topics
themselves are more concrete and less wishy washy than in BUSS1001. For the ongoing assessments,
they aren’t too bad if you actually understand the concepts and can write well. I was one of the few
that did relatively well in the first assessment (from memory, the average was around 60), and I’m
inclined to think that was because I was able to write clearly and with logical progression. It helped a
lot that they gave an example assessment. Also, a LPT: Read the Q&A before you start.The final is
also reasonable and doable if you know all the concepts covered throughout the semester. They did
have two ‘giveaway’ questions, which they told us in the last lecture and were (1) a PEST analysis on
one of three specified companies, and (2) an additional turned compulsory reading.
Lecturers: 7.25/10 (Omer Konakci 7/10, Heather Robson 7.5/10, Michael Allen)
Note: I slept in, skipped or didn’t pay attention to most lectures. (I’m a terrible student. ): )
Omer is actually a decent lecturer. The expectations of this unit were outlined very clearly by him at
the beginning, and he is engaging in his lectures. He encourages student input, and gives plenty of
examples, which make the concepts understandable.
If you like listening to voice inflexions, you’ll like Heather. I found her lecturing style to be clear and
very understandable. She did relate a lot of the concepts she taught to more real life scenarios, but the
reason she gets a small bump up from Omer is because her lecture notes were more structured.
Unfortunately, I was sick for the two weeks Michael lectured, so I have absolutely no idea how his
lecturing style is.
Tutor: 9/10 (Sharon Johnson)

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Seriously amazing tutor. Period. Sharon was the reason I didn’t hate this unit with the entire fibre of
my being. She was incredibly engaging and knew how to relate to us. She clearly knew all her stuff
and was able to convey this in a meaningful way. I really enjoyed myself in this tute; It probably
helped that the people I met there were all pretty cool and fun to work with for all the group work.
Interest: 4/10
Given that BUSS1002 is one of the core units for a B. Commerce, so you don’t really get a choice in
doing it, I think it gives me the right to be less enthusiastic about it. It’s not my type of subject, but it
does teach you very solid and useful skills. I didn’t hear particularly good things about this unit, but
it’s not that bad.
Overall: 7/10
I wasn’t very enthusiastic about this unit, but that was more to do with me than with the unit. The unit
itself is structured well. The lecturers are good. My tutor was amazing (and probably my saving grace
for this subject). The content is extremely relevant to a Commerce degree.

Semester 2 2012
Ease - 4/10
Content is easy but there's too many fucking assignments
Lecturer - ?/10
Waste of time, didn't attend
Interest – 3/10
Overall - 3/10
I'm not sure why they treated BUSS1001 and 1002 as separate units. They could have EASILY been
structured into one single unit.

BUSS1020 - Quantitative Business Analysis

Semester 2 2012
Ease – 8/10
This unit's structured so that you can't possibly fail unless you don’t study. I didn’t study 2U maths
and found this subject easily manageable.
Lecturer – 9/10
Initially had Danny, he was pretty good but I ended up watching the recordings on Blackboard. Archie
is a champ at explaining concepts, very well versed in statistics. Stopped attending tutes after week 3
because the tutor went through the material too fast.
Interest – 6/10
Overall – 8/10

BUSS1030 - Accounting, Business and Society

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 5/10
Both the mid-semester and the final were quite difficult, with the marking in the final being quite
polar. For one question, while some people got close to 25/25, quite a few people got around 3/25. It's
not hard to do well, but it's also not hard for these exams to go so awfully wrong.
The marking of short answer questions was also particularly brutal, with the median mark being
around 2/10 in the final.
Lecturers: 7/10
Content explained quite clearly, especially for financial accounting. Management accounting was
taught with quite a bit of fluff, however.
Interest: 6/10

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Although overall, the content is not uninteresting, I did find my mind wandering off quite frequently,
especially in the management accounting lectures. Not the most engaging of topics.
Overall: 6/10
The subject, overall, is somewhat engaging. But although I did relatively well in this subject, I still
think the exam design and marking, especially of the final exam, was quite unfair and bimodal. Since
it is so easy for people to lose many marks in the final exam for minor errors, it seems unjust that
students must achieve over 45% in the final exam in order to pass this subject.

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 4-6/10
Over half of the cohort failed the mid semester exam, easily. The final exam was much easier than the
mid semester though. There are weekly online 'MyAccountingLab' homework questions that form
part of your grade. Make friends in 1030 and try to help each other out for maximum marks.
Lecturers: 4/10
Interest: 10/10
Useful and applicable to real life. You'll benefit more if you're actively learning and questioning the
material.
Overall: 6/10
I like accounting but this unit was too theoretical (exam-wise) for my taste. I also didn't like how they
used IAN as a consequential class tutorial example. I would've preferred if they just made up
unrelated tutorial questions.

BUSS1040 - Economics for Business Decision Making

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 6/10
I found this subject a bit difficult.. I never studied eco in the HSC, however I managed to get a CR by
cramming the lecture slides (didn't bother with the lecture recordings.. too high of an opportunity
cost). I never did the readings after the mid semester exam and only studied crappy general maths in
the HSC. If you can draw graphs and differentiate (first principles), you'll be OK. Thank God I did the
2U maths bridging course. P.S. like accounting, make many friends in economics as well.
Lecturers: 8/10
Pablo was pretty good - he has a bit of an accent but still a very good lecturer. I preferred his lecturing
style compared to Andrew's, although they're both good lecturers.
Interest: 8/10
There are many practical applications for intro microeconomics- esp. opportunity costs, sunk costs
and the prisoners' dilemma.
Overall: 8/10

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 Business Information Systems (INFS)
INFS1000 - Digital Business Innovation

Semester 2 2012
Ease – 6-9/10
In terms of group work, things can get frustrating if you have a bunch of freeloaders. the content itself
is relatively straightforward. I did minimal study for this unit and I’m expecting a high D or possibly
HD.
Lecturer – 0/10
This guy intentionally talked extremely slowly to delay the lecture and literally read the lecture slides
verbatim. Total waste of time. Not going to name names but if you get a lecturer that does this, swap
immediately. Lectures are compulsory in order to receive marks. Tutes were fairly useless. I stopped
attending after week 4-5.
Interest – 2/10
Although this subject is piss easy, it’s also mind numbingly boring. I learnt nothing new from this unit
except learn how to draw ERDs and business process modelling.
Overall – 6/10
Averaged it - 9 because it’s a WAM booster, 3 because it’s utterly useless. Although it's useless, it's
probably less useless than marketing or management.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 4/10
I lived in fear before every assessment because I literally had no idea what could be asked or the
topics. For a long while though I could easily fail the course but I might even end up with a credit so
wtf.
Lecturer: 0/10
She was fucking shit. Thought her subject was the best in the world and did things very crappily.
Interest: 0/10
If I wanted to do databases I would have done an IT course
Overall: 0/10
Should not be core. Was painful and I didn’t even go to a lot of lectures.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 2/10
Very un-good stuff
Lecturers: 3/10
Sorry, though they try to lecture well, the stuff being taught are just too abstract to be understood by
human
Interest: 4/10

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OK, it's useful... that’s about it
Overall: 2/10
If you understand what's being said the first time around, I’d buy you a cookie.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 9/10
Lecturer: 6/10
Interest: 2/10
Overall: 6/10

Semester 1 2006
Overall: 8/10
Though course structure is a mess, lecturers are crap, assessments =WTFOMGBBQ, still, very useful
in real life

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 9/10
Lecturers - 6.5/10
Paul 7, other guy 6
Interest - 5/10
Lectures were BORING, computer stuff was alright though
Overall - 6/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 8.5/10
Lecturers - 6/10
Interest - 0/10
Overall - 0.5/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 9/10
Lecturers - 3/10
Lectures were useless, <50% attend lectures
Interest - 5/10
The programming stuff was interesting... kind of
Overall - 5/10

Unknown Date
Ease - 9.5/10
Lecturers - 5/10
Interest - 3/10
Overall - 6/10
Absurdly useless but amazingly easy to bullshit the final exam

Unknown Date
Ease: 9.5/10
Lecturers: 9/10
Don’t need to go to these
Interest: 5/10

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Overall: 9/10

INFS2001 - IS for Performance Improvement

Semester 1 2007
Ease: People with an IT background - 10/10 and People with a non-IT background 6/10.
If you have done any form of IT or are an INFS major, this course is basically an easy way to boost
your WAM.
For those commerce students doing this as part of the of their CPA the modelling is going to be the
most difficult skill to pick up i.e. given a problem constructing a suitable ERD, DFD etc. My stream
was also fortunate enough to have that Huy guy who disappeared than re-appeared then disappeared
again on BOS literally living on the forums and making the lecturers seem stupid . The lecturer
even noted his aim was to try and answer the students queries before Huy could, My suggestion if you
feel lost, find out who does B.IT. B.Eng or B.CST and get them in your group 'cause they will be able
to gun the course. The rest of it is really easy and just BS.
Lecturers: 7.5/10
The lecturers Mark and Sam did an alright job in both lecturing and tutoring. They bother to answer
questions on BB as well ,which is nice. In terms of how the explained modelling to new students i am
not too sure of since I already knew how to do all those things. Based on student feedback though the
students wanted more examples on modelling ,which they said they will incorporate into the course.
Interest: 4/10
I already knew everything that was taught, though i did get a half day for work so that at least made
me happy. Though I think some students might find the modelling an interesting change from all the
BS theory.
Overall: 6.5/10
For me an easy elective for Engo where I could walk away with a good mark with no effort. I read the
lecture notes the night before the exam, did the group assignment 2 days before it was due and walked
into the quiz with no study. All the non-IT students need to do is just practice the different modelling
techniques and you will be right

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 Chemical Engineering (CHNG)
CHNG1103 - Material and Energy Transformations Introduction

Semester 2 2012
Ease - 6/10
For anyone that got a 90+ ATAR and a C+ average in semester one you'll find this subject easy and
will at least get a C+ mark. (also, if you're good at Maths)
Lecturers - 3/10 (Marjorie Valix - 5/10, Vincent Gomes 1/10)
Marjorie is not a great lecturer but she is good with the concepts and she will see you afterwards and
speak and go through the work with you if you ask.
I don't like Vincent. He can't explain things. He's mean. He's generally just not great. I know other
people that like him but I don't. You might like him but I just think he's a bit of a meany and
sometimes he just has absolutely no idea what he is doing.
Interest - 1/10
Boring. A few things might seem interesting for five minutes, but after that it's like no.
Overall - 3.5/10
It's pretty bad. The only reason it isn't 2/10 or lower is because it's pretty easy.

Semester 2 2009
Ease - 7/10
The Mass balance component was ok but the Energy balance component was a lot harder and took
more time to master.
Lecturer - 5/10 (Marjorie Valix, Vincent Gomes)
The lecturers could have taught it better.
Interest - 7/10
It was interesting seeing how this is all fundamental to chemical engineering.
Overall - 6.3/10
Can be a good subject if you study it properly.

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 Chemistry (CHEM)

CHEM1002 - Fundamentals of Chemistry 1B

Semester 2 2011
Ease: 5/10
Harder than Chem 1A.
Interest: 4/10
Overall: 1/10

CHEM1101 - Chemistry 1A

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
Similar content to HSC chemistry, lots of topics, please study consistently! Very organised course.
Lecturer: Kaitlin Beare & Elizabeth New 10/10, Peter Harrowell 9/10, Ron Clarke 5/10
I like Harrowell while everyone hate him; good lecture notes.
Interest: 8/10
Different topics bring your specific interest to second year chemistry
Overall: 8/10
PLEASE do all the past papers!!!

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 6/10
This wasn’t easy for me
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 5/10

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 6.5/10
Lecturers - 4.25/10 (Ron Clarke 0.5/10, Adam Bridgeman 8/10)
Adam Bridgeman's really good.
Interest - 6.5/10
Overall - 7/10

Unknown Date

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Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 7/10
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 6/10

CHEM1102 - Chemistry 1B

Semester 2 2014
Interest: 6/10
Ease: 7/10
I found this course much better than CHEM1101 especially since the basics of reaction mechanisms
have been covered in HSC Chem. The reaction mechanisms were hard i.e figuring out the reagents,
starting materials and products.
But Piazza was a very helpful tool to utilise as well as the tutorials. it’s also easy to gain marks in the
tutorial quizzes.
Lecturers:
Prof Max Crossley: 7/10
Least engaging lecturer who was quite monotone and relatively hard to hear at most times - not really
a problem since I sat towards the front. Sometimes he’d go off topic and talk about random stuff
relating to chemistry or reminisce about the past which would be quite funny. However, he really
knows his stuff which is shown by his many, many accolades and experience.
Prof Adam Bridgeman: 10/10
He is absolutely the best! He makes every lecture entertaining (his hands on demonstrations that are
passed in every class) and easy to understand with his lecture worksheets. His use of lecture quizzes
helped to further understand the content. He is also always willing to help students and he has
extensive presence on Piazza.
Overall : 7/10
The content isn’t hard and there’s also lots of resources to help. It also helps to do this course
alongside MBLG1XXX since the content coincides.

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 8/10
My first lecturer, Chris McErlean, frequently remarked "Organic chemistry is easy" and hey, it really
is (in my opinion). No hard calculations except within the inorganic component of the course and it's
all very theoretical. Just being able to use logic and some understanding will get you very far. I did
note rote learn anything at all except the reagents for organic synthesis which becomes 2nd nature.
Lecturers - 11/10 (Chris McErlean, Tony Masters)
Chris McErlean: Very passionate about chemistry. Wow, I looked forward to every chemistry lecture
and had a blast learning the content. Every lecture I would literally be smiling for almost the full hour
- I'm not even kidding. I loved organic chemistry thanks to this man! He does blast out some dry jokes
but I found them hilarious since I am a fan of dry humour.
Tony Masters: Another passionate lecturer. He loves the Sydney Swans was one of the things I
remembered. A funny bloke too who knew the content and could explain it clearly. His pacing is quite
slow and you may find the he rushes the lectures towards the end of the semester, but nevertheless a
top lecturer.
Interest - 9/10

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Learning about the mechanisms, relevance and applications of organic chemistry was just awesome.
Inorganic chemistry was interesting, but I found that going over acids and bases was kind of tedious.
Overall - 9/10
Another unit I would highly recommend to anyone!

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 6.5/10
Challenging but interesting. Mechanisms are horrible though
Lecturers: 5.25/10 (Matt Todd 4/10, Anthony Masters 6.5/10)
Todd has notes which are decent if he didn’t leave so many spaces to 'fill in during the lecture.'
Problem being he’d very rarely use his lecture notes and just lecture from his head on what he thinks
the lecture covers. Then a week or two later he will be like 'oh yeah I forgot someone on this lecture a
few weeks ago' so it was a bit disjointed.
Masters is exceptionally enthusiastic and loves his job. Was a bit dry especially with the acid base
stuff and chucked in a few too many Sydney Swans references in his lectures.
Overall: 7/10
Ease: 8/10
The course material wasn't at all hard, and the tutorials were structured and ordered in a way that
followed lecture material closely, and prepared us well for the final exam (worth 75%). The tutorial
quizzes throughout the semester seemed useful, and were also good preparation for the exam. My
only complaint about ease was that at time, the solubility part of the course seemed a little iffy, with
questions occasionally seeming as if they could be both one type of question, or another. So long as
you know your material by going to lectures, and doing your tutorial sheets you'll be fine. My only
complaint, is that the laboratory quiz was damn impossible, but that might have had something to do
with my sloppy compound. Just make sure you study those ions well.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Peter Rutledge, Louis Rendina)
Dr. Rutledge is an awesome lecturer. This must be said. His dry, Irish/English/Kiwi/Aussie wit is a
perfect match for the sometimes formulaic world of organic chemistry. I love organic chemistry, of
course, and find it exciting in whatever form its presented, but Dr. Rutledge made it just that little bit
more spectacular. His habit of taking a break at the half hour point with his little "trips to Ireland" are
a fantastic idea that every lecturer should make use of. I loved the way he integrated questions and
practical examples (such as the non-working acid experiment) into his lectures, which were really
quite relevant to both the final exam, and our tutorial quizzes. I also had the luck of getting both Dr.
Rutledge and Dr. Rendina as my tutor, which was an added bonus.
Dr. Rendina was equally as good, once more integrating questions and practical experiments into his
lectures. The 'hydrogen bomb' remains the high point. He's just as funny as Dr. Rutledge, but in a
quite different way. My only complaint about Dr. Rendina’s style was that he occasionally focused on
talking to one person throughout the lecture, which occasionally was me. It's a bit distracting is all.
That, and the material he was lumped with was a little crappier than what Dr. Rutledge got to present.
Interest: 7/10
Yeah, I found it pretty interesting. Organic chemistry would get a 10/10, but the heavy emphasis on
acids/bases brought down what would otherwise be a fantastic course, in the Rendina part. If it had
have been organic chemistry/everything else but acids and bases it would have probably got a 10/10,
but yeah...damn those acids and bases.
Overall: 8/10
Good course, actually, quite a good course for a compulsory unit. I'd recommend it to anyone who's a
little confused as to whether they want to continue with chem after 1101/1001. This will hopefully
change your minds.

Semester 2 2009
Ease - 8/10
Some stuff was ok, some stuff needed some simplification and I got that more from Youtube
Lecturers - 9/10 (Matt Todd, Richard Payne, Tony Masters)

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We had a number of different lecturers(first two were for organic chemistry and last one was for
acid/base chemistry and other stuff) throughout the course, Matt Todd was pretty good, very to the
point, um Richard Payne was also pretty good, he kept things interesting, and the last guy Tony
Masters had an incredible sense of humour, which still managed to keep us interested in the content,
but what really prepared my for the final exam was not so much the lecture notes, but rather the
Youtube vids which went through this content
Interest - 10/10
Much better compared to last semester
Overall - 8/10

CHEM1611 - Chemistry A (Pharmacy)

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8.5/10
I think once we were at the end of semester, most of the content seemed fairly straightforward. The
final exam was pretty tricky though...
Lecturers: 8/10 (Trevor Hambley, Michael Kassiou)
Trevor Hambley was really good, kept things in order. Kassiou wasn't too bad either, but got quite
annoying when constantly telling people that there was an exit if they want to talk.
Interest: 8/10
I guess a lot of the stuff learnt was slightly irrelevant to my degree, but overall not bad.
Overall: 9/10
VERY organised School of Chemistry. Adam Bridgeman was the best at keeping everything
organised, and was very quick in replying to all sorts of issues. I'm happy with this UoS.

CHEM1612 - Chemistry B (Pharmacy)

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7.5/10
The final exam was really tricky and had unexpected questions. The subject had a lot of content which
wasn't cruising stuff.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Ron Clarke, Toby Hudson)
Ron Clarke was really good at explaining things, and his notes were great. Toby Hudson was OK for
teaching the course for the first time, but could polish up on his lecturing skills.
Interest: 7/10
A lot of thermodynamics and inorganic chemistry, not exactly my thing.. But there were quite a few
topics that overlapped with PHAR1822, so it helped there.
Overall: 8/10
Once again, excellent organisation by Adam Bridgeman in First Year Chemistry, but the course didn't
really interest me as much as organic chemistry in CHEM1611.

CHEM1901 - Chemistry 1A (Advanced)

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
Exam was very difficult, but everything else (40%) was easy marks.
Lecturers: 7.5/10 (Toby Hudson 8/10, Chris McErlean 7/10)
Interest: 8/10
I like theory and problem-solving, but having to memorise the applications was tedious (e.g. different
types of batteries, metallurgy, etc.)

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Overall: 7.5/10

Semester 1 2013
Ease – 0.5/10
I fulfilled the requirements to do it, hence them suggesting me to enrol in it (*cough* Chris Ling at
enrolment day). However, if you fulfil the requirements but are at the lower bracket of the chemistry
mark requirement, I'd advice to do normal no matter if they try and con you like they did me. Oh and
also, if you haven't done physics, they will gloss over stuff because they expect you to know it. Also
reconsider it if you are doing SSP/Advanced in a couple of other units. I'd recommend CHEM1901 to
people that did very well in HSC Chemistry (i.e. HSC mark 90+, ATAR 95+), but also an interest in
maybe pursuing chemistry as a major, or at least some intermediate units in it. The quizzes are okay,
assignment is very easy (cause it's common) but the final exam is very, very hard and almost
exclusively calculations.
Lecturer – 5.75/10 (Tim Schmidt 8.5/10, Chris Ling 3/10)
Okay Tim Schmidt was a really good lecturer, funny and made you understand things; I was devo
when we didn't have him anymore. Chris Ling urgh, boring, droned on, skipped so much stuff, or
didn't explain things well.
Interest – 4/10
Chemistry labs are boring, very boring for first year, like a cattle call of every chemistry unit bar the
SSP people (i.e Fundies, Pharmacy, Vet Science are all in there). You should get full marks in them
though. They don't relate to the lecture materials at all and feel like a waste of time. I liked the start of
semester subject content on the quantum numbers and shells. I liked the equilibrium calculations.
Thermochemistry was errrrr....but I'm more of an organic chemistry person and it was inorganic
central.
Overall – 4/10
Well, I don't quite obsessively love Nate as much as dear someth1ng, but he was a cool chemistry
tutor. Like the course has an interesting elements, I just found it hard personally, but I've never been
amazing at chemistry (it was my 'extra' units in year 12 that didn't count). Just my 2c.

Semester 1 2013
Ease – 9/10
I found it mostly quite straight-forward but it would be challenging if you don’t like chemistry.
Quantum model of the atom can be quite confusing because it is quite new. Lewis structures can be
incredibly hard – they don’t give simple ones like NH3 etc. There are lots of formulas that you need to
know how to apply and when to apply. I got 10/10 for the first two quizzes and 9/10 for the last quiz. I
believe I got most of the marks for the lab and didn’t drop a mark for the pre-lab (really easy).
Lecturers – 8/10 (Tim Schmidt 9/10, Chris Ling 7/10)
I would say Tim Schmidt (9/10) was the better lecturer over Chris Ling (7/10) but the lectures did
progress quite quickly. Schmidt was funny and interesting – I saw him near the front of the chemistry
building helping a student in one of the final weeks which is great. Ling did say “that’s quite easy”
quite a lot and missed some things but since I do agree with he says that it’s easy because, usually, it
isn’t that complicated.
Interest – 8/10
I would have to take some marks off because of the labs – they were terrible. The labs are really,
really boring and the demos don’t care or don’t really know what they’re doing.
Overall – 9/10
I’d say that I really enjoyed it but the labs did take away from that enjoyment. The teachers were
good. Last thing, my tutorials were the best and my tutor was Nate – too bad he’s going to Cambridge
for his PhD - true Chemistry hero.

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 8/10

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But the final exam is a 3/10; much more difficult than any other component.
Lecturers - 5.5/10 (Chris Ling - 3/10, Tim Schmidt - 8/10)
Tim Schmidt is awesome and funny! Great guy 8/10. Chris Ling mumbles and should be banned from
using the words "this is easy" and skipping over things, 3/10.
Interest: 10/10
A relevant and interesting course.
Overall: 8/10
Great course just do a lot of past papers because the final is hard! Labs are pretty boring though.

Semester 1 2012
Ease - 3/10
This subject is not easy. Well, it's is easy to get 100% in the laboratory side and 100% in the quizzes,
the final exam will make your life difficult. Even if you work consistently throughout the course, the
final exam is incredibly difficult and extrapolates a lot of knowledge away from what was taught. I
suggest practicing the papers throughout the semester and then you should be fine.
Lecturers - 6/10 (Chris Ling - 4/10, Tim Schmidt - 8/10)
We had Chris for the first half of semester and he was okay, BUT when the equations and worked
examples came up he would skip a lot of that stuff and say "That's pretty simple" when it clearly
wasn't, and you would have to be dedicated enough to go over it at home to actually understand it.
Tim was very good; explained things well, kept interest, and was funny and quirky.
Interest - 5/10
I LOVED HSC Chemistry and was really interested in it, but this unit is so boring at times it's just
horrible, but at other times it is quite interesting.
Overall - 4/10
Don't do this unless you're doing advanced science and want to major in chemistry or something that
has a distinction/credit in this as a prerequisite. Or unless you're a Chemistry genius (94+ in HSC
Chemistry and naturally good at Maths or Physics too).

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
The assessments throughout the semester were easy marks, especially the tutorial quizzes. Just study
the sample quiz the night before and you're set. The final exam was worth 70% and I thought it was
hard.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Tim Schmidt 8/10, Chris Ling 4/10)
Tim Schmidt was really good, everything made sense soon enough and his lectures were interesting. I
didn't really like Chris Ling's lectures though. Not quite sure what it was but I took in nothing.
Interest: 7/10
I had always been interested in chemistry and I guess it hasn't really changed. I found the practicals
boring though. They just seemed repetitive over the 3 hours.
Overall: 7/10
Interesting content, one good lecturer, one not so good lecturer.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer - 8/10
First lecturer was a bit dodgy, but Kepert wasn't too bad.
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8/10

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 CHEM1902 - Chemistry 1B (Advanced)

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 5/10
Quite difficult stuff
Lecturer - 8/10
They were both quite good, especially Trevor Hambley
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 7/10

CHEM1903 - Chemistry 1A (Special Studies Program)

NOTE: CHEM1903 shares lectures with CHEM1901, hence the following reviews can function
as a review for both units.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7.5/10
Depends on what you like and the HSC option you did as to how easy it is. I did Industrial Chemistry
for my option so that pretty much knocked out a good 2.5 weeks of material I already knew, if not
more. The sample quizzes are exactly the same as the actual ones, just with different numbers. Should
be a pretty smooth ride.
Lecturers: 6.25/10 (Tim Schmidt 8/10, Chris Ling 4.5/10)
Tim was a good lecturer to start the course with, he was straightforward and good at straightening out
concepts for us. I think if I'd had someone else for quantum chemistry I would not have understood it
at all. Chris Ling was really bad; he couldn't control everyone talking, he rushed through everything
and his lecture slides were far far too complicated to learn off. He knew his stuff, but wasn't able to
communicate it to us.
Interest: 7/10
It varies. I found quantum really interesting but the physical chemistry section was pretty boring. This
is really a matter of personal taste. Also, be wary that Tim is patriotic when it comes to his area of
interests so prepare to hear everything about spectroscopy.
Laboratories: 8/10
You do 2 separate modules in this lab; Essential Chemical Techniques and Physical Chemistry. The
first was just microtechniques and titrations, and the second module rotated through 6 experiments.
The better experiments were the ones where we made soaps and detergents and played with liquid
nitrogen. The most boring was the crystal structures prac, which just involved putting tennis balls in a
box to see how they fit.
Overall: 7.5/10
A fine first year, first semester chemistry course. Would have liked to see some organic chemistry
though.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
Pretty easy really, just extending the concepts from HSC. Quantum was really interesting, even if it
was revision. Thermodynamics was fine, as was equilibrium, electrochemistry and polymers. After
doing past papers, it’s evident that they always chuck in one or two dodgy questions that are a little bit
tricky, but the exams generally fine. Final exam was really hard- thought I'd fail, ended up getting a
distinction.
Lecturers: 8.5/10 (Tim Schmidt 10/10, Chris Ling 7/10)
10/10 for Tim Schmidt- Absolute champion. Explains stuff really well, answered questions well, was
funny and interesting. He made me want to learn more about spectroscopy, which I wasn't at all
interested in before.

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7/10 for Chris Ling- Nice guy who knows his stuff, but has a bit of trouble controlling the class. Also
made me interested in what he was teaching though.
Interest: 10/10
I love chemistry, what can I say?
Overall: 10/10
If you have the opportunity, do SSP over advanced. I was tossing up, but the labs in SSP are far better,
more self guided and less strict in their instructions.

CHEM1904 - Chemistry 1B (Special Studies Program)

NOTE: CHEM1904 shares lectures with CHEM1902, hence the following reviews can function
as a review for both units.

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 9/10
There's a lot of reactions to memorise, but they become almost second nature around when STUVAC
begins. Organic was a pain, and I found physical chemistry easier to learn. Neither are that difficult
though. The assessments/lab marks are dead easy to get, and you should be able to get close to full
marks before the finals. The finals are worth 60% and is where you'll lose your marks. Your pretty
much guaranteed a pass due to the free 35-40% before the finals, as long as you don't bomb the exam
completely. In terms of assessments, the only difference between CHEM1904/CHEM1902 are the
labs, which you'll probably get close to full marks anyway.
Lecturers – 9/10 (Chris McErlean, Louis Rendina)
Both are pretty good.
Interest - 7/10
Organic chemistry mainly focused on reaction mechanisms and reagents and introduced "curly
arrows" which can explain almost every mechanism there is in organic chemistry. Physical chemistry
focused more on equilibrium/solubility/structures and rates and involves some simple to moderately
difficult calculations. I didn't enjoy the seemingly random experiments done in labs that had almost no
relevance to the course, the equipment was sub-par quality and those god awful pre-lab quizzes made
the lab component of this course unbearable.
Overall - 8/10
Fair subject.

Semester 2 2013
Ease – 10/10
Mostly straightforward and nothing too complicated – well, if you go to lectures and listen. Some of
the calculations can get a bit tricky but it’s mostly doable. If possible, go in SSP and be very careful
about who you partner with. I had a really bad lab partner that drove me nuts. But otherwise, pretty
darn solid.
Lecturers – 10/10 (Peter Rutledge, Louis Rendina)
Rutledge and Rendina are both very, very good lecturers and you should be very happy if you have
them. They are engaging and approachable. It’s also worth noting that Adam Bridgeman is extremely
helpful and will answer any question you throw at him and will answer it very, very quickly. Top
notch above all others. Though, I must admit, the tutor was pretty boring – he was too strict and it
made the tutorials much more bland and boring.
Interest – 10/10
Very interesting course – bring on second year chemistry! I recommend it to anyone doing science –
chemistry is important and it’s fucking fun too. So yeah, do it.
Overall – 10/10

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What can I say? I really enjoyed it.

CHEM2401/2911/2915 - Molecular Reactivity and Spectroscopy

(Regular/Advanced/SSP)

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 9/10
First 5 weeks were pretty much revision of organic from first year, more curly arrows and more things
to memorise. Quantum was a little wishy-washy, wasn't very rigorous. I don't really know if
spectroscopy was hard or not, but it felt like some of the things we were supposed to know for the
exams wasn't taught or covered properly. For SSP, first half was run more tutorial-like and covered
stuff of fluorescence and presenting figures, which was alright. Second half was on drug discovery,
which i personally didn't like, too biology-ish for my taste, would've liked to have done something
quantum.
Labs : 5/10
Might just be because I’m horrible at practicals, but I really didn't like the labs. Your basically just
reading off the lab manual without really understanding what you’re doing, didn't help with my
sandbox organisational skills. Reports were annoying as well, most of the feedback for the reports was
incredibly vague, and I was losing marks every week for things that they didn't comment on the
previous weeks. In the end I lost around 5% weighed overall just from labs.
Lecturers: ?/10
Skipped most
Interest: 9/10
Always fun to draw curly arrows, i think quantum/spectroscopy could be a little more rigorous, but I
guess that's asking too much for a second year chemistry unit.
Overall: 7/10
Labs are killing it for me, but the content was alright.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 9/10
There are a couple of difficult concepts but a LOT to remember, particularly in organic chemistry
where there's a tonne of reactions to know - personally, I spend hours remember what the reactions
were - one tip to remember is that the oxygen on the carbonyl is almost always protonated first which
allows all kinds of reactions to occur. http://www.masterorganicchemistry.com/ is an awesome
resource that you can use - it will seriously help you do well. Also, in recent years, the subject has
been progressively been dumbed down and this year's exam was ridiculously easy. I don't think the
subject is hard at all but there is a lot of memory work to do and some conceptual understanding but
you don't need to be a prodigy to excel. The course involves 2 topics of organic chemistry (one is
aromatic and carbonyl chemistry, the other is more general organic chemistry) and 1 topic of physical
chemistry (spectroscopy). As for SSP, it seriously advanced material and you won't understand it so
you don't really get much out of it. Personally, I think I'd be better off with tutorials instead of SSP
seminars as to not impede my learning.
Lecturers: 9.33/10 (Peter Rutledge 10/10, Rob Baker 8/10, Adam Bridgeman 10/10)
Lecturers in this course were fantastic. Peter Rutledge is my all-time favourite, his lectures are
consistently clear and easy to understand and he is willing to spend time after lectures talking about
issues that you might have. He's also quite quick with help if you email him. Rob Baker is the
"weakest" lecturer of this group but he's still very good - though, my criticism is that he should use
actual slides and not just sheets - I'd prefer if they gave us copies to slides with curly arrows included,
that would really help learning so you know for sure what is correct and what isn't. Adam Bridgeman
is really, really good - personally, I think Peter gets the edge over him but he's still exceptional and
dedicated to teaching which is a huge plus. He seems to actually care about his students and that's
what makes him a great teacher.

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Interest: 10/10
I really like chemistry, in general and this course was fully of organic chemistry (my favourite) so I
really enjoyed it), the physical chemistry, surprisingly, was quite good - even for a non-physical
chemistry person like me.
Overall: 10/10
Good course, if you're interested in chemistry, I highly recommend this course - it's well run and if
you put some effort in, you can do very well.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
Nothing particularly difficult, just a huge amount of content so it is pretty hard to keep up with it all
and remember anything. Labs were also fairly easy and while the reports were daunting at first, if you
read the feedback you should end up getting close to 20/20 by the end of them. But they are definitely
very time consuming and it was a relief when labs finished and I no longer needed to complete any
reports.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Peter Rutledge 9/10, Rob Baker 6/10, Adam Brigeman 9/10)
Peter Rutledge was really good, extremely helpful, explained everything well and had a really well
structured course. Not sure who the 8 am lecturer was but we had him for 1 tute. Hopefully he teaches
his lectures better than his tutes because he was the worst tutor I’ve had for any subject at university.
Rob Baker wasn’t bad but definitely worse than the other two lecturers. Didn’t explain stuff as well as
he could’ve and often was not very clear. I listened to some 8 am lecture recordings and Kate Joliffe
was much better at explaining the content and she was really helpful during the tute.
Adam Bridgeman was pretty good and always extremely helpful however he lost the god-like status
he had in my mind from my experience of him last year. Whilst on the whole I rated him the same as
Peter Rutledge, I don’t think he is as good at explaining the content. The 8 am lecturer seemed quite
good.
Interest: 7/10
Interesting course covering both physical and organic chemistry but focusing strongly on organic.
Didn’t like the labs and reports and learnt very little from them. I thought there was a good range of
content which ensured studying for the final exam wasn’t monotonous and I did enjoy learning the
content.
Overall: 8/10
It can be tough because there’s so much content and it sucks if you’re in the 8 am lecture stream. Labs
aren’t particularly fun but made easier if you’re with friends. If you keep up with the content you’ll be
fine but don’t expect to be able to learn everything in the week before the exam, especially if like me
you didn’t pay attention in first year. My quiz marks weren’t particularly flash but still I managed to
do well because I did try and keep up the content as best as I could. For people doing SSP, just turn up
to the tutes, they make learning so much easier. If future exams are as easy as this year’s, you can
fairly easily pass this course even though there’s a lot of content. People taking this course are
fortunate enough to have some of the best lecturers even though Tim Schmidt no longer takes the
course and it was thanks to them I achieved my mark. If only all subjects had lecturers of the same
calibre.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
This course can get pretty full-on at times, but it's not unduly hard. You'll need to stay awake to
survive this one. If you don't have a good physics background, the quantum chem section might be
difficult. The final exam was also hard- many of the questions were on pretty fringe concepts. The
textbook isn't all that useful (it goes way beyond anything they teach you in the actual course), so you
have to rely on lecture notes and tute sheets for revision. If you are in 2915, you will attend an extra

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seminar each week on SSP content. These are conceptually very hard, but normally there's plenty of
help available for the assessments.
Interest: 8/10
Chemists, it seems, are divided into those who prefer organic and inorganic. This course has both.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Adam Bridgeman 9/10, and others)
The setup of lecturers in this course is pretty good. Bridgeman in particular is one of the best lecturers
in the school, and the amount of extra resources he puts on WebCT is amazing.
Labs: 6/10
Four hour labs on a Friday afternoon sound like a drag, but believe me, that four hours doesn't last
long. In short, you need to move quickly to finish the thing. There are two parts- an analytical and an
organic section. Analytical, which needs spot-on results, is harder. If you are ok at report writing, the
organic ones should not be that bad.
Overall: 7/10
It's not a course you can sleep through, but it's definitely worth your while to do if you like chemistry.
If you get an offer for SSP, definitely do it, as it's interesting and a good source of marks. And of
course, this unit is essential if you want to major in Chem.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
Not that hard but not that easy. Effort is required, and readings have to be done elsewhere for the
physical chemistry part. Took me a few times of reading over Tim Schmidt’s lecture notes before I
understood everything. Organic chemistry was easy enough to learn from lecture slides and
occasional reading from McMurray. Pracs are easy, as you get high scores by asking demonstrators
and reading the manual. Thing that brings down the score was the final exam: It was a bitch.
Questions were in there that I'd never seen before for the spectroscopy part, and some of Tim
Schmidt’s stuff was pretty hard. Some of the organic questions were also pretty fringe concepts, I
reckon.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Chris McErlean, Kate Jolliffe, Tim Schmidt, Scott Kable)
Awesome lecturers. Chris McErlean (1-3) was nice enough and had concise lecture notes. Kate
Jolliffe's (4-6) lecture notes weren't quite as good but she went through the material in a lot more
detail (with curly arrows and real life syntheses and crap). Both of those lecturers taught organic
chemistry so for me, they can't step too far out of line. Overall, they both made clear lecture notes,
related theory to practise and were genuinely interesting and interested in their field. Only negative
was that they both weren't that open to consultation and didn't put much stuff up on webCT apart from
their notes. Tim Schmidt (8-9) was a funny guy. Kind of condescending and rude but all the same, he
explained all the difficult maths and stuff pretty well. His lecture notes were kickass. Also, he took
the time out to write a 40 or so page book explaining his course content in detail and provided a few
links on the internet to resources that explained his stuff in more detail. Scott Kable (7, 10-13) is one
of the university's best lecturers, seriously. He took more lectures than the rest and it's probably
reflected in the score. He makes the most difficult concepts easy and makes the most dull concepts
exciting. He has a habit of coming up with analogies that help explain all the quantum theory
concepts, which are a fantastic idea. His notes were very detailed and the amount of extra material he
put up on webCT was staggering - seriously, he has a quiz for each lecture, he has pages of solutions
for each of his tutorials, he does fully worked solutions for every past exam he gave us and was
available for consultation at basically any time. The man's one of the most dedicated lecturers I've
ever had. Oh, and he's a really nice guy. I was asking a question at the end of a tutorial one day and
once I was done he asked about my [blue] hair and the chemistry of it and so on, and we talked about
it (and chemistry) until we got to the lecture theatre. How many lecturers are that friendly and nice to
students eh? I <3 Scott Kable!
Interest: 9/10
Organic part covers substitution, elimination and benzene reactions/properties. This involves a lot of
organic chemistry from a lot of areas, so there's lots of interest there for me. Tim's part's all about
quantum theory, which was also (surprisingly) interesting. Scott's part was about spectroscopy, so it
wasn't as interesting, but he makes it so. I didn't think I could ever enjoy physical chem but I was

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proven wrong. Organic labs are interesting enough but the inorganic ones are a bitch to have interest
in.
Labs: 7/10
It's split up into two lots of four weeks. For the first four you perform analysis in the inorganic labs.
You know, detecting ion concentrations and crap. You basically spend three hours preparing absurdly
accurate solutions, run a test of em, do some maths and go home - BORING. Easy though. I got an
HD average for the inorganic labs. Organic labs were much better. It's pretty much potions mixing, so
how can that be boring? Demonstrators were always there for you in both labs, but the organic ones
had the bonus of having a "special guest" academic staff member teaching us in the lab. So you've got
about three PhD students telling you how to do things, with one of the academic staff walking around
to help out, which is pretty cool (staff members were Max Crossley, Richard Payne and Kate Jolliffe).
Overall: 9/10
Very pleased with this subject. Interesting and fun. I'd definitely recommend it!

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
Large majority was organic chemistry which I disliked personally. However, aromatic chemistry was
quite easy. Quantum Huckel Theory and Spectroscopy were quite difficult to understand but once you
understand them, everything falls in place quite nicely. The final exam is horrible. There was way too
much stuff to learn and study for. There is only so much we poor students can fit into our brains. Labs
were a bit of a pain overall. I preferred the analytical over organic labs because there was no report
writing for homework...
Interest: 6/10
Organic chemistry is like the biggest yawn for me. Thank god for Spectroscopy and Quantum theory.
Even though they were hard to understand, the colourful lectures were far more interesting than the
black and white overheads in the organic lectures.
Lecturers: 7.5/10 (Chris McErlean 6/10, Kate Jolliffe 8/10, Tim Schmidt 7/10, Scott Kable 9/10)
McErlean is such a show off and makes hard exam questions. I particularly hate it when he says
organic chemistry is so easy so frequently. He goes through the lecture rather quickly as well and
that's worse for me as I do not like organic chemistry in the first place. He does show glimpses of a
good lecturer, but it’s an uncommon sight.
Joliffe was a very good lecturer. She went through the lectures at a slower pace and really she really
knows her stuff. She asks straightforward questions in exams which is an added bonus.
I've heard bad things about Schmidt but I never saw them in his lectures. He can lecture quite well
and went at an alright pace. One thing I do like about him is that he was lazy enough to set the exact
tutorial questions as the exam questions....LOL
Kable is an awesome lecturer. He provides heaps of support and is committed to helping us
understand the material. He does make the lectures engaging and interesting. Unfortunately, he also
likes to ask hard questions in exams....
Overall: 7/10
Organic was hard and boring, except for aromatics which was easy (but still boring) and the physical
chemistry (quantum and spectroscopy) were very interesting but takes a while to understand. Final
exam was hell, there's far too much content that can be examinable.

Semester 1 2006
Pretty interesting. The Spectroscopy and Aromatic Organic Chemistry is quite good. The Quantum
stuff is not so good, especially when the lecturer is quite boring. The last part of the lecture series
included an overview of AAS, AES and other methods of analysing samples- it was quite boring.

CHEM2402/2912 - Chemical Structure and Stability (Regular/Advanced)

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Semester 2 2014
Ease: 6/10
This rating is inflated by how easy I found the final exam to be. Content was definitely the hardest of
any course I have done so far. I felt it was made harder due to the way it was taught and things could
have been explained better. It was also hard to relate what you were learning in lectures to what was
going to be tested. Labs were worse than first semester though my marks were a higher.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Toby Hudson 1.5/10, Greg Warr 7/10, Deanna D’Alessandro 8/10, Lou Rendina
9.5/10, Siggi Schmid 6.5/10, Chris Ling 8/10)
12 pm stream lecturers were not good. I did not like any of them. I liked the 8 am lecturers much
better.
Interest: 6/10
I gave a 6 since I feel if I actually put in effort to understand the content I would have enjoyed it more.
Thermodynamics is definitely the least interesting. Solid state may have been better if it was taught
better. At the end, the more complicated parts were a bit rushed. Coordination was the most
interesting.
Overall: 6/10
A massive step down from first semester in terms of how enjoyable I found it and how the course was
run. It was also a massive increase in difficulty which I wish I knew beforehand since I did not expect
it. Really cannot recommend it unless you want to do 3rd year chemistry. Whilst I ended up with the
same mark as last semester which I cannot explain and did not expect at all, I was cursing myself
throughout the whole semester for doing this subject and could not bring myself to study for it at all.

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 4/10
Despite getting an 89, this unit is HARD - it's easily the hardest chemistry unit so far and you want to
be good at maths to do well in this. I'm okay with maths but I'm not great so I found it quite tough.
Make sure you go to classes/find the ones with good lecturers and don't fall behind or you'll be really
fucked.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Toby Hudson 1.5/10, Greg Warr 7/10, Deanna D’Alessandro 8/10, Lou Rendina
9.5/10, Siggi Schmid 6.5/10, Chris Ling 8/10)
We got some pretty good lecturers but we all got some pretty awful ones. Toby Hudson was pretty
bad, to be honest - he was boring and unclear but since there's 2 streams, the other lecturer, Greg Warr,
was decent, much clearer but not the best in the school. The next section had much better lecturers,
Deanna D'Alessandro and Lou Rendina. I had Deanna in tutes (so her rating might not be as accurate)
and she seemed quite good but I think she needs to be more confident, Lou was much more relaxed.
I'd say he is one of the best lecturers for inorganic chemistry, so far. The last section was run by Siggi
Schmid and Chris Ling, my peers didn't mind Schmid but I really didn't like him - I found him hard to
follow and understand. However, I really liked Chris Ling - he was MUCH easier to understand and
very clear with explanations and he seems pretty relaxed which was nice. But I have to say, Siggi puts
a lot of effort into teaching so he's not too bad.
Interest: 7/10 (Coordination Chemistry 9/10, Thermodynamics 3/10, Solid State Chemistry 6/10)
The coordination chemistry section was really good and enjoyable - definitely interesting but the other
sections weren't as good - the thermodynamics was pretty hard and boring but the solid state
chemistry was just hard - maybe a little bit boring but it was more hard than anything. You're pretty
much only doing this unit if you want to major in chemistry
Overall: 6/10
This unit is a pretty tough unit, the hardest there is in chemistry for CHEM1 and CHEM2. You want
to do this if you plan to major in chemistry or something like that - you definitely shouldn't be doing
this if you're looking for an easy subject. If you want to do well in this unit, make sure you get as
many marks in the assessments as possible (i.e. quizzes and labs) - the exam can be pretty average or
really hard.

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Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
Personally for me much easier than the CHEM2401/2911 in terms of understanding the content.
However, the exam questions for the metal complexes part are quite difficult. Quizzes were heaps
hard though. Average for quizzes over the entire cohort was a FAIL...eep! Thermodynamics
(statistical and classical) was easy (though we had to learn some formulae off by heart), though I'd
imagine it would be difficult for those without a strong mathematical background. The carbonyl
organic chemistry was somewhat easier than I expected. I liked the fact that this time everyone
provided answers to their sections of past exams (except for Harrowell lol) which made life a lot
easier. This time the labs were organic (lvl5) and physical (lvl3) rather than organic and analytical
(lvl4). Labs were similar to CHEM2401/2911 in difficulty for organic and physical was more about
using computers to analyse results rather than experimentation which I guess made it a bit easier.
Interest: 8/10
The metal complexes section was quite interesting and because it's inorganic chemistry I definitely
had more interest in it. Statistical thermodynamics was quite neat and interesting as well. I didn't
expect classical thermodynamics to be so easy and interesting. Carbonyl organic chemistry made me
fall sleep.
Lecturers: Beattie: 7/10, Bridgeman: 9/10, Harrowell: 6/10, Hudson: 8/10, Baker: 8/10
Big problem I had with Beattie was trying to understand what he was saying. He was always
mumbling the lecture rather than speaking out loud. If you can actually understand his mumbling then
some of the stuff he says makes his material easier to understand.
Bridgeman is very committed and supportive. He provides extensive answers to virtually everything
and actively participates in the discussion board. He explains things rather well as well and goes
through the stuff very slowly. He does set some difficult questions though...
Harrowell is an absolute a-hole because he chucks a tantrum every time someone talks in the very
slightest. His actual lecturing is good; he can explain things well, but his lack of tolerance and his
impatience just gets in the way too much.
Hudson explains things decently and is very supportive. He usually asks easy questions in the exam
(which were mostly plugging numbers into formulae). I liked his "flash quizzes" and his unusual
"word of the day" presentations lol, some were quite interesting.
Baker took the organic carbonyl chemistry section. As much as I find organic chemistry hard, he
actually made it quite easy. His exam questions were generally quite easy. However, he didn't make it
any more interesting though. It was quite monotonic...
Overall: 8/10
Definitely prefer this unit over CHEM2401/2911. Most of the material was more interesting (though
some of it was quite hard to understand) and the lecturers were more supportive (overall). There's a
bigger emphasis on inorganic and physical chemistry which favoured my way of thinking a bit more.
Final exam was still horrible though; far too much material to study for.

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 4/10
Ugh, hard. Final exam was hellish. Lab reports are fairly easy if you know what you're doing.
Lecturers: 4/10 (James Beattie, Adam Bridgeman, Peter Harrowell, Toby Hudson, Rob Baker)
The lecturers for this course are a bit of a joke. James Beattie (3 weeks) stands and mumbles for the
most part in a monotone. I'm not sure why, because he can be exciting if he wants to be. Adam
Bridgeman (3 weeks) was excellent who was able to be interesting at 8am, provided a tonne of
learning material to help us through the stuff was genuinely entertaining. Toby Hudson (3 weeks) is
friendly enough, competent but not excellent. Rob Baker (2 weeks) was very good and explained
everything quite well. His lecture notes were awesome too. So why the low score? The majority of
assessment seems to fall under the shitty lecturers, and too much of Bridgeman’s stuff was picking up
the pieces from Beattie.
Interest: 3/10
Depends if you're an organic or inorganic person. This course has made it very clear that I'm an
organic person. You'll be learning about ligands, d block chemistry, thermodynamics and so on for

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the bulk of the course. The ligands part was ok in terms of interest (once I grasped it), but 8am
lectures made it a little hard to be interested in. Statistical thermodynamics was intriguing, but a little
abstract to really be interested in. Normal thermodynamics was a little more practical, but wasn't
terribly interesting at all. The chemistry of carbonyl compounds (organic omg!) was awesome though.
Overall: 3/10
I didn't enjoy myself in this course. The synthetic techniques labs and organic lectures were the only
parts of the course where I could actually say I was enjoying myself. The assessment was difficult,
the lecturers were shoddy. I hadn't done 2401 either (which isn't a prerequisite), which made a bit of
the material in some labs and some lectures a little harder to grasp. If it weren't compulsory, I wouldn't
recommend it. Try going to the 12pm lectures for sure.

Semester 2 2006
I found this course better than the first semester core Chemistry unit. It involves less organic
chemistry. The first two lecture series involves learning about metal complexes, crystal/ligand field
theory, the bonding of ligands to complexes and how that affects the reactivity, and a little on rate
laws. The next two series involves statistical thermodynamics, which I found quite interesting, and
classical thermodynamics (which I didn't like as much). The final series is a little on organic
chemistry, but nothing too detailed (just SN1, SN2, E1 and E2 reactions).
The lecturers...well no one that actually stands out. If you guys have James Beattie, good luck trying
to understand him. He mumbles.
The labs are horrible, as they are in first year. There are organic and physical labs. The organic labs
aren't too bad, but the physical ones are shocking. You have to hand in your report by 5 pm that
afternoon! You will have one lab each week, including weeks 1 and 13, which will run for 4 hours.
The only major difference between the advanced (2912) and normal (2402), are the questions asked
in the labs for the lab report. CHEM2916 is SSP, and those students attend additional seminars as
well as do some extra assignments.
Overall: 6/10

CHEM2403 - Chemistry of Biological Molecules

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 6/10
I don't know if I found this subject hard or if the lecturers were just bad. It was easier than core
chemistry but it definitely wasn't just an easy subject. The labs are easy to get good marks in, though.
I got full marks in all pre-work and got 19/20, 19/20, 20/20 and 29/30.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Richard Payne 9.5/10, Peter Lay 5/10, Ron Clarke 5/10)
The first section is basically about organic chemistry in the body - some reactions and curly arrows,
not too hard and it was taught well by Richard Payne - he's loud and clear. The other two lecturers are
pretty boring, to say the least. Peter Lay knows his stuff but his voice is really boring to listen to and I
found that I just tuned out within 10 minutes or so and I had pretty much the same problem with Ron
Clarke.
Interest: 6/10
The content probably isn't so boring but it was taught in the really sluggish way which got me pretty
bored. I like chemistry so I tolerated it but the course seemed pretty disorganised and the content was
incoherent - it didn't seem like it connected but rather, it seemed like it was a bunch of information
about chemistry stuck together to make a course.
Overall: 4/10
It's a course there for the sake of having a course there, unless you're keen on getting as many
chemistry units in as possible (like me), I wouldn't recommend this unit.

Semester 2 2008

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Ease: 7/10
Nothing too hard. The organic chemistry is easy enough to learn, and the inorganic material is a
mixture of first year stuff and trivia. Only difficult part would be the physical chemistry, but luckily
the exam questions are identical to previous year's, so you just have to know how to use the formula
(and remember how to use them, rather than forgetting that in the final exam). Final exam was a bit
tough compared to what I thought it'd be like, but nothing that challenging.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Peter Rutledge, Ron Clarke, Peter Lay)
Peter Rutledge is fantastic. Interesting, funny, good slides, makes lots of references to drug design and
other practical applications. Peter Lay is good too. He writes on the blackboard, distributes handouts
(with graphs and whatever), makes detailed lecture notes and generally makes things pretty
interesting. Ron Clarke is the weak point - he's kind of shit. Faces the blackboard, reads
off slides and whatever. Overall the two others raise the overall mark.
Interest: 9/10
Yeah interesting subject. Organic chemistry was lots of fun, inorganic chemistry was surprisingly
interesting (learn about the chemistry of teeth and cool stuff like that), but physical chemistry was a
bore.
Labs: 5/10
Eh. Pretty crud. Demonstrators were shit and didn't give very good advice. Labs were long and boring
and kind of not that related to the lectures. Plus they do them on level 4, and there's a distinct lack of
fume hoods on level 4, which makes things cramped. Oh, and feedback was non-existent.
Overall: 8/10
Apart from the labs and the physical chemistry, it was a very good subject. Highly recommended.

Semester 2 2006
I didn't really mind this course. You will be learning about sugars, how they react to form
disaccharides, lipids, cholesterol, steroids, artificial sweeteners, DNA and proteins. The second series
consists of physical chemistry. You'll learn about osmosis, Brownian motion, diffusion, muscle
contraction and the process involved, heart function, kidney function, electron transport, colloids and
a bit on proteins. The final series in learning about metal complexes in biology (eg. Pt used to treat
cancer). You'll also learn about the chelate effect, unit cells, crystal growth and the crystal structure of
teeth and bones. You will have 5 labs in the semester, 4 hours each, and they are all inorganic labs.
They aren't too bad (well, not as bad as the core chemistry). Overall: 7/10

CHEM2404 - Forensic and Environmental Chemistry

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 7/10
A lot of the things taught was really random and unorganized in forensics, it just seemed like a course
you'd take as an elective if you weren't doing science for interest. Environmental/green chemistry
were slightly better, but still a bit of a mess. There's a lot to remember for the finals and I'd try to
remember every small detail like definitions of pph, LD50, every type of forensic technique if you
want to ace the multiple choice ( I lost like 7 marks here cause i didn't memorise those definitions).
The short response in the final exam was almost exactly the same as the previous year’s paper, they
didn't even bother to change some of the values. Also for the online quizzes, don't make the mistake of
accidently shifting your answers down by one after scribing it on a piece of paper .
Labs: 7/10
A lot shorter than main chemistry labs, most are done by 2 out of the 4 hours. Some experiments were
interesting, but i was seemingly losing marks for the experiments somehow, which was all a bit
dodgy. Although a problem i had with some of the experiments was that they just didn't make sense,
or the answers to them was impossible to determine without a google search.
Lecturers: ?/10
Didn't go

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Tutorials: ?/10
These were like revision sessions every 2 weeks, not much of a tutorial, cycled through 3 tutors.
Interest: 5/10
Looking back, would i take this subject again? Probably not. I guess this would be a bit of a WAM
boost for people in science if you put in the effort.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
It's not a particularly hard course but since it's very poorly taught with mostly content that seems quite
random, it can seem very hard. The first topic involves forensic chemistry, some techniques used to
detect substances and things like that - what you'd expect, really. The second topic is environmental
chemistry in terms of soil and water solutions - this is probably the hardest part since it's really poorly
taught but the concepts are quite tough to understand. The last section involves atmospheric chemistry
and green chemistry - green chemistry is a bit different to environmental chemistry since green
chemistry is more about improving processes to have a smaller environmental impact - this part of the
course is quite easy and you should really be able to do most of it with first year chemistry
knowledge, though, there is still some new content like the 12 principles of green chemistry. Finally,
if you do core chemistry, you can really excel in the labs - I got 17/20, 19/20, 19/20, 19/20 and 20/20
for my lab reports which was considered pretty darn good - ALWAYS read comments you get and
improve from them, that's how you do well in the labs - also note that the labs start when the other
labs end so you'll just have 1 lab each week for the whole semester if you do both chemistry courses.
Lecturers: 3/10 (Anthony Masters, James Beattie, Peter Harrowell)
Overall, lectures in this course were quite bad. Anthony Masters (first) was pretty average, nothing
outstanding and I felt that it was quite boring but he wasn't the worst lecturer of the bunch. James
Beattie (second) is a really smart guy but he's a bad lecturer because he is extremely difficult to
understand - he doesn't speak clearly so you really need to put in a lot of effort to understand what he's
saying and even then, it's hard. Peter Harrowell (last) is a decent lecturer and taught the best section -
I'd say he's the best lecturer of these three but he isn't as good as the lecturers in the core chemistry
classes - Peter also kicked me out of a lecture once but no big deal, kind of my fault, I guess.
Interest: 6/10
I mean, I like it because it was chemistry but the way the course was structured, run, and taught,
wasn't appealing to me. There could a many improvements that could be made. If teaching was
improved, I could imagine this course being much, much better. Atmospheric chemistry, for me, was
really nice because I'm also doing an Environmental Studies major so it matches up but obviously, not
many people will be like me and find that it's not extremely relevant.
Overall: 5/10
Overall, definitely not what I'd call a good course but it could've been much, much worse. I would
like to be improved teaching which is drastically make the course more interesting. My
recommendation is to not expect a pleasant course - basically no one actually likes the course.

Third Year Chemistry Advanced Seminars

Semester 1 2007
Advanced Course
Additional seminars comprising 1 hour per week. We did asymmetric synthesis and "green" power.
We did two assignments in groups of 3-4. The first assignment was devising a way to synthesise a
drug and the second was to present a seminar on different technologies for power (nuclear power,
wind power, clean coal, etc.). There's a lot of work involved.

Third Year Chemistry Practicals

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NOTE: Third year chemistry lab courses are ran separate from the theoretical courses, and
each student shall be enrolled in a lab session regardless of which units they are taking. Your
marks for the practicals will, however, have an impact on the mark for your theoretical course.
The practical courses come under three main topics: Organic, Inorganic and
Physical/Theoretical. Reviews not marked as one of these topics can be considered as a review of
the overall practical course.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 5/10
The experiments are not easy - whereas organic experiments throughout undergrad chemistry labs are
chosen for their ease, these ones required a bit more patience, technique and understanding. The
experiments also didn't always work or go anywhere near close to completion, which offers a
challenge. The apparatus's used are complex and a thorough understanding of organic spectra is
needed to elucidate the structures of the molecules you make. Lab report questions are not easy and
need a lot of time to be spent on them. Having said all that, I got first in the whole year woop woop!
Interest: 10/10
All the experiments looked great, but I only got to do three. Nevertheless, all three I attempted (more
later) were a lot of fun and the reports were interesting, even if a bit too challenging, to write up. This
stuff is essential organic chemistry so if you like organic chem you'll be on easy street.
Demonstrators: 10/10
Great batch. The organic demonstrators from first semester must have been sent on their way and
replaced because these guys were all very helpful, very enthusiastic, very relaxed and awesome all
around. Trent was the best demo we had, but the others were all pretty good: Althea (very nice), Sam
(hilarious and he encouraged us to smell the chemicals which meant i wasn't expecting pyridine to
smell quite so bad), and Fargol (also very nice and helpful). There were others on the days I was not
in the lab but I don't know much about 'em.
Involvement: 10/10
Always something to do and always a fair amount of thought required. You'll be running around like a
mad chook for the first few weeks but by the end I felt as if I had a pretty good command of organic
chemistry apparatus's.
Overall: 10/10
I enjoyed them heaps. Basically it runs like this:
Weeks 1-2: A compulsory experiment in purifying a mystery compound, working out what the
compound is through spectra, and then performing experiments on the compound to verify it. I got a
phenol/ketone so I verified it through making a benzoate ester and a phenylhydrazone. None of these
experiments worked particularly well.
Weeks 3-6: You choose some experiments based on how many subjects you're attempting. The
experiments offered are:
Natural Product Isolation - You're given pepper, tomato and nutmeg and you have to isolate a
natural product and then find out what it is via analysis of spectra. Very hard spectra but its rewarding.
I did this one. A pretty hard column is required too.
Synthesis of Azulene - A blue hydrocarbon! Essential organic chemistry here with a range of pretty
neat reactions. An overnight reflux and a simple column are the hardest parts. After that you have to
thoroughly explain the mechanisms of all steps, stereochemisty included. I did this one.
Synthesis of Hexaphenylbenzene - Melting point of over 400C! More essential organic chem but on
a very, very micro scale. I did part of this for fun. The questions are easy from what I gathered.
Stereoselective Syntheses - You make things that have a certain stereochemical outcome then you
perform your own HNMR analysis to find out which stereoisomer you made. The questions looked
incredibly hard for this one so I didn't attempt it. It also looked a bit boring imo.
One Pot Reactions - Messy, essential organic chemistry. You do some neat one pot reactions (like the
Mannich reaction) so the prac work is easy. But theres some computer modelling to be done
afterwards and the questions looked pretty hard.
So yeah, a lot of fun but pretty involved and more difficult than previous organic chemistry sessions.

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Semester 2 2009 (Physical/Theoretical)
Ease: 2/10
Too much maths, not enough information available, references are unhelpful. This all combines to
make for a painful, laboured lab semester. If you like PT labs maybe you'll enjoy it. I did not.
Interest: 1/10
You do a half hour of an experiment and then spend 7 hours in a computer room churning through the
data that you obtained. Then you write a dull little report and move on to the next one. I did mine on
building and characterising a solar cell. Which meant stick two pieces of glass together and then write
long reports on how nitrogen can stick to titanium, or how chlorophyll absorbs light. Nothing
interesting about it.
Demonstrators: 1/10
Very unhelpful. After our semester was over we were told the lot of 'em were sent to a demonstrator
training program.
Involvement: 4/10
You'll have something to do most of the time and the time allotted is a little bit sparse. But what you
are doing is boring.
Overall: 1/10
A shit stain on senior chemistry.

Semester 1 2009 (Organic)

Ease: 7/10
If you understand organic chemistry none of the theory is at all hard. Difficulty comes from the
learning curve of using the glassware and learning the techniques. It's all thrust upon you. You'll have
to ask how certain procedures are meant to be done and a minor slip up means your lab work for past
sessions is spoiled. For example: You'll do a series of reactions over three lab periods, and you must
finally recrystallise your product. But if this overheats then it isomerises and you'll have to start over.
Still, the session is long enough to rectify these iffy situations.
Interest: 10/10
Practical organic chemistry. What's not interesting about it?
Demonstrators: 6/10
The demonstrators are a mixed bunch. Some are condescending. Others are plain weird. But most are
nice and helpful. Still, they could be more helpful and the shit ones could be gotten rid of (and you
will have a shit one in your lab since there's enough of them to go about). A benefit in the school of
chem is that a lecturer must be present. In our labs they alternated between Jolliffe, McErlean (head of
3rd year organic prac), Matt Todd, Adrian George and Rutledge. All of these lecturers are great to chat
with and to get help from...some moreso than others. McErlean's a nice guy.
Involvement: 9/10
Chemistry pracs are notorious for being laboured and abstract. Phys/Theo is well known for this.
Organic chemistry is hands on and you're always doing something in the labs. No time is wasted
sitting in front of a computer or doing calculations.
Overall: 9/10
The experiments I did were:
1. Testing the difference between the kinetic and thermodynamic products of a reversible reaction
(imine synthesis, from memory)
2. Oxidation at a benzylic centre via sodium dichromate, using column chromatography to isolate the
products
3. The Wittig reaction
4. The Diels-Alder reaction, and catalytic hydrogenation
Great series of reactions. Easy. Fun. Involving and very enjoyable. Senior chemistry labs are likely to
be downhill from here.

Semester 1 2007
I must say that the practical course for third year chemistry is much more interesting than first and

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second years. I love the inorganic labs where you have to do 5 mini practicals and 2 major projects.
You'll write up a report for the two major projects and have an interview with an academic regarding
the experiment. The experiments available include x-ray diffraction, synthesising linkage isomers and
using different techniques (IR spectra, UV-vis spectra, etc) to identify different properties,
synthesising molybdenum compounds, etc. Very interesting. Experiments are done individually.
The physical labs involve four experiments comprising one large research project. There are three to
choose from; construction of a dye-sensitised solar cell, biodiesel and some biophysical one. I did the
solar cell one and it was quite interesting. We investigated the properties of titanium dioxide and the
effect of particle size, surface area, etc on the performance of a solar cell. You'll do 3 major reports
and corresponding interviews, one smaller introductory project, and another introductory project
involving the use of solver. The experiments/reports are done in pairs.
CHEM 3110/3910 - Biomolecules: Properties and Reactions
(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 7-8/10
Conceptually, there isn't anything extremely difficult in this course but there's a lot of information to
remember such as reagents needed which makes the subject pretty dull to learn. You learn about DNA
(e.g. cleavage, structure etc.), peptide synthesis (coupling regents, protecting groups) and reactions
with amino acids (reacting with sugars etc.), and spectroscopy that's used to look at biological
material (e.g. XANES, XAFS, SRIXE etc.). I don't think much of the course is that difficult but if it's
not what you like, you'll be dreading every lecture you go to.
Lecturer: 6 /10 (Louis Rendina 8/10, Richard Payne 8/10, Peter Lay 3/10)
Louis Rendina is a decent lecturer and if you have had him before, you would know he's quite good. I
think what made me give him an 8 and not 9 or 10 was that the content was quite boring so I found it
hard to be interested in lectures. If you're interested in DNA, you would probably find it much better. I
think he could structure his lectures a bit better, though. Richard Payne is quite good, about the same
level as Rendina, he's loud and clear and always ready to answer questions - you see him in the 3rd
year labs supervising and he goes around and look at how everyone is doing in the lab which is nice.
His section of the course has a lot of mechanisms though and not simple/small molecules, reactions of
massive molecules is what you'll find in his section. Though, not particularly hard if you have been up
to date with previous chemistry you should have learnt in the past. Peter Lay is unanimously
considered the weak link of the lecturers in this course. His lecture slides contain big blocks of text
which are filled with jargon and his slides have really obnoxious colours which make it much less
motivating. His explanations are monotonous and hard to follow - after a few lectures, I never turned
up again.
Interest: 6/10
In terms of how I felt in the course, I felt similar to how I felt in CHEM2403 which wasn't all that
great since I personally find biological chemistry quite boring. I know it's not that boring for many
people but I personally thought it was pretty uninteresting, at best.
Overall: 7/10
I mean, this depends if you like this type of chemistry or not - if you liked CHEM2403, I'd say it's
very likely that you would like this unit because it's (in a way) built of that class. Students that did
CHEM2403 are definitely at an advantage over students that didn't.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
The DNA (Rendina) section was pretty trivial and straightfoward, as long as you attended lectures.
There was a fair bit to remember though, I suppose, so start studying early for the exam. Richard
Payne's section on organic chemistry was (and it pains me to say this) a bit dense. Far too much
content, especially compared to the DNA section. None of this content was too difficult though.
Mostly curly arrows and what not. I more or less skipped Ron Clarke's section in the exam. None of

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the lecture material was hard, but I found his choice of exam questions a little confusing. It's a bit of a
lucky dip. There is no pre-exam assessment for this subject.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Louis Rendina, Richard Payne, Ron Clarke)
Rendina and Payne are fine lecturers. Notes were clear, both were open for consultation, both were
approachable. Ron Clarke is a bit boring, though his notes are good. Consult previous subject reviews
for a summary on Ron Clarke.
Interest: 7/10
Pretty good, but Clarke's section is boring and it brings down the mark. I find curly arrows and the
chemistry of DNA pretty interesting, so it gets a good score. If you enjoy thinking about how
molecules can interact, build, destroy and bond to/with DNA you'll enjoy that section. Payne's bit is
all about constructing peptides via mechanisms (read: curly arrows).
Overall: 8/10
It was alright. Be forewarned about curly arrows, and boring Ron Clarke stuff. Start studying early.

Semester 1 2006
Involves lots of DNA background for the first component of it all. So if you have done 2nd year
MBLG and BCHM, you'll be passing this with flying colours. Lecture notes are online but you are
FARKED if you don't go to chemistry lectures... you write all over the notes in the end. Organic
reactions are involved here too unfortunately, so quite a bit of memorising... Good for people with
photographic memory. Pracs are randomly allocated... 4 hours a week. Long... and boring!
Overall: 8/10

CHEM3111/3911 - Organic Structure and Reactivity (Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 9/10
Nothing in this course is particularly difficult but you does require some logic and basic maths
because you do need to do some simple calculations (i.e. simple algebra) for spectra analysis. I'd
definitely say this course is useful and worth learning and you definitely should do this if you plan on
doing organic chemistry in future (e.g. honours). The first part was taught by Kate Joliffe and was the
spectra part - if you understand the ideas of what each spectrum is measuring and what it tells you, it's
not very difficult to analyse and determine the structure of a given molecule. The second part is taught
by Mat Todd - he's also very good and he teaches about organic reactions for smaller molecules - he
goes into more depth with E1, E2, SN1, SN2, and E1cb reactions as well as some new phenomena
such as "neighbouring group participation". If you did well in the past organic courses, you should
have no trouble doing at least decently well in this course. Take note in the exams though, you need to
make sure you mention EVERYTHING you know about it like you did in HSC because they expect a
lot of information for each reaction in the final exam. Personally, I found there wasn't enough time in
the final exam because I wanted to write more than I could.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Kate Jolliffe, Matthew Todd)
I mean, neither Kate nor Mat are perfect but they're definitely up there in terms of the best lecturers in
the School. I would say they lie between 9 and 10 but I would definitely recommend Mat Todd to use
the projector and take advantage of the lecturer recording so we could watch it at home in our own
time, if necessary. He likes to write on the board and that's obviously not recorded, he should use a
piece of paper and use the projector to show what he's writing, that way, it will come up on the
recording.
Interest: 9/10
I'd say this is the most liked chemistry course in semester 1 - I don't think I know anyone that
particularly disliked this unit from our year or any past year. If you have an interest in organic
chemistry or are unsure of picking against the other units, this unit will not disappoint. I highly
recommend this course.

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Overall: 9/10
The best course I did this semester, definitely take this course.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
I hear that everyone goes well in the final exam. This means that slip ups in that exam mean big losses
in rank. The subject material is tough but the way its presented means that it's easy to grasp.
Spectroscopy is easy thanks to the problem sessions (exam questions for that part were way too easy).
Baker's stereochemistry is a bit harder but his notes are pretty thorough and if you go to the McMurry
text it will clear up any issues.
Interest: 10/10
Spectra is made fun and the rest is hardcore organic.
Lecturers: 10/10 (Kate Jolliffe, Rob Baker)
Damn good. The course is split in two. Kate takes the first half, and her notes are detailed and easy to
follow, plus she's an interest lecturer (funny too). Baker is the same he's always been: competent, easy
to follow, great notes etc. Special mention for the spectra problem sessions. In between the two lecture
components you'll do five tutorials in place of a lecture per week. All the organic lecturers come down
and help you individually with those spectra questions. Excellent stuff.
Overall: 9.5/10
Not my favourite chemistry subject so far but damn close. Nothing to whinge about. A must-do in
senior chem.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 10/10
For content 4/10, for the exam everyone does well... so if you make a silly mistake, you are gone...
Lecturer: 10/10
Mal's just gold... I want to be just like him *sighs dreamily*
Interest: 10/10
Organic person... what can you say?
Overall: 9.9/10

CHEM3112/3912 - Materials Chemistry (Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 5/10
It's pretty hard (even though the exam was open book), especially Chris Ling's stuff on bonding and x-
ray diffraction stuff. I think scaling was my saviour for this subject...
Lecturers: 7/10 (Brendan Kennedy, Chris Ling, Adam Bridgeman)
All of them are pretty good. Although you should listen to them carefully, particularly for Brendan
Kennedy and Chris Ling as the lectures notes are not detailed enough for the former, and the lecture
notes are too complicated for the latter.
Interest: 6/10
Wasn't the most interesting course. If you like inorganic solids, fullerenes, lattice defects, unit cells, x-
ray diffraction and superconductivity, then this is the course to do.
Overall: 6/10

CHEM3113/3913 - Catalysis and Sustainable Processes

(Regular/Advanced)

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Semester 1 2015
Ease: 3/10
This unit is a mix of hard and easy and application of past concepts of inorganic chemistry (mostly)
and a bit organic chemistry - it revolves around organometallic chemistry, the name speaks for itself.
When you mix them together, it gets pretty confusing and random, concepts aren't clear and what you
need to do isn't as clear as organic. This unit is the second poorest performing unit in the school after
CHEM2402/2912/2916 however due to major changes in CHEM2, this significantly improved last
year. Anyway, most people found CHEM3113/3913 quite difficult to grasp, partly because of the
mediocre (at best) teaching.
Lecturers: 5/10 (Anthony Master 4/10, Rob Baker 6/10, Markus Muellner 6/10)
Anthony Masters is a cool and interesting guy to talk to but he's not very interesting in lectures. His
lecture slides are very convoluted and the structure of his section is quite erratic. He often goes on
tangents in his lectures - his explanations when you ask a question are decent, though. Rob Baker is a
decent lecturer and about the same as what he was when he taught us in other classes but I don't think
he's as good at explaining this kind of coursework compared to his other lecture courses in carbonyl
chemistry (IIRC). Markus Muellner was pretty average, in my opinion - the girls in the class were in
love with him though, but that was because he has a German accent and personally, I prefer a native
speaker as it's just one less hindrance, especially when you're not that good at the coursework to begin
with. Maybe I would have liked him if I had a vagina that was on fire (not an STI, so we're clear).
Interest: 2/10
Boring course, unless you find these things particularly interesting, I would definitely recommend that
you skip this. Students do badly in it for a reason.
Overall: 4/10
Avoid this course, it's not a good one - I don't think I gained many (if any) useful skills and you pretty
much go through it by rote learning.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
Unfortunately I had no idea what was going on throughout the semester due to me not
paying attention, but once you study, you'll realise that the course is quite interesting and not that
difficult to understand
Lecturers: 7/10 (Tony Masters, Sebastien Perrier)
Both a quite good. All lecture notes are thorough.
Interest: 8/10
I quite enjoyed it and I wish I did pay attention throughout semester. You'll learn about polymerisation
(free radical and "living"), different catalysts and their properties (metallocenes, zeigler-natta, etc),
different catalytic cycles (decarbonylation, hydrogenation, hydroformylation, etc)
and zeolites.
Overall: 8/10
I definitely recommend it.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 3/10
Rather hard... polymer + sustainable part
Lecturer: 10/10
Bob Gilbert + Tony Masters are LEGENDS!!
Interest: 8/10
Quite interesting... though none the less hard
Overall: 9/10

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 CHEM3114/3914 - Metal Complexes: Medicine and Materials
(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10
Adam's section was quite good in terms of ease of understanding. The rational explanation behind the
phenomena made perfect sense in his words. Trevor's section was also quite good, but considering I
had little biological/pharmacological background I found it a bit harder to understand. Cameron's
section was not easy at all, mainly because the rationality behind it was not really explained at all.
Lecturers: Adam Bridgeman (Metal Complexes) 10/10, Trevor Hambley (Medicine) 9/10,
Cameron Kepert (Materials) 6/10
Adam was definitely the best. He can explain things in really simple terms and they always made
sense to me. I particularly liked it when he explained WHY something behaves/reacts like this etc
which definitely helps in understanding it. His notes are really organised and he has worksheets for
each lecture which we spend half the time on and as a result there isn't a lot to go through in the
lectures (i.e. the less content examinable the better ). James Beattie took this section last year and I'm
so glad that he got replaced by Adam lol.
Trevor was also really good and definitely promoted interest and curiosity in his part. However, I felt
he sort of rushed through the content a bit too quickly. It wasn't clear what was examinable and what
was not. Just about every question I emailed him for, got a reply that it wasn't examinable lol
Cameron has a monotone and speaks too quickly. There is way too much stuff in his lectures which
leads to him just brushing over everything briefly. His section is more about memorising facts rather
than theory. He doesn't really explain the "why" behind everything. His lectures are very example-
based and doesn't really go through the underlying theory as a generalisation.
Interest: 9/10
All sections were very interesting (even Cameron's section, despite the fact that I didn't really
understand it that well) mainly because I'm inorganically inclined. Organically inclined people are
advised to steer clear of this unit of study or else you have to put up with the anti-organic chemistry
attitudes from the lecturers haha!
Overall: 8/10
Loved the way the assessment was structured. Other than the final exam, the only other theory
assessment task was an OPTIONAL (that's right optional) assignment. No other senior chemistry unit
of study has such a generous theory assessment structure.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
It's hard, but lecturers are super... Trevor is legend of legend... AND I am in his honour group this
year!!! YAY!!!
Lecturer: 10/10
interest: 10/10
Interesting stuff... especially heavy metal poisoning etc... metal complex is interesting too...though
James Beattie's kinetics is hellish (not the lecturer... the difficulty)
Overall: 9/10

CHEM3115/3915 - Synthetic Medicinal Chemistry (Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 8/10

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I found it easy. It's all organic though so it's all curly arrows, transition model diagrams and functional
groups. If you find that easy you'll fly, if you find it hard try another subject. The exam was harder
than expected by comparison to previous years, but the assignment was piss easy.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Matt Todd, Peter Rutledge, Chris McErlean)
McErlean and Rutledge each get a 10/10 but Matt Todd was a bit lost in terms of unit administration
and wasn't as open for consultation. They're all interesting, clear and offer good lecture notes though.
Interest: 10/10
Essential organic chemistry - what's not to love?
Overall: 10/10
Fantastic way to cap off a chemistry major.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
Not too hard... lots to remember though
Lecturer: 8/10 (Peter Rutledge)
Peter Rutledge is a nice lecturer... if you can stand his ireland 5 min each lecture
Interest: 10/10
Can't argue with organic =D
Overall: 9/10

CHEM3117/3917 - Molecular Spectroscopy and Quantum Theory

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 2/10
I had no idea what was going on once Scott's section was over, and even then I was kind of struggling.
It was a mistake for me to enrol in this one and yet strangely I managed to pass. Scott does
spectroscopy, Meredith does symmetry (which I had to teach myself) and Tim does quantum
chemistry.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Scott Kable, Meredith Jordan, Tim Schmidt)
Scott wasn't as friendly and approachable as I remember from second year. Meredith's lectures were
snore fests (she records them though). Tim was alright, funny too. Having said both Scott and Tim
kept things going and explained things well (even if the things in the lecture didn't seem to correspond
to our assignments...)
Interest: 3/10
Um. I guess it was kind of interesting for a couple of lectures. Kind of...
Overall: 3/10
Not too happy. Very hard and not enjoyable.

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 Chinese Studies (CHNS)
CHNS1101 - Chinese 1A (For Beginners)

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 7/10
Listening, reading and writing is fine, pronunciation and remembering pinyin is the only issue. If you
memorise the characters you won't have a problem for most of the course. I fell behind and suffered
because of it, if you don't fall behind you'll enjoy it. It's a fun course. Chinese isn't as bad as it seems,
and I have no prior Chinese experience.
Lecturer/Tutor: Linda Tsung (7/10), Peiru Tong (9/10)
1 hour of grammar by Linda Tsung was pretty good, she knows her stuff, able to explain most
concepts. Good practice for speaking in these, keeps it interesting with videos etc. Guest lecturer for
two weeks in the middle, don't know her name, can't remember anything about her, she wasn't shit
probably, was fine. Peiru Tong was my tutor, she was fantastic. Really really helpful and willing to
communicate via email outside of class. Did her best to answer from a native perspective about
natural speech, and explaining some phonetic concepts nicely with diagrams. Kept classes fun and
really engages with us. Forces you to speak, which is good.
Interest: 8/10
My interest dropped off late in the semester because I got lazy, lost some marks because of it. Work
on your pronunciation and you'll be good.
Overall: 8/10
Pretty good teachers, interesting course and super fun with other beginners. Definitely recommend,
but you have to stay on top or you'll get fucked over down the line, unless you go on exchange (I'll
have to probably). They had two language exchange sessions arranged every week, I wasn't able to go
but definitely do if you can, they're fantastic for putting these on, invaluable.

Winter School 2014

Ease: 6/10
It's not a particularly difficult subject, but it isn't particularly easy either. Those of you who can speak
other Asian languages would probably have a small advantage, but that's not to say those without it
can't do well. The most challenging aspect of the content for most (non-Asian) people would probably
be learning all the characters. Especially for me, who did this unit in Winter School, there was scarce
time to remember a decent amount of information. In the end I did do pretty well, and while I'd have

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to do another Chinese unit during the normal semester to compare, I would think doing this unit
during the standard semester would be easier, so many of you may be better off than I was.
Assessment wise you will have a number of tasks which test your reading, speaking, listening and
writing, none of which exceed a 20% weighting. While the final exam was a little more difficult than
usual, the assessment tasks are generally fair and serve as a great method of self-evaluation. Just make
sure you keep up with each lessons material and don't fall behind.
Lecturer/Tutor: 8/10 (Jiefen Li)
The fact that she was teaching a class of about 16 students was probably responsible for the better and
more personable learning experience, but aside from that, Jiefen was a great teacher. She was able to
introduce and explain the content pretty well, and she was quite approachable if you had any issues.
I'm not quite sure if her lecture slides and resources were actually made and compiled by her seeing as
she is normally a tutor, but in any case they were well organised and she utilised them well. Being a
native Chinese speaker she did have an accent, and there have also been particular instances where I
have had to double take when she repeats the phrase 那个 in between sentences (if you want to know
why watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTk2WkRMLzg), but otherwise she is easy
enough to understand, and I can't really fault her.
Interest: 10/10
I've always wanted to learn a second language, and I was instantly drawn to Chinese for its usefulness
and extra challenge it offered in comparison to many alphabetic European languages. For me, my
keen interest in the subject was enough to more than make up for the already few criticisms I had with
this course. Despite this being an introductory subject, which presumably focuses on basic
knowledge, I found all the features and intricacies of the language studied in this course to be very
interesting. In terms of the unit content, it revolves around textbook lessons on greetings, family,
dates/time, hobbies, and visiting friends. In addition to this you also have a running "mini-drama"
series composed by the Chinese department which further extends your knowledge of vocabulary and
everyday speech. Both of these resources were a pleasure to study and learn from. On the whole this
subject is probably one of my favourites done to date, plus I must say it has been quite satisfying
walking around the university the past few weeks and being able to understand a word here and there
of what international students are saying .
Overall: 9/10
I was very impressed with this course. Whether you are wanting to learn a new language, or just need
to take an elective to fill space, I would definitely recommend this unit. There is a lot of work
involved; studying any language at an introductory level at university is very intensive. Plus with
Chinese, not only do you have to learn all the vocabulary, grammar and expressions, but you also
have to learn characters by copying them into your workbook every week about 30-40 times each.
That's not to say the workload is not manageable (I managed and I was doing 13 weeks’ worth of
work in 13 days), but don't expect to do this unit and be able to coast through. You will have to put in
the work, but I can guarantee you that at least the work is fun . Mandarin Chinese is a great language
to learn, and you've got nothing to lose by choosing this unit.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 5/10
Had a reasonable amount of difficulty with this subject as memorising the characters/words for the
weekly vocab tests (2.5%) each is a big pain. Homework is due every week (lab work and written
homework), and this is strictly enforced, no homework on day its due (or if you’re lucky, the next
day) = no marks. The HW marks saved me(at least I think they will). HW is not too hard, just takes
ages. There are 2 large (20%) tests in the semester, testing writing/listening etc, I found them hard, but
others didn't. Mainly memorising again. I aced the speaking part of the course and found it easy, but
others didn’t fare so well. This subject had an overwhelming amount of work and we did 1 chapter a
week (way too fast)
Lecturer: 5/10
Dr Kong is a good lecturer, interesting and always helps you out, however I didn’t listen to most
lectures as the class test is at the end of the lecture, so i usually revised during the lecture, thus

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missing it. Lectures get 5/10 as they are structured poorly i.e. tests at the end, which makes you miss
the lecture out as most people are compelled to do some last minute study
Interest: 8/10
Fairly interesting, depends on the individual. Classes were quite fun, my tutor was awesome (but she
isn’t returning next semester). You always get picked on to answer questions so it makes you study.
Overall: 7/10
Would have been higher if there was less work. Overall quite fun, but a lot of work, but it’s very
rewarding when you can understand other mandarin speakers (to some extent).

Commercial Law (CLAW)

CLAW1001 - Foundations of Business Law

NOTE: Apart from the first three reviews for CLAW1001, the rest of the reviews were written
for the discontinued equivalent subject “Commercial Transactions A”. The final review was
written for another discontinued unit; CLAW 1002 (Commercial Transactions B). All of the
content has since been subsumed into the one unit, hence these reviews can serve as an adequate
representation of how the current CLAW1001 is run.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 9/10
A very structured unit, it was clear what you had to do for each component. The tutorial questions
were very useful in practising the IPAAC format of writing, and the tutors were all knowledgeable
and helpful (especially Josh and Mikaela). Everything might seem fuzzy, abstract and confusing in the
first 2 weeks, but it WILL get better, don't worry. As always, do the tutes. These are extremely
important for this unit because some tute questions were adapted from past papers. I suggest writing
out the answers to the tute questions in the IPAAC format before the tute and getting feedback from
the tutor after the tute, so that by the time the mid semester exam comes up, you would have had a ton
of practice on the IPAAC style of writing, which is very advantageous. Also, exams are open book!
half the exam lies in the preparation of your own notes to take into the exam, don't rely on the
textbook and lecture notes because there won't be time to flip through the lecture notes/textbook
trying to find what you are looking for in the exams.
Lecturer: 15/10 (Giuseppe Carabetta)
You won't regret attending his lectures, but remember not to text/play/fiddle with your phone/laptop
during the lectures - Giuseppe is very particular about this. A few lectures were also given by the
tutors, standouts were Josh and Mikaela.
Interest: 10/10
A standout subject!! The relevance of this subject is very clear in everyday life (e.g. consumer rights,
the sale of goods act, negligence etc.), and overall, the content of the subject is fun to learn, especially
the cases!!
Overall: 10/10
Never regretted taking this subject for one moment. This is a subject that requires continued effort to
put the pieces together, but once you do, the open book mid-semester and finals will be a breeze.

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Semester 1 2013
Ease: 7/10
Pretty easy, just show up and listen. Get notes off the net for the subject and update them as you go. I
stupidly did this at the end and not at the start; it would have changed my marks drastically
Lecturer: 10/10
Brilliant! Giuseppe is a god. Best lecturer there is, makes it enjoyable and fun. I could write all day
about how good he is but just take my word that you won’t be disappointed if you choose this subject.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting, you learn a lot of helpful skills and learn you’re legal rights etc. You also go over
some pretty crazy cases and decisions
Overall: 9/10
Would highly recommend!

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 8/10
Summarise the principles and authorities and bring them into the exams and you'll be sweet.
Lecturer: 9/10
Juice made the content pretty interesting. He seemed pretty enthusiastic about the material so that was
a plus.
Interest: 6/10
I studied this unit because it's a CA/CPA requirement. Learning about contract law is pretty fun but
my passion lies in accounting <3
Overall: 8/10
Easy subject. Recommended.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 9/10
It helps if you'd done Legal Studies (particularly consumers) in high school. Otherwise the readings
were straight forward, there were quite a lot of readings.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Giuseppe Carabetta)
Giuseppe is an AMAZING lecture. He keeps you absolutely entertained through the theory. One note
though, don't speak during the lecture.
Interest: 8/10
It's a consumer/law based subject. It's was interesting to me, but at times it can be awfully dry.
Overall: 9/10
I thoroughly enjoyed this subject. It was the fantastic lecturer that made me come to my only classes
on Monday.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7.5/10
It is quite difficult learning to think from a very different perspective. However, it is also very
rewarding. The final exam was way too long and I didn't get to finish it, thus putting me out of HD
range. There is also a lot of reading to do, but the readings are very interesting.
Lecturer: 9.5/10 (Giuseppe Carabetta)
Giuseppe is amazing. His delivery of course content is always fascinating and interesting. People are
actively engaged during lectures, as he asks lots of questions. He's also a very funny and charismatic
guy, although he does like to show off quite a bit (but then again, if I achieve as much as him, I would
flaunt my achievements, too). Most people come to lectures, even if the times are inconvenient for
them (i.e. their only class for the day).
Interest: 9/10

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Some course content was a bit boring, but that was the very small minority. Overall, the course was
amazingly interesting. I really, truly loved it. Also, you can apply everything you learn to the real
world: something which can't be said about most other subjects.
Overall: 9.5/10
A great subject which I would recommend anyone to take. It is relevant, interesting and very
rewarding in the end. All in all, I would describe it as 'fun'.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
The research assessments are really good, with plenty of time and topics that have plenty
to research. Some people (like my mates) found the amount of topics to understand were too many,
especially when we only spent one lecture per topic. There's not much reading...but if you wanna do
well read up on extra material as much as you can. The exam is long answer/essay type
questions...That, in my opinion is much harder than the written assessment/tutorial work.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Giuseppe Carabetta)
Giuseppe is awesome! But does go really fast through the material. Lectures are never boring. But the
only thing that is totally crap is the lecture notes....WAY to brief...it's like one word per
slide...shhheeesh!
Interest: 9/10
It's only interesting when u read up on the latest developments and attend G's lectures.
Overall: 9/10
Thought it was relatively easy and interesting. But note...some of the tutors are crap as!

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 9/10
Straight-forward content; identifying ALL of the issues in some of the problems can be a challenge.
Also our major essay question lacked any point that was arguable.)
Lecturer: 10/10 (Giuseppe Carabetta)
Giuseppe is also one of the best. I hear behind the scenes though he can be quite ruthless in his
administration of the course.
Interest: 10/10
Love the stuff. Can’t get enough
Overall: 9.5/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease - 8.5/10
Lecturer - N/A
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 7/10
Didn’t go to any lectures, pretty fucking easy, pretty interesting

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
The topics weren't too difficult and were taught well
Lecturer: 9/10
Giuseppe is a champ
Interest: 6/10
The law isn't my cup of tea
Overall: 6/10

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Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7.5/10
Lecturer - 10/10
Interest - 10/10
Overall - 9.25/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 10/10
Interest - 9/10
Overall - 8.5/10

Unknown Date
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer - 9/10
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8.5/10
Easy enough just don’t talk in lectures

Unknown Date
Ease: 8/10
Interest: 9/10
Lecturer: 8/10
Overall: 8/10
This subject deals primarily with property law. It has obvious practical real world
relevance. A nice, solid subject that I would recommend to all.

CLAW2201 - Corporations Law

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Just covering the Corporations Act and important sections. Mostly statutory law, not much case law
(different to CLAW1001).
Lecturer: 7/10
Lecturer makes a huge effort to be interesting but structure and time management is god damn awful.
Spend 45 mins explaining the definition of one piddly little thing and rushes through 60 slides in the
remaining 10 minutes. Textbook sucks too. Ask around for good reccs on textbooks. Lipton and
Herzeberg text is stupid. Actually, just read the legislation.
Interest: 7/10
I liked it. Good coverage of corporate collapses (Adler, Adler and more Adler). Much more interesting
than CLAW1001.
Overall: 8/10
Good subject though most people wouldn’t care cos they would be doing it for CA/CPA requisite
anyway.

CLAW2205 - Competition and Consumer Law

Semester 1 2007

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Ease: 8.5/10
It’s a clearly structured, straight forward subject. If you can handle the earlier CLAW subjects, this
one shouldn’t be too difficult. The workload is manageable. Topics: Restrictive Trade Practices (Anti-
competitive agreements, misuse of market power, exclusive dealing, resale price maintenance,
mergers and acquisitions,) Consumer Protection (Product Liability, Misleading and deceptive
conduct, False Representations, Unconscionable conduct.) Assessment: Multiple choice exam (15%),
Participation (10%), Essay (25%), Speech (10%), Group Essay (40%)
Lecturer: 9/10 (Patty Kamvounias)
Great lecturer. No complaints from me. It probably helped that she also took all the tutorials and was
thus able to get to know everybody.
Interest: 9/10
Like many CLAW subjects, its relevance to everyday real life situations is immediately apparent. I
was able to stay quite interested throughout.
Overall: 9/10
Probably the best CLAW subject I’ve done so far.

CLAW2207 - Business, Ethics and the Law

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 10/10
RIDICULOUSLY easy if you can tell wrong from right/black from white/up from down…you get my
drift. Tutorial answers can be written in about 15 minutes flat and get 4/5 or 5/5. Essay is a little long
(3000 wds) but is marked really easy. 90% of the class gets Distinctions and 90% of students would
be sitting on 50/60 and above by the time final exams roll around. Final exam is open book and piss
easy as well.
Lecturer: 3/10
So boring. Bring a pillow to class. If you have notes from a friend, no need to attend. She is also the
tutor and you can get 5/5 for tute participation by attending a few tutes just for the sake of it and never
turn up again.
Interest: 6/10
Not as bad as I thought it would be. It’s about how ethics in the professions of
lawyer/accountant/auditor/banker/business person blah blah. And a little re-hash of ethics from
Accounting 1B.
Overall: 7/10
Good filler subject for CLAW major or people looking for easy electives to finish off their degree in
the E+B Faculty.

CLAW3201 - Australian Taxation System

Unknown Date
Ease: 4/10
Friggen hardest claw subject ever
Lecturers: 5/10
G-Dogg 6/10 Love the guy, so mysoginistic; Cynthia 4/10 Not a big fan
Interest: 6/10
Quite interesting can be dry
Overall: 6/10
The tutor in this ruined my whole experience, still I like CLAW subjects

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 CLAW3202 - Tax Strategies for Business

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 9/10
One group assignment, tutorial marks for hand ins (you get to choose) and a 40% open book final
which resulted in me copying down answers word for word I had already done for 2 hours. Some had
passed before the final.
Lecturer 7.5/10
Antony is OK, not engaging enough but he’s reasonable.
Interest: 8.5/10
Somewhat interesting tax law stuff
Overall: 8/10
Recommend if you did tax law 1 and are looking for a cruisy 3rd year subject.

Computer Science (COMP)

COMP2129 - Operating Systems and Machine Principles

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
For those who haven't previously encountered C or Unix, it's a steep learning curve requiring
considerable self-directed learning of C and playing around with the OS. Fortunately, the final is very
C-based and a lot of the more theoretical material (eg the machine basics, threads) isn't examined.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Bob Kummerfeld)
Bob Kummerfeld really inspired my curiosity about the content. The slides are a bit sparse on the
detail though, so listening to the lectures (live or otherwise) is a must.
Interest: 8/10
As mentioned, a sizable chunk of the course is pretty much for interest's sake. Especially enjoyed the
regular trips through the history and philosophy of C/Unix development.
Overall: 7/10
It's a bit rough getting started, but the weekly labs will ensure that one picks up what's needed by the
end of the course. However, unless one is going down the IT path, it's not all that relevant to anything
else.

COMP3520 - Operating Systems Internals

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
The course has fairly intensive assignments but there is a lot of resources given on how to complete
them. In addition, the course uses a thick textbook reminiscent of commerce or humanities subject, so
you will have to study like those students.
Lecturer: 1/10
Absolutely terrible lecturer.
Interest: 7/10
Fundamental topic for budding computer engineers. But Course is boring as fuck due to the lecture
notes being a shitty rehash of the textbook.

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Overall: 5/10
Irritating subject.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 10/10
Half the course walked into the exam with 90% without even blinking. The exam wasn't too difficult
for me even though I studied for maybe 1.5 days for it.
Lecturer: 0/10 (Bing Bing Choi)
Bing Bing's an absolute cock. You can't understand what he's saying and the labs were completely
useless.
Interest: 4/10
Nothing in the course made me squeal with interest, but stuff like scheduling and deadlock prevention
is alright I suppose.
Overall: 5/10
Shit course, but I got 88 so I'm not complaining.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Pretty easy course, the assignments are just extending the skills learnt in COMP2129 (making a
simple shell and threads and synchronization, so it does incorporate bits of INFO2120 in it too, I
suppose). All the rest is boring rote learning. I probably could've done a bit better on the rote learning
part.
Lecturer: 2/10 (Bing Bing Choi)
DO NOT WANT. One of the worst lecturers I’ve ever had. I couldn't understand what he was saying
most of the time and all he did was read off the lecture slides found on the textbook's website (the
EXACT same slides too). To be fair though he marked our stuff (asides from the final exam) fairly
quickly. Textbook is pretty handy for the rote learning stuff. No tutors and tutorials were optional. No
one turned up after the first week to tutes, and the lectures shrank from about 45ish to less than 5-
10 within a couple of weeks.
Interest: 5/10
The assignments were interesting (2 of them, programming in C), but that's about as far as interesting
goes for this course.
Overall: 6/10
If you were mildly interested in COMP2129 and the serializable stuff in INFO2120 then this course
will probably appeal to you. I guess it's a plus since you don't have to turn up to any contact hours if
Bing Bing's running it next year (unless he finds tutors or something). I guess good filler credit points
towards a computer science or IT major?

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 Econometrics (ECMT)
ECMT1010 - Introduction to Economic Statistics

NOTE: Prior to 2015, this unit was called “Business and Economic Statistics A”

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 7/10
Things start off really really easy then after the mid semester exam it accelerates really fast. I skipped
most lectures after mid semester exam and still did well. Wish I kept up with the work and I could
have done much better.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Simon Kwok)
Simon Kwok is alright, very boring but cope-able.
Interest: 3/10
Very random and not very interesting unless you’re into stats about businesses. Would have been
better learning how to apply these stats to improve the business and not just calculating them
Overall: 6/10
Once again, do the work and you’ll do fine.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
If you did 2u maths, you're set. If you did 3u maths, you'll find this boring. First 3 weeks are a joke.
Lecturer: 2/10 (Erick Li)
Erick Li is horrible, calls people dumb, and quite a few can't understand him through the fobby
accent. He's produced so many retarded comments though... e.g. "Werr, to put it in a poriticarry
incorrect way, you retarded." and "can you all shut your mouth outside I do not have my student
attention!" Yeah, he's crap. Heard the other ones aren't any better :S
Interest: 5/10
The tiny amount of maths in Commerce is disgraceful. Furthermore, the lectures are boring. The
workshops are ok. That said I was on fb during the computer lab sessions :P The work is ridiculously
easy if you just pay attention and don't forget to study. I suppose that's what ECOF1010 is for, but it
screwed up my timetable when I put it in. Heard that is bad too :S
Overall: 4/10

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For those who are decent at maths, this subject is a massive joke, so long as you pay attention.
Seriously... and their tests are jokes too. Sometimes they put in material you are told isn't in it e.g.
hypergeometric formula, and the final exam is a joke. 30mc, 2h to do it. Pathetic. PUT SOME
EFFORT IN ERICK LI!

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
It's hard, but if you just sit down and focus you can get it. You have to put effort in.
Lecturer: 4/10
You CANNOT learn anything from Murray. Tig was cool; he explained things a little better, but for
me textbook + lecture slides + workshop questions was how I understood the content.
Interest: 6/10
I don't know how you can be interested in statistics. It's just something you do, like maths.
Overall: 8/10
I only like it because I get it.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
There’s a reason why so many people fail
Lecturer: 5/10
Tig was nice, Murray's a tightarse and he speaks in a monotone, though I managed to learn shit during
his lectures
Interest: 6/10
I hear 1020 is more interesting...
Overall: 5/10
Most boring course this semester by far

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 3/10
But I didn't do maths in year 11/12
Lecturers: Tig - 7.5/10, Murray Smith - 0.5/10
Interest: 2/10
Overall: 2/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer - 7/10
Only had Tig
Interest - 5.5/10
Not that bad really, once you get over the whole 'statistics is boring and useless' thing
Overall - 6/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturers - Tig 8/10, Murray 4/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 7.5/10

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Semester 1 2005
Ease - 8/10
Lecturers - Tig 9/10, Murray 3/10
Murray was awful, Tig was awesome.
Interest - 8/10
Interested me more than other commerce units anyway
Overall - 8/10

Unknown Date
Ease - 7/10
Lecturers - Tig 9/10, Murray Smith 0/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall 7.5/10
For 4/5 weeks Murray Smith will make your life hell

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 6/10
Lecturer: 0.5/10
Interest: 3/10
Overall: 3/10

ECMT1020 - Introduction to Econometrics

NOTE: Prior to 2015, this unit was called “Business and Economic Statistics B”.

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 10/10
Easiest course I've ever done at university, got my first HD despite cocking up the final majorly.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Peter Exterkate, Kadir Atalay)
First lecturer (Exterkate) was fine but very slow/boring as was the whole course. Second lecturer
(French guy) was hard to understand as well as being slow/boring. If you struggle with statistics then
Exterkate would be good for you, I think he's teaching the whole course next year. If you're good at
statistics like myself, don’t bother with any lectures.
Interest: 9/10
Very slow but a lot of interesting applications of stats esp. multivariable regression.
Overall: 9/10
Great WAM booster if you're solid at stats, no work and good marks couldn't ask for much more.

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 8/10
It's not too difficult for the mathematically inclined.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Peter Exterkate, Kadir Atalay)
I appreciate Dr Exterkate's attempts to make the course more rigorous, and to teach more basic
statistical theory. I believe he's going to be the only lecturer starting next year. Kadir Atalay is a super
nice guy.
Interest: 7/10
In general it's a pretty solid consolidation of ordinary least squares regression. There could've been
better coverage of more advanced topics though, and I would've enjoyed it more if it introduced more
theorems, etc.
Overall: 8/10

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I still maintain that they should use R in conjunction with Stata.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 9/10
Easy stuff... though had no idea how come I got only a D...
Lecturer: 10/10 (John Goodhew)
GOODHEW is a LEGEND!!!! Tutor ain't the best, but hey! Can't wish for all good things eh?!
Interest: 9/10
Will probably do a econometrics + finance major
Overall: 9/10

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
It's about the same difficulty as ECMT1010. You learn multiple regression, and use more
distributions (like chi squared, t, f,... you barely use z-stat and normal). There are random topics that
seem completely useless, like learning how to work with matrices. There are stupid quizzes worth
only 5%, a relatively easy mid- semester test, and an assignment involving regression, with heaps
of data. The exam is just a repeat of previous exams' questions. It is exactly the same- do them, and
you will be completely prepared.
Lecturer: 8/10 (John Goodhew)
John Goodhew is very friendly and polite - even to the people that are constantly rude to him in
lectures with their talking. He goes very very fast though sometimes through the content. Though he
provides handouts, we were always writing fast to get everything down without being able to listen
properly to his explanation.
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 8/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7.5/10
Lecturer - 8/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 8/10

ECMT3110 - Econometric Models and Methods

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
The only thing in the course that i had to re-read a couple of times was large sample theory but our
lecturer Vasilis had warned us that it was the hardest topic. All the other topics are straight forward. If
you do the work for the course and attend your tutorials the final exam will not have any surprises in
it. Literally about half the questions were exactly the same as the tutorial questions. The mid-semester
was straight forward as well though many people stuffed up the last question probably 'cause they
didn't revise their log and differentiation rules or got put off by the summation signs.
Lecturer: 10/10
Vasilis is a gun and you have got to love that Greek accent. The other half of the Greek invasion,
Anastasios is an awesome tutor, definitely clarifies things that were left a bit iffy in lectures.
Interest: 10/10
Really enjoyed this Econometrics subject, different to the ones I had done previously probably cause
it was more theoretical.
Overall: 9.5/10

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Whilst people say it is the hardest metrics subject definitely the most rewarding.

Economics (ECON/ECOS)
ECON1001 - Introductory Microeconomics

Semester 1 2016
Ease – 7/10
Fun fact: 20% of students who take this course fail. Initially I expected this unit to be fairly easy,
especially since the first three to four weeks were all similar to HSC economics. However, don’t let
that fool you. There comes a point in the subject where a lot of students are thrown off – specifically
around week 7 regarding the study of markets. While the mathematics of economics are basic HSC
2U algebra and calculus, it can be quite easy to lose sight of the context behind the mathematics. That
being said, however, as long as one can grasp the analytical approach towards markets, an HD in this
subject isn’t too difficult.
Lecturer – 7.5/10 (Pablo Guillen Alvarez)
Among the most amusing lecturers I’ve had all semester – digresses often to mildly amusing jokes
about “kinky maths” and how he’s only rich because he “married well”. He goes through the content
in a relaxed and comprehensible way.
Tutorials, however, were incredibly dry. It was due to a mixture of only going through the set
questions each week and a dry tutor.
Interest – 7/10
The section on government intervention can get quite dry at times. The first few weeks were
essentially all from HSC and preliminary economics. While difficult, the section on market analysis
can prove to be interesting in a counterintuitive way. Game theory was also intriguing, though it was
only small section of the course.
Overall – 7/10
Probably the driest course I’ve done all semester, but I can’t complain about my HD. As a compulsory
subject for quite a few majors, it’s a reasonably decent course.

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 6/10
I struggled with this course (credit average) even though I did pretty well in economics back in high
school. If I had to compare the two, economics in high school relied more on memorization while
ECON1001 focuses mainly on graphs and calculations. There is still some crossover between the two

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but it isn't a huge (dis)advantage by any means. How easy is the course? Well, half of the cohort failed
our mid semester exam. The raw marks for the final exams were also similar in that half of us would
have failed if the marks weren't adjusted. Thankfully, the marks were changed and the average is
around 65 but still. Changing the marks doesn't lower the actual difficulty of the course material.
Tip: The mass tutorials they hold before an exam is a 'must-go'. You get immediate support and the
tutors there really do help clear up important theories.
Lecturer: 4/10
At first, you would think the lecturer is rather nice as he keeps on asking if people had questions. In
truth, all the answers for his questions are identical: "stop being lazy and go listen to the lecture
recording." Well, that's helpful...especially since most students asked legitimate questions like "can
you please elaborate on X in game theory?" rather than "when's the next exam?". But no. We receive
almost 0 support from him. Furthermore, he has the tendency to leave very important lecture slides
blank. His theory is that, if you don't bother to come to lectures (and thus fill the slides out then), then
you don't deserve to get good marks (or in some cases even pass- see above). According to him, he
would even take down the lecture recordings if he had the choice as he thinks it promotes "laziness".
As someone who went to most of his lectures and ALL the tutorials, I found his attitude pretty
insulting as it’s almost like he is assuming we're all lazy. Also, the one lecture I missed, I missed
because I was sick. And while I was sick, I still had to phone up my friends and croak to them if they
would please scan me the graphs so I can fill stuff in. Not happy. At all. Apart from all this though, the
lecturer actually goes at a decent pace and doesn't cram 100 slides into a 2 hour lecture. He would
actually be a 7/10 if he gave up his attitude.
Interest: 8/10
Surprisingly this course is actually pretty interesting. If only the lecturer changed and the examined
material was a little easier (because what's the point if you are going to +15 to everyone's mark in the
end?), then I would highly recommend this course.
Overall: 5/10

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 5/10
I found this subject to be quite tough, especially after the mid sem. It wasn't really helped by the fact
that I didn't do maths in high school and that the material is covered really fast. Out of all my subjects
I spent the most time on this subject, which paid off as I got an 84. I kind of think that they scaled
very generously though coz I thought I did terribly in the final.
Lecturer: 0/10
TheGreatest99.95 summed it up pretty well: "Whelan is terrible, full stop". He really is a terrible
lecturer who doesn't seem to give a shit about his students. The number of times he said to ask
questions was pointless, as every time you did ask a question he snubbed you right off. However, my
tutor was fantastic and definitely deserves a 10/10. Without him I definitely would have failed this
subject (no joke!).
Interest: 2/10
Terribly boring, and something I wouldn't recommend unless you wanted to major in economics (only
cause you have to!).
Overall: 3/10
Shit, due to a combination of the coursework and the lecturer

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 6/10
This subject is easy until about the mid semester, then things go crazy. It’s too theoretical and not
practical enough for my liking. If more effort were to be put in, no doubt you can go well but it’s not a
subject you can just skip the lectures and is really dry
Lecturer: 1/10 (Stephen Whelan)
Whelan is terrible, full stop. A wanker and is more than happy to see kids fail. He left stuff out of the
lecture slides on purpose and also wrote wrong info on the slides to prove a point to those who didn’t

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show to his lectures. Also the tut teachers are terrible as well; maybe I just lucked out but they didn’t
do anything and didn’t get the class involved
Interest: 2/10
Boring, partly due to Whelan being a terrible lecturer.
Overall: 5/10
Unfortunately its compulsory for a major in economics otherwise avoid at all costs.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9-10/10
If you've done economics in HS, 6-7/10 if you haven't.
It's an introductory course. The lecturers know it, you know it. Pretty basic. Also, the exams are pretty
basic if you get the concepts.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Elina Gilbourd)
I had Elina Gilbourd. She is amazing, so interesting! Apparently she has lame jokes. I just thought she
had jokes :P Beware of the TUTORS though. You may learn to not go, since they're pointless and not
compulsory.
Interest: 8/10
Of course it could have been more interesting, but since it's introductory, they're not getting into
HEAPS of issues. The stuff we did was ok though.
Overall: 9/10
A well-done subject with good lectures, horrible and barely necessary tutes. Looking forward to
Macro!

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
It’s not a very hard subject. It’s just solving equations and drawing graphs. Simple ones
too. When I did it, it was 2 mid semester exams and a final where the finals is mainly the last few
topics.
Lecture: 8.5/10
Jordi was a good lecturer.
Interest: 9/10
Nowhere near as interesting as intermediate micro but there wasn’t a topic which wasn’t interesting
Overall: 8.5/10
I really enjoyed this subject. You can get through with just the lecture notes really.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Straight forward stuff. If you haven’t done maths at all, some of the content may baffle you at first
though.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Natalia Ponomareva)
I don’t go to lectures anymore. She’s not that bad I guess, but Micro can be a pretty dull subject and
the lecturer can make it more interesting; something Natalia fails to do.
Interest: 6/10
Most of it is quite simple to me, so I quickly lost interest.
Overall: 7/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
The concepts were easy enough to grasp
Lecturer: 6/10 (Natalia Ponomareva)
I had Natalia, if you could work with the accent it was alright

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Interest: 9/10
I like economics
Overall: 8/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Like ECMT, you need to focus, and then you can understand easy.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Natalia Ponomareva, Andrew Wait)
Like ECMT, individual learning + tutorials was best. Andrew Wait is good.
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 8/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease - 2/10
THIS SUBJECT WAS HARD DAMMIT. I never had done economics before and so everything I was
learning was from scratch and WE COVERED SO MUCH MATERIAL I couldn't handle it. I failed
this as well.
Lecturer - 0/10
I might get charged for slander but Andrew Wait has got to be the WORST LECTURER
IMAGINABLE!!!!!!! Asshole of a personality, Crap lecture slides, and terrible public
speaking voice!
Interest - 0/10
Overall - 0.7/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 7/10
Depends on lecturer
Lecturer - 8/10
Dennis is great, but he's gone... De Roos is a douche bag. Tutors are shit
Interest - 5/10
Fairly boring, only lifted by lecturer
Overall - 6.5/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 9/10
Lecturers - 9/10 (Nicholas De Roos)
I liked Nicholas De Roos, very organised lecture notes and well-structured lectures. Not a particularly
sociable lecturer, but I liked his lectures.
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8/10

Unknown Date
Ease - 6/10
Lecturer - 2/10 (Nicholas De Roos)
Interest - 5/10
Overall - 5/10
Nick De Roos should be shot for his crimes against excitement

Semester 1 2005

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Ease: 6.5/10
Lecturer: 5.5/10
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 6/10

ECON1002 - Introductory Macroeconomics

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 9/10
Quite an easy subject to do well in. Exams are surprisingly straightforward and the content is mostly
easy enough to learn by yourself without going to many of the tutorials. The essay task isn't too
difficult to do well in, provided that you go beyond the concepts taught in the course and introduce /
synthesise models from your research and analyse their applicability to the Australian economy.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Mark Melatos, Ed Nelson)
Mostly explained clearly, apart from some of the money supply topic. Had to rely quite heavily on the
textbook and my research for this, as the lecturer would contradict himself in both lectures and
consultation.
Interest: 10/10
Great subject. Would recommend.
Overall: 9/10
Although the lectures may not be amazing, the content itself is engaging and not at all difficult.

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 9/10
It's just fiddling around with some basic models, nothing all that difficult.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Mark Melatos, Ed Nelson)
Dr Mark Melatos is pretty solid - stops during the lectures and quizzes the audience about trends, etc.
Prof Ed Nelson is also a cool guy.
Interest: 8/10
It would've been nice to be introduced to more models, such as IS-LM. The brief introduction to
monetary economics was definitely taught far better than I expected, and the introduction to Solow-
Swan was nice, but overall it did seem a bit lacking.
Overall: 8/10
I saw an interesting piece the other day that questions the actual utility of teaching first year students
macroeconomics, and it does hit home a bit. ECON1002 is a pretty solid unit for anyone who's
interested in how the economy works in general terms, but I'm not sure how strong of a foundation it
gives for people who want to learn economics seriously (a lot of this can probably be blamed on the
lack of adequate maths prerequisites though).

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 7/10
Surprisingly actually very difficult. The midsem was amazingly easy, shoulda done better but the
essay was marked insanely hard. Average was under 50%. Final was a bit tricky too, but pretty sure
they scaled, reweighted or just marked really easy cause they said i got 85% in the final and my friend
got 95% which was a bit hard to believe. I think this changes from semester to semester. I heard he
marked nicer on the essay in semester 2. Hate in class essays in general though, so probably avoid if
you dont like that
Lecturer: 5/10 (Mark Melatos)
So boring, so slow. Just went on and on and on. Was fine to understand though, and occasionally
interesting
Interest: 8/10

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I found it reasonably interesting overall. Some of the reserve bank stuff with money
creation/destroying was nice
Overall: 7/10

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 7/10
Marks are not scaled this time around. However, if you go to the lectures and the tutorials, you will
almost be guaranteed a credit. The average for the course is, you guessed it, a credit.
Lecturer: 7/10
There are 2 lecturers; one Indian guy and the course coordinator who is Greek. Both are good in that
they provide clear instruction and solid lecture slides. If I had to choose though, I'd go with the
coordinator simply because he incorporated more graphs and statistical information which is more
applicable to the 'real world' and made the course that little bit more interesting. Meanwhile, the
Indian lecturer had a more textbook approach. Overall though, you can't really go wrong.
Interest: 7/10
I didn't find it as interesting as microeconomics. Things were rather dull and straight forward at the
start of the course but it picked up towards the end when we got to the Cobb-Douglas/Solow Swan
function.
Overall: 7/10

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 7/10
A lot easier than ECON1001. Just do the work and you’ll be fine.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Stella Huangfu)
Stella was a no BS lecturer. Got stuff done and did it in a reasonable fashion. My tutor deserves a
0/10. Absolute shit, barely showed up with all the equipment he needed and was extremely awkward.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting to learn about what you see on the headlines like unemployment, inflation etc. and
their effects on the economy.
Overall: 7.5/10
Just do the work and you’ll do fine.

Semester 2 2007
Ease - 9/10
They don't make this subject very hard. The tutorial questions are easy marks if you have a good
group,. The mid semester exam was very short and easily doable if you attend tutorials and lectures.
Lecturer - 8/10
Anu is a good lecturer. She can explain things well. But she can’t really control a class I suppose.
Michelle is a wonderful tutor!
Interest - 7.5/10
I prefer micro over macro but exchange rates were good
Overall - 8/10
It’s not a hard subject, somewhat interesting and the exams are straightforward.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
It's not very difficult. You need to be able to understand and apply models, and refer to them in the use
of macroeconomic policy.. cause of issue, ways to correct it. There are two in- class tests each 4-
weeks of the semester that examine immediately relevant content. The final exam focuses most on
everything that hasn't been tested in the in- class tests, which was really good. A lot of the difficult
concepts from the opening weeks did not appear in the final exam, at all.

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Lecturer: 9/10 (Matthew Smith)
I had Matthew Smith. He's really good. He's quite intelligent and explains things very well, beyond
the provided lecture slides.
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 9/10
The only stupid thing about this subject was that the recommended core text, that was purchased by
almost everyone, was close to useless. I used the course reader more often, and had to access other
books. The lecturer actually advised us for one topic NOT to refer to the text book. The tutors for the
subject are okay, and the assessment structure has an actual focus on tutorials themselves (individual
and group presentations, participation and attendance mark) unlike ECON1001.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 6/10
Lecturers: 6/10
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 6.5/10

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 5/10
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 7.5/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 5/10
Geez those essays are awful
Lecturer - 7/10
Tutors are shittier than 1001
Interest - 7/10
More interesting than 1001
Overall - 6.7/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 9/10
Catherine is really good - her exams are more comprehensible as well. All the tutors are bad.
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 5/10
Still a bitch of a subject, but easier and more 'grasp-able' than micro.
Lecturer - 5/10
Sorry Jordi...you probably know your stuff, but you're not crash-hot at explaining it.
Interest - 4/10
I hate economics and am only doing this to get my ground units for commerce out the way but by god
I like this much MUCH more than micro!

Unknown Date

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Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 7/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 7/10
Why is every Economics tutor, Indian?

ECOS2001 - Intermediate Microeconomics

Semester 2 2011
Ease: 9/10
Content wasn't too difficult to grasp at all. I found that for me, one read through the relevant chapter
and I could understand the key concepts well. Then it's just a matter of rote learning.
Lecturer: 8/10
He was nice, easy going and easy to understand. He posted all the lectures on Lectopia as well! (This
was a big plus, I struggled to be at uni before 12).
Interest: 7/10
I only really liked the elegance of most of the theory. A lot of it is a rehash of ECON1001 but it breaks
a lot of it down and goes into far more depth which I found really interesting.
Overall: 9/10
I enjoyed this course quite a bit. I think it may have turned me from a macro-geek into a micro-geek.

ECOS2201 - Economics of Competition and Strategy

Semester 1 2008
Ease 8/10
It’s not a very hard subject to get marks especially if you have Olleski. The content is easy and
straight forward, although some consumer theory was at times a bit confusing.
Lecturer 8/10
Olleski was pretty good. I liked attending is lectures and he made things simple and easy!
Interest 10/10
The content in this subject is so interesting. All the topics were enjoyable to learn. But I really like
microeconomics
Overall 9/10
My favourite subject last semester. I would recommend people who like economics to
do this subject

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 2/10
No idea what the hell this course was about. Very micro-economics based. Big rehash of Intermediate
microeconomics. Basic assessments (2 mid sems and a final)
Lecturer: 0/10
Nasty lecturer, totally snide and rude too.
Interest: 3/10
I would’ve been more interested if the lecturer wasn’t so awful.
Overall: 2/10
Very misleading subject from the subject description in the handbook. Thought it would be awesome,
turned out awful and difficult to boot! Very maths based, be warned.

ECOS2901 - Intermediate Microeconomics Honours

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Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
The content itself isn't too difficult, however it's applying your knowledge on unseen questions that is
difficult because a lot of the solutions are based on assumptions of "intuition". Many questions which
can be solved analytically if you had the right mathematical knowledge (e.g. maximising utility
solutions) require you to solve it by "intuitive" means instead which can be difficult if the intuition
doesn't come naturally. Game theory is particularly difficult especially when done with payoffs
functions that are continuous rather than discrete (again these can probably be solved mathematically
but you are required to use your "intuition" to solve it). Also, some equilibrium analysis questions that
ask whether a certain condition is satisfied require you to come up with examples that contradict the
condition if possible which can be difficult because you have to consider all permutations of
possibilities and not overlook anything.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Kunal Sengupta)
Kunal is a good at explaining, but this year he fell behind schedule and had to delay our second mid-
semester and we had to have evening catch up lectures which was not good. Also, 9am lectures meant
I fell asleep most of the time lol, unfortunately the lecturer doesn't have that command and flair that
stops you from falling asleep.
Interest: 7/10
Most of the early topics were pretty ordinary. Game theory was interesting but hard to get your head
around when it comes to solving more difficult questions. Choice under uncertainty was quite good
(moral hazard and adverse selection).
Overall: 8/10
Good course, but unfortunately due to early morning lectures and the fact I am a macro person (at the
moment) meant that I didn't quite embrace the unit for all it was worth. Not sure if I can handle the
third year advanced microeconomics because I'm not good at game theory.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
It's not very difficult at all, both the lecturer and tutor are fantastic. A mid semester exam and final
exam worth 40% and 60% respectively. Lots of time given for both. Make sure you completely
learn tutorial questions. The lecture notes can replace the text book, though I studied both.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Kunal Sengupta)
Couldn't have been better. (10/10 for tutor as well).
Interest: 10/10
So much more interesting than intermediate macroeconomics honours. It's just more
straight- forward and clear.
Overall: 9/10

ECOS2902 - Intermediate Macroeconomics Honours

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 7/10
It's quite confusing and there's a lot of content put into each week, so you need to make
sure not only to keep up but also relate each week's chapter to what you've previously learnt.
Otherwise it's confusing and overwhelming. The honours course attempts to cover the whole book
(but we only made it up to ch22) whereas the normal intermediate (ECOS2002) only goes up to ch14.
3 multiple choice quizzes throughout the semester, tutorial work 'marked' (checked for completeness),
and a mid-semester exam. A lot of marks go towards multiple choice so master it. No tutorial answers
are put up at all, so you have to go by what the tutor might/might not have done in the tute.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Jeffrey Sheen)
He goes through the textbook that he wrote with set slides.

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Interest: 6/10
I really don't like macroeconomics, though a lot of people do.
Overall: 7/10

ECOS2903 - Mathematical Economics A

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 6/10
The content is easy once you get it but the mid-semester exam was very difficult and completely
abstract. No calculators were allowed because questions were completely numberless. Most people
didn't 'pass' the mid-semester after massive scaling. The final exam went better though because mid-
semester questions (which we had limited solutions for) were repeated, and the lecturer made the
questions more clear.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Don Wright)
Our lecturer was Don Wright. The lectures were mainly rewritten sections of the textbook with the
lecturer's reworked examples. So we basically covered all of 'Essential Mathematics for Economic
Analysis' except for maybe a chapter and a few sections (thankfully before it got too difficult).
Interest: 5/10
I was generally not interested in cobb-douglas functions and the like represented in three- dimensional
planes. A lot of the mathematics we did was too complex and abstract to actually be interesting, in
terms of its relevance to economics. Maybe derived demand functions from solving a Lagrange
equation (with multiple constraints) was kind of okay once you finally got to a simple answer?
Overall: 6/10
I feel a lot more capable in mathematics having passed the unit, but it's hard to see its relevance to
economics just yet.

ECOS3002 - Development Economics

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Very basic. No nightmare economics graphs or complex equations. Theory based subject
(which suits me) and more than a little left-leaning…
Lecturer: 1/10
If it’s Dilip, run for your life. Apparently, lecturers for this subject change a lot but I got stuck with
Dilip. Impossible accent to understand (and I have an ACCT major and have had my fair share of
accented lecturers!!). Good textbook though and class follows textbook closely so no need to attend
really.
Interest: 6/10
Lots to do with poverty/the environment/welfare economics. I found it boring and I’m
actually interested in those issues…makes no sense.
Overall: 7/10
OK I guess. Easy subject to fill up an economics major but I don’t see why you would do it otherwise.

ECOS3003 - Hierarchies, Incentives and Firm Structure

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
Very easy. You just need to learn the theory in the textbook and the algebra in lectures. Assessment
questions are easy multiple choice mostly based on textbook facts and short answer. No essays. It's all
about the theory of the firm, incentive compensation, and decentralisation of decisions. You don't need

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to do the set readings if you follow the lectures properly because everything you need to know is
covered there.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Andrew Wait)
Lecturer was okay, he went through all the algebra really well
Interest: 8/10
Pretty interesting, if you prefer microeconomics to macro. If you like interest rates and the budget, do
monetary policy in semester one or international trade or something else, because there's none of that
here.
Overall: 8/10
Pretty good, but if I had put more effort in it would have been better. Only two mid-semester exams in
week 5 and week 10 that go for an hour, and a straight- forward exam that focuses on material mostly
after week 10.

ECOS3006 - International Trade

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
Very micro-economic based.
Lecturer: 9/10
If it’s still Mark Melatos, it’s still good
Interest: 5/10
Boring because whenever anything interesting is covered, the numbers/graphs get in the way of
learning the good stuff. But depends on the individual.
Overall: 6/10
There are easier ECOS electives around to take.

ECOS3010 - Monetary Economics

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
No maths required, just memory and some decent essay skills.
Lecturer:9/10 (Tony Aspromourgos)
Tony Aspromourgos is a genius. Alternative, critical and with a dry humour that will make you laugh
Interest: 9/10
NOW is the time to do this subject, post GFC. All the interesting stuff is going on whilst you learn!
Overall: 9/10
Great course. Would recommend to any student, not just economics majors

ECOS3011 - Public Finance

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 4/10
NOT a cakewalk. One of the harder economics electives I’ve done. Lots of complex graphs with
about 8-10 squiggly lines running in all directions (in all colours!) and you have to understand what
happens each time one moves. Assessments are also quite harshly marked and I see no evidence of
scaling happening in this subject.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Stephen Cheung)

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Pretty good. Not a drone, actually makes an effort to teach. EXCELLENT lecture notes, very
organised content, good coverage, fair assessments and good pace. No tutorials though.
Interest: 7/10
Very interesting if you’re into public/govt/fiscal economics
Overall: 7/10
Good subject for the keen but takes a fair amount of effort to get a good mark.

ECOS3019 - Capital and Dynamics

Semester 1 2010
Ease- 9/10
This is a new subject in 2010, and it kind of shows. High-school algebra required, but apart from that,
all you have to do is a bit of cramming before the exam. There is an optional essay, but you would be
crazy to do it considering how easy the tests are
Lecturer- 7/10
Graham was very interesting, if a bit dry at times. He definitely went through the course too slowly
for everyone though.
Interest- 8/10
Will probably only appeal to econ nerds. It's a VERY alternative take on orthodox economics, seen
through a historical lens. Good to know though
Overall 8/10
Easy and interesting, but not everyone's cup of tea

ECOS3901 - Advanced Microeconomics Honours

Semester 1 2010
Ease - 7/10
Some of the mathematical proofs are a little difficult the first time around, but as the lecturer says, all
you need to do is read them a few times before the logic becomes clear. The tests and problems are
very lenient, considering how hard they could theoretically be. Usually are just rehash's of last year's
test.
Lecturer - 9/10 (Abhijit Sengupta)
Abhijit is fantastic. No other word for it. He rambles a bit, but he is supremely intelligent and he
knows his micro. He'll reinspire you after Don Wright in ECOS2903.
Interest - 9/10
Not conventional micro theory- no producers and consumers here. It’s all advanced game theory, and I
found it really interesting at least.
Overall - 8/10
Great course, but as its pre-Honours I can't see a lot of people liking the look of it. But it would still
be interesting even if you didn't got to fourth year!

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 Education - Foundations (EDUF)
EDUF1018 – Education, Teachers and Teaching

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 3/10
Interest - 1/10
Overall - 2/10
If this wasn't a compulsory unit of study I would have definitely not chosen it.

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 6/10
I really didn't like this course. The essay was boring and difficult, the exam was really boring and
really difficult. You have been warned.
Lecturers – 6/10
I skipped most of these. Some of 'em were good. The Curriculum lady was incredibly boring, way too
much like Umbridge.
Interest - 7/10
Historical stuff was very interesting, curriculum stuff was dull. Some people may disagree. *shrugs*
Overall - 6/10
NOT what I was expecting. Only do this if you need it for teaching.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
It wasn't a hard subject at all. Lectures and readings provide more than enough information for each
topic, and the structure of seminars (speech/tutor summary) summarises each subject in quite a good
manner. The only time someone wouldn't find the material easy, I imagine, would be if they had zero
interest in the subject matter.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Lesley Scanlon, Robyn Ewing, and others)
Depends. Lesley Scanlon was a fantastic lecturer who articulated everything in an interesting and
concise manner, and Robyn Ewing (curriculum/knowledge) was able to do the same, albeit in a much
nicer tone. The men who took the teaching technologies and empathy related classes were quite good
too. Other than that though, there really weren't any lecturers to write home about. Quite frankly, other
than the ones mentioned the lecturers were really quite shit. Sometimes this was dependant on the

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subject matter (aboriginal teaching), other times the lecturer was just horrible (hidden curriculum). It's
a good thing that Lesley and Robyn took most of the lectures
Interest: 9.5/10
I found most of the subject matter quite relevant, thus interesting. The material was
far more tailored to suit first year interests and needs than any UNSW course was. In other words,
putting education students into the frame of mind of being a teacher is by far more important than just
launching them right into it, a la UNSW. Regardless, the course was aimed at getting students to get
into the teachers frame of mind. I feel that this was achieved for the students who would naturally
have an interest in the matter. Those who were not interested, might do well to get out of teaching?
Then again, maybe I've just been brainwashed by Lesley.
Overall: 9/10
Course would have got a complete 10/10 if it had have been not so obviously oriented
towards the arts students. Maybe just a little on the educational psychology side of things would have
made the course a little better...maybe. None the less, a relevant, interesting and quite fun course.
Peaks were the seminar discussions and the lectures of Lesley, troughs were the lecturers who took
only one lecture and then moved on.
Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
I found quite a bit of the content to be stuff that you could probably figure out on your
own from common sense. It was well structured and clear. I kind of wanted to go a little more in depth
into some of the topics (now, say what you will against it, but I actually found the child protection unit
interesting and I wouldn’t have minded if we did more on it. It was a bit of a drag at the time but
when I went and read some more I got way into it, I don’t know if anyone else did?)
Lecturers: 6/10
Lesley was brilliant. The six marks go to her. The other lecturers were...I hesitate to say shit, but, they
kind of were. Especially the lady who did Aboriginal Education, oh god, I wanted to throw my lecture
pad at her the whole time. And I actually had an interest in the content there, I just hated her lecturing
style, her whole demeanour...everything, ew. But kudos to Lesley, she was tops.
Interest: 9/10
I've been told by several people that the first couple of years of my degree will be largely irrelevant as
far as real-world teaching goes, but having not had any teaching experience yet I'll definitely say that
this was really interesting. If you want to be a teacher, chances are you did/will as well. I honestly
think if you didn't/don't find the content interesting then you probably don't really want to teach, deep
down. This was the only course out of the ones I did this semester where I actually minded and got
annoyed if I had to miss a lecture because of transport issues or whatever. Every other subject I
skipped at least a couple of classes to go do fuck-all; this was the one I always went to unless I really
couldn't, I think that says something.
Overall: 8/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
Apparently 25% failed the major essay
Lecturer: 4/10
Lesley was good, but the subject matter killed me. It was vacuous and at times overly PC. The history
of classroom methods wasn't bad.
Interest: 8/10
Due solely to tutorial discussions
Overall: 6/10
I'm expecting next semester to be much worse.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 9/10
Lecturers - 1/10

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I despised the Head Lecturer, and since she took most of the lectures, it was crap. the one who took
"Knowledge" was equally crap, and spoke to us like we were 5 years old.
Interest - 3/10
It made me rethink my degree choice.
Overall - 3/10
I was definitely considering changing degrees. it was a crap subject and it was really boring

EDUF1019 - Human Development and Education

Semester 2 2009
Ease 10/10
They gave us the exams questions beforehand so we had to prepare. All the information needed was
provided in the reader.
Lecturer 2/10 (Jean Ashton)
Jean Ashton is a nice enough lady, but she wasn't much of a lecturer. Her lecture notes were very
bland and many people stopped attending her lectures. I didn't even use any of the stuff off the
lectures for my exam.
Interest 7/10
Except the ICE component which deserves a 0/10 as it was a massive waste of time
Overall 7/10
A vast improvement from the terrible EDUF1018 subject I did the semester before. Human
development was much more straightforward and easy to follow. Where EDUF1018 was all over the
place, jumping from one unrelated topic to the next, EDUF1019 was very logical in its structural
manner. The only things I disliked about EDUF1019 were mainly a) its lacklustre lectures and b) the
ICE component of it. Totally unrelated to the main bit of the course. It should have been a separate
subject. Also, it was absolutely too much effort expected for 10 measly % of the overall mark.

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 9/10
Assignments required an understanding and implementation of the entire course. This was really
useful, as working on the essay also prepared us for the exam. The lectures were accessible and the
theories were interesting.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Stephen Juan)
Great stuff. He also emailed us his entire lectures, word-for-word, so cramming for the exam was
about as painless as cramming will ever be.
Interest: 9/10
This course overlaps a lot with the more interesting and accessible parts of psychology. It was all
relevant and up-to-date.
Overall: 9/10
This was SOOO much better than education 1018. However, I did not enjoy the tutorials/seminars,
otherwise would have been 10. I'm worried about teaching now, because my seminar presentation
marks are consistently low.

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 11/10
Half of the essay criteria was made up for technical stuff (periods, sentence structure), the speech
criteria was insanely easy, the exam was essentially spelled out for us in the last lecture and anyone
with a computer experience can pass the compulsory computer skills exam. Nothing too taxing, and
interesting to boot in my opinion, which makes it easier. There's not too much difficulty to be had in
understanding three or so human development theories, which is what the majority of the course was
based off, so as long as you do the reading then you'll be fine. I was scaled down for this course. I

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was averaging well into the HD range and was scaled to a high distinction. Doesn't affect the ease of
the course, which next to other uni courses, was baby food. Actually, a word here about something
else. The fact that this course (among other arts/education subjects) is worth the same as a chemistry
or biology angers me a bit. By comparison, I would have spent about five times as long doing
chemistry/bio work than I did doing education work. That's including class hours though. But
seriously, the workload for science subjects >>>> the workload for arts subjects. They shouldn't be
worth anywhere near the same. It's dumb. </rant>
Lecturer: 9/10 (Stephen Juan)
Ahhh Dr. Stephie. I found what he said to be interesting. I found the way he said it to be fun and
engaging. He's one of those public speaker people who goes around giving speeches and frequently
appears on TV, he has his own books, so he's got experience on how to talk and he uses it well. Does
he have the tendency to ramble? Yeah, he does, but most of his ramblings are on the subject. And in
any case, they liven up the lectures quite a bit. in my opinion, none of the stuff was really in need of
too much attention in lectures. However, if you think that lectures need to remain on subject (that's
what you're paying for) and if you don't like his ramblings on human development and whatever, then
I can understand. Malfoy's criticism of the man’s lecturing style was understandable. I, however,
loved his style, loved what he had to say and loved his style. He couldn't maintain control, which is
what brings him down to 9/10. Oh, and he emailed out totally comprehensive and well written lecture
notes. So kudos for that.
Interest: 9/10
The only part I didn't find interesting was the crap on birth statistics and such. That only took up one
lecture though. You'll cover all human development theories and the development of a human in
general, so it's pretty interesting. What would have been more interesting, is if they cut out some of
the early childhood stuff and talked more about adult behaviour, but that wasn't within the confines of
the course so I can't really fault Juan for not putting it in there. Tutorial discussions rocked too.
Margarita is a totally awesometastic tutor, and if you get her you're lucky to have her. She stops
presentations frequently so we can talk about the topic, which is actually very beneficial for teachers
in-training. When she stops it, if you're able to get a class discussion going then she'll pretty much
butt right out of it. This is fantastic in this course, because the tutorial discussions that arise from the
topics (we had a great talk about genetic engineering in a speech about teenagers, I believe) are
absurdly interesting. My most fond memory of the course was doing some irl trolling and getting the
class into a debate about the supposed benefits of engineering all humans to be alike so that they're as
happy as can possibly be. Probably a bit philosophical really, but damn it was an interesting debate
and the class had one every week. Fantastic tutorials. I loved them to bits. The ICE component
(computer skills) was pretty shitty though, but I got an exemption since I did HSC computers, heh.
Overall: 9/10
Great course. ICE (computers) was shit, but that's it. Lecturer was fun, subject matter was interesting,
assessments were [too] easy. I loved it! I recommend the course to everyone looking for a stimulating,
rewarding and easy course to do.

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 9/10
Lecturer - 10/10
Dr. Stephie is the best
Interest - 10/10
Overall - 10/10

Unknown Date
Ease: 7/10
The assessments and exam for this course were really easy. The exam for it was basically rote
learning and memorisation of some theories, and took only about 45 minutes to complete out of the
two hours allocated. There was some personal opinion thrown in there as well, which was a surprise.
Dr Juan gave us the exam topics and basically the questions as well in the last lecture, which helped

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me immensely as it was one of the few I attended. I had some issues with them that were not related
to ease. For example, I do not believe that ICE should be an assessable component. Is there anyone
these days who does not know how to cut and paste in Microsoft Word, for an example? It's a joke! I
also was unimpressed by the fact that the first three weeks in Dr Juan's tutorial groups got automatic
full marks in their seminar presentations, by virtue of the fact they did not have as much time to
prepare, while those in other groups did not. Since I was not in his tutorial group, but was in the first
three weeks, I felt at a disadvantage.
Lecturer: 3/10 (Stephen Juan)
Dr Juan is a nice guy, to be sure, but I really did not enjoy his lectures. He had a tendency to ramble
on some topics, and furthermore half the time I was just plain disinterested. He also had some very
strong political viewpoints, which is to be expected in Education lectures in my experience (most
memorable being that the will of the collective was more important than the freedom of the
individual, which was in one of the beginning couple of lectures and repeated in the course readers). I
gave up on attending lectures after the first couple of weeks, actually, because they were so painful.
Be warned that he does not use WebCT or anything like that, although he did end up emailing the
notes to us at the end of the course. Many people enjoyed his lectures, so do not take my opinions on
face value.
Interest: 0/10
I only took this course because it was compulsory. I was not interested in any aspect of it at all. In
fact, I loathed it from the time I read the course description when I enrolled for second semester. It
was not relevant to my degree, either, so it was just a painful experience, particularly given my
aversion to stuff about early childhood. A lot of the course seemed focused on social justice - notions
of gender, and of third world development, and other such things, which I found got rather irritating
after a while. I did not have a particularly good tutor, either. She didn't do much to facilitate
discussion, even at the conclusions of seminars - just kind of sat there a lot of the time. I guess the
fact that tutorials were a bit of a waste of time - seminar presentation after seminar presentation isn't
really conducive to discussion - meant she didn't really have that much to teach.
Overall: 1/10
This course is plain awful. It was boring, irrelevant and just completely not my thing. I think a lot of
people had the opposite experience to me, so as I said, don't take this review at face value. I just had a
lot of issues with this course, its assessment, and the way it was run.

EDUF2006 - Educational Psychology

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
Theories. Names. Years.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Richard Walker, Nigel Goodwin)
Richard Walker was a pretty boring and abysmal lecturer but thumbs up for Nigel Goodwin who made
every lecture of his enjoyable.
Interest: 5/10
It was a real mixed bag. Highly likely that you will find only certain aspects of the content interesting.
Overall: 7/10
Certainly informative subject, but its heavily theoretical and textbook based.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
LOTS of stuff to grasp, plus a whole new "emphasis on citing actual research" kinda thing. But yeah,
the research is after all on how people learn, so you can apply it sorta recursively to yourself, y'know?
The essay was made pretty easy though, 'cos they actually gave us all the sources we were expected to
use. 'Tis generally good when they do that. ^_^
Interest: 8/10

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Woooo! I love learning about learning and teaching about teaching. It's just... interesting!!! And most
of the research / etc. articles are really interesting too. Good stuff here.
Lecturer: 7/10
Wish I could tell you more, but I skipped too many lectures. I will say however that Paul Ginns was a
very positive & responsible tutor.
Overall: 8/10
Yeah, so I really quite liked this course. Not quite as awesome as EDUF1019 last semester, but still
pretty good.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
Learn the theory, remember the theory, regurgitate theory in exam which is given to you
beforehand. Easy. The only possibly hard thing is remembering the many many names of the many
many people you will look at. But whatever, I went to about 10% of the lectures and I did fine (exam
results pending lol).
Lecturer: 2/10 (Richard Walker)
Richard Walker is the most boring lecturer I've ever had. His voice literally put me to sleep. Hence
hardly ever going to lectures.
Interest: 8/10
I enjoyed it. A couple of topics were a bit meh but overall it's good.
Overall: 7/10

Unknown Date
Ease: 5/10
This was ridiculously hard compared to first year education subjects. There are about a billion
theories and theorists you have to remember, and there's a big, fat, $100 textbook that you have to
read which only somewhat clarifies things. Assessment is 40% essay, 30% exam, 30% tutorial
presentation and group essay. The essay was what got me through - if I hadn't gotten 37/40 for it I'd
have failed this subject. The tutorial presentation was ridiculous because it had a group essay
component. If you think group work is bad, try writing a coherent essay with four different writing
styles and whatnot. I find the very notion of a group essay ridiculous. The exam was hard - you had to
really know your content and I certainly didn't. As I said, you have to know a lot of theories and
theorists and I just... didn't.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Richard Walker)
Richard Walker knew his stuff. He was very solid - clear and concise. I found him very
accommodating, especially when I had problems handing things in due to illness. An overall good
lecturer, if slightly uninspiring at times due to the material. A special mention must be made of my
tutor, Wayne Leahy. If you get him for your tutorials you will not enjoy them. This was the general
opinion of most people in our tutorial, at least.
Interest: 3/10
It wasn't as bad as EDUF1019, which was made terrible by the lecturer and the general irrelevance of
the subject matter. This had more relevance to actual teaching, somewhat, but was still concerned
with a lot of theory. As far as I'm concerned, generally the theoretical side of things doesn't actually
predict what will happen once you're out in the practical side of things. Too many names and studies
and theories for it to hold my interest, as well. Tutorials were painful, as well - listening to a seminar
presentation per tutorial, plus having a horrible tutor, does not make things particularly fun.
Overall: 4/10
It wasn't as bad as EDUF1019 but that was really its redeeming feature. For a compulsory education
course it was solid but uninspiring. Too heavy on the theories. Richard Walker did the best he could
with dull subject matter.

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 EDUF2007 - Social Perspectives on Education

Semester 2 2008
Ease - 9/10
They pretty much feed you everything they want you to know (which leads to immense boredom but
I'll go into that in a sec). You get the exam questions well in advance. The content is hell easy, if you
can handle it being annoyingly biased at times you will be cruising. The only reason it’s not a 10/10 is
because of the research project which is probably the reason that everything else is so easy. If you get
yourself a dodgy partner or are not organised it'll be a nightmare, but I found it pretty sweet. You'll
probably be up all night before its due but whatever. You're only allowed to miss one tute without a
doctors certificate which is probably standard in a lot of faculties anyway.
Lecturer - 4/10 (Craig Campbell)
Craig Campbell is a nice guy but his monotone is, well, monotonous. And he has this really annoying
way of kidding around, I don’t know if it bugged anyone else but. The lectures pretty much consisted
of slides which summarised the textbook chapters, read out nearly word for word with the odd painful
joke. Protip: get the textbook and don't bother with lectures til the last week when he hands out the
exam. I only went to about 3 and probably slept through them.
Interest - 4/10
The aforementioned lectures made it boring. Also once you worked out what angle each social issue
was being approached from you could almost parrot the lecturer as they talked, v. predictable.
Overall - 6/10
Very easy but not sure if ease is worth being bored to death for 3 hours a week.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
I went to maybe four lectures (I gave up after the Aboriginal Education one, which was exactly the
same as the corresponding lecture in Education, Teachers and Teaching in first year), and still
managed to pass before the exam was done. Everything in this unit depends on the tutes, and if you've
been in the school system (public or private), you're pretty much guaranteed a pass (at the very least)
in this one. Oh, and the fact that the exam was given to us word for word helped too.
Lecturer: 1/10
I went to less than half of the lectures. There is a reason for this. It was generally a mismatched set of
lectures, jerkily put one after the other with no apparent theme at all. The tutes were good, though.
Interest: 5/10
Only the tutes were interesting. There were lots of debates about public and private schooling, gender
stuff, the media, and a whole lot of other factors that are relevant to schools.
Overall: 5/10
For a compulsory subject that's pretty much a repeat of Education, Teachers and Teaching, it wasn't
too bad. The unit's redeeming feature was the tutorials, but that's something that comes down to how
good your group is.

Unknown Date
Ease - 5/10
I've done surprisingly well in this course so far but I don't think it's a particularly easy course. There
are four assessments and an exam (25%) for it. The exam is perhaps the easiest part; you are given the
exam format and exact questions in the final lecture so there's no excuse for not doing at least
decently in it - plus it's only an hour and a half, which is reasonable for two mini-essays (10% each)
and four short-answer questions (5% total). Also rather straightforward were the seminar
presentations (15%) which are standard fare in an education course; I was lucky and got to talk on
libertarian education policy, which is something I'm interested in, but that was only after twisting the
seminar topic - it was quite obvious they wanted me to present the "anti" viewpoint but there was no
way that was going to happen. (Seriously, the list of sources we were supposed to use couldn't have

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been more unbalanced if it tried.)
Where this course fell apart was the assessment relating to the research project. Basically, the course
requires you to design and write up your own research project with a partner (35%; 4,000 words) on
something to do with social conceptions of education. This is supposed to prepare you for later
educational research. However, given the limited time frame and the wide scope for topics, it was
difficult to perform well in the project. Also, for 35% of the mark it was a lot of work. Once you add
in appendices and results and whatnot, my essay ran to 44 pages. Most other courses allow you to
hand in a 2,500 or 3,000 major essay which is not only shorter but worth more of the mark!
There were also two other assessments relating to these projects. The literature reviews (15%; 1,000
words) were not explained particularly well. There was a second presentation (10%) in the form of
presenting project findings in the last two weeks of the course. Most people either did not take the
projects seriously or made up statistics and results - it was a very silly way to assess us in all honesty.
I really felt there was too much assessment here and that the workload was too high, particularly
when you consider how little most of the assessments were worth. Plus the conception of the project
was probably okay in theory but didn't work in practice mostly, and a lot of people found it hard to do
well because it was hard to pin down what was specifically required.
Lecturers - 0/10 (various, mostly only remember Anthony Welch)
This course was atrocious in terms of content. It was ridiculously ideological, the lecturers were
biased as all hell, the lectures did not follow a common thread and I honestly only went to three of
them because the bashing of any views right of Karl Marx's got old after a while.
I know I was not alone in this distaste for the lectures, for two reasons. Firstly, our tutor was absent
one week and the course coordinator took the seminar and asked everyone if they attended the
lectures. He then said that wasn't possible given he counted less than ten people in the room for that
week's lecture. Furthermore, we received at least two emails exhorting us to attend lectures from him
because he kept saying attendance was slipping/not particularly good. This suggests that most people
didn't find the lectures worth going to. I know at least one person earlier in this thread took the course
last year and agreed.
Interest - 0/10
I'm just going to reiterate how useless and awful this course was. It had zero relevance other than to
serve as indoctrination, for one thing. I don't even understand why it was included as a core subject.
Basically, we covered all the standard left-wing fare - gender, class, race, indigenous issues, anti-
private school rhetoric, blah blah blah. Complete waste of time and I resented being told how to think.
Also, it had that awful format of seminar presentations week in, week out. Given that seminars were
two hours long it was really, really painful. A lot of people ended up walking out early (I did it myself
many times - for a course with a 90% attendance requirement I don't even think I managed half that).
Our tutor was a nice guy but liked to ramble a lot on tangential issues and so it made the tedious
seminars even more sleep-inducing. Our seminar group was also totally disinterested which meant
there weren't even many debates or discussions save for maybe the first week or two when people still
cared. In a word: painful.
Overall: 0/10
You know a course is painful when you find yourself wishing to hear more of Dr Juan's rambling
political statements rather than waste one more minute in these mind-numbing classes. There was not
one redeeming feature of the course, from the horrible lectures to the uninspiring and deadly boring
two-hour seminars to the insane workload.
This course cemented my decision to change from a teaching degree to something more suitable. I've
always found at least one thing interesting or relevant in a course - whether it be de Mause's six
modes of childrearing (EDUF1019) or medieval Christendom (HSTY2001) or Caligula (ANHS1004)
or problems with collaborative learning (EDUF2006), and those are all from courses that I didn't
particularly enjoy! For me to have not found a single thing interesting, redeemable or enjoyable in a
semester-long course was pretty surprising. Education people: you're stuck with it, unfortunately.
Everyone else: avoid, avoid, avoid!

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 Education - Secondary (EDSE)
EDSE2001 – Craft Knowledge and Professional Practice 1

Semester 1 2010
Ease 9/10
Laid back. Just show up and let the good marks roll in.
Lecturer: 8/10
A lot of guest lecturers.
Interest: 8/10
Really interesting subject, I felt mentored more than lectured. Very promising.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 10/10
Easy as pie. Do your readings. Attend the lecturers. Contribute to class discussions like you've always
done in education subjects. 40% practice lesson assignment is easy if you know how to deal with
classes from previous experience. Don't sweat it, if you put effort into it, you'll do fine. The portfolio
is a lot of work, but easy since it's a reflection. Watch the word count though.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Kelly Freebody, Michael Anderson, Dorothy Bottrell)
Love Kelly Freebody and Michael Anderson. Dorothy (can't remember her last name) is the other
lecturer and she's crap. She was also my tutor and was totally unclear in terms of assignment
guidelines etc. She's nice... just useless. I'm not sure about the lecturers (if they were any).
Interest: 10/10
You only do this subject if you're going to teach it so you really do have be interested. Having that
said, Kelly and Anderson do try hard to make the class interesting.
Overall 8/10
I speak very highly for this class. Hope you like it if you're doing 2nd year education!

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 8/10
Do the reading, go to the lectures (compulsory and Kelly Freebody in particular seemed to be a hard-
ass about it) and you'll be fine. Nothing you can't handle (if you can't handle it you might be in the
wrong degree). There's a school visit in like week 4 or something make sure you go to it. Assessments
are 2 online discussions, a case study analysis and a 10 minute mini lesson. No exam. You can knock
over the readings in about an hour a week so it's all good.
Lecturers - 8/10 (Michael Anderson, Kelly Freebody)

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Michael Anderson is a funny guy, <3 him. Kelly Freebody is kind of scary but she's nice. Both of
them gave pretty effective lectures. There were a few guest lecturers but I don't really remember them
well.
Interest - 8/10
Pretty good. Some stuff predictable and boring but I was mostly engaged so yeah.
Overall - 8/10

Unknown Date
Ease - Realistically, 6/10. For me, 4/10
The reason I differentiate between the two marks is because there is a 'seminar' component of the
course, where you spend two hours a week doing public speaking, mock teaching and group work
exercises. I find said things horrifically difficult (and I'm reconsidering my degree at the moment
because of it). Most people who are going into teaching probably wouldn't find this anywhere near as
difficult as I do, so realistically you'll find this easier than I did. The real problem with this unit is the
assessment model. The assessments were vague and not in traditional formats, so one is often left
without an idea of what the tutors/lecturers expect. The first assessment was a "teacher narrative"
which is kind of like an essay but with personal experiences and perspectives incorporated; I got
marked down on this for not "personalising" it enough but I don't think it's really fair to expect
students to lay out their hearts/feelings in an assessment like that. Aside from that, the structure of that
is pretty vague. The second assessment was three discussion entries on WebCT. Most everyone I have
spoken to thinks this is not only vague and bordering on inassessable but a ridiculous idea for an
assessment. You'll see why when you do it. The third is a case study, which is basically an essay and
which is totally fine. Thankfully, that's worth 50%.
Lecturers – 10/10 (Kelly Freebody, Michael Anderson, John Hughes)
All 10/10, guest lecturers varies, for such a short unit there were a lot of lecturers! All three main
lecturers were excellent - they are all former Drama teachers (John Hughes might be English, not
entirely sure) and are really engaging and funny. You actually want to attend lectures with these guys,
which is good because they mark the roll in lectures and there's a 90% attendance requirement. As for
guest lecturers, Lilian Merritt who took the first lecture was good, Roslyn Arnold who took the
one on empathic intelligence was fairly boring, and the lady who took the one on classroom
management was excellent.
Interest - 9.5/10
I won't give it a perfect ten because there were a few things that were a bit irrelevant/woolly/flat out
boring but that's mostly in the readings so your hour of tutorial a week can get a little tedious.
However, the actual lectures were excellent, and since they form the bulk of the content this one
scored really high on the interest factor. The stuff you do in the seminars is pretty interesting, though
I did spend my time trying to get out of it because I'm fairly phobic of these situations - but watching
everyone else was a real experience, and some of the debates we had were great. Nearly perfect, but
not quite. One major asset of this course is that unlike everything you do in Education to this point,
it's actually relevant to your practical experiences (unlike Social Perspectives, for example, which is
pretty much political preaching week in, week out).
Overall - 9/10
Overall, an excellent course. Lectures were inspiring, it was relevant, the seminars were essentially
practice for your practical work and it could be a lot of fun. The only real downside were the vague
and downright stupid assessments.

EDSE3040 - Teaching History 1

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
If you have Tim Allender as your seminar leader, I'm telling you to swap classes right now. Do it.
Don't even question me. Anyway, this class sucks because the first assignment is due quite early into

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the course and you haven't learnt anything yet. It really pissed me off because the answers to the
assignment were given to us in subsequent lectures after the assignment was due. It's like... why
would you do that? Why don't you teach us this first and allow us to show you we've learnt it in the
assessment? That was also worth 50%.
The readings are really good by the way. Both lecturers from EDSE3040 and EDSE3044 write their
own textbooks. Carmel basically sums up the readings for you in the lectures but you still need to do
individual readings for the tutorial class. Oh, the structure of this class is as follows: 1hr lecture, 1hr
tut, 1hr seminar. The seminar is really helpful because it's were you learn to draft lesson plans and
assessment tasks and pick sources etc.
Lecturers: 4/10 (Carmel Fahley, Tim Allender)
You'll be surprised but I went to every single lecture for this class - mainly cos my 2hr seminar was
directly after it. Anyway, Carmel is a great lecturer. I really enjoy her stuff. Tim sucks. He skips slides
and information because there's no time. All the lecture material will NOT be available on sumo. So
basically, do your readings.
Interest: 7/10
Actually learnt really good stuff for teaching history!
Overall 6/10
Only slightly better than Teaching English I because Carmel was on the ball with everything. Don't
ask Tim for help with your assignment. He told me to google the answer. I kid you not.

EDSE3042 - Teaching Drama 1

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Same kind of thing as with English, introducing ways to teach stuff. Same icky crammed-in structure
but content not difficult. Two assessments: writing an essay-ish (I use the word loosely, you can write
it up however the heck you want) thing comparing live theatre to classwork; and an overview of a unit
of work containing six lesson plans with assessment. The organisation of these tasks left a bit to be
desired.
Tutors: 8/10 (Michael Anderson, Kelly Freebody)
Michael - all round a great person, v. engaging, knows stuff. Not keen on theoretical wankery which
was great. Kind of disorganised but thats OK.
Kelly - I'm kind of scared of her tbh but she's a great teacher and more organised than Mr. Anderson
which was a plus.
Interest: 9/10
Considering the kind of course it is it would be a bit of a problem to not have an interest in the subject
matter. Good lecturers etc. helped, obviously.
Overall: 8/10

EDSE3044 - Teaching English 1

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 3/10
This class really sort of sucks. They're not clear with what you have to do most weeks. You have a 1hr
lecture then a 3hr seminar/tutorial. In the 3hr tut, you're required to operate as a normal tut class in the
1st hr then for the next two hours, you're part of three groups doing three different things - that don't
count towards anything at the end. Also ALL your assignments are due in the same day. The word
count is ~6000 words but trust me, you NEED to disregard that word count. Even Jacky + your tutor
will tell you this. I ended up writing 13,000 words.
Lecturer: N/A (Jacky Manuel)
Okay so I didn't attend any lectures bar the 1st week's lecture so you really shouldn't look to me for
answers. Jacky Manuel was pretty .. enthusiastic in the first lecture but she didn't teach us anything.

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Does this make sense? She's like, yeah, English teachers, woohooo! And that was it. BTW, none of
this is on sumo.
Interest: 5/10
The textbooks besides the A - Z English suck. I learnt some "practical" skills to apply in the classroom
but we didn't really go much into depth. Waiting for Teaching English II next semester to expand in
this.
Overall 5/10
I don't understand why this class had to start in week 7 and run until Stuvac week (all the classes were
cancelled during Stuvac week cos apparently you can't hold classes during this week). I wish they
spread it out over the semester so we weren't stuck doing 4 hours a week! Also, the class has a 90%
attendance rate. HOWEVER, since it only started in week7, you're only allow to miss 3 out of the
4hrs. Make sure you go to class man. Or get someone to write your name on the roll. They always
mark the roll in both lectures and tuts.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
None of this is hard stuff. It's basically an introduction to practical strategies for English teaching.
There is only one assessment for this course which is a reflective journal + concluding statement
which includes certain tasks (lesson plans etc.) that are set out in the criteria. The only irritating thing
is that the subject starts halfway through the semester and runs for like 7 weeks so everything is really
kind of crammed together and it seemed like there was too much reading for each week because of
that. But yeah whatever I survived just fine.
Lecturer/Tutor: 8/10 (Jackie Manuel, Jowen Hillyer)
Jackie is a competent lecturer. She is a bit all over the place with organising stuff but otherwise pretty
good, clearly knows her stuff and is happy to impart that to us. Jowen is a fantastic tutor, if someone
can make 3 hours of the same class enjoyable then you know something is right. I was initially
concerned that what we were doing in seminars didn't seem to follow anything in the outline but since
your tutor is the one who marks your journal and stuff it doesn't really matter in the end (and I think
what we did was better than what we were ''meant'' to do)
Interest: 9/10
Considering the kind of course it is it would be a bit of a problem to not have an interest in the subject
matter. Good lecturers etc helped, obviously.
Overall: 8/10

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 Electrical Engineering (ELEC)
ELEC1601 - Foundations of Computer Systems

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 4/10
Way too much stuff to learn. It's great if you want to learn about how things work at the machine level
of the computer.
Lecturer: 7/10
Colin Jones was ok. He read off the lecture slides which made the lectures boring but
ran the course quite well actually.
Interest: 5/10
Unless you're interested in Logic Circuits and coding in BASIC/MIPS, you'll hate this subject.
Overall: 5/10
There's way too much stuff to learn in this subject which made it really hard to cram...

ELEC2602 - Digital Logic

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Easy subject, a continuation of digital logic study from first year. Laboratory focused so make sure
you pay attention to the labs
Lecturer: 7/10
Decent lecturer but you feel he may not know his stuff 100%
Interest: 8/10
Fundamental topic for budding electrical engineers.
Overall: 7/10
Pretty cruisy subject

ELEC3305 - Digital Signal Processing

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 5/10
Everything up to the mid semester is easy enough to get your head around. Then it's a total mindfuck
for the last few weeks. Yash took it this year and made a buggery of a final exam. Think about the last
2 questions on a 3-4unit maths paper. The final exam had 7 of those questions (10 total). Scaling does

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heaps though. I only finished half the questions and I'm pretty sure I only answered about 3 properly
(needed 45% to pass), yet I walked out with 61.
Lecturer - 8/10
Yash is a brilliant guy. He might not have known much about circuits in first year but
signals/control/dsp is supposed to be his speciality. He was very quick to reply to emails and his
tutorials were very helpful.
Interest - 7/10
The labs were the most interesting parts. But you had to trudge through the mundane tutorials for the
first 6 weeks to get to the good parts. Digital filter design if you're interested in that stuff.
Overall - 7/10
Basically ELEC2302 with easier maths (unless you actually like all that continuous stuff) and real life
applications.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 2/10
Hard as fuck and textbook is a piece of shit. Lots of study from textbook won't guarantee you a good
mark; you need multiple references for this UoS. No solutions in assigned textbook
Lecturer: 9/10
Brilliant lecturer, quality notes.
Interest: 9/10
Fundamental topic for budding electrical and telecommunications engineers.
Overall: 6/10
Content is not that difficult - it is in fact dumbed down from other DSP courses. Most of the difficulty
comes from the way the run. A 67% final and 28% midterm with no past papers or textbook solutions.
Screw up once and you are resigned to a terrible mark

ELEC3404 - Electronic Circuit Design

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 5/10
It's not that the individual concepts were hard, in fact the maths involved is relatively simple (mostly
linear stuff) when compared to other subjects such as electromagnetics or DSP etc. The problem is
just that there was so much content jammed into the final exam. If they had say, 5 quizzes throughout
the semester on each topic, it would've been alright.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Alistair McEwan)
Alistair McEwan was a bit boring to listen to at times but i have the feeling it's because it was his first
time taking the course and he was simply reading over last year's slides. He was quite responsive to
feedback and assignment work though.
Interest: 9/10
Definitely a key subject if you want to go into anything electronics or digital circuits. I found the
content and labs very interesting. It's a good alternative for electrical engineers who don't want to go
down the power engineering side of things.
Overall: 7/10
Got 61 in this subject, easy enough to pass (they mark the final exam quite easy) but you have to work
pretty hard for the final exam to do well in my opinion.

ELEC3610 - E-Business Analysis and Design

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 10/10

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If you've done the prerequisites (info2120, info2110) then this will be a walk in the park. Write up a
project specification document for an online business idea and build a prototype website for it. The
software they provide will code everything for you, all the design is done by click and dragging
models of your prototype.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Jorge Villalon)
Jorge Villalon was our lecturer. He was fun to listen to but the content wasn't anything to write home
about (I guess that isn't really his fault though). The marking guidelines for some of the assignments
weren't very clear cut unless you actually asked a tutor though, and even then they sometimes
contradicted each other.
Interest: 7/10
Pretty interesting, but I would've liked to focus more on the website development and webapp side of
things. However this is what the corresponding ELEC3609 subject next semester is for apparently.
Overall: 9/10
Easy marks, I got 78 and only studied the morning of the subject (had a really tough exam the day
before). It's an open book exam as well and you don't need that 40% rule the IT department usually
sets. Definitely would recommend for either elec engos looking for a 3rd year elective or BCST
students looking for a 3rd year core subject.
Electron Microscopy (EMHU)
EMHU3001 - Electron Microscopy and Imaging/Theory

Semester 2 2014
This unit will take up most of your time (study timetable at university). The classes are usually small
(as seen in the past few years). You do not need in depth knowledge in physics, chemistry nor
anatomy and histology for this unit as the content you are being taught will be done from scratch. This
unit is easy to keep up with seeing a lot of information is available online. [Ease: 6/10 | Lecturer:
7/10 | Interest: 5/10 | Overall: 6.5/10]

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 Engineering - General (ENGG)
ENGG1800 - Engineering Disciplines (Intro) Stream A

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 9/10
Takes you around the different engineering faculties - 4 weeks of Civil and Chemical and 1 week each
for Aero, Mechanical, Mechatronics and Biomedical (AMME).
Civil was the most challenging, throwing you in the deep end in the first tute - telling you to do
random physics/civil eng calculations with minimal explanation beforehand.
The first Civil eng tute was the most fucked I've ever felt in uni so far (and it was on my first day lol).
Box building was shit. Paddlepop bridge was quite fun with moolah if you won.
Chemical was piss easy - just basic HSC mole calculations and formulas to chuck in.
AMME wasn't too bad for the most part. Mechanical quiz had random questions not covered in the
lecture. Biomed presentation was boring.
Final exam is a joke.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Rob Wheen, Marjorie Valix)
Both lecturers were boring but covered the content they were supposed to. The mechanical
engineering lecturer needs to stop talking shit about other engineering disciplines.
Interest (1/10)
Useless for people who have already chosen a discipline.
Overall (4/10)
Shit subject but easily passable. Good WAM booster.

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 5/10
Lecturer - 5/10
Interest - 6/10
Overall - 6/10

Semester 1 2009
Ease: Easy

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12 x 3 hour labs each usually worth 3% final grade. 2 essays (around 2000 - 3000 words) worth 3%
also. Unsure about exam really, no previous papers released. Will update this post after the exam.
Civil - hardest, but tutors were good at explaining things (unlike the next two)
AMME - easy, just regurgitate information from handouts.
ChemE - easy, just follow the handouts
Interest: Some
Civil Engineering module was interesting. Professor Wheen covered bridges and gave some
interesting lectures.
AMME module was crap, the lecturer read off a powerpoint slide about the degrees offered and job
prospects and really bored the fuck out of everyone.
ChemE module was actually what I wanted the most and turned out to be playing around with dodgey
hydrogen cars and doing mundane calculations.
Lecturer: Mostly shit
Each module had a different lecturer. Wheen was good with his bridges. Valix was average with her
hydrogen. Here's a professor who gives a lecture on an essay which is due in 1 hour. Onya! AMME
guy mumbled and read from a power point slide some garbage about how great engineering at USyd
is. Didn't like emails, please save questions for the 1 hour time slot each week. There was a guest
lecturer who spoke about her career as a Chemical Engineer. It was supposed to be the topic on "What
is Chemical Engineering" but we heard about a PhD now working in Risk Management...
Labs: Average
My biggest gripe was AMME labs (and essay), the tutors would mark the logbooks without any name
nor any comments. Nawakowski liked to play music in labs and threaten to "dismember limbs" if
anyone should break the dodgy hydrogen cars in the ChemE lab. Apparently he doesn't like first years.
In Civil we were made to do an assessment on Gannt charts, critical paths, resource levelling project
management garbage on paper. Apparently it was to teach us... I think they were too cheap to let us
use a computer with oh I don't know, say MS Project installed.When we were doing the tower
construction lab the tutor called out to everyone by the type of t-shirt they were wearing. This was
very unprofessional.Oh yay I love Engineering at USyd, please can I do some more.
Overall: Refund please
A 6 credit point course at ~ $900 stolen from all those who thought they'd learn about the various
engineering disciplines. Haha suckers we got your money nyanya!The highlight was the last lab with
a tour of the ChemE department... yes we actually paid to be shown the admin area, the BBQ area
(with lots of leaves and broken tables) and a lab area with some equipment the tutor did not know
about."And in this room here is some research on carbon nano tubes... the head researcher gets lots of
awards" :mad1:
Would you recommend this course to a friend? NO, not even to an enemy.

ENGG1801 - Engineering Computing

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 8/10
Designed for students with no programming experience. Excel part was pretty easy and
straightforward whereas MATLAB was a bit challenging towards the end of the course with lots of
logic required for the most of the harder codes.
The logic was definitely a speed bump, but once you have that nailed it's all downhill from there and
the content isn't really too bad.
3 Lab exams throughout the semester was good revision for the topics learnt and helps with clarifying
the concepts you find difficult.
Even though the ENGG1801 website was allowed during the lab exams, giving access to lecture
slides, lab exercises etc it wasn't as big a bonus as you think, since the thinking process is the most
important however always handy if you forget syntax or a few less common codes.
A double sided 'cheat sheet' is allowed in the final (which is pen and paper).
Lecturer: 10/10 (Jason Chan)

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This guy is a BOSS. He knows his shit and gives clear explanations, allows students to follow along
and makes sure they don't get too sidetracked by repeating difficult concepts at least 3 times in the
lecture. Very approachable both at the end of the lecture and outside of class to answer any queries.
Gives a 2 minute break in the middle of the lecture to give students time to regather, as content can be
a bit overwhelming at times (especially in the second half of MATLAB). Motivational speeches might
be a bit too much for some but I found them interesting and did not impact on him finishing the
lecture on time. Cool suit.
Interest: 8/10
Excel and MATLAB were both really useful outside of the subject, allows you to process large
amounts of data like marks for a subject and where you ranked etc.
Cool applications in first semester maths courses - 3D plotting used in MATH1001 and matrix stuff in
MATH1002.
Overall: 9/10
Fun and easy course. Definitely would recommend to students as an elective or an alternative to
INFO1103 if doing engineering.

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 3/10
Lecturer - 3/10
Interest - 1/10
Overall - 2/10

ENGG1805 - Professional Engineering and IT

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 4/10
This course should have been a cakewalk. But when half your group drops out/never shows up, it can
be hard. Also, I don't see how bridge building (specifically, the marking of said bridge) is relevant to
IT students. The quizzes (which comprise most of the course's marks, as there is no final exam)
contained trivial questions, and questions on lecture(r)s that didn't exist and lab content that we had
not been through.
Lecturer(s): 3/10
One of the lecturers had a tendency to go 'ehhhhhhhmmmm' after every sentence, which I found
hilarious. (probably because I had been driven into a state of insanity by the tenacity of the course)
But other than that, the 2 hour lectures they delivered were unbelievably boring. Lecture attendance
dwindled to below 20% by the end, and people were only really attending because they were
assessing us on the trivial content of the guest lecturer's speeches. (eg. What was the role of X at X
company?) Even most of the guest lecturers managed to be as boring as the standard lecturers.
Interest: 1/10
This is core unit, which apparently only exists due to the requirements for ACS accreditation. Having
to build a bridge, write pointless reports and presentations, maintain a 'lab notebook' on trivial lab
content and be tested on content that had nothing to do with anything - this course really only exists to
frustrate you.
Overall: 0/10
This really is an abomination of a unit. If I knew how to make a formal complaint, I probably would.
The only redeeming factor would be my tutor (thanks Aengus!) - and even so, it was initially so bad
that I had to change labs (my previous tutor was incredibly condescending, and made the 2 hour lab
feel like 2 years in Gitmo). I personally believe that the feedback sheets just get flushed down the
Carslaw toilets, where they clog them up. They then remove them and then use them to paper mache a
statue of a child slumped over his desk, having been abused by 13 weeks of grating, irrelevant torture.

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Semester 1 2010
Ease: 3/10
This is without doubt the most useless compulsory unit ever, you learn nothing and they get you to
build a wooden bridge as a group project.
Lecturer(s): 1/10
All the lecturers are very boring, one of them spent 30mins getting the projector in the law annex
auditorium to work. All of us stopped attending the lecturers, while this means that you will probably
fail one of your quizzes, we just don't care anymore.
Interest: 3/10
Not very interesting. At one stage, the lecturer started talking about cheese-making to gain our
attention.
Overall: 2/10
If it wasn't compulsory, no BIT/BE(Software) student would be doing this course..

English (ENGL)
ENGL1002 - Narratives of Romance and Adventure

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
It wasn't debilitatingly difficult, but I was somewhat uncertain about how to address the questions and
ideas we encountered, at least in essay form. The medieval section is perhaps the hardest. The essay
questions were reasonable, and the exam was ok so long as you could talk about narrative theory.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Lawrence Warner and others)
Lawrence Warner, the co-ordinator of the course, is wonderful and hilarious, though some people
found his style a little haphazard. The others were less dazzling after Lawrence, but good nonetheless.
Interest: 7/10
The texts are really good, though I wasn't enthralled by the medieval texts that had to be read in the
original old English language - Gulliver's Travels was my favourite text of the lot. When we analysed
the texts, the guiding ideas of "romance" and "adventure" were hard to grasp, given the terms were
never really defined. It all seemed a little vague, which made the exam difficult to approach. I did like
the texts and lecturers, though, so I still recommend it.
Overall: 7/10
It was interesting, and a good introduction to university English. Given the choice between this
subject and Australian Literature, this one was the easier and more popular option.

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 8/10
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 7/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
I managed to finish my major essay in 1.5 hours
Lecturer: 2/10
I quit going to lectures after the first three
Interest: 0/10

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As I said, I gave up on going cause I was that bored
Overall: 3/10
The subject matter is completely dry. I feel completely unable get into it. Our tutor isn't particularly
inspiring either... even those who've been into the subject material have been complaining.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
As always there was a lot to read, but if you knew your stuff and were willing to read everything
there was no problem. A lot of the assignment questions were quite broad, so there was a lot of
latitude in what you wanted to argue or explore based on the text.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Liam Semler)
Great lectures, both informative and genuinely interesting (and funny!) by Liam Semler. Even people
I know who weren't that into the course enjoyed the lectures.
Interest: 8/10
Great texts, I found this much better in developing general English critical thinking skills about
narrative and discourse than ENGL1025.
Overall: 9/10
Loved it
ENGL1007 - Language, Texts and Time

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
There is a lot of subject material to learn in this unit. But it's manageable if you're committed. The
assessments are a little on the difficult side, too, but the highest marks remain achievable with effort.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Nick Riemer)
I've seen subject reviews about this unit before, and I think Dr. Nick Riemer gets a bad rap. He's got
some complex ideas to explain at times, but he gets them across well. His lectures are always very
clearly structured, and well linked to the readers. He's quirky, which adds a bizarre sense of humour at
times.
Interest: 7/10
I'll admit, some of my classmates found this subject terribly boring. I didn't find it so
bad, though, even if the readings can be incredibly tedious at times. There's a lot of interesting stuff to
get out of this unit, if you want it.
Overall: 7/10
I think this unit has been getting overly negative reviews. It can be difficult, but high
marks are within reach, and the lectures rarely get bogged down on one boring point for anything
more than 10 minutes. If the handbook outline sounds interesting to you, don't be put off this unit by
word of mouth.

Semester 1 2008
Ease and Interest- 5/10
I definitely didn't find this easy, seeing as I failed the second assignment. As said before there's a lot
of stuff covered here, the upside being you're probably bound to like at least one topic here given it's
broad-ness (mine were the politics of English and EME). There's a lot of downsides so I won't bother
going into it I would recommend going to the lectures rather than dodging it and instead going
through the brick. If you were doing linguistics simultaneously the phonetics and semantics stuff were
covered in both units.
Lecturers - 6/10
My mate and I thought Dr. Nick sounded like Hamish Blake. haha, his style of delivery and
presentation was alright but it does look a lot better compared to the "guest" lecturers: Dr. Warner
was funny but I didn't get anything out of him. Dr. Anlezark (sp?) was boring and I got nothing out of
him, so he pulls this rating down. Although it would be have been a lot better had they given us a

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detailed criteria how they were going to mark the essay.
Overall - 6/10
Definitely the hardest course in my first semester. It made me seriously think about dropping my sem
2 ENGL unit, but thinking about it my effort reflects my mark - average. It's definitely not a
"filler"/"bludge" subject. Only do it if you're persevering to do an English major.

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 6/10
Quite difficult, this one. Assessments are VERY much 'trial and error' & 'hit and miss'!
Lecturer - 8/10
I enjoyed most of the lectures. Guest speakers were good, Nick Riemer was good
also. LOTS of note-taking though.
Interest - 6/10 overall
Some bits were 8/10, some bits were 3/10. Opinions vary.
Overall - 7/10
Only for those who really LOVE English, and I mean the language itself, not the writing-wanky-
essays part. The exam was very difficult, by the way.

Semester 1 2007
Ease - 0/10
And if I could give it a negative number I would do so. This is hands-down the hardest course I have
ever taken at university. It has a very, very complex textbook along with a 500-page reader brick,
which lets you know from the very outset that this course is going to be not only very intensive and a
lot of work, but a lot of hard work.
The assessment is broken down into two grammatical exercises (15% each), in which I failed the first
one and by some miracle scraped a pass in the second one. These are ridiculously hard, and vague to
boot. I spent longer writing those exercises than I usually do on major essays -- and I still only
managed to either guess or Google the answers to half the questions. There's a major essay (1,500
words; 40%) which is rather difficult because the questions were pretty esoteric, but I found one on
intellectual property which meant I could somehow twist it into a political/historical essay. It's scary
that the essay was the easiest part of the assessment schedule because it seriously took a lot more
work than most do.
The exam (30%) is tomorrow and judging by practice exams available on WebCT, I'll be lucky to
salvage five marks from it. Seriously, we're expected to know the phonetic alphabet, a million
complex grammar rules, poetry techniques, Old and Middle English and a bunch of semiotics and
cram that all into a 90-minute exam. I'm doomed.
To put it simply, I ended up being totally lost by the end of the first two weeks and never recovered. It
remains the only subject in which I have ever failed an assessment, and as far as I know I've not
spoken to anyone who's really done exceptionally well in it. Even the WebCT anonymous discussion
boards are filled with people who are totally lost.
I'm doing two senior English courses this semester and even if you combine them in difficulty it
doesn't touch this course. I don't know what the fuck the English department were thinking when they
made this a first year course.
Lecturer - 5/10 (Nick Riemer)
I stopped attending lectures after a while because I got too confused, and Eastern Avenue auditorium
didn't have anywhere convenient for me to plug my laptop in so I couldn't type up notes (my laptop
has a very, very short battery life) anyway. Nick Riemer is a nice guy and very approachable, but he's
softly spoken and doesn't explain things particularly well. He seemed to waffle for a fair bit and
launched into insanely complex topics without much background or explanation. I'd mark him down
but the fact he made himself so available for consultation and on WebCT was a real bonus - you really
needed the clarification sometimes!
Interest - 2/10
I thought this could be interesting (most first year English subjects are pretty awful and this looked to
be the best) but I don't have much to say about it because I zoned out very early on due to the overly

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technical and complex nature of the subject. The fact that I ended up so lost meant that I stopped
being interested very early on. In fact, I wouldn't even be able to tell you what went on in more than
one or two of the tutorials because I just ended up daydreaming (or occasionally writing fic on my
laptop).
Overall - 1/10
Like I said earlier, this could have been an interesting course but they just crammed too much into it.
Not only did they cram a lot of material in, but it was a lot of complex material. This could easily
have been two or three courses. It was just too much to learn. I will never understand why they made
this a first year course. It was much more difficult than any senior English unit I have ever done and it
would have probably been better as a 3000-level unit - no, I'm not kidding, that's how difficult it was!

ENGL1008 - Australian Texts: International Contexts

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 6/10 (Too much to read!)
Interest 6/10
Overall - 6/10
ENGL1009 - Reading English Texts

NOTE: ENGL1009 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 7/10
Two essays with a number of options to write on, both of which you are given ample time for; but
should you need it, requesting a general extension with the simple words "I need more time" will give
you an extra week with no penalties. The final exam is a mix of ease and terror. Pay attention weeks
9-12, because the essays you need to write in the final exam will be on any one of those poems/prose.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Bruce Gardiner, Huw Griffiths, Lawrence Warner and others)
Dr Bruce Gardiner is of particular note, as his lectures are a stream of consciousness that is thrown at
you, filled with the most incredible knowledge... just try and keep up with him. Huw Griffiths and
Lawrence Warner are also great. A nice wide variety of lecturers, ranging from interesting and
insightful, to fall asleep, mind-numbing boredom. The latter was rare though.
Interest: 8/10
Simply a great course, filled with some amazing literature.
Overall: 8/10
Highly recommended and a great introduction to the world of English Literature.

ENGL2603 - Imagining America

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Nothing too hard. There's a wide range of texts, not a lot of reading to be done, and the texts available
were mostly accessible and interesting. Negative points for restrictive essay and take home questions;
I'd have preferred more choice. The essay was ONLY on Huck Finn, where we had a choice of two
passages.
Lecturer: 9/10 (David Kelly)
David Kelly was a lot better in this subject than in subjects I'd previously taken with him. I think that
might be more to do with interest, than his skill as a lecturer, because he's pretty good, clear and
enthusiastic about the subject. Extra points for his use of webCT, online lectures, etc.
Interest: 9/10

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The thread that holds the course together concerns how America was created, imagined and sustained.
Very original content, especially when it came to contemporary texts like Gangs of New York.
Perhaps not so interesting when it came to Walt Whitman.
Overall: 8/10
Very decent English unit. Texts were given a thorough analysis in how they relate to the imagining of
America. Well put together, good lecturer, good texts, though the assessment questions were perhaps
too restrictive.

ENGL2607 - Drama: Classical to Renaissance

NOTE: ENGL2607 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
You are expected to read every play, although I actually got away with only reading about three of
them. I wouldn't say this subject is easy because its asking you to combine drama with english, but
you do get a lot of help and guidance which made it an easier ordeal
Lecturer: 7/10 (Huw Griffiths)
You can tell the subject is Huw's baby. He was really enthusiastic about the subject. It also meant he
was more willing to give feedback and offer suggestions.
Interest: 4/10
I tried to stay very positive about this subject, but upon reflection I feel that I didn't really ever fully
enjoy the subject. It was certainly enlightening but everything felt forced.
Overall: 6/10
A well-thought out and supportive subject. However it is not for everyone.

ENGL2611 - Jane Austen, Then and Now

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
Too much reading. We got through 5 Austen novels by the end of the semester. I actually read three of
them. Weekly tutorials also required us to bring in two questions relating to the novels/lectures as
well, meaning you had to do some work on it every week. You can't use the same text for the
assessments so that also forces you to read the texts or look them up.
Lecturer: 5/10
So, as per usual, I didn't really attend the lectures. The few I went to, Nicola was her amazing
articulate analytic self and raised a gazillion awesome points. Then she put them up on WebCT so that
was good. There's two other lectures, Will Christie and someone else. Will Christie is really bad.
Honestly, the man spoke really quickly and discussed about a bunch of useless, unrelated material to
his original point which I've already forgotten by the end of his rambling. He also didn't put up notes.
Interest: 7/10
Austen is surprisingly interesting. I really enjoyed the tutorial discussions.
Overall 7/10
Bumping the overall up to 7 because you can Sparknotes/Wiki all Austen's novels so it's not too hard
to complete the course. Also it got me to appreciate Austen, so it must be pretty good.

ENGL2613 - Literature, Politics and Modernity

Unknown Date

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Ease - 8.5/10
The assessment for this course is fantastic. You have one tutorial presentation (10%), one reflection
on the discussion that evolved out of your presentation (10%, 500 words), one mini research essay
(35%, 1,500 words) and one major research essay (45%, 2,000 words). I think this is essentially as
close to perfect as one can get for an assessment schedule, especially given there's no participation
marks and no exam, and there's no way Arts lecturers will stop with the format of tutorial
presentations week in, week out (I hate tutorials because of this). Everything is straightforward, you
have a lot of leeway in topics for all assessments and for the major essay you can invent your own.
The only thing I found moderately difficult was the first mini-essay (the 1,500 word one) because I
didn't "click" with the politics of the person I was writing about and so I found it hard to stop being
sarcastic in my essay.
Lecturer - 8.5/10 (Peter Marks)
Dr Peter Marks is absolutely fascinating (apparently he gets applauded at the end of every lecture in
the other unit he runs, which is Literature and Cinema). I also had him as a tutor. He knows his stuff,
he has an opinion but he doesn't force it on you, he's interesting and he's approachable (for example,
he marked me down for having a friend sit in on my presentation, when I explained the reasoning
behind it he agreed to revise my mark). Also, he allows you to have debates in class and allows all
viewpoints (education faculty could learn from him) and he's happy for anyone to develop essay
topics that interest them even if they're not course material (my major essay was on libertarian
theory). The only problem I had with him was that either his microphone was broken or his voice
wasn't loud enough - this could have been possibly the room we were in for the lectures, I don't know.
It just made things a little hard to hear sometimes.
Interest - 8/10
I loved the idea of this subject - politics and reading, what could be more interesting, particularly
since it was an examination of the politics in the texts and not a "let's force this opinion on you"
course. It lived up to my expectations, mostly. Most of the material was left-slanted but it was
balanced enough that I enjoyed it. Also, a lot of the texts were fascinating - you get to do Orwell (The
Road to Wigan Pier) and Solzhenitsyn (One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich) which to me is a
huge bonus.
Langston Hughes was awful (if you're radical left you'll enjoy him, maybe it was that I wrote an essay
on his poems and had trouble taking them seriously), LeCarre (Spy Who Came In From The Cold)
and Algren (Man With The Golden Arm) were meh. On the whole, the text selection was varied and
decent and Dr Marks even put in Friedrich Augustus von Hayek (*love*) as one of the
supplementaries!
Tutorial presentation/seminar format was boring, to be honest, but I always have that problem.
Sometimes the resulting discussions were fabulous, other times I wanted to tear my hair out, and
other times I was watching the clock.
Bonus marks for allowing us to write on our interests and for interesting tutorial discussions at times.
Overall - 8.5/10
This is hands-down the best English course I've taken for assessment structure, lecturer and interest
value. It also has the best selection of texts (and considering I'm currently doing a course with Harry
Potter as a text, which runs a close second, that's saying something). I love the balance of the course,
it didn't feel like Dr Marks (even though he was left himself) was pushing opinions on you, you were
encouraged to think, and it ended up being really fascinating. Anyone who's even remotely politically-
minded (of either end of the spectrum) who is doing English should look into this course, it's
wonderful.

ENGL2617 - Postmodernism

NOTE: ENGL2617 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2009

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Ease: 8/10
Will likes to make the purpose of his courses, and the methods of assessment crystal clear. This is
good. Texts weren't hard and were genuinely enjoyable, and both the major essay and exam had scope
for choice.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Will Christie and others)
Will's good, but he takes only the introduction and conclusion (since he is about as far removed from
postmodernism as possible). So usually, it's some other dude who takes it. Other than Will you'll get
an assortment of English lecturers, all of whom are competent and pretty interesting with the sole
exception of the Borderlands lecture (terrible book, mediocre lecturer).
Interest: 7/10
I went into the course with rage for the subject matter, but came out delighted as it was all pretty
involving and the texts are genuinely enjoyable. In rough order they are: The Crying of Lot 49, some
shitty poetry, Borderlands, Trainspotting (book + film), Fight Club (book), No Country for Old Men
(book), Hot Fuzz, The Office (UK).
Overall: 7/10
Very good English subject. Highly recommended. Could have done with more theory based stuff but
meh.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 6/10
I went to about 1/3 of the lectures at most. I did about four readings, and spent most of my time in
tutes having no idea about what was going on. I managed to get 77% in the assessment (not including
the final essay), so I must have done something right.
Lecturer: 5/10
Julian was a good lecturer, but there were a lot of assumptions made about prior knowledge that I
didn't quite agree with. I also thought that he went through the lectures too quickly, with no actual link
to how each lecture fit into the course as a whole.
Interest: 4/10
Postmodernism is pretty big in the HSC syllabus at the moment. I only did this course because I
thought it might be useful in the future. I did, however, find some of the theories very interesting, and
the photo essay I chose to do at the end was a lot of fun to set up and write (though it wasn't very good
for my bank account).
Overall: 5/10
Difficult information with a couple of interesting readings thrown in, reasonably easy assessments and
decent marks. Can't bring myself to give this less than a pass.

Unknown Date
Ease: 6/10
A varied range of texts and some very intimidating theory (Adorno and the Language poets in
particular), though as always, if you're willing to make an effort it all comes together etc.
Lecturers: 8/10
Both Julian and Stefan were great lecturers in my opinion, very knowledgeable and enthusiastic. The
above post said something to the effect that the lectures didn't seem to hang together as one whole
course, but for me that was part of the appeal; there was so much subject matter that you really could
pick and choose which aspects of the course you liked or disliked before applying your knowledge to
any given text. Some very animated and enjoyable tutorials were also a highlight.
Interest: 8/10
As I said before the vast range of material meant that there was something for everyone, and I really
loved Pynchon, Hedwig, and Baudrillard. Also giving students the chance to do a photo essay, blog, or
short story for the final assessment was a welcome change.
Overall: 8.5/10
Loved it.

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 ENGL2627 - Screening Sexuality

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 5/10
A load of wanky intellectual wankery about crap. We studied quite a few good films which was fun,
BUT the lectures were hard to follow and always crammed in too much to think about in one hour.
The readings were similarly obscure and half the time had absolutely nothing to do with the films we
studied and went off on weird tangents about...I don't even know. Luckily it's one of those "give your
own interpretation" kind of subjects so it's not like you were going to fail if you neglected to analyse
the films from their wanky perspective but still. It was hard. English nerds would probably disagree
with me. I'm just finding university English in general to be shit. Oh yeah and the exam was a bit
WTF as well.
Lecturers: 5/10 (Melissa Hardie and others)
As above, lectures were too hard to follow. Points for attempts at humour but otherwise meh.
Interest: 5/10
Some things were interesting, most of it had me scratching my head in confusion or frustration or
sleeping out of boredom
Overall: 5/10
Don't do it unless you like over-analysing everything to death in a really weird way

ENGL2638 - Literature and Cinema

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 5/10
Texts are a bit dry, the workload is a bit high and idk, bit dodgy overall so it was hard to remain
enthusiastic.
Lecturers: 5/10 (David Kelly, Peter Marks)
Mediocre. Lectures are all recorded, which is a nice touch.
Interest: 3/10
It sounds like a really good subject but it's not that good. The seminars were way too big to get any
value from them, and each one is a student presentation, which is rubbish for a senior English subject
in my opinion. Texts are as follows: A Streetcar Named Desire (film + play), Adaptation (film), A
Clockwork Orange (film + novel), Oedipus Rex, Rope, Maltese Falcon (novel + film), The
Dispossessed, Brazil. Sounds like a good text list yes? Agreed. Pity the presentation and subject
matter and...everything doesn't reflect that.
Overall: 5/10
Very mediocre indeed.

ENGL2650 - Reading Poetry

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
You are expected to read a lot of poetry but I actually got away with only reading a handful of poems.
I did really well in this and I was quite surprised. Also, you do not need to buy the Norton Anthology.
All the poems you will need can be accessed on Google. Save yourself the money and the back pain.
Lecturers: 5/10
The lecturers know their stuff, but there were no visual aids, audio files etc. which made it way too
easy to fall asleep or lose concentration. The Yeats lecturer was particularly hard to listen to.
Interest: 7/10

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Sonnet bit was good because it was quite diverse and short. However the 'type' of poem studied in this
subject changes every year. We also did Yeats and Victorian Religious Poetry, both of which I found
quite boring.
Overall: 6/10
It's an alright course, It’s not as intimidating as they make it seem. You just need to show a bit of
initiative and you should be fine.

Semester 1 2010
I may have *some* useful comments to make, even though I didn't go so well in the exam.
Ease: 7/10
Reading lots of poetry is important. It's all in the textbooks though, you don't need to look elsewhere
(although the Norton Anthology is very heavy).
Lecturers: 8/10 (Bruce Gardiner, Barry Spurr and others)
It might even be higher, except the lectures = all there was: no audio files, no slides (except for
sonnets guy), no PDFs. Just talking. We had Bruce Gardiner, Barry Spurr, and, umm, the shakespeare
sonnets renaissance drama guy. They're all pretty good, they just cover a LOT in every lecture and it's
hard to get it all down. But that's OK because you're not being tested on the lectures.
Interest: 6/10
Sonnets: 8/10 I really liked this part of the course, the first few weeks. Sonnets are very interesting,
very small and bite-sized so easy to get through :-)
Yeats: 3/10 The lectures were good (Bruce Gardiner I think?) and the poetry is at least slightly
interesting, but still. Kinda dreary.
Victorian religious poetry: 5/10 Kinda vague, also some of the poems were REALLY long.
Overall: 7/10
It is not a bad course at all, I just found the poetry kinda hard to get through once we got past the easy
little sonnets. Your mileage WILL vary because I understand they pick a different form, poet and
period for every year.

ENGL2653 - Western Theories of Language

NOTE: ENGL2653 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 5/10
It's not that the content was really difficult. There was just a lot of it. The linguistic majors ate it up,
but sadly I am not a linguistics major, so... yeah.
Also, 90% of the course was due over the last 3 weeks (the essay and the exam). Good for some, bad
for others.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting. The history of grammar interlinks with the history of Western thought and Western
civilisation in general, so that was pretty cool.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Nick Riemer, Bruce Gardiner)
Nick Riemer is awesome. Bruce Gardiner was good too I guess.
Overall: 5/10
The higher-order thinking required by this course just went *whoosh*, over my head. *sighs*

ENGL2657 - Myths, Legends and Heroes

NOTE: ENGL2657 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

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Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
It was OK, but I don't think the aim/focus of the subject was made clear enough at the start. The actual
content was not actually hard to grasp it was more the way it was taught, IMO. I don't feel like I learnt
much from this course at all.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Daniel Anlezark and others)
Daniel Anlezark has a nice easy going lecturing style and it's pretty clear he knows his stuff (as for
conveying it clearly, well.). We had a couple of guest lecturers, one was SO BAD, some geriatric who
couldn't talk without fumbling every sentence and didn't understand how to work the projector thing.
Other one was quite good, she took us for the Old Norse part of the course. Sorry don't remember
names.
Interest: 5/10
Totally subjective. If you like this kind of thing then clearly you will find it interesting. I didn't. I was
expecting something a little different to what the course actually turned out to be about so eh.
Overall: 6/10

ENGL2660 - Reading the Nation: American Literature

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
Not hard. Texts are easy and some fun is to be had with them. They range from mediocre (Ceremony)
to fantastic (Revolutionary Road). You only have to have read a maximum of three of the set texts to
get through the exam and essay, which is nice, and means that the initially hefty reading requirements
are very relaxed.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Sarah Gleeson-White)
Sarah's not bad. She just reads her notes though and doesn't record them, which is bad. Very, very bad.
But meh. She's a nice lady though who's very open for consultation and has lots of communication in
her subject, so I can't complain there.
Interest: 8/10
Pretty good for an English subject in my opinion. The texts are strung together with an interesting
central theme. Truth be told, it would have been nice to have some positive US writings in the unit but
you can't have everything. Only one text was a little drab and that was Ceremony, but I enjoyed bits of
that too. Texts are: The Ox-Bow Incident, Richard Wright short stories, Invisible Man, Flannery
O'Connor short stories, Revolutionary Road, Ceremony, Outer Dark
Overall: 7.5/10
Pretty decent for an English subject. Easy, interesting and a good selection of texts,

ENGL3603 - Contemporary British Literature

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Reading material is easy, tutorials are okay (hopefully you get a good group!). Only problem is the
first assignment is a whopping 40% then an in-class presentation with report which is 25% and the
final is 35%. The reading material for the first few weeks isn't as interesting as the material later on in
the semester.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Peter Marks)
Peter Marks is a pretty dodgy lecturer. He mixed up a lot of the assignment dates and put most of
them on public holidays. He also got stuck in London during the volcano ash thing and that really
messed up the order for lectures/tuts/reading. He's really nice though, records all the lectures + puts up
the PowerPoints. He responds pretty quickly to emails as well.

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Interest: 5/10
We studied Ian McEwan, Jeanette Winterson and looked at Monty Python, Bridget Jones' Diary,
Atonement and Bend It Like Beckham. These were all in the latter stages of the semester though. The
beginning had a lot of poetry.
Overall 6/10
Easy easy English credit class. Take home exam was the best but the first 40% assignment was a
killer. Readings were relatively easy each week too.

ENGL3623 - The 18th Century: Scandal & Sociability

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 5/10
Assignments are straightforward. You have two essays and three online discussion posts. The only
reason this gets a 5 is because the material you have to get through is utter shit. Do not do this subject
if you can't stand reading 18th century text about women written by men with stupid unexplainable
excessive use of capitals. If you do take this class, just remember, all the reading material is available
online as an e-book. Don't waste your time and money buying them.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Nicola Parsons)
Nicola Parsons is wonderful and nice. Individual comments. Posts up powerpoints AND notes. Easy
to follow lecturing style. She did get a bit lazy near the end of the semester where she just lumped
everything all the notes from various weeks together and posted it in one go though. That was
annoying.
Interest: 1/10
Apologies in advance to everyone who enjoys this course/material. As I said, the whole course is
reading about women who have been portrayed by men through their writing about their scandalous
lives and how a real lady should really act. Otherwise you looked at the guy who wrote the dictionary.
That was bullshit. The only interesting part was the beginning of the course where you looked at
Habermas and the public sphere - and even then, the reading was confusing.
Overall: 6/10
Nicola Parsons is the only saving grace to for this class.

Entomology (ENTO)
ENTO2001 - Introductory Entomology

Semester 2 2011
Ease: 5/10
Exam was easy but you need to catch 50 different insects, this was mad.
Interest: 7/10
Overall 6/10

Environmental Statistics (ENVX)

ENVX1001 - Introductory Statistical Methods

NOTE: ENVX1001 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

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Semester 1 2011
Ease: 8/10
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 8/10

Environmental Studies (ENVI)

ENVI3111/3911 – Environmental Law and Ethics (Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 8/10
Nothing in this course is conceptually hard, at all. The only thing is that you're kind of expected to be
cluey about environmental law in Australia, important cases and things like that. If you have that
common knowledge already, great, but otherwise, prepare to go through some reading. Personally, I
just remembered the names of 3-4 major pieces of legislation (eg EPBC Act) and a few different
(about 5) cases for the exam and used some common sense to write answers. The environmental
ethics section went through concepts in ethics and applied them in an environmental context which
wasn't that hard.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Josephine Gillespie 6/10, Gemma Smart 10/10)
Josephine Gillespie (6) is a pretty boring lecturer, if you ask me but she's a very friendly person and
quite approachable. I didn't really like her as a lecturer because she didn't really catch my interest and
much of her content is just raw information to remember and put together to make an essay - not that
cool. Gemma Smart (10) is possible one of my favourite lecturers to date, and definitely my favourite
outside of chemistry. She explains things (ethics) in a really straight forward way for you to
understand and goes into different scenarios and discusses how they would apply - she likes to
occasionally do a "show of hands" to see what people think of particular scenarios which is cool to
see how uniform or divided the class' opinion on a matter is.
Interest: 7/10
I was not that interested in environmental law, at all. However, environmental ethics was awesome -
ironically for me, taught by HPSC. So you know, assessment is a 3000 word essay for law, 2000 word
essay for ethics and a final exam with environmental law only! Unfortunately, the ethics section was
only 25% of the course and I really wish it was more since I loved it.
Overall: 7/10
Basically, environmental law section is pretty boring but the ethics section is awesome. Gemma Smart
gets the someth1ng approval!

ENVI3114/3914 - Energy and the Environment

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Semester 2 2014
Ease: 10/10
It's a stupidly easy course, if you want, you could use this unit as a WAM booster, honestly. The
content is like, high school level difficulty. It's a joke that it's a unit that counts to a/my major.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Chris Dey)
Chris Dey is decent and interesting - he conveys stuff clearly which is nice but the assessments are
retarded - make sure you use excessive sig figs because I used the right sig figs and got marked down,
just stick to 5 sig figs and you'll be fine.
Interest: 8/10
Interesting but I knew everything the course had to offer before even starting so I didn't learn
anything, really.
Overall: 9/10
Easy unit - did all the assessments and you basically don't have class for half the semester.

Finance (FINC)
FINC2011 - Corporate Finance I

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 7/10
To be honest, and I have no idea why, I didn't expect the course to essentially be applied
microeconomics. Points deducted for my own silliness - being the first business school subject I've
taken, I didn't realise that the assignment was supposed to be written in the way that an actual report
would be written in the real world, rather than the academic mumbo-jumbo that I actually turned in.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Tro Kortian)
I liked Dr Kortian.
Interest: 8/10
I guess I had an interest in the topic area beforehand, so I found it quite enjoyable.
Overall: 8/10
Overall, the course is a pretty solid introduction to the topic.

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 7.5/10
Not too bad a course. Keep on top of things, smash effective rates and you'll be fine. Assignment is
seriously time consuming though, you will waste a good week on that if you want a good mark (80%
+) which is very doable and probably required to get a good overall mark. Final was a bit tough, but
fair. They asked us to do 3x3 covariance which was annoying but luckily id memorised that one.
Lecturers: 7/10
Amy is great, 9/10, explains things well and is extremely nice. If you have her be happy. Craig 5/10.
Pretty boring and not that helpful, go to his lectures if you like but not the biggest deal in the world if
you miss them.
Interest: 8/10
I found the course overall to be pretty interesting, the capital budgeting was a bit boring but i liked
time value of money, IRR and some of the risk parts.
Overall: 8/10
If you're majoring in finance, it's a solid intro to basic concepts. A little bit on the tricky side, so
probably wouldn’t pick it as a WAM boosting elective.

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Semester 1 2008
Ease - 2/10
This was one HARD subject. The mid semester exam was bearable. The assignment was so hard, it
Didn’t matter how early you started, the night before you would still be up crunching away at it. The
final was even worse, many walked out knowing they had failed, I walked out with about 10%
certain. However, the marks were better than expected
Lecturers - 4.66/10
8/10 Julianne is so funny and entertaining. No one can make finance bearable the way in
which she can. Frino 6/10 ...knows his stuff but not very entertaining. Tro 0/10 don’t even bother
going in his weeks
Interest - 4/10
I’m interested in finance but not enough to major in it. Economics is much hotter
Overall - 3/10
Definitely a hard subject. Don’t do it if you just need to fill an elective. There are other
subjects with much easier marks. This is a risky elective as many people fail finance.

Unknown Date
Major assignment was better than expected...so was the final. Should go well, touch wood.
Overall: 8/10

FINC2012 - Corporate Finance II

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 5/10
A very hard subject, group assignment was marked relatively harshly, mid-semester was challenging
as was the final. I found it fair but hard. The final didn't seem as hard as last semester's final but was
still very challenging and definitely tried to test your understanding of the course. Received a 70,
lowest mark this year for me (WAM was 77.5 this year).
Lecturers: 6/10 (Amy Kwan, Hui Zheng)
Amy was a great lecturer, unfortunately she got stuck with all the boring weeks. First 2 weeks are
revision and the capital budgeting/taxation is very uninteresting. Hui was atrocious, don't even know
why I bothered showing up he spends about 20-30minutes turning late, talking about useless things
like Turnitin or other admin crap and finishes early too. Could easily condense his lectures into an
hour if he wanted.
Interest: 7.5/10
At the time, a lot of cap budgeting was boring as anything especially calculations for tax shields. But
after doing the course a lot of the content was exceedingly useful for finance, Pecking order theory,
yields, risk/return, financial distress, debt/equity etc.
Overall: 6/10
Essential course for finance (and required) but boring at times and VERY hard. Be prepared, study
hard and hopefully it won’t drag down your WAM too much if you want to major in Finance.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
Did no work all semester (course related, assignment was on real estate unrelated to the course but
related to the lecturer's paper he was writing /rolls eyes gg Frino). But managed to cram all in stuvac
reasonably well.
Lecturers: 4/10
Boring, boring, boring.
Interest: 7/10

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Interesting stuff about options etc. in my opinion.
Overall: 6.5/10
Not a fan of the finance discipline (it's a bit all over the place in my opinion).

Unknown Date
Ease: 6/10
Fairly difficult, but I love finance
Lecturers: 4/10 (Mark Van De Vyver 2/10, Graham Partington 6/10)
OK overall
Interest: 8/10
I love it, when you're dancing in my arms
Overall: 8.5/10
Fairly cool subject

FINC3011 - International Financial Management

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
An overall pretty easy subject. Mid-exam (25%) was probably the hardest assessment. However if
you can get your hands on a previous mid exam, then you should be set; otherwise it comes as a bit of
a shock if you expect it to be the same as tute questions (in terms of ease). Group assignment (20%)
was straightforward (putting together 20 pages on your own topic of interest). In lectures, not much
new stuff after about week 9, and there is a lot of repetition in the concepts the whole way through.
Final exam (45%) was fair; everything to know was from the lecture notes/tutes. Tutorial
attendance/participation = 10%.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Juan Yao)
Juan is clearly no linguist, and always copped the slack for it. Nevertheless, the lecture notes were
pretty much perfect: much more helpful and detailed than other senior level finance subjects. Plus
Juan was really helpful in person and responded quickly to emails.
Interest: 6/10
Some topics were really interesting (e.g. forecasting), the other half were just shitty financial theory
(e.g. parity conditions).
Overall: 8/10
Once you get used to Juan’s speaking, and past learning some of the tough new concepts, the subject
is actually quite easy and fair.

FINC3013 - Mergers and Acquisitions

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 3/10
Probably not that hard if you do the work, but that's a bit unlikely considering how fucking boring it
is.
Lecturers: 1/10
Shit. Didn't go after Mid-Semester. Was told by my friends this was a wise decision.
Interest: 0/10
Thought I'd be really interested in this…was sorely disappointed.
Overall: 1/10
Easily the worst Finance subject I've done and my expected average performance in it

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will probably preclude me from doing honours.

FINC3015 - Financial Valuation: A Case Study Approach

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 5/10
The three very anal individual case studies were a constant struggle. They are worth only 10% each
(should be worth twice as much in my opinion). However despite the difficulty, it is easier to score
higher assignment marks than in other finance subjects. Also there are no questions or homework, and
through the case studies you are forced to really grasp the concepts and thus study. Plus you can use
all of your knowledge from the individual case studies in the group case study worth 35%. The final
exam (worth 35%) was fair, there was not much study required; about 1/3 of it was based on prior
finance subjects (such as capital budgeting and cash flows).
Lecturer: 8/10 (Joel Fabre)
Seriously boring lecture, but Joel was very responsive to questions on blackboard (his replies would
take up a whole page). Recommended that you attend as there is a lot of stuff in the lecture notes that
is not assessable, and he constantly gives out tips regarding the case studies.
Interest: 8/10
Interesting subject, only pulled down by the mental rape inflicted by the individual case studies.
Overall: 7.5/10
Once you get past the hell of the individual case studies, it’s all downhill and repetitive from there.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
I found the case studies fairly simple managed to receive nearly full marks in the 2nd and 3rd one.
Overall people found them challenging however. the final isn't too hard too
Lecturer: 3/10
Joel Fabre sucks, boring voice, thinks he’s funny when he isn’t, didn’t understand what he was talking
about in lectures
Interest: 10/10
I found the valuation of companies very interesting.
Overall: 8.5/10
Highly recommend it for anyone doing finance major

FINC3017 - Investments and Portfolio Management

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 4/10
The lectures are deceptively easy and brushed over very quickly. However, this is not what is reflected
in the assessment tasks. They are deliberately designed to trick you as they are supposed make you
"think" and test if you really understand everything clearly. There are hardly any straightforward
questions at all. It's one of those subjects where you can study for the entire course early and still not
get half the questions in the exam. Also, there are REQUIRED readings of specific journal articles (In
particular, the Roll paper to criticise CAPM) which are directly examined in the final exam (much like
HSC English where you have to read a text and then get asked questions about it). I did not like
reliving those days of regurgitating an analysis of a prescribed text.
Lecturer: 5/10
Kerry is an evil witch. She's okay at lecturing and often gives some quite entertaining anecdotal
examples. That's probably the only good thing I can say about her. However, she is ruthless when it
comes to exam questions and she enjoys it. She has one of those "arrogant grumpy old lady"
personalities and always tries to assert her views onto the lecture. For example, this course is

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supposed to be about fund management and ironically she has a grudge against active fund managers
for ripping people off because they never beat the market in their portfolios. For fks sake why lecture
this course if that's how you feel about them?
Interest: 7/10
Not exactly interesting, it's just about extensions of CAPM and pricing models along with portfolio
management strategies, derivatives, bonds and hedging. However, I did find the behavioural finance
lecture very interesting (basically psychology and finance put together). There should really be a
behavioural finance unit in 3rd year.
Overall: 6/10
This unit was not what I expected it to be. Before Kerry came along, apparently this course used to be
really easy. Thanks to her for killing it.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 10/10
The two mid semester exams, worth 15 and 20% respectively, were piss easy (average being almost
HD). Final exam (65%) was a bit harder, but still easy relative to FINC3011.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Robert Wixted)
There were some good laughs had and Robert provided interesting and practical insights to careers in
finance. However there were some errors and gaping holes in the lecture notes which required you to
carefully fill in by reading the text book (never a fun task). Also many lectures were based on 2 or
even 3 textbook topics, yet only half of the lecture was dedicated to the lecture notes themselves.
Interest: 6/10
The material is dry and there is much revision of corporate finance I and II. However Robert’s real life
stories from finance were very interesting.
Overall: 8.5/10
It’s all worth it considering the ease of the subject. And Robert is actually a great guy.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
Easiest finance subject I’ve done
Lecturer: 8/10
Although he spoke about shit most of the time he was a top bloke. (Jiri)
Interest: 7/10
Yeah same as other finance subjects really.
Overall: 7.5/10

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8.5/10
I initially made the mistake of this course thinking it was going to be mathsy, WRONG and hence I
got owned in the mid-sem. It's more like here is the situation explain why and maybe a quant question
where u do it and explain why. Also do the readings as they will be examined in the final, though the
lecturer kept telling us that over and over and over again. If you listen to what Kerry says in the final
review lecture there will be no surprises for the final. However I did find myself taking a moment to
think as opposed to diving head first the question which I normally do. Lots of writing in the final
including the reasoning for the quant questions. I was very unsure as to how I went seeing as I thought
I did well in the mid-semester and didn't, but obviously what I did in the final was the BS that they
were expecting. I was expecting at best 65 overall but got above 80.
Lecturers: 6.5/10 (Kerry Pattenden, Andrew Lepone, Mark Van De Vyver)
Kerry Pattenden is a nut case, who keeps telling us that we should never manager her super and that a
passive investment strategy is the best. However, if you listen to what she says and ignore her smart
ass remarks she does teach you the stuff and tell you what is in the final. Andrew Lepone aka the
goofy uncle, not too bad just starting out, did improve his techniques from the two lectures he took

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for Trading and Dealing in Semester 2 last year. Dr Mark Van de Vyver was a shit boring lecturer. My
tutor was a lazy shit who didn't really teach us anything. Furthermore I was extremely ticked off
as after the final I found out that apparently the tutors were meant to go through a question on last
year’s paper which was very similar to the one we got.
Interest: 7/10
I had done most of the stuff before through financial metrics, derivatives and FINC2012. I hate to say
it but I did find behavioural FINC interesting.
Overall: 7/10
I needed one subject to finish my finance major and chose this thinking it would be quantity. It wasn't,
I thought I was going to do shit but somehow did a hell of a lot better than I expected.

French Studies (FRNC)

FRNC1631/1632 - Junior French Advanced 5/Junior French Advanced 6

Semesters 1 & 2 2006

These two subjects are basically the same; 6 is just a continuation of 5.
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer - 7/10
Nothing special
Interest - 5/10
The crap course made me lose interest in an otherwise interesting subject.
Overall - 7/10

Gender Studies (GCST)

GCST2610 - Intimacy, Love and Friendship

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10
Most people laugh at the name of ‘Intimacy, Love and Friendship’, although it is not as easy to study
as it sounds. Some of the readings were quite dense, thick and really required complete attention to
understand. The course goes into much deeper topics than the UOS title suggests.
Lecturer: 6/10
She was kind of … off-topic sometimes and was quite eccentric. Sometimes, it seemed like the
material presented had nothing to do with the course, although she’d later surprise us by tying it to
major course concepts. This is a woman who showed us scenes of ‘Sex and The City’ – the movie and
blasted Barry Manilow in the General Lecture Theatre. Believe it or not, it actually had links to the
course topic.
Interest: 6/10
The course is divided into three components as its UOS title suggests, and I found intimacy and love
to be the most interesting. The best part of the course was a student-run lecture on the concept of love

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– and it was by far the most compelling, engaging and challenging thing I have seen in a lecture so far
at USYD.
Overall: 7/10
Assessment structure was good (there’s a 50% essay instead of an exam, so make sure you go to the
lectures/ weekly online reflections were fairly easy at only 100 words), content was fairly interesting
and readings were well proportioned.

Geosciences (GEOS)
GEOS1001 - Earth, Environment and Society

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 7/10
It definitely wasn’t a *hard* course but I found it quite difficult because I am not a good rote learner.
Also, I found it incredibly boring (all of it) as it was mostly just a pile of facts and information - not
much required conceptual understanding.
Lecturer - 5/10
There were 4 lecturers, each teaching for a few weeks where they had one 2 hour lecture per week -
the fact that it was 2 hours made it incredibly boring an staying there for the second hour was a pure
waste of precious time. After one hour, you get immensely bored of the lecture - you sometimes get
bored after 30 minutes as the course is just that bland.
Interest - 0/10
Linking back to the lecturer section - it was really bad in terms of interest. It was mostly rote learning
and you don’t really get much out of it. If I could turn back time, I would have picked something else
to do. The field trip of Long Reef was the worst - it was such a disappointment as it was poorly
organised - we were never told where we were so it made it difficult when the field trip quiz came.
They even asked questions that weren’t covered in the lectures (for the field trip quiz). The tutorials
were also pretty bad - using ArcGIS was quite lame and boring. The women were quite good, though.
Overall - 3/10
I would say this is the least enjoyable subject that I did during my first semester - it has left me with
disappointment in the School of Geosciences. Considering that I did incredibly bad in a heavily
weighted assessment (25%) and still passed, just shows that this unit is one that is easy to pass.

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 10/10
Very easy course, going into the final I was already sitting on a credit.
Lecturers: 6.5/10 (Webster 3/10, Aitchison 8/10, Pritchard 8/10, Gillespie 7/10)
Webster was unorganised, and his slides are a joke. Aitchison was pretty decent; good content and
great slides. Pritchard was really nice guy and had good slides. Gillespie was a really lovely lady but
reads direct quotes a bit too much, super helpful if stuck on anything though.

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Interest: 10/10 then 5/10
The change from geology to geography (human) is not one I personally enjoyed
Overall: 8/10
Great course, easy so would make a good WAM booster, would and will recommend. Tutorials are a
bit boring but generally don't go for long, presentation involves group work but luckily I had a good
group, scientific report and mid semester exam were extremely easy, final exam was a bit more
difficult.

GEOS1902 - Introductory Geography (Advanced)

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 9/10
Very easy, no I didn't do HSC Geography. The online quizzes (6 if I remember correctly) after your
tutorials are very simple MC-worth 20% and I got almost full marks. The group work component of
GEOS1902 was good as it is an Advanced course, the people you do group work with are likely more
intelligent than yourself, so it makes it a breeze. Everyone pitched in and did their respective part and
we scored well overall. (this is the only part that differed to normal, if you do normal it's a 30%
individual essay). We got to pick our own project and each of us a section of interest for it. The final
exam is 3 essays in 2 hrs (yes flashbacks to HSC English). I was a bit rusty from not having done an
essay since being at uni (lol #sciencelyf) but managed to get down about 10 pages with some pretty
diagrams, as the questions were quite broad, you had scope to bring in a large range of examples.
Lecturers - 9/10 (Kurt Iveson, Dale Dominey-Howes, Dan Harris)
Well Kurt is probably my second favourite professor of all time (after Danny Liu). You know when a
2 hour lecture feels shorter than your regular 1hr lectures, they are lecturing well.
Dale has also had a really interesting background in natural hazards and makes his lectures very
interesting as well.
Dan's a bit boring at times, but he only lectures a little compared to the other two.
Interest - 8/10
The series of lectures are very interesting. Firstly you begin with looking at 'What is Geography?' and
its key concepts/perceptions have changed. Then we had a 3 lecture series on Hurricane Katrina
which was probably my fave of the course. I loved the second part looking at the social vulnerabilities
of NO in particular. For the physical geographers, there was a lot on hurricane formation and
migration. Then there was a lecture on the risk of Tsunamis in Australia. There was a two part on Haiti
Earthquake that was also interesting. There was a two part lecture series on Desertification in Darfur
which I also liked a lot. Also a lecture on Pacific Climate change and a two part lecture series on
Mega Deltas. Only points of for interest was that the 'pracs' (they are really tutorials) are a waste of
time, my tutor was bleh. Boring because people would take like 50 mins to finish the readings and I'd
be done in 10 mins.
Overall - 9/10
This subject was like having pina coladas on the beach and I'm so glad OzKo recommended I take it
*thumbs up*. I really enjoyed it and Geography is going to be a major for me.

GEOS2111 - Natural Hazards: A GIS Approach

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
The first half of the course on cyclones, earthquakes and tsunami's seems difficult when considering
the maths involved, but you learn that none of that is assessable in the final exam, and hardly any
appears in the online quizzes. So instead, you're assessed on the more basic stuff about those natural
hazards. The second half of the course is about the easiest shit I've done at uni. It's year 7 crap.
Lecturers: 4/10 (Patrice Rey, Maria Seton)

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Patrice is fine, he gets a 4/5. Bit hard to understand at times. Maria is terrible. She gets a 0. Boring,
boring, boring. You'd be right not to turn up once Patrice is finished.
Interest: 4/10
The disaster stuff was pretty cool. Everyone loves learning about cyclones and earthquakes. The GIS
stuff was dry, and like I said, more suited to a year 7 class. It was hard to remain focused, and hence,
my study for this section was inhibited by how boring it was.
Labs: 8/10
The first half of the course has labs concerning data manipulation in Excel, which is a little dry. But
later on, you get to map earthquakes and construct a pretty cool hazard map using ArcGIS, based on
what data you found in the field trip. Learning how to use this program, ArcGIS, is of supreme utility
and it was fairly rewarding. Easy too!
Overall: 5/10

GEOS2115 - Oceans, Coasts & Climate Change

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
Not an incredibly hard course but since I didn't really have any knowledge outside in first year first
semester (GEOS1001), I really didn't have any prior knowledge of the stuff being taught. It's not that
hard but there can be a lot of content in this course to remember, particularly for the essays in the final
exam which can be quite difficult if you don't know a whole lot about what is taught. I highly
recommend turning up to ALL lectures. The labs can be a bit challenging, particularly the Atlantis
project but once you understand how to use the programs, it's quite straight forward. The PETM one is
really easy as all of the information you need is on the Carleton College website (where they link you
to) and you can just cite everything they use for virtually full marks.
Lecturer: 9/10
All of the lecturers were incredible - I thoroughly enjoyed every lecture, even if the content was new
or difficult for me to grasp. All lecturers were clear, organised and taught the content in a way that
even someone without background could understand. The issue which took 1 mark off was that the
lecture recording didn't show the slides so they were hard to follow but if you attended them (which I
did), you would have absolutely no problems.
Interest: 9/10
This course gives quite a well-rounded teaching of oceans, coasts and climate change as you would
expect. I really couldn't ask for more. What more is there to say? The title of the course sets you up
quite well and the description is decent.
Overall: 8/10
Overall, this was a really good course - much better than GEOS1001. This subject singlehandedly got
me interested in actually majoring in Environmental Studies. I highly recommend this course.

GEOS2121 - Environmental and Resource Management

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 7/10
Strange course, I'm good at water sensitive urban design (WSUD) but that's about it...lol. It's a pretty
random course so it's not that cool but it's straight forward, not real concepts to understand - just
information.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Phil McManus, Jeffrey Nielson)
Good lecturers all-around, I find GEOS to have pretty much lecturers, generally.
Interest: 7/10
Unlike ENVI3114, I didn't really know much about this stuff so it was good to learn - WSUD was
particularly interesting. The rest was content that was so-so.
Overall: 7.5/10

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Most of the assessments aren't difficult in nature, just be good at essays and working in a team, turn
up to lectures if you can (I didn't turn up to any after the 2nd week).

German Studies (GRMN)

GRMN1111 - Junior German 1

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
I was about to drop this course after the first week – the initial grammar lessons can be very scary,
especially if you have never learnt another language in such a structured method. However, stick with
the course, be dedicated with your learning and it’ll be easy.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Andrea Bandhauer)
Andrea Bandhauer was an intimidating woman, however she became much more nicer in GRMN1122
(review below). Nevertheless, she was only like this during her lectures because it was her teaching
method (I assume) to scare students into learning something – and there’s nothing like public shaming
in front a whole lecture to make you remember something.
Interest: 9/10
My tutors were wonderful and the class was so fun! Learning how to speak German and utilise it was
very rewarding.
Overall: 9/10
Highly recommended.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
Requires a lot of work, especially seeing as this semester was the first time it covered the whole
textbook in one semester (used to cover it in one year). Wasn't structured too well: we spent about 1-
1.5 weeks per chapter in the start of semester, but in the last 3 lessons, we covered 2 chapters and a lot
of grammar. I also thought the assessment weightings were stupid: 3 tests totalling 40%, then one
worth 60%.
Interest: 8/10
Very fun course.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Andrea Bandhauer)

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She seemed a bit scary in lectures, although she's apparently good in tutes. My tutor was good though.
Overall: 8/10
I liked the course, it's very fun although it requires a lot of work.

GRMN1122 - Junior German 2

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 9/10
After finishing GRMN1111, this unit seems unbelievably ‘easy’ – and it is! Once you get through the
first round of grammar from the previous unit, it becomes much more easier. However, you need to
ensure you keep practicing your new grammar and vocabulary each week for this to happen.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Andrea Bandhauer)
The same lecturer from GRMN1111- the head of the German Department, Andrea Bandhauer. I think
she was much more nicer this semester because we weren’t absolute beginner idiots anymore. The
bottom line was that she was effective in her teaching.
Interest: 9/10
German was by far the most fun, engaging and rewarding unit to complete. The tutorial sizes for
GRMN1122 are quite small so you actually do get to know your fellow classmates and the tutors were
very fun and friendly. It’s only difficult if you don’t keep up with the work and feel completely lost all
the time.
Overall: 9/10
Highly recommended.

GRMN1311/1322 - Junior German 5/Junior German 6

Semesters 1 & 2 2006

Ease - 8.5/10
I like German. I loved it at school. It's not giving me much grief at uni at all.
Lecturers - 8/10
Emilie, Kenny and Udo were/are great.
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8/10

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 Government and International Relations (GOVT)

GOVT1101 - Australian Politics

Semester 2 2009
Ease 8/10
If you're familiar with Australian politics at all, a lot of the course will be like revision. I found it was
very similar to year 10 commerce. The assignments were marked fairly harshly though.
Lecturer 6/10
Rodney was fine. There was nothing particularly memorable about him at all though. Wasn't bad,
wasn't good.
Interest 5/10
It was very dry. I went into the course hoping I'd come out caring about Australian politics. I still
don't.
Overall: 6/10
I wouldn't recommend doing it. I can't think of a single thing I learnt. But it wasn't like it was arduous.
Other than the fact the lectures were in Bosch.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
The content of the course was pretty easy - Rodney (the lecturer) broke down the topics in a
manageable way, and everything was basically in the textbook. If you have a keen interest in
Australian politics, you will find this easy, especially considering that the exam consisted of short-
answers only and that you were given a wide scope for your essay.
Lecturer: 8/10
Rodney Smith was a pretty good lecturer - engaging, communicated well and actively tried to
participate the entire class into contributing when brainstorming ideas (or demonstrating how certain
systems work eg- preferential voting). He taught the materials in a clear, concise and chronological
order.

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Interest: 7/10
Some bits such as party politics was interesting, but some other areas were just plain dull eg -
federalism and to some extent, the public sector. All in all, the content was able to sustain my interest
until the end of the unit.
Overall: 7.5/10
Would do it again.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
If you love Australian politics already, this won’t be of much difficulty for you. The assignment
structure was done very nicely – a bunch of small assignments which led up to the major 40% essay,
so we received feedback for development on the way while receiving marks for things such as essay
plans. The exam was excellent in regards to its structure – 20 questions of a maximum 100 (or 150?)
word limit. The questions were quite easy if you had turned up to the lectures and done the readings,
which were one chapter of a textbook per week.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Rodney Smith)
Rodney Smith structured the content very well and was prepared with the content.
Interest: 7/10
Although I fell asleep in many lectures, it was an engaging and interesting unit with an excellent
assignment structure, especially for first-year students.
Overall: 8/10
Good lecturer, content wasn’t difficult and well-structured assessments.
Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7.5/10
Nothing in the course was particularly brain-bending, and a good knowledge of the textbook and
lecture notes was generally sufficient for the exam. The assessments were pretty dodgy. They
expected too much from the very short bibliographic assignment, and they did that hateful thing
where they specify the type of sources they want you to use, so you had to use a web site, a
government/NGO report, and so on even if there weren't any particularly relevant ones. It took me
forever to find a report on my topic, and it wasn't even in Fisher or online, so I had to trek over to the
State Library to get it. It wouldn't surprise me if people whose research was less thorough than mine
never found a report. So that was pretty poorly thought through by Shelly. Also, most of the essay
options relied on a recent case study, which was a problem because they were so recent (2006 stem
cell debate, McKew for Bennelong, Brian Burke) that there was no academic literature on them.
Again, poorly thought through. Also, some of the questions were quite unclear, a problem which
carried over into the exam. But for all those complaints, if you got started early and researched
thoroughly there was no real difficulty with the assessments. I got a high credit in the essay and
assignment, and probably would've got a distinction if I'd addressed the case study more.
Lecturer: N/A (Shelly Savage)
I didn't go to the lectures because of a timetable clash. Props to Shelly for having comprehensive
notes in the lecture PowerPoints she put on Blackboard, though.
Interest: 8/10
Most of the stuff in this course I found pretty interesting, but I've always been interested in
government and civics so that was always going to be the case. Standouts for me were figuring out
that elections and parliaments are about far more than simply selecting a government, most of the
stuff about federalism/the constitution/the High Court, and some of the stuff about the public service
and neoliberalism. But bear in mind that since I didn't go to the lectures these judgements are based
on my own interest in the topics and the reading, not on how the material is presented.
Overall: 7.5/10
This course felt pretty nothingy to me, probably because the only time I spent on it in a normal week
was the tute and about an hour skimming the readings. However, I feel that doing the essay and
preparing for the exam did give me an appreciation of the workings of democracy and Australian
government which I didn't have before, which is a good thing, I suppose. It was reasonably
interesting, so if you want to major in GOVT or just want a better understanding of the government

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then I'd recommend this subject.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 6/10
It's not hard by any means, the subject matter is straight forward, the lectures are sufficient and the
resource book/text book is full of extra information that's useful. On the other hand, it's quite tedious
to have to remember a lot of stuff. It's not hard, but it's also not very exciting. The essay was a major
furfy as well. The questions were a little vague, and the marking criteria not all that obvious. Perhaps
the Economics faculty should take a page out of the Education faculties book and make criteria
abundantly clear, and actually mark off the criteria so student knows what they're meant to be aiming
for.
The bibliographic essay was a bit of a joke. It's incredibly hard to articulate an entire essay in one
page, shortening it down so that it's short, but also appearing as if you know what you're talking
about. I didn't do too well in my bibliographic essay, and I think that the poor structure of a
preliminary essay which is marked as an actual essay is a bit contradictory, and dumb. Maybe that's
just me though...
Lecturer: 6.5/10 (Shelly Savage)
I had the lecturer, Shelly Savage as the tutor too. I'm a little torn about Shelly. On the one hand, she
articulated things quite well, organised the content in a good way and made things fairly straight
forward. Her lectures were quite interesting at times. On the other hand, she didn't make much of an
effort to make her lectures really interesting (something which is a pity, in this field), I dozed off a
few times in her two hour lectures, and I found her personality to be one of being 'head and shoulders
above the rest of the scum' type personality. She seems like a snob, and as such I can't really profess
to like the lady. Her references to "political scientists", 'sif there is any such thing pissed me off to no
end. Fortunately, she kept those references to a minimum (although the resource book was full of it).
Interest: 7/10
Interesting for sure...for the most part. The stuff about policy and interest groups was deathly boring,
but the content about federation, the constitution and media was actually quite stimulating. Everyone
knows what Australian Politics is about though, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that something so
diverse would have parts that are interesting to some, and boring to others. It should also be said, that
her lecturing style sometimes made the boring parts a little more boring, but also made the exciting
parts (media/constitution) a lot more exciting.
Overall: 6.5/10
It's a decent course, let down by monotony, occasionally shabby lecturing and an overall personality
clash of the subject with my own interests. There's a definite air, or what I perceived to be an air of
this subject being a prestigious subject. The references to "political science", the lecturer, the subject
matter didn't really bode well with me. I'll also say that it seemed to be, that the course and the
content was a bit of a case of overcomplicating things, or so it seemed to me. The "policy cycle" is a
great example. It's a case of taking something so simple, and creating something out of nothing. There
was an aura of that around most matters in this course. It's extremely difficult to articulate how it sits
with me. It just seemed a little snobby is all. I guess that's a personal preference though, and doesn't
really speak for the subject...kind of. Still, a decent introduction to Australian Politics and fairly
interesting all around. I'll be steering clear from this discipline from now on though (probably because
I don't have much more space for electives.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 10/10
If you already follow politics, most of the content will be familiar. Even so, most of the stuff is basic.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Shelly Savage)
She manages to sustain interest
Interest: 9.5/10
As quite a political person, I find the course to be quite stimulating.
Overall: 8.5/10

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Semester 1 2005
Ease - 10/10
Lecturer - 5/10
Ariadne - if it’s the other one you're better off.
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 7.5/10

GOVT1105 - Geopolitics

Semester 1 2011
Ease - 7/10
The overarching concepts of the unit were pretty easy to understand. The essay topics were also
straightforward - the first one was essentially describing various geopolitical theories. However, the
readings were a bit heavy and some of the concepts in the readings seemed farfetched.
Lecturer - 6/10 (Diarmuid Maguire)
I had Diarmuid Maguire. He's funny, in a pathetically dry manner. However, he primarily read off the
lecture slides. After the first lecture, I stopped attending and I found that I could just copy and paste
the slides content and leave it at that. The only lecture I really listened to was the exam topics lecture.
My tutor, Patrick, was also hit and miss. He's sartorially down and obviously smart, but he needs to
work on directing the class and explaining concepts better. After a mid-sem feedback session, he
slightly improved.
Interest - 6/10
Hit and miss overall. The popular geopolitics section was very interesting. I think my interest in it
might've been maintained if there was more enthusiasm from the lecturers/tutors.
Overall - 6/10
Relatively interesting content that could've been improved on by other aspects of the unit.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 5/10
The only topic I really found interesting was the Rise of China… everything else was kind of dull and
I fell asleep many times during the 2-hour lectures. Some people loved it and found it very engaging –
lots of tutorial arguments over things such as the War on Terrorism, the positives/negatives of
Nationalism and globalisation. Some of the lecture content also didn’t seem well linked to the actual
concept of geopolitics. The exam consists of an entire section on very specific parts of the reader
(which is massive in content) so yes, you’ll actually have to do them. I truly hated the reader – I did
do my notes every week on them, but by the time I had to read them, it was just all so dull and boring,
it didn’t absorb in my mind at all.
Lecturers: 5/10 (Diarmuid Maguire)
Previous GOVT1105 reviews have stated that Diarmuid tends to mumble and drift off a lot…. I can
confirm that. However, he wasn’t that bad and got through the material in a structured way. Next
year’s (2010) GOVT unit have a different lecturer though.
Interest: 3/10
I liked the Rise of China and that was all. Enough said.
Overall: 3/10
It wouldn’t have been that bad of a subject if it wasn’t for the sheer massive size of the reading
content. Just another topic for GOVT major students to go through. I wouldn’t have done this unit if I
wasn’t forced to.

Semester 2 2008

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Ease: 8/10
Pretty straightforward, you just have to adapt your brain to think about everything in a
geopolitical sense (which was kind of hard at the beginning of the course). The assignments weren’t
overly hard, but the exam was pretty tough - you needed to have extensive knowledge of the readings;
I actually found the essays to be easier than the short answers in the exam. Plus, for me, I had a tutor
that was a really hard marker.
Lecturer: 7.5/10 (Diarmuid Maguire)
Diarmuid is a bit of a mixed bag; at times he was great, wasn’t ever boring, made some jokes that
were pretty funny at times, and he kept lectures contemporary. Though he did have the tendency to
trail off, mumble and whisper at the end of a sentence, which made things difficult sometimes.
Interest: 10/10
I loved the content of this course, it’s exactly the kind of thing I’m interested in.
Overall: 9/10
Great course overall. The only negative thing I have to say about it, is about my tutor. He was a great
guy and everything, but he just tended to treat as like children at times. And he was a very, let me say
that again, VERY strict marker, which put a damper on things, especially when I thought that my
essay deserved a higher mark than it got. Ah well. But yeah, definitely recommended for anyone
interested in government and international relations.

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 7/10
Most of the interesting stuff - on the rise of China, resource geopolitics and that sort of thing - was
pretty easy, but the more abstract topics, mostly the cultural ones, were a bit more difficult to grasp,
especially considering their apparent irrelevance to the course. (I also had a rambling replacement
tutor for some of those topics, so that's probably part of it.) In terms of assessment, I thought that two
750-word assignments as well as a 2000-word essay was slightly (although only slightly) excessive
for a junior unit. I would reduce it to just the bibliographic assignment and the essay, since the critical
reading assignment was utterly pointless. It involved taking two articles, allegedly written from
opposite sides of the same issue, and writing a comparison: but since most of the article pairs were
only tangentially related, it was pretty difficult. The essay itself wasn't too bad as long as you stuck to
the easy topics, although I felt they marked a bit harshly.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Diarmuid Maguire)
I'm finding it hard to come to a conclusion about Diarmuid. Some of the lectures were quite
interesting, but he tended to ramble a bit or cover things in a very shallow manner (sometimes it
seemed that his geopolitical analyses basically involved thinking of as many aspects of sovereignty,
economics, culture and territory for a topic as he could, then listing them). His lectures need more
detail to engage people a bit more, I think. I'd like to single out the lecture on protest for criticism: it
was confusing, boring and apparently pointless, as it didn't have an attached tute or readings and
didn't come up in the exam. Apparently he just talked about it because it happens to be his research
topic. It was hell. But for all that criticism, I thought that Diarmuid was slightly OK. He gave just
about enough of an overview - if you could strip back the rambling - to allow you to work out the
bare bones of the topic, to which you could then add the readings and your own thoughts to get some
idea of the topics. I'd also like to praise Betsi Beem's guest lecture, which was excellent, and
refreshingly detailed and structured compared to Diarmuid.
Interest: 6/10
As I've been saying, some of it was interesting. Much of it was appalling. Much of the reason for that
appallingness was the difficulty in understanding what the topics we were studying had to do with the
course. Sometimes they'd have a geopolitical topic - like migration and refugees, or the political
aspects of sport - but then give us readings largely irrelevant to the geopolitical aspects of the topic,
and/or fail to tie it back to the core of the course in the tute. The lectures didn't explain the links very
well either.
Overall: 6.5/10
Unfocused, unfocused, unfocused. Some weeks were really good - the ones about resources and
geostrategy and generally what the course description suggested the course was about - but a

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significant number didn't really seem to have any relevance to anything. The lack of coherence in the
course made it extremely difficult to study for in some cases, and left you with the feeling that you
hadn't really learnt much at all. I'd find it hard to recommend this course to anyone who isn't forced to
do it by their degree (poor fools), and I'd like to emphasise to people considering doing junior
government and IR that GOVT1101 Australian Politics is probably the pick of a bad bunch. Do that
instead.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
Lecturer: 2/10
Interest: 4/10
Overall: 4/10
I didn’t like this course at all. A few reasons existed for this
1. I didn’t like Diarmuid Maguire at all. I found that he trailed off at the end of sentences, making it
hard to listen and to follow a train of thought. He tended to mumble and his information often didn’t
really correlate to the subject matter at hand.
2. The course content is interesting, don’t get me wrong. But the way its presented in lectures makes it
look like mould, the tutorials don’t really further the information at all, the readings tend to be a little
off kilter to the subject matter and the assessment material were COMPLETLEY off centre. Not to
mention the final exam didn’t actually test what it said it would.
3 .Geopolitics (as a school of thought) is largely defunct anyway, so studying it seemed to be a little
pointless. Admittedly its making a comeback, but nonetheless, Diarmuid didn’t really point out the
links or relevance at all.
I’ve found that people tend to fall into two categories with this course. They either love Diarmuid and
hence, the course, or they hate him and the course.
Oh, he’s supposed to be a Neo-Marxist too - I didn’t really see much bias there, but then again, I slept
through most of the lectures anyways so maybe there was, maybe there wasn’t, I have no idea.
The assessment for this unit was APPALLING. It was all over the shop. We were told that the exam
content would come from the readings and tutorials - instead they were obscure facts here and there
mishmashed from lectures or some readings. The major essays were also unrelated to course content.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
The content isn’t hard but it is very boring - it’s difficult to concentrate on what you’re doing)
Lecturer: 3/10
Unorganised, doesn't explain things very well, and sometimes he trails off his sentences so that you
don’t know what he is saying. Also, lectures are 2 hours long - and finish at 6pm.
Interest: 5/10
Some weeks are interesting, some aren't. The readings are deadly boring.
Overall: 4.5/10
Not as interesting and fun as it sounds in the faculty handbook.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
The exam required you to discuss specific details from the readings but it was easy enough to
remember. Tutorial content, especially from the reader was more important than the generality of the
lectures and text.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Diarmuid Maguire)
Lectures were very interesting. Diarmuid Maguire speaks well, I don't get it when people say he's
boring.
Interest: 10/10
I love government + international relations.

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Overall: 9/10
Geopolitics especially- examining how international relations are influenced by the economics etc. of
geography, is so cool.

Unknown Date
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: 4/10
Interest: 8.5/10
Overall: 7/10

GOVT1202 - World Politics

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 4/10
The first assessment was really difficult, a 'roadmap' for answering a question which would then
actually be answered in the second essay. And the readings were so long and technical. The exam is
not an essay but a multiple choice, which seems good but actually it was so hard even if you did do
the readings, the terminology was so very difficult. that.. my HD mark fell to a final mark
Lecturers: 5/10 (Gil Merom)
Dr Merom is really nice, and genuinely tries to be helpful. But unfortunately, he tends to go on and on
and on about really easy concepts, like power, yet in the exam there was so much hard issues he
should have elaborated on. Even though I am usually good at listening etc, I just found it impossible
to pay attention.. A lot of people often left halfway. Many of us just gave up and stopped coming to
the lectures. Annoyingly, there is no web CT recordings, just notes - but they pointed out the main
issues and so they were adequate.
Interest: 2/10
Whilst the realism paradigm appealed to me, overall, I found the topics pointless and far too
theoretical i.e. as opposed to ECOP which involved real world engagement. The tutorial readings were
so dry and boring. And the tutes were horrible. Two mature age students dominated the discussions,
and our tutor always made us do these activities she found 'fun' like role playing a UN negotiation
between Iran USA and Israel. It was NOT fun. Also, everyone had really really biased and extreme
views, which I found scary.
Overall: 2/10
Horrible. I wanted to do GOVT as my major. Now I am staying clear from politics!!! It makes you
realise how pointless the subject is, and it just feels really irrelevant, plus it is difficult in a bad way.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 3/10
I hated it more than anything, readings were boring, essay was long and fucked and the exam was
farcical. Too many readings, which are too hard to read due to their absolute blandness.
Lecturer: 0/10
Worst ever, cannot be understood. Went to half the first lecture and that was the extent of my
involvement with him. He was just so painful. Tutor was ok, but knew my hatred of the course so
didn’t like me.
Interest: 0/10
Absolute pointless piece of shit. Why do you have to throw complex and confusing theory onto
common sense concepts. I just hated it.
Overall: 1/10
I can't believe I passed. Worst subject ever. DO NOT DO IT. I can happily say that will be the last
connection I will ever have with the Economics faculty. Fuck you Government and fuck you
economics.

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Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
The subject is quite easy overall, but the exam will pwn you hardcore. The average for this multiple
choice exam is below 50%, so that's saying something. A lot of the questions will be very obscure.
However, there were also waaaaay too many readings.
Lecturer: 2/10 (Gil Merom)
I learnt the least from Gil, compared to any of my past lecturers. It's strange. No matter how hard I
tried to concentrate and listen, I couldn't. There's something about his voice that does that to you.
Interest: 5/10
The concept of the course, world politics, interested me, but the execution of the
course didn't. Some of the readings were rather interesting, but overall, I would avoid this subject.
Overall: 3/10
Very boring subject, which is compounded by a horrible lecturer. I wish that I enjoyed
it a lot more, but sadly, it was crap. I'm also going to stay away from the discipline of govt in the
future.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
I found the assessment essays to be particularly difficult. It takes a long time to actually figure out
what you're arguing, in relation to political theory. The exam was multiple choice based entirely on
the concepts of the readings. If you actually have time to study the readings that much, you will do
well in the exam. Because I didn't have time to do that.. my HD mark fell to a final mark of C. It was
very difficult in this subject, more than any other for me, to balance the challenging assignments with
the completion of course work.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Gil Merom)
I was one of the few people that liked Gil Merom. It's very difficult to follow what he's saying
initially, not at all because of his accent, but just his style of speaking. Like out of nowhere he'll say
something like "and secondly!" when there wasn't even a first point. But once you get it, he has a lot
to say and there's a lot for you to write.
Interest: 10/10
Such political theory is very important for senior government units.
Overall: 9/10
Though it was hard, I enjoyed it.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 6/10
The content is dense and convoluted, and this is compounded by tedium. Despite clearly outlined
criteria, the marking of essays remained contentious, unclear and questionable. Readings are too
incoherent, too boring, and this translates into crap tute marks all around. The exam however is a
category unto itself. Questions are ambiguous and the topics examined are totally out of the blue - a
clear trend over the years apparently. Hardly anyone gets over 80% in this.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Gil Merom)
As incoherent as the readings. I had a clash, meaning I could never stay for a full 2 hour lecture, but at
least I came out alive and kicking every time. Gil Merom lovers are a weird species, but they exist.
Interest: 3/10
Who cares if it's politically and academically relevant - not meaning to be cliched, it’s as boring as
batshit.
Overall: 4.5/10
Enough to put one off GOVT altogether, but older kids advise to keep the faith...

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Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
Lecturer: 3/10
Interest: 4/10
Overall: 5/10
This course was a theoretical introduction to the study of political science. The lecturer, Gil Merom,
is very hard to understand, speaks very fast, with a very thick accent.
He is extremely knowledgeable and very smart - PhD from Cornell etc. It takes a lot of effort to
maintain consciousness in his lectures so come prepared with strong coffee.
Seriously though, World Politics will put you in good stead for senior Government subjects, even if it
is a labour of love. The theoretical foundations are handy to understand, although if you don’t fully
get it I wouldn’t worry too much as they are covered again in the later years.
Like Geopolitics, World Politics should have been a great subject, but a combination of difficult
lecturer, uninspiring tutor and bad time management on my part with the less than average assessment
meant that the course as a whole was not enjoyable for me. It seems though that all first year
Government subjects are pretty bad. Please don’t let this deter you though. It gets better. Promise!

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 4/10
Lecturer - 2/10
Interest - 2/10
Overall - 2/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 10/10
Lecturer - 7/10
If you can understand his wog accent
Interest - 0/10
I've already studied political science
Overall - 6/10
Not hard to get a credit/ distinction, you won't get better if your tutor thinks (s)he is top shit.

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 6/10
Lecturer: 8/10
Once you get over the accent
Interest 9/10
Overall: 8/10

GOVT2119 - Southeast Asia: Dilemmas of Development

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Basically no theoretical content so the material wasn't hard to learn. in terms of assessment, I thought
there was a tad too much: 30 minute presentation with a partner, 4000 word report on your
presentation done in your pair, 2000 word essay, mid-semester test and end of semester exam. The
4000 word report was epically pointless because it was basically a written version of the presentation.
Final exam was heaps easy, she basically told us the questions in the final lecture.
Lecturer: 7.5/10 (Lily Rahim)
Lily is a reasonably good speaker who gets through a lot of content in her lectures,
but they're basically just listings of facts and figures without much analysis or theoretical insight to

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make the course about more than just getting a general knowledge of the region. she definitely has her
own opinions, though, and it's worth researching stuff yourself to ensure that you're not taking her
particular opinions as gospel. (the material on guanxi is a case in point - she presented it very
positively, but people in my tute with experience of the guanxi system said that in some cases it's just
systematised corruption.)
Interest: 7.5/10
Varied. each week is on a different topic - which is either a country or a theme like Islam or
democracy - so it really depends on how much you're interested in each one. overall it's reasonably
OK if you're interested in the region. I would have liked coverage of Vietnam, the Philippines,
Cambodia and so on - the focus was almost exclusively on the archipelagic states.
Overall: 7.5/10
I don't really have strong feelings about this course in either direction. I'd recommend
it to GOVT majors because knowledge of the region could really come in handy, but it's nothing to
write home about.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
The assessment is really spread out here in terms of value, so much so that if you do well
enough during the semester, even if you just manage to pass the 25% worth final exam, you could
still manage a Distinction. Again, 30% from tutorials alone.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Lily Rahim)
Some found Lily Rahim slightly intimidating, and a bit lacking in warmth maybe, I
didn't think so, but most would agree that she is quite helpful. Some found her a bit grating, wasn't
an issue for me. She knows her stuff and is heavily involved in her research expertise (for instance,
that morning when she announced that she just 'flew in from Southeast Asia', fresh from the region
she was about to lecture us on. How very appropriate).
Interest: 9/10
One of the surviving remnants of the former Economic History Department, recast as GOVT unit.
Fascinating topics - East Asian political economic development, democracy versus growth,
regionalism, the politicisation of Islam. I might just major in Asian Studies because of it.
Overall: 8/10
I did have my expectations, and yeah, it was pretty much what I expected it to be. Great source for
empirical evidence to use in essays for other units.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10, Lecturer: 8/10, Interest: 8/10, Overall: 8/10
If you like facts and figures and you’re interested in South East Asia developmental issues then this is
a really good course.
If you don’t mind a little raised voices either, then Dr. Lily Rahim is a pretty good lecturer as well.
This is her area of expertise and she is good (she is the supervisor for the Honours students
specialising in SE Asian Politics) with a comprehensive knowledge of the region, in particular,
Singapore & Malaysia. She also has extensive knowledge about Islam and about the rise of militant
Islam in South-East Asia in recent years.
The reason I say that a liking of facts and figures is needed is because the nature of the course,
dealing with one country/topic per week, means that we speed along, cramming tonnes of information
into a small pocket of time, without really analysing. It seems that a lot of facts are given without
much analysis - although, as senior students, this is really our job I suppose.
Assessment was good. Tutorials are HEAVILY weighted in this UoS, with 25% on your presentation
and paper alone. Assessment was all good, nothing nasty or scary and was heavily tied to the lecture
material. Again, showing up to lectures and doing some readings is good enough to get you there.

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 GOVT2221 - Politics of International Economic Relations

Semester 1 2010
Ease 10/10
This subject is just an extension of first year GOVT and ECOP subjects. If you read the newspaper,
you will ace this subject. The most difficult thing was finding the room.
Lecturer- 8/10 (John Mikles)
John Mikles is insightful, informative and I've never seen a lecturer whose views I agree with so
strongly.
Interest 5/10
Most GOVT/ECOP students will find this subject terribly familiar, as there is a lot of crossover with
other units (especially ECOP1003 AND ECOP3014). This can make it extremely boring at times, but
on the plus side, there is absolutely no need to make lecture notes.
Overall- 6/10
I don't like repeating material, and this subject definitely took the cake there. However, the material
itself is/was interesting (the first few times). As usual, the major essay is the pivot of the course- you
don't want to mess it up. Tutes were fun, many a lively discussion.

GOVT2226 - International Organisations

Semester 1 2006
Lecturer: 5/10
Ease: 5/10
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 7/10
Very difficult exam, only one big assessment, quite a lot of readings, very hard lined on rules,
definitely not for one wanting to take it easy.

GOVT2445 - American Politics and Foreign Policy

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10, Lecturer: 9/10, Interest: 9/10, Overall: 9/10
By far the most useful unit of study I’ve undertaken at my time at University so far. Conducted by
Dennis Phillips (no link!! Sorry!!), a lecturer from Macquarie University visiting USYD, he is a
former Texan who has been living in Australia since the 1970’s. More importantly though, as Dennis
is actually American, his perspective is that which is perhaps more accurate and more whole than say,
the opinion of an Australian who had gone to study American politics.
He is also not without bias, but Dennis freely acknowledges them and indeed, gives his background to
explain why this may be the case. For example, whilst being against the Bush Administration and
critical of the administration’s foreign policy directives, he can also state that he understands the
staunch, Southern Republican voter because his parents are of that stock.
The course is basically set in two parts: domestic American Politics and American Foreign Policy.
The latter section is not as good, only because time constraints meant that we weren’t able to study it
in as much depth as required for such a vast topic. The topic is also, very contentious and ever
increasing so a comprehensive coverage was always going to be difficult.
The first section though is really really good. It explains a lot about America, the psyche of
Americans and how and why their political system works. By studying the foundations of American
politics, we can learn a lot about the current situation, the current Administration and, to a lesser
degree the effect that is has on the world.

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Lectures were excellent (although again, the lectures for the Foreign Policy component were virtually
word for word the same as the text), tutes were great and the readings were useful. Assessment wasn’t
exactly easy but it was good it didn’t really tie in with what we were learning but it built upon it well.
I would thoroughly recommend this course to ALL government students.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
I managed to misinterpret the 40% question and thus had to do really well for the 40% finals to even
get something decent. And I managed to do so. Final exam was just three essay questions: one long,
two shorter. The thing is that the course is centered around three major themes, and if you know the
themes you won't go wrong. Sadly I think those themes just kinda take the edge of what I thought was
going to be a good subject. I'm not sure one should condense all of American Politics into 3 main
themes/patterns.
Lecturer: 3/10
Goldsmith (A lot of people took to calling him Goldstein?) isn't a very good orator. Maybe he knows
his stuff, but he's just boring to listen to. Tutors are nice though.
Interest: 6/10
I did say the course was based around 3 main themes. Having said that, the text book really does
cover a lot of American politics. If you've done your readings, you'll know a lot more American
Politics. I did get a general feeling from people saying that a lot of the stuff in the text weren't relevant
to the course. Which is right I suppose.
Overall: 7/10
If you want to know your US politics and the main workings of it, do the course. If you're interested
in Obama and only Obama, please don't.

GOVT2552 - Policy Analysis

Semester 1 2008
Assessment: Reading Summary, Policy Brief, Research Essay, Policy Monitoring Report, Tutorial
Participation
This subject focuses on the policy cycle/process. Each week looks at a different stage in the cycle,
developing an insight into how policy is developed and what influences its design.
Ease: 7.5/10
A lot of reading to be done, but the stages of the cycle provide a natural structure. Once you've filtered
out the basic features of each, it's merely a matter of applying them to real world examples. If you are
well read it should be a breeze.
Lecturers: Not rated (Shelly Savage)
I did not attend many of the lectures, so I will not provide comment on them. The tutorial program
however struck the correct balance between having a structured program whilst allowing scope for
free discussion. The content of the course lent itself to many excellent class discussions on policy
design in practice.
Interest: 9/10
If you have an interest in politics, public policy or government then this subject will also interest you.
It has significant relevance to the real world and applying the theory to practice managed to sustain
interest in the material.
Overall: 9/10
A must for a government major.

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 Health Sciences (BIOS/HSBH/REHB)
BIOS1168 - Functional Musculoskeletal Anatomy A

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 2/10
LOL! There's so much content in this subject it's not funny. You definitely need to frequently revise or
else you will definitely fail. The mid semester assessments weren't too bad, I did pretty well in them.
The final ID exam was pretty good as well, although a lot of people thought it was really difficult.
However, for the theory exam I thought I was prepared, I actually felt confident... next minute, "WTF
IS THIS SHIT!" - it was the hardest thing of my life. The theory exam was extremely difficult, people
literally came out of the exam crying...
Lecturer - 9/10
Jan (my prac demonstrator) was amazing! She was the reason why my ID exams were easy for me.
She definitely knows her anatomy and teaches you all the little tricks to learn the content. However I
heard that a few of my friend's pracs didn't go as well as mine. The lecturers were also very good and
helpful however at times they would go a bit too fast and you would end up getting lost.
Interest - 9/10
Despite the subject being really difficult, I loved the content! The unit has been structured to suit all
disciplines in the health faculty.
Overall - 6/10
My recommendation is just to study... a lot!

BIOS1170 - Body Systems: Structure and Function

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 5/10
The content itself was pretty difficult, it takes quite a bit of effort to get yourself around some of the
content. However once you have understood what the content is about, it gets a bit easier from there.
If you have done a science (biology, chemistry or physics) then it will definitely help you in this

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subject, however it's still no walk in the park. The exam is purely multiple choice however, they are
written in a way to trick you, meaning the answer is never straight forward. The labs were pretty
exciting at the start of the semester, however this excitement wore off and became very boring which
made the content difficult to study.
Lecturer - 8/10
All of the lecturers were quite good, they catered mainly for visual learners as they had lots of
diagrams. I found that even though I had made notes, watching the lecturer slides were the best way
for me to study and learn the content. They are always willing to help (I spent 4 hours with a lecturer
who went over the whole subject for me because I asked for help about 2 weeks before the final
exam)
Interest - 7/10
The content was interesting, we learnt about the individual systems in the human body and how
various diseases can affect them. There's some basic things that you have to go over so everyone is on
the same playing field such as acids and bases in the body and stuff, but enjoyed the things that we
were taught.
Overall - 8/10
This subject took up most of my time in semester 1, but the results definitely reflect the work that you
put in.

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 7/10
Pretty much an expansion on HSC biology. Covers respiratory, renal and cardiovascular systems and
some stuff on fluids and gases as well. Most of the content was easy to comprehend if you have an
interest in how the body works. I found it easy because I really enjoyed the content. However, the
exams are pretty challenging (not the type of exam you can just wing it).
Lecturers: 7/10
Multiple lecturers. None of them were stand out fantastic or stand out horrific. Peter Knight was my
favourite.
Interest: 9/10
I really enjoyed it. If you like the human body and how it functions, you probably will too.
Overall: 8/10
You do need to progressively study for this unit as there is quite a lot of content and it can get
overwhelming. But overall it is interesting.

BIOS2115 - Embryology

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 7/10
The content was really difficult in most topics. Towards the end with foetal surgery/artificial
reproductive technologies/teratology it got easier to understand but the initial 'the X derives from the
Y' stuff is pretty dry and so difficult to remember. But in saying that, the assessments are broken up
into the mid semester exam (25%), project (35%), online quizzes x 3 (15%) and final (25%). The
project is a lot of work but it's easy to get into the D-HD range because you are given a detailed
marking criteria. The online quizzes can be attempted as many times as you like so that's an easy
15%. The mid semester was the hardest assessment as it tested the really dry stuff, I think the class
average was around 60%. The final exam only tests content from the mid semester onwards (and the
content covered then is much easier). My advice for succeeding at this unit: do the quizzes and get
100%. Follow the marking criteria as you do the project. DO THE PRACTICE EXAMS. They were
virtually identical to the actual ones.
Lecturer: 5/10

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The majority of the content is delivered via video lectures which are given out at the beginning of
semester on a CD. These are pretty boring, literally just a lady reading out notes. There is the odd
'tutorial' in which the unit coordinator gives a face to face lecture. She was excellent and made content
really easy to understand. It's virtually a distance subject as tutorials are not compulsory, so that's a
plus.
Interest: 7/10
I found it interesting. I enjoyed the content (some of it was dry, but at the end of most topics abnormal
development was explored and I found that very interesting).
Overall: 7/10
You do need to be prepared to set aside 1-2 hours/week to watch the online lectures and write notes. If
you don't, you'll fall behind. I liked it and thought it was relatively easy to achieve a high mark if you
put in a reasonable amount of effort.

HSBH1003 - Health, Behaviour and Society

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 8/10
Doing the bare minimum for this course will most likely get you a credit, it's pretty easy. If you turn
up to the tutorials and at least watch the lecture online, then you'll definitely be fine. It's a health
sociology and health psychology unit, so at times the content was very broad.
The assignments were written really well, and basically allowed you to research anything you wanted
in the specific area given. However, the exam on the other hand was pretty difficult, and required a bit
of memorisation which I did not realise. I do not recommend buying the textbook (psychology in life),
it's a waste of money - borrow if from the library if you want it.
Lecturers - 5/10
The lecturers and tutors taught in a way that made the subject extremely boring. However they were
always willing to help when you had trouble and gave some really helpful advice when you needed it.
Interest - 7/10
The content itself was pretty interesting, although a lot of it was common knowledge.
Overall - 7/10
Overall, it's a pretty good unit with interesting content and average lecturers. I can see how this relates
to all the health courses that do this subject.

REHB3064 - Alcohol and Drug Misuse Rehabilitation

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 8/10
Really easy content. 50% online quiz, 50% essay. The online quiz was difficult because it tested stuff
that was not in our notes and couldn't be googled. I thought the test was pretty dumb as the questions
were poorly written and a couple of questions had two completely equally correct answers with only
the option to select one. I brought this up with the lecturer but he said he wouldn't give me the
questions again so I could point out the faults because he uses the same test every year. The essay, on
the other hand, was really easy. You can make up your own question or choose from a long list. I
literally wrote mine 4 hours before it was due and got a D for it. Not very much critical thinking
involved, more a compilation of information about a topic.
Lecturer: 4/10
Notes were given in the form of a word or PowerPoint document once a week. Sometimes he'd decide
to post a recording in which you could not hear/understand him. Content was all over the place. He
wasn't very helpful when I tried to discuss questions in the mid semester exam which was frustrating.
Interest: 5/10
I wasn't interested in this unit, however I never was just picked it because it was online. Content was
boring.

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Overall: 7/10
Easy unit with minimal effort. I probably did a total of 7-8hrs work for this unit the entire semester.
It's a great way to bring up your GPA.

History (HSTY)

HSTY1025 - The Middle Ages

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
Oh man, did I get caned on my 'Historical Significance' piece of work; plus there's a lot of reading
Lecturers: 10/10 (Lyn Olson, Julie Smith)
Lyn Olson is the bomb! I think Julie only took a couple because I missed two weeks of lectures due to
union stuff, and they were the only weeks she was there. Seriously, though, I actually make time to go
to the lectures, unlike just about everything else.
Interest: 10/10
I'm loving this subject, particularly its focus on church history, Islamic history and some of the things
that happened just after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire
Overall: 9/10
I would have given it a 10 except for the difficulty

HSTY1031 - Renaissance and Reformation (1498-1648)

Unknown Date
Ease: 8/10
The assessment for this was very straightforward. The final exam was a take-home and he basically
gave us the questions in the last lecture so you knew what you were studying for. I haven't collected
my essay yet so I'm not sure how I went on it, but I didn't have any trouble when writing it.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Andrew Fitzmaurice)
Dr Fitzmaurice is an awesome lecturer. He was very engaging and really knew his stuff. The two hour
lectures were difficult to concentrate in, however. I would have rather two one-hour lectures.
Furthermore, he didn't post his notes on WebCT, which would have made things much easier. He did
post the audio, but I don't have the concentration to listen to it.
Interest: 6/10

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Some of the topics were very fascinating, such as the Reformation and Milton's republicanism. Others
were dull. It was very hit and miss. The course is structured in a way that places a lot of emphasis on
the history of ideas and of philosophy, rather than an events-based narrative history. I prefer the
narrative approach, but I still enjoyed this course on the whole because most of this period is
interesting. Plus, learning about liberty and republicanism in one segment of the course appealed to
me because a lot of these works were the forerunners of classical liberal ideology. There were a lot of
readings which could be rather difficult - don't let the Middle English and the density of them sap
your interest. Doing the readings would be useful, but you don't need to do all of them - if you do the
ones that interest you, you'll cruise through. The tutorials were dull, and it wasn't the fault of our tutor
- he really did try and spark us into discussion. It was a pity that one mature-aged student felt the need
to dominate the entire tutorial every week, and interjected at every conceivable opportunity in order
to ramble at length about whatever opinions she held. This made everyone else in the tutorials remain
quiet for the most part, and so most of us lost interest. I fell asleep in quite a few tutorials, to be
honest.
Overall: 6.5/10
This was a good course with a good lecturer, but the fact that it was ideas and not events-based
dragged the mark down a little. What really spoiled it, however, were the tutorials, which were
absolutely painful. I still recommend this, because it's not really the fault of the lecturer or the topics
or anything that really could have been prevented.

HSTY1044 - Twentieth Century Europe

NOTE: At the time these reviews for HSTY1044 were written, the unit was called “Twentieth
Century Politics and History”. While the content that has been written about would be quite
similar to what is currently taught, please note that the foci may be slightly different.

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
Everything was pretty straight forward, there were no curve balls in any of the subjects or anything.
But I guess, there was a lot of info packed into one course. The first assignment was one of those
historiography type questions; the actual question though was worded real weird, and got a bit
confusing sometimes, I found. There were a crap load of questions to choose fro for the major essay,
so that was a plus. The exam was easy, but that’s only because my tutor told us pretty much exactly
what each question was beforehand; if not, I guess the exam would have been pretty hard.
Lecturers: Judith Keene 7/10, Margaret Poulos 5/10
Judith was pretty good, she had an enthusiasm for what she was doing. She was a bit too feminist,
though, for my liking, and a bit leftist. Many of the subjects were explained in ways that you would
think would be reserved for a senior, and more specialised unit.
Margaret... meh. She was boring. Also a bit leftist - she took a Marxist view for explaining the Nazi
state for crying out loud!
Interest: 6/10
I was interested in it at the beginning, just because I hadn’t much in modern history, but I was slightly
disappointed overall..
Overall: 6.5/10
The problem with this unit was that it was way too leftist... A lot of the readings were from a feminist
perspective, and the lectures. Some of the views taken just seemed to be out of place with the
subjects; sometimes it just made things confusing. I dunno, for a junior course, they just should have
explored the basic points of the twentieth century, at least the basic ideas and facts for each subject;
yet the course seemed to look at the more abstract ideas that (I would think) should be reserved for
senior units

Semester 2 2006

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Ease: 8/10
The content covered isn't difficult to grasp, and the assessments were all fairly straight
forward. The hardest part of the course were the tutorial readings, which were v. dense, and
sometimes seemed random and irrelevant to the course.
Lecturer: 6.5/10
I thought Chris got better as the semester progressed. But it seemed like he was
quite nervous when he spoke, and for some reason that made it difficult for me to listen to him.
Sometimes he mumbles, and sometimes I didn't feel like he explained things very well.
Interest: 5.5/10
I was really looking forwards to this course, but most of the content seemed to be
either rehashing things that I already knew, or learning things that were random and not relevent. The
lectures some weeks could be painfully dull, as could the tutorials.
Overall: 6.5/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease 8/10
Lecturer: 3.5/10
Interest: 3.5/10
Overall: 5/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 6/10
Lecturer: 7/10
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 5/10
Chris Hilliard took this course last year for whatever reason, as Dr. Judith Keene was mostly
unavailable for most of semester. In the end, the one lecture we had with Dr. Keene was so bad (dry,
boring, condescending and dull) that it made us all feel very grateful to have Dr. Hilliard. His lectures
were fairly interesting, certainly engaging enough to make you want to turn up.
In terms of content, the course was very similar to that of HSTY 1045, and certainly without as much
emphasis on politics or culture as the unit of study title would lead you to believe.
Again, the assessment was fairly straightforward as well, with no kinks or unpleasant surprises. (I
really should have wrote all my first year reviews when I could still remember everything!!)

HSTY1045 - Modern European History 1750-1914

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
The content was pretty easy to understand, with a chronological approach from 1750 to 1914. The
unit dealt with a range of political, social, economic, cultural and ideological issues, with a strong
focus on France's history and sexuality (due to Robert Aldrich's specialties). We were given a huge
array of questions which covered a wide variety of topics to choose from for our essay. The exam
consisted of completing 3 essays in 2h (which was a pressure cooker after not writing in an
assessment task for 6 months).
Lecturer: 8/10 (Robert Aldrich)
Robert Aldrich made the content appear engaging and interesting. He's very eloquent and verbose
with his words, which works to his advantage. As such, he was an exceptional communicator who was
very very knowledgeable on a huge period of history. However, the same cannot be said of the
substitute lecturers who took up his position when Aldrich was absent.
Interest: 7/10

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Some aspects were very interesting, including the French Revolution, the Restoration, the revolutions
and nationalism. However, other parts were undoubtedly dull - the social and cultural topics, along
with the Industrial Revolution
Overall: 8/10
If you have a strong interest in history, especially European history dealing with Germany, France and
Britain, then this topic is for you.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7.5/10
It's not marked too harshly and the texts + lectures are understandable. There is quite a lot of reading
however, and it’s a hell of a lot of content to remember
Lecturer: 7/10 (Robert Aldrich)
Robert does a good job of making a very broad topic logical and comprehensible - but the lectures can
sometimes be a little dull and he talks too softly)
Interest: 6/10
Some weeks are interesting, some are very very dull
Overall: 7/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: 7/10 (Robert Aldrich)
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 7/10
Robert Aldrich specialises in French History and History of Sexuality - these are where the two
biases in the course lie. This is not to say that without a grasp of these topics you won’t get anywhere
- the bias is nowhere near as strong as it is in the Political Economy department. Rather, you’ll find
that, particularly with France, this is where Dr. Aldrich takes most of his examples.
Course content was fairly engaging, if a little dry at times. My tutor was an “interesting” character to
say the least - nothing much was learnt in his tute, and as most of us didn’t do the readings either, we
spent a lot of time just looking at each other, or arguing about things mostly unrelated to the topic.
Assessment wasn’t difficult. Essay was fairly stock standard - read the question, read at least 2 of the
books on the suggested reading list and answer the question directly and wholly. You should be fine.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 2/10
Lecturer - 7/10
What he said was very informative, but he spoke way too quietly.
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 3/10
It was interesting, but i hated it. it was too political

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 6.5/10
Very obscure stuff but not much work
Lecturer: 5/10
Depressingly boring
Interest: 2/10
The most boring subject ever
Overall: 4/10

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 HSTY1076 - American History from Lincoln to Clinton

Semester 1 2011
Ease - 7/10
Assessments were source-based. WHAT DOES THIS SOURCE SAY??? Straightforward.
Lecturers - 5/10 (Stephen Robinson, Rebecca Sheehan)
The lecturer for the first half of the semester, Stephen Murray Robinson, was decent. Explained things
well and at least attempted to inject some interest by making jokes and et al. However, Rebecca
Sheehan was horrible. Before she started talking, she would play a Youtube video related to the
content of that day's lecture and I assumed she did so because she wanted to compensate for how
monotonous her voice was and the fact that she read off a piece of paper.
Interest - 6/10
Relatively interesting content marred by the quality of the lecturers and the tutes. My tutes were
personally very boring.
Overall - 6/10
Decent primer. There's also AMST1001.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
You are given a lot of advice how to write essays, which is very useful for other subjects. The big
essay is worth 40% though so it's a lot of pressure. The group tutorial performance is fun.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Ivan Coates)
Dr Coates is in my opinion one of the greatest lecturers ever. His style is really engaging as he
combines quotes, statistics, trivia, economic information, political cartoons etc. into his lectures so
there is so much variety. He also is really witty and perceptive, I really loved his last lecture, in which
he spoke of USA all the way up to the present i.e. the BP oil incident. And he puts the lectures on web
CT which is really useful. I was fortunate to also have him as my tutor, and he is even better as a tutor
than a lecturer. His comments on essays are really really detailed and helpful.
Interest: 10/10
I love America, and this was such a well done course, because not only did it cover the history, but
also dealt with the culture a lot. It had interesting themes, such as the role of government, and what it
means to be American. A lot of perspectives were offered. The tutorials were also really great, you use
a variety of sources including films, reports, photos so it's really interesting, and the last tute is
'guerilla street theatre' in which you dramatise a radical group from the 60's which was really fun (I'm
shy yet I still enjoyed it). It also crossed over with ECOP a lot, especially The New Deal and the
Keynesian approach.
Overall: 9.5/10
I can't recommend this course enough. And even the tutorials are good, and really interesting. My
favourite course ever. (Even more than ECOP!) The scope of the subject is so broad and yet addresses
so much, it's really amazing. The only negative as I said is the weighing of the major essay.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
A fair amount of reading and it's quite harshly marked. I was told 10% failed, 70% passed and only
20% got higher marks for the last assessment.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Clare Corbould)
She's awesome and she's also my tute leader. She has a really dry sense of humour and covers the
material in a coherent and easily-followed way.
Interest: 7/10
This is bumped much higher due to the lecturer. I'm not as into cultural history as other aspects, and
this course has a lot of focus on it. Plus, there's too much focus on 'minority group history', at least in
the tutes, for my liking.

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Overall: 7/10
I love American history but I don't really like the focus of this course - based mostly on tutes, to be
fair - as much as I should. Plus, too much cultural history.

HSTY1089 - Australia: Conflict and Transformation

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
Source analysis was a piece of cake after modern history in the HSC. Essay was extremely boring to
research and boring to write. Exam was relatively painless, as we got given a choice of 3 out of 12
essay questions, all of which we were given word-for-word in the last lecture.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Richard Waterhouse)
Interest: 9/10
I missed almost all the lectures, but I listened to them on Lectopia and they were clear, accessible and
interesting. Yes, Australian history was actually INTERESTING, brought up some fascinating stuff.
Many thanks to our lecturer, who by the way has an awesome Australian accent.
Overall: 7/10
Adored the lectures on Lectopia. Unfortunately, did not enjoy the tutorials at all - too many people to
make your voice heard. Also did not enjoy any of the assessments. However, if you *have* to do
Australian history, this one won't scare you off. MAYBE even the opposite.

HSTY2614 - Living in Modern Australia

NOTE: When the review for HSTY2614 was written, the subject was called “Australian Social
History”. While the content between the two subjects is largely similar, keep in mind that the
foci of the units themselves may have changed.

Semester 1 2006
Lecturer - 7/10
Ease - 7/10
Interest: 1/10
Overall: 3/10

HSTY2670 - New York, New York

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
10% for tutorial participation, the other 90% from three 1500 word essays, which were delivered
evenly across the semester, this has been by far the most organized and accommodating unit I’ve been
in, they history faculty really knows what they’re doing. Lectures more or less followed the history of
the city chronologically, while tutorials covered specific places (e.g. Five Points, Greenwich Village)
or features (Subways, Skyscrapers, Pools), together providing an extremely clear vision of the city.
The first essay concerned an event in the city, and the second a place, so each allowed you to combine
aspects of lectures and tutorials in a very simple way. Although lectures were recorded, those for the
first half of the semester were so soft as to be inaudible on my laptop, the early ones especially
cutting in and out a lot, though the problem was eventually fixed. The reader was a bit too large
though, particularly factoring in online components, that we were always expected to have read.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Stephen Robertson)
Stephen Robertson was a great, intelligent and entertaining lecturer, really demonstrating his
experience with and love for the city, packing in a huge amount of information but always with

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clarity. Sometimes it was held back a bit by the impersonal, huge classes. The number of students
also meant that tutorial times filled up quickly, class numbers were huge, and accessing resources,
even in Fisher Reserve, could be difficult.
Interest: 7/10
Really provided a good sense of the history of New York from its founding to the present, and always
seamlessly connecting the greater economic and political changes to the changing experiences of
ordinary people, with a good emphasis on cultural trends.
Overall: 9/10
Very easy to recommend this course. Provided everything it offered in an entertaining way,
everything you could want from a history unit. The assessment structure has been perfected, with
options allowing you to pursue the aspects of the unit you found most appealing.

Semester 1 2006
Lecturer - 9/10
Ease - 7/10
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 5/10

HSTY2692 - International and Diplomatic History

Semester 1 2012
Ease - 8/10
The subject was not very hard, just two essays, one which is 700 words and the other was 2300. There
is also an exam, part one is just on content which is just one line responses, the second section is a
document response where you just regurgitate what you said in your 700 word essay. The final section
is an essay response where you just talk about a historian/historical methodology you have studied.
Lecturer - 7.5/10 (Glenda Slugga)
It is very hard to fault Glenda's oratory skills as a lecturer, she has a really bubbly personality and at
the start of the semester she seemed to get everyone excited to learn history. However everything kind
of collapsed from there. Her organisation was pretty awful and the lectures were just very
unorganised. We seemed to cover the same topic for 3 weeks in a row and spent only one lecture on
the Cold War, which anybody would think is a significant period of diplomacy.
Interest - 5.5/10
I have been interested in history since primary school so just doing a history unit was fun. If you don't
have that natural historical inquisitiveness however you will be disappointed. Reiterating what I said
above, there was very little meat on the content bones (using a tired cliche). There would be a couple
of dates thrown out, and an almost repetitive use of race as a construct. There was clearly some
intellectual bias there, which I suppose is unavoidable in broad subjects like these but it would have
been nice if we actually approached how diplomacy was done, and how it changed in a historical
context (which should have been half the course).
Also be prepared for crappy readings. Nobody did them and there was a clear reason for that. They
were long, unhelpful and you could get most of the content in the first page of the readings. I spent
most of the time rambling off the top of my head and that seemed to serve me well. There were some
people who did them but you could see in their eyes that they were tortured by the experience. The
tutor was nice but she seemed unable to steer the conversation. In the first half of the semester she
was just getting into it, but in the second half she became much better.
Overall - 6.5/10
This unit unfortunately made me rethink doing history honours, which is not just a fault of the course
but also my changing interests. If you are interested in race relations in an international context, the

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development of international law with a tiny bit of diplomacy thrown in you are perfect for this
course.

History and Philosophy of Science (HPSC)

HPSC1000 - Bioethics

Semester 1 2016
Ease - 10/10
Very straightforward course. If you do the readings each week you'll be in a very good position for the
class discussions; many people in my tutorial didn't so it made it much easier to make your case for
those tutorial participation marks. All that needs to be done is three essays, and as long as you have
kept up with the material and have a clear thesis you should do well.
Lecturer/Tutor - 8/10 (Anson Fehross, Sophie Ritson)
As a lecturer Anson was pretty good and made the subjects entertaining. Like Sida said, he was quite
edgy and deadpan, and I know a few people who were put off by his somewhat abrasive personality. I
didn't mind it though. Sophie was a great tutor, and it was good to see that she was able to come up
with small group activities that were able to get around everyone’s unwillingness to talk.
Interest – 8/10
You start by learning about a few particulars of ethical theory, and after that you learn to apply it to
practical issues such as euthanasia, abortion and genetic enhancement. I recently decided to pursue a
career in medicine, and a lot of the issues discussed were definitely relevant to that, so that was
enough to keep my interest. Plus the lecture and tutorial debates were very stimulating.
Overall – 9/10
Interesting subject matter, and probably the easiest first year science unit you can do. Comes highly
recommended.

Semester 1 2016
Ease – 8/10
No homework. No final exam. Three take-home essays. Class discussions. That being said however,
tutors have been known to be picky when it comes to marking. An HD in this unit does take some

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effort. As long as you work with your feedback and at least be somewhat up-to-date with readings,
you should be fine.
Lecturer – 11/10 (Anson Fehross)
Probably the most memorable lecturer I’ve had all semester. Loaded with deadpan humour, somewhat
edgy, amusingly sarcastic, sassy – all making it very worthwhile to attend his lectures. While he has a
notable utilitarian slant, his lectures are highly informative, packed with debate and rewarding to
attend.
Interest – 10/10
It’s philosophical ethics. Of course it’s interesting! The content is far and wide, so you’ll be sure to
find areas of interest. The assessments give you a large degree of freedom regarding topics and
stances.
Overall – 10/10
Have a spare elective? Do it. Particularly if you are a lover of debate, controversy and/or philosophy.
Also, a special shout-out to my tutor Adam who invited us to drinks.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 7/10
Lots of essays marked fairly hardly, but no exam
Lecturer: 8/10
Very solid
Interest: 7/10
They really start to scrape the barrel at the end
Overall: 7/10
HPSC2100 - The Birth of Modern Science

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 9/10
There's nothing inherently hard in the course, at all - marks you lose are almost purely of shitty
marking/dumb assessments and retarded quizzes. Period.
Lecturer: 0/10 (Ofer Gal)
Ofer Gal is a really bad lecturer that's hard to understand. He doesn't record lectures and doesn't put
out lecture slides - just some random notes (that aren't bad). Thought, Laura was a good tutor and kept
things interesting - she also gave good advice and talked a tiny bit about what it was like in America
but mostly on the actual content (history of science).
Interest: 1/10
Seriously, it's a boring subject - if you want to learn history of science, buy a book on it and save the
$700 that you're about to waste. The way it's lectured is EXCRUCIATING.
Overall: 2/10
My recommendation is to completely avoid this subject, no worth your money or time.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 8/10
For me I found it fairly easy as long as you stayed up to date and tried to engage with the points the
lecture makes and all his tangents. I know others battled with it. The assessment for the course is
broken into lots and lots of little things where the best of a certain count. The quizzes were fairly
straight forward if you engaged in everything. The essays were a bit difficult but again I found an
effort to engage in the stimulus was rewarded. The questions were super annoying
Lecturer: 8/10 (Ofer Gal)
Sure he’s crazy. Sure he'll scream at you if you're more than five minutes late. Sure he'll have crazy
tangents. But the thing I like about him is he is so passionate about his topic matter and really wants
everyone listening to have the same passion he does. This makes him very engaging and easy to listen
to. His slides are normally all pictures and this works very well.

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Interest 7/10
Was a space filler that I wasn't overly interested in to begin with but it was a very nice relaxing
subject with some dull topic matters but overall surprisingly interesting.

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 9/10
Assessment structure very complicated, but all OK, plus no final exam. Essays were based on primary
sources and absolutely fascinating, plus no research required. Lectures absolutely fascinating also.
The 4x quick multiple choice exams were diabolically difficult, but kind of fun as well - you didn't
need to study too hard, just to think on your feet on the day.
Lecturer: 7.5/10 (Ofer Gal)
10/10 for the lecture content. 5/10 for repeatedly yelling at us and telling us we were the worst class
he'd ever had, and then wondering why we stopped going to his lectures.
Interest: 9/10
Struggled a bit when it started dealing with the Laws of Motion - physics is not my thing.
Overall: 9/10
Very glad I took this subject, despite the lecturer badly needing a holiday.

HPSC2101 - What Is This Thing Called Science?

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 6.5/10
This course's assessment is 3x1500 essays and 1 annotated bibliography of weekly readings up to 3 a
week. You need to submit three questions with each reading as well as a very short summary of the
text. This got very tedious fairly quickly. The essays are all on very challenging subject matter
(although you were given a ridiculously large amount of questions meaning you could pick the ones
that interested you the most). There’s very little help on the first essay and it can be fairly difficult to
get the right amount of information in.
Lecturer: 3/10 (Peter Farleigh)
He's a lovely guy who really loves his topic matter but he’s a very dull lecturer who has exceptionally
text heavy slides that are just read off with the occasional tangent. It makes it very hard to
concentrate.
Interest: 2-7.5/10
The course covers such a wide range of stuff that the interest level fluctuates massively throughout
semester.

HPSC3107 - Science, Ethics and Society

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 9/10
The 3 essays were only tangentially related to the lectures, but hey, no exams and lots of scope for
creativity, it's all pretty good.
Lecturer: 9/10
Occasionally wandered off topic.
Interest: 9/10
Great stuff. Always entertaining. (You do NOT need the textbook, although you will definitely need
the course reader for your essays.)

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Overall: 9/10
Very enjoyable.

Immunobiology (IMMU)
IMMU2101 - Introductory Immunology
Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
There are a LOT of terms - all with very similar names. You do need to sit down and revise all your
materials during your Stuvac. The work is alright, though I did not do well in the written component!
There is also a speaking and practical component, but as long as you put effort in, it's alright. Final
exam is stressful due to 50% being written!
Lecturer: 9/10 (Scott Byrne and others)
Scott Byrne - great lecturer, engaging! Most of the time, concepts were explained clearly and he
clearly enjoys teaching immunology. Various other guest lecturers were average compared to Scott.
Interest: 8/10
Wish there was more material on how pathogens invaded the body, rather than how body reacts - but I
guess that's my own biased opinion. Last few lectures were quite boring, mainly because I'm not the
biggest fan of 'applications'. I prefer knowing how things work. Except for the end, I very much
enjoyed the lectures (though I should have attended more...but only 1 9am lecture on Friday - nope).
Overall: 8/10
It was an alright course, though I got 80 which was my lowest score... should have chosen a better
WAM booster for Bachelor of Psychology. Nonetheless, was an enjoyable course!

Semester 1 2006
Very interesting course, learn all about the body's biological defence system against foreign bacteria.
2 hours of lab work every 2nd week (that usually don't even go for 2 hours), but are on friday's only.
1 hour of tut every 2nd week, extremely easy, only have to do one presentation with 2-3 ppl in the last
few weeks of semester on any medical topic that involves the immune system i.e. Diabetes.
One essay that you can start preparing and completing from week 1 and is due in week 10.

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Although the lecture material tends to be all over the place... if you like the content then you'll love to
study it.
Overall: 9.5/10 - an immensely bludgy and carefree subject... but fascinating to ready about.

Indigenous Australian Studies (KOCR)

KOCR2600 - Indigenous Australia: An Introduction

Semester 1 2014
This unit explores the histories of the colonial impact in Australia and how culture was preserved
through the years. The lectures are engaging as on numerous occasions there will be guest lecturers
and documentaries to watch and interpret to emphasise the theory component. There are two essays
and a group presentation to complete in this unit. (Ease: 8/10 | Interest: 8/10 | Lecturer: 10/10 |
Overall: 9/10)

Industrial Relations and Human Resource

Management (WORK)

WORK1003 - Foundations of Work and Employment

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
It's pretty good...a lot of it is today’s work and employment situation. Assessments are pretty dodgy
but, they don’t look at the practical side more theoretical. Exam is only worth 30% and to me seemed
like the easiest part of the course.
Lecturers: 6/10
Marian is alright, her lectures are more reading off her lecture slide note things which she posted up
anyway. Tutorials are good, better than lectures, you learn more and if you get people who actually
talk in your tute you will have some decent debates. There is way too much reading for this subject
and a lot of it is just irrelevant. You have to be selective with the reading and not read the huge chunks
of the text book. Even just reading the summary is good enough lol.
Interest: 5/10
You learn about current issues so it’s kind of interesting.
Overall: 5/10
It’s not that hard to get a good mark for this subject, just need to attend tutorials. Good for learning the
fundamentals of employment and industrial relations

Unknown Date
Ease: 8/10
Not too hard to get a credit even if you don't try
Lecturer: 9/10

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Really hilarious
Interest: 6/10
There were times where I really enjoyed it and there were times where I was so close to falling asleep
so mixed emotions
Overall: 8/10

Information Technology (INFO)

INFO1103 – Introduction to Programming

Semester 1 2016
Ease – 7/10
The content itself isn’t difficult. Problem solving was required, and rewarding to do. The assessments
were perfectly doable. The final exam however was a slight leap in terms of difficulty, but also
manageable.
Lecturer – 7.5/10 (John Stavrakakis)
I can’t concentrate in his lectures because his smile is too bright. Aside from his seemingly unending
joyfulness, he is an adequate lecturer who goes through the content in a comprehensible way.
However, he sometimes goes through content too slowly, particularly when it comes to examples of
codes. As a result, his lectures can get quite dull at times.
The seminars weren’t that helpful for most people, and often quite dry, hence I got into the habit of
doing maths or readings during them. Tutors, on the other hand, were often helpful, engaging and
friendly.
Interest – 7.5/10
Programming itself is pretty interesting. Exercises during labs were often enjoyable. Assignments
were interesting and satisfying to finish. Lectures and seminars can sometimes be a little boring.
Certain topics, such as testing, were incredibly dry.
Overall – 7.5/10
Overall a rather interesting and engaging course. The IT staff and tutors were amazing; they were
highly active and helpful on the forums, friendly and professional.

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Semester 1 2015
Ease: 3/10 for complete beginners, 7/10 for experienced programmers
This course in now HARDER than ever with the large majority of the cohort unable to complete the
last two assignments on time (or if at all). No past papers or useful resources released, they wouldn't
even tell us what we would be examined on in the quizzes. Even worse, they wouldn't even release the
tutorial solutions up until heaps of people complained about in the mid-semester survey. Assignments
are hard, especially for beginners and they are marked automatically, meaning that if you don't
remember to put a full-stop or something silly you will be punished. On top of this, lab machines are
often faulty e.g. can't log in, terminal stuffing around and not compiling etc. so bring your own laptop
if you can.
Lecturer: Masahiro Takatsuka: 6-7/10
His accent wasn't too bad. Goes through material very quickly, and it's kind of hard to hear or see
what's going on if you're sitting anywhere near the back of the lecture theatre cause the speakers are
crap and the projector is unclear. One major complaint is that he often goes on a major tangent when
some experienced programming kiddos interrupts him with a load of programming jargon filled
question(e.g. "couldn't just do X method (not even in the course) instead of the method you used?")
presumably to show off and confusing everyone else in the process. If you're one of those people, I'd
suggest you keep your mouth shut - no-one wants to hear that shit, talk to the lecturer afterwards if
you want to stroke your ego. Also, for tutorials, get a tutor who can actually speak English properly
and it will make life so much easier. Apparently the unit co-coordinator, John, is very harsh which
could explain why it was so hard this year. Also, many of the tutors seem to be oblivious to what we
were taught in the lectures or the course structure e.g. using syntax that we haven't learned before or
ones that aren't even in the course (and being completely surprised that we don't know it) - "for" loops
in week 12 are you serious?.
Interest: 4/10
I wasn't interested very much which probably accounted for the difficulty levels. If you're studying
mathematical or physical related science, I would recommend having a look at COSC1X01 or even
ENGG1801 as INFO1103 is mainly related to object orientated programming rather than calculations.
As I quote from the first lecture: ""Introduction" does NOT mean "easy": No, it really doesn't. (Would
you think "introduction quantum mechanics" was going to be simple?) - I found it way harder than
intro quantum mechanics as I was at least interested in it.
Overall: 2/10
Won't really consider doing programming again for a while after this course.

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 9/10
Introduction to Programming is exactly what it sounds like. I personally found it rather
straightforward and fun. It made a great impression and really has pushed me to take more computer
science courses. It is fairly easy if you read through the lecture notes and complete your lab exercises
every week. All the assessments are reasonable and there are no ‘tricks’ at all, although the
Assignment was challenging (but you had the option to work in pairs and there was plenty of help
available)! The final exam is partial open book (double sided A4 page) and on a whole, I’d consider
this course a WAM booster.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Irena Koprinska)
I stopped going to the lectures about 4 weeks in because I really struggled to understand the lecturer’s
accent, not to mention the lectures ran a little bit slow for my liking. The lecture notes were also super
detailed and really, it was fine just going through them by myself. Having said that, Irena is incredibly
nice, and any questions you had she would answer them very well. She is a very good lecturer.
Tutor: 10/10
Labs had one tutor and two mentors so there was plenty of help to go around if you needed it. They
were all super keen to help, and very approachable! I liked to work independently and didn’t need
help until the later weeks. When I did, I never had to wait too long and they all explained things very
well (although the tutor tended to be better at sticking to concepts we had already learnt, while the

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mentors seemed to push those boundaries a bit). My tutor also pointed out a lot of things we shouldn’t
do which was super helpful in troubleshooting our own errors.
Interest: 9/10
This was a very interesting introductory course into Java. If you’re like me, and enjoy problem
solving and using logic, then you should give this course a go. This, along with MATH1004, were my
favourite subjects I took this semester.
Overall: 9/10
This course was very well structured. Weekly homeworks (10 MCQs with five goes) made sure that
you did at least go through and understand the lecture content on a week by week basis, and
completing the labs cemented that knowledge. Assessments weren’t difficult at all. The final was also
reasonable, and as long as you put in the time every week (I estimate about 4-5 hours being necessary
including the lab but not the lecture), this is an easy HD.

INFO1903 - Informatics (Advanced)

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
This is a rigorous course, covering the basics of Unix, Python, SQL, HTML, Excel and dabbling in
CGI, CSS and LaTeX. There is no assumed knowledge, but the course moves quite quickly and it
certainly helps to have a background with some of these areas.
The labs certainly help with this aspect though. There are 2 1.5hr (that usually run over into 2hr) labs
a week that supplement the 3hrs of lectures. The tutors are fantastic (especially Tim!) and are willing
to help you with whatever issues you may be having.
Lecturer: 10/10 (James Curran)
Dr James Curran is probably the best lecturer I had all semester. He delivers the content in an
engaging manner with little anecdotes and stories on the side, and he puts the slides on the course
website, each containing a summary of what we needed to know for the exam from each lecture.
Interest: 10/10
This course is about data - the management and processing of it by computers. If you're interested in
programming, this course should suit you well.
Overall: 10/10
A challenging, but fantastic course.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
While this course is much more difficult than its alternative standard INFO1103 unit, this unit is much
more interesting and much more suited to students who have a genuine interest in programming.
Enrolment in this course requires alot of dedication but this shouldn't be hard for enthusiastic students.
Also, for enthusiastic students, the ease level should be adjusted to about 8/10.
Lecturer: 15/10 (James Curran)
James Curran!!!! BEST LECTURER EVER!! - If you were selected to attend the National Computer
Science School program (NCSS) in y10/11 you would have known him, but if not, he is the coolest
lecturer one could ever hope for. He is very knowledgeable and his lectures are both interactive and
informative.
Interest: 13/10
This is a very interesting course regardless of whether if you have prior programming experience or
not (although it sure would help). The course is based on the Python programming language and it
leads you through an extensive problem - the major assignment which is broken into several parts.
Overall: 13/10
If you are a capable computer science/IT student then you should definitely consider this unit of study
as it will be probably the best UoS you will ever enrol into during your entire university degree.

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NOTE: Enrolment in INFO1903 is only by permission from the Dean of Engineering and
Information Technology whose selection criteria is based upon your ATAR and academic results. A
portfolio of work can also be submitted to be considered for permission. (Usually each year 60-75
students get selected for this course so it remains very interactive).

INFO2820 - Databases 1 (Advanced)

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 9/10
Mostly straightforward database stuff. A few arts students that had to do the course had trouble with
grasping syntax and stuff, but if you've done any sort of databases or programming before you
shouldn't have too much trouble. Advanced stuff was easier than the standard stuff in my opinion, plus
you don't have to do quizzes, so if you can get into advanced, go for it.
Lecturer - 7.5/10 (Alan Fekete 9/10, Sanjay Chawla 6/10)
We had Alan for the majority of the course. He was very quick to answer to emails and was equally
helpful (replied emails within 5-10 minutes prior to an assignment submission, i think that guy lives
in the school of IT or something). Sanjay's lectures were a bit tangential and the advanced stream
kind of fell behind the material for the first couple of assignments. No tutors for the standard stream
of this course (but i heard they assigned some about halfway through the semester).
Interest - 8/10
SQL, JDBC/database apps etc, analysis of transactions, storage and relational algebra...advanced
stream dabbled into data log. Not that hard to fall out of interest with really.
Overall - 9/10
I liked this course, might do 3rd year databases if my degree can accommodate it. Course outcomes,
marking schemes and exam layouts were very concise, kind of makes me miss 2nd year subjects (3rd
year ones I did didn't seem to have much clarity this year).

INFO3220 - Object Oriented Design

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 5/10
The source material itself wasn't too difficult, but the exam was fiendish and I spent 50-70 hours on
assignments which I only managed 7/10 for. Plus it doesn't scale.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Michael Charleston)
Michael Charleston is a real gem. He's funny, interesting, presents stuff well.
Interest: 10/10
As a software engineering student this is the kinda stuff I took the degree to be able to do.
Overall: 8/10
Even though I did substantially worse in this unit than my others, it was still a really interesting
course and I'm glad I've done it (even though it is core).

INFO3402 - Management of IT Projects and Systems

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 9/10
Very basic course. Exam was exactly the same as the sample and the in semester assessments were all
pretty easy to get 90% in, save the quizzes which I got 70-80% in with minimal study.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Geoff Kennedy)
Geoff's a good guy but not an amazing lecturer, Accenture lectures were pretty solid though.
Interest: 6/10

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Bleh. It's just rote learning.
Overall: 7/10
Easy marks, but nothing too great.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Fairly straightforward. Exam was a lot easier than I thought (ALOT different to the quizzes). No
programming necessary at all, in fact I'm sure if a student from any other faculty would've had no
problems doing this course. Half of the course is essentially regurgitation of terms. Managed to
squeeze a D in there; could've been higher but I bummed out on a few of the in-semester assessments.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Geoff Kennedy)
Geoff Kennedy was the lecturer for the majority of the course, and there were 3 Accenture guest
lecturers for the last few weeks. Geoff was a bit of a shifty character throughout the course, and never
gave me a straight answer when it came to feedback, so minus points there. His lectures weren't
stunning, but they did the job. Plus props to him for compiling last year's textbooks and resources into
a reader though. Accenture lecturers were mildly interesting, but I found the quiz questions related to
them a bit odd ("In lecture X, how long did Accenture associate with company Y before pulling out of
project Z")
Interest: 6/10
Nothing to write home about, but I can see the relevance of this as a stepping stone to the project
subjects you have to do in 2nd semester. I found it's pretty much just
Overall: 7/10
Not overly interesting, but easy enough to pass, not that hard to do well in and it's a core subject for
all IT related majors (computer science, info systems, software engineering, etc.), so chances are that
if you are doing this subject, you have to do it.

Information Systems (ISYS)

ISYS2140 - Information Systems

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 8/10
Easy enough, couple of fairly tedious assignments, but you work in groups. Final exam is rote
learning.
Lecturer - 6/10 (Byoungu Choi)
Strange accent and weird analogies of e-commerce terms aside, Byoungu was a decent lecturer.
Granted I didn't go to most of the lectures (9am start), but the content and assignments were
straightforward in what was expected. Marking was quick for the first assignment, but we never got
the second assignment back.
Interest - 5/10
Tutes consisted of a presentation and 'debate' (you did 1 of each for the entire semester). Only about
half the topics sparked my interest so I guess 5/10 reflects that.
Overall - 7/10
Well you have to do this one if you want to do anything related to information systems. I'd say easy
brownie points, but on retrospect, the group assignments could get pretty hardcore if you wanted good
marks. I'd say this subject would be easy to pass but you'd have to do quite a bit of work to get 80+.

ISYS3401 - Analytical Methods and Information Systems

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Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
The quizzes were a bit challenging, but if you had a good study group and/or if you worked through
enough examples in the textbook (which I only acquired for one quiz), they weren't too hectic. Exam
was a bit of a cockslap, but it was open book so it was always going to be a bit harder. Also, it didn't
help that I didn't bring in a couple of the online quiz solutions with me, as a couple of the exam
questions were essentially the same question with different numbers. Also didn't help that I only
started studying for this particular exam the night before.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Ying Zhou)
Can't really comment much on this as I only attended half the lectures (usually left halfway through a
lecture, or caught the last half of one). The stuff that I heard from Dr. Ying Zhou wasn't too inspiring,
she was just reading off slides most of the time. However, she did respond very quickly to feedback
on WebCT and gave us a lot of help and pointers during the tutorials.
Interest: 4/10
This is another core unit for the Information Systems major. The only part I found mildly interesting
was some of the probability stuff we did.
Overall: 7/10
The subject that lies in between first year stats and second year stats, except the exam is open book,
and all the tutorials are done with excel and non-compulsory. If it weren't core, it would make a good
filler subject. Didn't spark my interest, but easy enough to pass.

International and Global Studies (INGS)

INGS1001 - Power and Money in Global Society

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 5/10
There's a massive reader of which you're meant to read 3 readings a week. Pretty much torture to get
through. You need a very active interest in the topic and current affairs or you'll get called out for lack
of participation.
Lecturer: 7/10 (John Brookfield)
I stopped going to lectures because I couldn't understand what John was saying. His voice is a sort of
husky baritone that seems to actively inspire sleep. The lecture slides pretty much sum up the readings
anyway.
Tutor: 8/10 (John Brookfield)
Again, I had trouble understanding John from time to time. He's a nice guy though and he encourages
group discussion. Didn't really need to do much because most tutorials were taken up by either
discussion or presentations.
Overall: 7/10
I think some of my classmates loved this topic because they actually had an interest in what was going
on in the world and made a point of staying up-to-date. If you're not one of those people, you're not
going to get a lot out of this course.

Semester 1 2009

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Ease: 7/10
There were a lot of issues to deal with in this unit, ranging from neoliberal globalisation to the effects
and functioning of regionalism. Most of the content and readings were manageable; however, some
pages (especially dealing with finance and economics) that were written by certain authors such as
Dick Bryan took a long time to digest. The essay was pretty 'easy', as you were allowed to choose any
topic that you wanted to investigate, as long as it fell within the topics that were explored during the
lectures. Furthermore, the exam consisted of you completing two questions in 2h.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Dick Bryan and others)
Dick Bryan was a superb lecturer - exceptional and knowledgeable communicator who was able to
bring humour into his lectures. However, some of the other lecturers were only competent.
Interest: 7/10
Most of the stuff was interesting and engaging, especially on regionalism and the effects of
globalisation. There was a strong bias against neoliberalism and on economic stuff (to which people
may find to comprehend at times).
Overall: 7/10
All in all, this unit was alright. It consisted of a range of areas and issues that are relevant to us in our
'globalised' world. It's just at times, the economic aspects of this unit were overwhelming.

International Business (IBUS)

IBUS2101 - International Business Strategy

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
There weren't many readings, and nothing was very challenging.
Lecturer: 6/10
Whilst his material was fantastic, it was virtually impossible to concentrate on what he was saying, as
he had a mechanical voice. Plus I had brogan distracting me.
Interest: 6.5/10
I've covered a lot of the stuff in other subs, and nothing really tickled my penis. I mean fancy.
Overall: 7/10
Not the best unit, but I suppose it's necessary for the major.

Unknown Date
Overall: 7/10
Fuck this subject, I still don't know what my mark was for any of the course whereas some people
know up to 60% of their possible marks.

IBUS3101 - International Business Alliance

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Semester 1 2013
Ease - 6/10
Should have been an easier subject but the lecturer marks pretty harshly in all components. There are
tons of subject components, the tutorial participation is really tough. He marks very very harshly.
Subject ease depends a lot on finding good group mates in my opinion. The mid sem exam was pretty
hard and researching about a real life alliance coupled with the lecturer's harsh marking makes it a
relatively hard subject in terms of obtaining D-HD marks. The BSG online component was easy in
terms of getting easy marks, overall it’s one of those subjects where hard work does not equal to good
marks because of the amount of uncertainty involved and the amount of reliance on finding good
group mates.
Lecturer - 2/10 (Nimer Uraidi)
Hated the lecturer in terms of incompetence, he seems to not know much about the subject content. I
really regret taking this subject despite getting a considerably good mark. I didn't learn anything
useful. Do it only if you want a pass and you're not needing to get D/HD.
Overall - 5/10
I'd give it a 5 purely because I had "okayish" group mates. But I really regret taking this subject...

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8.5/10
Lecturer: 8/10
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 7/10
Fun assessments, but they don't really test course content. The bulk is an online strategy game,
however, if you don't do well in week 1, you're pretty much screwed.

IBUS3102 - International Risk Management

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7.5/10
No exams, but there is quite a bit due. The online game takes up a lot of time, but is only worth 10%.
Which is lame. Whilst nothing is really difficult about the subject, she marks quite harshly and based
on a marking criteria that we weren't told to refer to: I.e. it turns out we weren't meant to answer the
questions, but answer the same generic marking criteria for each assignment.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Sandra Seno-Alday)
She's a great person, and very responsive to student feedback, but she did, again, make content too
simple.
Interest: 8/10
She teaches interestingly, but the problem is that she targets it at a high school level: i.e. content is
oversimplified. The assignments were fun.
Overall: 7/10
It left me feeling a bit empty, as I didn't learn very much, but did have fun.

IBUS3103 - Entrepreneurship and Innovation

Unknown Date
Ease: 9/10
Easy as pie. Get a good team for the group assignment. Make sure you have someone with 1337
Finance skills like me, and you're laughing. You can bullshit your way through the rest.
Lecturer: 8.5/10

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Seymour's a good kid, guest lecturers were fucking interesting. Still didn't go regularly to lectures
because the content was just a rehash of all the base commerce courses I'd done.
Interest: 7/10
Fair interesting in parts. fair boring in other parts. Private equity stuff was cool.
Overall: 8.5/10
I worked with a cool team, made awesome friends and got a nice mark. Recommend the course as
something different in the Economics + Business faculty since you actually develop a real business
proposal and pitch it to industry experts.

Japanese Studies (JPNS)

JPNS1611 - Japanese 1

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
It's an introductory course so the content covered is not particularly complicated at least
at first, but it does move quickly and if you don't keep up you might find yourself in the
uncomfortable position of hardly understanding a word that is said to you in tutes, as i did a couple of
times. I would say that if you have a background in some variety of Asian language you will find it
easier to grasp than i did (you know, being used to a normal 26 letter all-purpose alphabet and all).
grammar, particles, sentence structure and speaking were all okay for me although i had a few issues
with structure at first what with all the backward-ness compared to English. Script was my
downfall...hiragana and katakana were okay to learn, but fuck me sideways i sucked at kanji
characters. Other people might be different though.
Lecturers: 8/10
Yasumoto-sensei was good at covering content quickly without it feeling too rushed; she had a nice
clear way of explaining things and she was just a nice lady overall. Matthew Stavros who did the
culture lectures was awesome, really nice, laid back, and funny; he made the most interesting
component of the course even more so with his delivery and humour. Top guy.
Interest: 7/10
I really liked the culture component and found it the most interesting even though the focus was
meant to be on learning the language. As for the actual language learning, communication tutorials

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were the most fun/interesting, script tutes were fucking boring though. grammar lectures fell
somewhere in the middle.
Overall: 7/10
It was good, not great, but okay. If you're into languages and don't mind a bit of rote memorisation,
you should find it enjoyable. Tip: you have to study and keep up to date or you will fail, the end. I just
found this out the hard way.

JPNS2621 - Japanese 5
Semester 1 2016
Ease - 8/10
If you did continuers during high school, you should find the difficulty to be on par with HSC
Japanese. There is, however, a much bigger focus on Kanji, so be prepared to spend a lot of time rote
learning hundreds of new characters. The emphasis of university Japanese seems to have shifted away
from using and applying the language (as was sort of the case in high school), to being much more
about studying the language as an academic discipline. Consequently, there was also a big focus on
grammar, ESPECIALLY in the final exam. Assessments aren't hard if you study consistently. The one
speaking assessment is rather difficult to get good marks in, not because it's hard or anything, but
because you almost never get the chance to practise speaking in class.
Tutors – 7/10 (Michael Lewis 6/10, Nerida Jarkey 10/10, Yasuko Claremont 5/10)
Basically, they divide the course into three different streams - Speaking, Reading and Grammar. Each
section gets a different tutor, who have varying levels of teaching ability
Michael Lewis (reading) - Great guy who knows his stuff and has interesting insights to share.
Unfortunately, classes felt really stagnant because all we did was read and translate the texts in our
textbook, and then he'd correct any mistakes we made.
Nerida Jarkey (grammar) - LEGIT THE BEST TUTOR EVER. So so SO enthusiastic about Japanese
grammar. Her bubbly personality and passion are really infectious. She can make something as mind
boggling as indirect-causative-passive verbs very interesting. She is so patient when it comes to
answering questions and I feel that she really cares about her students. I could go on and on about
how great she is, and if I had my way I'd make her teach the whole course by herself. Only minor
issue is that, as she is a linguist by training, her explanations are sometimes very technical and
grounded in theory (as opposed to the real world). That said, it was really fascinating hearing her talk
about the linguistic mechanics which go behind certain language structures.
Yasuko Claremont (communication) - Lovely, sweet woman. Too bad the way she structured her
lessons was really bad, and not at all conducive to improving speaking ability. In high school, I
remember practising conversation all the time, but in her classes all we did was read out dialogues
already written in our textbooks. It was very frustrating that we spent the majority of our so called
"communication" class just reading off the textbook. In fact, the only bit of conversation practise we
did throughout the whole semester was during the final speaking exam, where we had to hold a
discussion in Japanese. Needless to say I was ill-prepared for the task given how little in class practise
we got.
Interest - 7/10
The score would be much lower if it wasn't for Dr. Jarkey's brilliant grammar tutorials. I always found
HS Japanese to be very impractical and not really grounded in reality, but uni Japanese is so much
worse in this regard. 2/3 of the tutorials felt very useless, and it was really hard to engage with the
language because of it.
Overall - 7/10
Fascinating subject and language - just not the best teaching (bar one FANTASTIC tutor). I wish it
had a much more practical focus, and my Japanese didn't improve as much as I wish it did. But
regardless, if you're interested in Japanese, none of this really matters. For me at least, despite all my
misgivings towards the teaching, studying Japanese was, and always will be, a pleasure.

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Semester 1 2013
Ease: 9/10
If you did Japanese Cont. / Ext at high school, this will be a piece of cake. If you did Jap 3/4 and or
are transferring from other backgrounds of Japanese, you may struggle. They didn't do screening of all
individuals this year, so many people of lower standards crept into Japanese 5, making the cohort
weaker and making it easier for competent students. The textbook is very accessible and if you even
study 10 minutes a day you should be on your way to a D/HD. Kanji quizzes were all seen, so full
marks was readily achieved. Other grammar and reading quizzes were simple, however there were
some pedantic points the teachers marked people down on. The final exam is relatively easy, provided
you revise all sentence structures in the text, including those that weren't covered.
Lecturers/Teachers: 3-4/10
All classes were tutorials. We had Yasuko Claremont (old Japanese lady), Samantha Haley (Australian
lady), Michael Lewis (American man). All teachers were below what I expected of a department so
famous among arts departments in Australia. Claremont sensei was out of touch and couldn't properly
express herself. We had her for 'communication' but usually all the communicating that was done was:
Yes, no. Goodbye. End of lesson. Not good at all. She created strange assessments esp. for speaking
and was just generally terrible. A sentence in the textbook sums it up: Not all Japanese people are
good Japanese teachers. Samantha Haley was below par. I had other Australian Japanese teachers in
the past and they were excellent, so I am not saying that just because she isn't Japanese, she is terrible.
She is terrible because she is terrible. Her PowerPoints were alright, but covered few grammar points.
Her activities were basically for yr7-9 students, not a 2nd year adv. Japanese class. The large range of
levels in the classes made it difficult for her, as well as the non-responsiveness of the class. Generally
these classes were fruitless and I ended up going for attendance only. Despite living in Japan she had a
thick gaikokujin accent which perturbed study. Perhaps the best out of the 3 was Michael Lewis. He
had previously studied Chinese and taught Japanese now. He was very knowledgeable culturally as
well as with respect to Japanese language. We had him for reading, and the low levels of kanji reading
ability as well as general intonation issues made these classes also unbearable for those who were at
the standard expected. Lewis sensei couldn't do much - it would have been helpful to have him for
other glasses as well.
Generally, I was extremely disappointed in the quality of teaching of Japanese at USYD. I know it is
not completely the fault of the teachers, but it was seriously below what I expected (coming from high
school - my wonderful teacher *tear*)
Interest: 3-8/10
Declined from 8/10 to about 3/10 by the end of semester. I am passionate about Japanese, but the
courses just put me off of it...so disappointing.
Overall: 5/10
Poor teaching coupled with students who needed to be in lower levels created a dead classroom
environment. Assessments were easy and high grades could be achieved if you are at a certain level
(that is expected - nothing above the level of the text).

JPNS2622 - Japanese 6

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10
I'm writing this review because there are no subject reviews for JPNS past Japanese 1, and obviously
the difficulty will increase at the intermediate level. This is the subject after JPNS2621 (Jap 5) which
you'll do if you did Continuers or Extension at high school. Have a look through 'An Integrated
Approach to Intermediate Japanese' and you'll be able to see how difficult/easy the subject is.
Lecturers: 6/10
This depends COMPLETELY on who you get for your separate tutorials (3 per week: reading,
writing, speaking) - Suter is great, Babicz is a laugh but too discursive, Hiroko is heaps of fun....Mats
is a bore.
Interest: 6/10

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The subject is as interesting as you make it - I managed a HD by just rote learning the textbook but
you sacrifice a lot by doing this. Your Japanese will not improve unless you actively go out and watch
movies, speak with native speakers, learn a shitload of kanji. My one tip would be learn 'beyond' the
textbook and this subject will be a lot more interesting.
Overall: 6.5/10

Jewish Thought, Civilisation and Culture (JCTC)

JCTC2606 - The Holocaust: History and Aftermath

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7.5/10
A lot of readings, but that depends if you really want to engage in tutorial discussions. If you can
simply do your essays and your presentation during your given week, you should be fine. I'd probably
even say there'd be no need to attend the lectures themselves.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Konrad Kwiet)
Konrad is a great and nice guy all round. Perhaps too nice. But his lecturing style was quite
unsatisfactory, as he had the habit of triggering a mass exodus of students half way through his
lecture. However, his performance in tutorials is a bit better, with a lower of number of students.
Interest: 7/10
If you're interested in the Holocaust, this would be the unit for you. Though, it can be quite tedious at
times.
Overall: 7/10
Would probably do it again - it was almost a bludge subject.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10

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I would give this a 9/10 but there's a bunch of extensive reading material to get through if you want to
do well. If you're interested and have the time, it shouldn't be a problem. You also won't need to attend
the lectures (I'll elaborate on that in the next paragraph).
Lecturer: 8/10 (Konrad Kwiet)
Konrad Kwiet is amazing. Nicest lecturer ever. Having said that, his lecturing style sucks. He drones
on a lot and if you don't follow closely, you'll get lost. A lot of worksheets/overheads. He has also
somewhat mastered technology. Responds really quickly to emails and gives extensions really easily.
Also, don't worry about attending the lectures (unless it’s out of interest), just DO YOUR
READINGS. The outline also gives you all the assignment questions in advance so you can literally
complete this course in the first two weeks of the semester and hand them in.
Interest: 5/10
I covered a lot of the material in other classes, so nothing amazing. Good first person sources though
and Konrad played some good documentaries. Don't be silly and enrol in the class if you don't care for
the Holocaust obviously.
Overall 7/10
It's probably best to have some background knowledge before taking this class. A lot of students carry
over from previous Holocaust subjects or the Middle East subject with Dirk Moses (that I also did).

Korean Studies (KRNS)

KRNS1621 – Korean 1

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 10/10
I went into this course having already done about 1 year (on/off) study in my own time, and found it
extremely easy, so don't take this at face value. Already knowing virtually all of the grammar and
vocab was a massive advantage. I was able to basically do nothing for the first few weeks while we
learnt spelling/pronunciation of the alphabet. The course was exceedingly easy for me, but I know this
isn't the case for many people, I saw many people getting 15-20/55 in quizzes. I think I enjoyed this
course a lot more because of this prior knowledge.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Park Duk-Soo)
Lectures were 2 hours on grammar, taken by Park Duk-Soo. He knows his stuff, particularly about
phonetics and morphology, as well as syntax. His lectures could get a bit rambly at times, and he had
trouble using the mic/recording a few times, I sat front row to ensure I didn't miss anything. I'm
personally interested in these areas as well, so I think that made me enjoy his lectures a lot more than I
may have otherwise. He sometimes went through somewhat complicated concepts fairly quickly,
losing some stuff in the process, and explained some concepts weirdly, but he was pretty good at
answering any follow up clarification questions.
Tutor was Anna, was good but slow at times, didn't explain some concepts that well. Pretty good at
answering questions though. Would have enjoyed more chances to practice speaking, as it's where

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most people are lacking most. I'd give her 6/10, mainly because they were boring as I already knew
content. Other tutors were allegedly better, I don't personally know.
Interest: 8/10
This is for my major and I want to get good at the language, so I paid attention and tried to stay
engaged. Tutorials were boring mostly, but I had to attend to hand in homework and do the weekly
quizzes (8 of them, 10 words, pretty easy if you study). The lectures were great, but I enjoyed them a
lot more because I knew most of the Korean and didn't have to pay that much attention.
Overall: 9/10
I loved it, only downside is rambles in lectures/boring tutes, but nothing big. I'm continuing Korean 2
next semester as it's my major. I haven't sat the final yet but I'll update with my marks when I get
them. Also I think I got marked slightly harsher because I have prior knowledge, but that's fair
enough.

Law (LAWS)

LAWS1006 - Foundations of Law

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
Not easy, but not necessarily hard either. Difficulty is inversely proportional to the amount of reading
you do each week - some weeks you'll be lost, others you'll be in your element.
Lecturer: 8/10
Friendly, knowledgeable, approachable - pretty much the tri-factor. Was a bit inconsistent with the
marking, though.
Interest: 7/10
The history is mostly crap. The philosophy behind law is an acquired taste (I liked it, personally, but
most of the class didn't). It gets more interesting as the course culminates in international law/politics
and issues such as Guantanamo Bay, which sparked some very engaging discussion. If you're not
opinionated you will find this course not only hard, but intimidating.
Overall - 7/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 9.5/10

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Interest: 7/10
Overall: 8/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 9/10
Lecturers - 9/10
Some interesting guest lecturers (Kirby); some not so interesting
Interest - 8/10
Interpretation and history stuff boring, but otherwise assessments and stuff interested me
Overall - 8/10

LAWS1012 - Torts

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7.5/10
Lecturer: 9.5/10
Interest: 9.5/10
Overall: 9/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7/10
Advice: Keep well-organised notes and annotate wisely.
Lecturers - N/A, Tutors 9/10
Knowledgeable, well-organised, friendly and approachable
Interest - 9/10
Overall - 9/10

LAWS1013 - Legal Research I

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 10/10
Lecturer: 6/10
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 7/10

LAWS1023 - Public International Law

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
Assignment (20%) was decent (similar to past law subjects), 5% participation also easy,
final exam (75%); killer, clearly too much weighting, very hard to answer 3 questions in 2 hours (1
essay and 2 problems).
Lecturer: 9/10 (Kate Miles)
Great tutor, all tutorial materials were up on WebCT (by Steven). If the tute materials are put up, don’t
bother writing down anything other than what the tutor says about the essential readings as that is
what is usually missing from the online notes.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting.
Overall: 6.5/10

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Interesting. HEAPS of readings. The final exam was a killer.

LAWS3412 - Australian Income Tax

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
There is a lot to cover with this subject - but if you attend all the seminars, read the lecture notes, read
both prescribed texts, and make summaries, you can't go wrong. The hardest part of the course was
the mid-term - there was so little time that all marks were scaled up by 5 marks.
Lecturers: 10/10 (Celeste Black, Micah Burch)
Excellent lecturers - very thorough and lucid.
Interest: 9/10
Coming from a commerce background, I enjoy tax law.
Overall: 9/10

LAWS3413 - Banking and Financial Instruments

NOTE: LAWS3413 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
Very hard to study for this subject - the seminar goes all over the place, you have to refer to handouts,
overheads, multiple textbooks, confusing legislation and reading materials all at once.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Roger Magnusson)
Although the lecturer points you in the right directions - he points you in too many directions.
Interest: 6/10
The content itself is pretty interesting - but that interest wanes as you discover how difficult the course
is.
Overall: 6/10

LAWS3436 - International/Comparative Jurisprudence

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Difficult at the start to choose a topic and do the research (the assessment was a 5000 minimum word
research thesis with absolute freedom as to content) - but overall it is relatively easy compared to
other law assignments.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Klaus Ziegert)
Laid back lecturer, very approachable, but hard to understand sometimes.
Interest: 10/10
Subject allows you to research what you find to be most enthralling.
Overall: 9/10

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 Linguistics (LNGS)

LNGS1001 – Structure of Language

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 7/10
Not the easiest subject ever, nearly most all of the concepts make sense in the lec/tute, but it was hard
to put some of them into practice in the assignments. A bunch of typos in assignments made it
difficult, threw me off a bunch. Phonetics was pretty straightforward, it's easy to make small mistakes
but they can cost you a bunch of marks. Phonology was pretty interesting, but again it's sometimes
difficult to see patterns. Morphology is cool but combining this with phonology is annoying as fuck
and usually tiring. Grammar and syntax were pretty straightforward, not many complaints. The cohort
didn't perform that well this semester so they gave us an extra optional assignment and would count
our best 4 of 6 instead of just the normal 5 for 50% of the course, but this 6th assignment had fucking
arabic tri-consonants so I didn't bother submitting it, I knew it wouldn't be in my top 4. Make sure you
make friends in your tute and work on assignments together, you will do much better (unless you
already know everything), many people failed a few assignments before they worked this out.
Lecturer/Tutor: 10/10 (Nick Enfield, Georgia Carr)

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Nick Enfield was fantastic, really engaging and good at explaining all the concepts. They were, in
order, phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, grammar. Great powerpoints with
diagrams/pictures/videos of his own research sometimes (and shitloads of examples). Some idiot in
the lectures kept asking dumb questions which got annoying for everyone. Nick asks lots of questions
to us in the audience which is great, and lots of homework for tutorials was good practice for
assignments.
Tutor was Georgia Carr, really great at explaining stuff also. Helpful via email. If you contribute the
tutes are 10x better, if you sit quiet it's just awkward and shit. 9/10.
Interest: 10/10
I went in with little linguistics knowledge and absolutely loved it. Super fun to learn about phonology
and morphology. As someone learning two languages this stuff feels very practically applicable even
if it isn't really, makes it a lot more engaging.
Overall: 8/10
Very interesting course, highly recommend to anyone doing languages. Taught well and interestingly,
I'm taking two linguistics units next semester, that's how much I enjoyed it.

Marketing - MKTG

MKTG1001 - Marketing Principles

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Relatively basic stuff. Our class also didn't have to do homework. However, GROUP WORK is a
pain! 2 group assignments, no chance to change.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Geoff Fripp)
Geoff Fripp is a fantastic lecturer. Funny, interesting, gives us TV Commercials and so on. He tells
you what you need to know, and gives real-life examples as well.
Interest: 6/10
Bleah, it's ok. Nothing I'd want to do again, and yeah it is pretty basic.
Overall: 7/10
Not too bad for a core unit I won't be using. The group work is a pain, but eventually it'll pass. You
will too.

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Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
Already passed course before final exam which is worth 33%. Assessments and tests are easy as long
as you have a decent group and the concepts aren't too different from HSC Business Studies if you did
that.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Geoff Fripp)
Lecture slides were a bit general, but he was a good speaker and gave very good examples to
emphasis his points. Would be happy to ever have him again.
Interest: 8/10
Found lectures and marketing rather interesting, the textbook made it fucking
dull though. But pretty interesting overall compared to most subjects.
Overall: 8/10
Core subject so commerce students have to do it anyway but it's a pretty good course.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 5/10
Rather hard I think
Lecturers: 9/10 (Paul Henry, Robyn Martin)
Paul Henry is good, Robyn is a LEGEND!!!!
Interest: 10/10
Definitely fun
Overall: 9/10
Despite the shitty result...

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8.5/10
All theory no maths
Lecturers: 9/10
Don’t need to go to lectures
Interest: 7.5/10
Overall: 8/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 6/10
If you're not that interested in the advertising and psychological components of marketing, 7/10 if you
are.
Interest: 7.5/10
Ambiguous, as some people like maths others don’t. some like hot chocolate. others like rape.
Overall: 6.5/10

Semester 1 2006
Overall: 10/10
Though got crap results, Robyn Martin + Paul Henry made this subject doable

MKTG2002 - Consumer Behaviour

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8.5/10

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Lecturer: 6/10
Interest: 8.5/10
Overall: 8/10

MKTG3114 - New Products Marketing

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 9/10
You can get 25/25 for tute participation just by handing in homework each week. Then you get
another 2 bonus marks for participating in a research study. The final exam was also quite simple and
1/5th multiple choice. I am currently on 58/60, and should have about 90% overall.
Lecturer: 3/10 (Michael Paton)
Really nice guy. That's about all the positives of his lecturing style. I have no idea why, but for some
reason he insisted on summarising the textbook chapters himself, making his own PowerPoints from
these summaries, and then reading them during the lecture. So, what we got was a summarised
version of the text.
Interest: 3/10
The above made it very uninteresting, especially as the text was the most boring and dry marketing
text I have ever read. A course on new product marketing can be very interesting: I've taken one in the
US on exchange, however, this was horribly boring. The only redeeming feature was some of the
tutorial homework exercises.
Overall: 3/10
The sad thing is that this course is very useful, as badly as it was taught. I think this is mostly owing
to the fact that Michael Paton has no real interest in the subject area (he is teaching as a replacement
for the regular lecturer). The good news is that there will be a new lecturer taking this course next
semester.

MKTG3116 - International Marketing

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
No final exam, 35% video assessment, 20% participation (with bonus quiz if you don’t have 20/20 at
the end.
Lecturer: 3/10 (Catherin Sutton-Brady)
Catherine Sutton-Brady wrote the text and seems to prepare the lectures exclusively from it. Quite dry
in terms of content delivery.
Interest: 6/10
Not an interesting course as I knew a lot of the content already. However, the assessments were
brilliant fun to prepare (such as the video).
Overall: 7/10
Assessments were fun, tutorials were great, but the course itself wasn't that good. Still worth taking,
though.

MKTG3117 - Services Marketing

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
Nothing was particularly difficult. All the assessments were quite simple and were very interesting to
produce. I would recommend going to all lectures, though, as Iain will give you hints about the final
exam to reward those who come. Note that the workload is high, though, with loads of readings to do.

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Lecturer: 7.5/10 (Iain Black)
It's hard to assess Iain. He has a lot of knowledge and he teaches well, although he is a bit too quiet,
and his accent serves as a bit of a barrier until you learn to understand it. He also adds a bit of a
political and environmental spin to some things, which is very welcome.
Interest: 7/10
Probably my least interesting marketing subject, as it was a bit dry, although very
applicable to the real world, and I'm sure I'll use a lot of the things discussed in my future jobs.
Overall: 7.5/10
I quite enjoyed the course, however, it was just less interesting than what marketing
usually is. I craved a bit more creativity and unfortunately I wasn't able to demonstrate it in the
course.

MKTG3120 - Building and Managing Brands

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
There isn't much to do, as there's no textbook. I didn't study at all until the final exam, and even then I
didn't do much. Content isn't challenging, but there are a lot of assignments.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Paul Priday)
I love the lecturer (I've rated him before). He tells a story, rather than delivers a lecture. However, if
you're not interested in the subject matter, you won't like his delivery style. However, he's the worst
administrator ever known.
Interest: 8/10
As I said, the lecturer makes lectures fascinating, but at the same time, marks have to be deducted, as
the subject wasn't an accurate reflection of brand management (he was never a brand manager,
himself).
Overall: 8/10
A cruisy, highly enjoyable subject. Important to do if you want to work in brand management

MKTG3121 - Advertising: Creative Principles

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8/10
There is nothing too difficult in this unit of study. However, we never received any marks back for
ANYTHING. The final exam was very simple to do.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Paul Priday)
Paul Priday is brilliant. He's had a lot of industry experience and this will show. However, he doesn't
really stick to his lecture outlines. He likes to drift off and prefers to show off various ads he likes,
rather than teach the things in the syllabus. He also sucks at computers and has trouble putting up
most things on blackboard. Nonetheless, he's a fascinating lecturer that kept me enthralled.
Interest: 9/10
Whilst some people may not like Paul's style, I loved it. It led to some interesting course content that
has even inspired me to research some of his concepts and theories further. His exploration of
advertising historically is especially of interest, as he tries to explain how people's perceptions of the
world shaped marketing and advertising. You also get to see some boobs in this course sexy time!
Overall: 9/10

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I loved this subject. I was enthralled during lectures, and the assignments were practical. The tutor
was also fantastic, although she said she won't teach again, as she earns 50 times as much doing
consultancy work. poo. However, ask Paul what day Karem teaches, and avoid it. I had Karem for
1001, and feel that he would be horrible for this subject (I mean, the man is an accounting major).

Mathematics (MATH)
MATH1001 - Differential Calculus

Summer School 2015

Ease: 8/10
The final topic on Taylor Series can have some challenging questions at times, but on the whole, this
unit isn't difficult at all. A lot of the stuff you learn is new, but it follows well from what you learn in
high school, so you shouldn't have too many problems grasping the content. Assessment wise, there
were 3 quizzes and 1 assignment (keep in mind that this was in Summer School, and this probably
differs from how the course is run in the normal semester). The assignment wasn't too difficult, and
the quizzes were pretty easy too, despite not being given any sample quizzes to study for. The final
exam was relatively straightforward in comparison to previous years.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Joachim Worthington)
I can't really fault Joachim on too much; he lectured well, nothing too flashy but got the job done. He
was a nice guy as well, willing to help you out if you had any individual problems, and his lectures

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had occasional moments of deadpan humour which I could appreciate. Only criticism I would make is
that he went a little slow on the lecture material, and we were generally a topic behind at the end of
each lecture. If you didn't read ahead then you may not have known how to do a few of the tutorial
questions from time to time. This wasn't too much of an issue though, it just meant we didn't get to do
any revision lectures at the end of the course.
Tutor: 6/10 (William Tong)
William was great when you needed individual help, he was good with all the course material and
could answer any questions you gave him. His explanations and recaps of the content we learnt in
lectures seemed a little rushed, and it wasn't for any reason in particular, I think it was just how he
spoke. Fortunately for him, this subject was relatively easy, but I don't think I'd want him as a tutor for
any of the units on the higher end of the difficulty scale. Overall though he was a nice guy and I
definitely benefited from him.
Interest: 10/10
Well maths has always been interesting to me and this is no different. While I would say Linear
Algebra was probably the more interesting unit out of the two, Differential Calculus is quite good in
itself. The most important new topics you'll cover will be complex numbers (provided you haven't
done 4U Maths in high school) and calculus of several variables, and you'll also have some time
devoted to limits, Taylor polynomials/series, and gradient vectors/directional derivatives (which
provides an interesting application of some of the content you learnt in MATH1002 to calculus). So,
all very interesting, all very fun. 
Overall: 9/10
A very good course, which is pretty much essential for any further study in mathematics. If you have
the credentials, I would do MATH1901, but 1001 is good in its own right.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 9/10
Easy course. But then again I did 4u.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Di Warren)
I had Di Warren who was a very good lecturer, although I only attended a couple of lectures.
Interest: 7/10
It’s calculus. I liked it better than my other maths unit, but still…it’s just calculus.
Overall: 8/10
Not hard to get good marks if you do well in quizzes, etc. Probably much higher chance of doing
VERY well if you take the Advanced/SSP version.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7-8/10
Topics include combinations of complex number, graph calculus, limits, and Taylor polynomials
(questions that distinguish HD and D students)
Lecturers: Di Warren 11/10, Holger Dullin & Daniel Hauer 5/10
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 7.5/10
Try to maximise your quiz and assignment marks and do all the past exam papers.

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 8/10
The course isn't that difficult if you put in some decent level of effort. If you turn up to the tutorials
and lecture, you should be fine. The questions in the exam and the tutorial quizzes are pretty much all
covered in the lectures. The content is quite different to what you have been exposed to if you came
from 3U but if you came from 4U, it should be quite a breeze, at least, for the first half or so. It gets
harder towards the end where Taylor Series is a bit confusing at first but if you think about it, you
should be able to get it. I got 9/10 for both quizzes and 20/20 for the assignment.

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Lecturers - 9/10 (Andy Hammerlindl, James Parkinson)
A. Hammerlindl and JW. Parkinson were my lecturers for this course. They were both quite good and
I enjoyed it because they were quite clear and easy to understand. On top of that, they were very
enthusiastic to teach the unit.
Interest - 7/10
I didn't think it was hard but I didn't think it was THAT interesting but it definitely wasn't a total pain
in the ass to follow.
Overall - 8/10
As you can tell from what I have said, it was quite decent. 4U students have an advantage over 3U
students.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Starts off relatively easy with complex numbers (I had never done them before but they were quite
simple to pick up) and then moves through functions and differentiation techniques, limits etc. Some
of the differentiation is really messy, and none of the content is hard, but applying it to complicated
functions can be confusing.
Lecturers: 8/10 (James Kennedy, Florica-Corina Cirstea)
James Kennedy has a good vocab and explains stuff really well.
Florica Cirstea speaks really quickly with a Romanian accent, but you get used to it after one lesson
and find that she's good at maths and funny.
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 8/10

Semester 1 2009
Ease - 7/10
Lecturers - 6/10 (Tegan Morrison 7/10, Mary Myerscough 5/10)
Interest - 6/10
Overall - 6/10

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 5/10
Starts off as an easy subject but turns really random after the first quiz when you start learning about
the Extreme Value Theorem, Mean Value Theorem and so forth.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Ben Wilson)
Ben Wilson was such a gun. He made the course interesting and explained content in simple real life
examples. He also wrote on the blackboard instead of using overheads or PowerPoint presentations
which meant there were breaks every 20 minutes or so.
Interest: 7/10
Sometimes it's boring, sometimes it's interesting.
Overall: 7/10
Not bad but not spectacular.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 5/10
Lecturer - 2/10
Worst lecturer in history. refused to use a microphone
Interest - 4/10
Overall - 4/10

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 MATH1002 - Linear Algebra

Summer School 2015

Ease: 7/10
This unit is probably the hardest normal level mathematics unit you will do, as the content taught is
completely new to most people and often relies on quite a few abstract ideas. That being said, it is not
particularly difficult by any means, you just have to keep up with all the material and make sure you
understand everything. What made the subject a lot easier, for those who had trouble with the
material, was the introduction of worksheets for each of the different topics, which asked repetitive
but essential questions that you would expect to be able to do. It was a good initiative, so I hope it
continues for future classes. Assessment wise, we had one sample quiz which was pretty much an
exact copy of the sample quiz we were given except with the numbers changed, which made that 15%
of the mark quite easy to obtain. The assignment and final exam were probably a bit harder to make
up for it, but again, it was doable.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Clinton Boys)
Clinton has just finished his Ph.D, and he has had a bit more experience lecturing then Joachim. He
was a very engaging lecturer who taught the content as well as could be hoped. I'm also pretty sure he
was the one who compiled the extra conceptual worksheets, which were great for nailing in harder
concepts. If he stays at USYD, and is one of the lecturers for a unit you are doing, I would definitely
recommend going to his lecture stream.
Tutor: 6/10 (Les Farnell)
Les was a really nice guy, and was able to help out a lot. When he forgot to bring along the answers,
he'd sometimes have problems answering the higher end questions. He'd get there in the end, but it
wasn't a good look. Still, did what he was supposed to do so can't really complain too much.
Interest: 10/10
The first half of the course is about vectors: basic operations, the cross and dot products, and
applications to lines and planes. The second half is on linear systems, where you will look at solving
systems, matrix operations, inverses, determinants and eigenvalues/eigenvectors. As I said, most of
the material is completely new, hence it probably piqued my interest a little bit more than
MATH1001. Clinton also went through quite a few real world applications during the lectures which
was really good to see (so just keep in mind everything you learn does have a point. )
Overall: 9/10
A very good introduction to linear algebra, and it has definitely made me look forward to second year
maths. There are aspects to the course that are more challenging than the other first year units, but if
you do all your work you should be fine.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
The exam was much, much harder (proofs, much more abstract, etc.) than MATH1001. Quizzes etc.
are easy.
Lecturers: Bob Crossman 3/10, Andrew Crisp 8/10
Crossman is a horrible lecturer. Can’t understand a word he says because he mumbles and breathes
really heavily (sorry, but it’s probably because he is really obese). He wasted so much time in the
lectures telling people off and his handwriting is illegible.
I wasn’t in Crisp’s stream, but I used his lecture notes, which were very helpful. Unfortunately, he
does seem to make a lot of mistakes during the lectures (going on about something for ~10 min and
then crossing it all out and apologising, starting over).
Interest: 5/10
Pretty boring. It’s about like matrices and other calculation-type things.
Overall: 6/10
It’s not bad…but I just don’t like this type of maths and some of the lecturers were really bad.

Semester 1 2014

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Ease: 8/10
Loved vectors and hated matrices, if you like it, you will find it so easy!
Lecturers: Bob Crossman 5/10, Andrew Crisp 10/10, Zhou Zhang 7/10
Crossman was bad, but his lecture questions are very exam typical, unlike the textbook style dry
questions, he made final exam questions I think...
Crisp was perfect.
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 8/10
Try to maximise your quiz and assignment marks and do all the past exam papers!!!

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 8/10
I think it was a bit harder than MATH1001 but they were pretty much the same - different people will
think either is harder. Matrices are a bit confusing at first but then you learn how to apply it and how it
works - it’s not too bad. It gets harder towards the end. Some questions can be quite hard to solve and
you may have some problems but mostly, you should be okay if you turn up to lectures and tutorials,
like MATH1001. I got 15/15 and 12/15 for the quizzes, respectively, and 19/25 for the assignment -
the assignment marking is VERY picky.
Lecturer - 5/10 (Bob Crossman)
I did not like Crossman as a lecturer and it was annoying when he’d stop the lecture when he saw
somebody use their phone. He has quite a boring tone and seems as though he doesn’t want to teach
that much.
Interest - 7/10
About the same as MATH1001 - to me, they were both just maths.
Overall - 7/10
It wasn’t bad but I didn’t like it as much as MATH1001. 4U students do have an advantage but not as
much as it was in MATH1001.
Ease: 8/10
Unlike MATH1001, the first half of the course was much harder than the second half.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Adrian Nelson)
Adrian Nelson was ok. He used overheads and had some errors in them which he corrected during the
lecture. Not the best but wasn't the worst either.
Interest: 7/10
Gets pretty boring sometimes (vectors) but the matrices part isn't too bad.
Overall: 7/10
It was OK. Questions from past papers usually equals 5-10 marks in the final exam (there's always the
parallelogram question in the final exam...)

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Surprisingly easy. If someone said to me that I'd be doing matrices a year ago, I would have thought it
impossible. However, the way this course is taught makes it very easy to understand (and the textbook
by David Easdown is fantastic).
Lecturers: 10/10 (Bob Crossman)
A lot of people didn't like Bob Crossman, one person calling him an 'angry, old douche'. He has a
tendency to sweat and breath heavily which is disturbing, but he is an excellent lecturer in my opinion
who explained everything fantastically.
Interest: 8/10
I can see the relevance and use of this stuff, but it didn't persuade me enough to continue maths next
year.
Overall: 9/10

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Semester 1 2009
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 8/10 (David Easdown)
David Easdown is really good
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 8/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 6/10
Vectors are dodgy, but matrices are easy
Lecturer - 6/10
If you talk in lecturers, you will be in big trouble
Interest 5/10
Overall - 5.66/10

MATH1003 - Integral Calculus and Modelling

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 7/10
Not very difficult overall. If you've done 4 unit maths in high school, it shouldn't be too difficult. Like
3/4 of the course was just trying to remember what I did in high school whilst the other 1/4 was
modelling certain scenarios and such. I'll admit that I had some trouble with generating some models,
but the majority of the students found the content quite straightforward. The final was harder than
expected and was an exception in terms of the relatively low difficulty of past papers. Although I will
attribute the difficulty of the exam to my lack of effort. Remember kids, never get arrogant - it'll bite
you in the ass.
Lecturers - Zhou Zhang 7/10, Andrew Papanicolau 2/10 and Bob Crossman 0.1/10
Zhou Zhang: Pretty good lecturer. He goes through the content in depth and he actually puts the effort
into trying to prove the theorems. Although he has a slight accent, it's hardly noticeable and that was
the only negative a found.
Andrew Papanicolau: Copies directly from the compiled notebook for MATH1003 into his lecture
notes and spends 1 hour reading off the projector. He's a new lecturer and although he has improved, I
found his lecturing style quite disappointing.
Bob Crossman: All he does is whine about telling people to turn their phone's off. Explanations
weren't very good at all.
Interest - 1/10
I found it to be quite tedious, especially since I learned most of the course in 4u. In terms of interest, I
probably should have tried out for MATH1903 since it looks much, much more interesting but eh.
Overall - 5/10
Not too bad in difficulty but personally, not appealing at all.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 7/10
Amleops’ description is pretty solid.
Lecturers/Tutors: Zhou Zhang 7/10, Tutor 8/10
As stated his accent can be hard to understand but he sets out his notes pretty well and tries to be
thorough. There’s a couple things he rushed through but I think that was more through losing lecture
time rather than a fault of his own.
Not sure about my tutor’s name; he was external. He was pretty good., one of the best tutors I’ve had.
Always doing questions on the board and willing to help.
Interest: 7/10

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Decent mathematical subject that seems to lay foundations for any more important maths you need in
your degree.
Overall: 7/10
Based on most of my ratings being that

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 6.5/10
This course was aimed at students with an Extension 1 background, however, I would encourage
those with just the 2 Unit knowledge to do this course as well, as it is quite manageable if you are
motivated enough. While not a hard course, there lies the potential in the course content for some
curve balls. Especially for the final exam, it seems like they picked the hardest type of question for
most of the topics (of course this may not be the case for other years). On the whole though the
mathematical methods required were easy enough to understand, and if you studied consistently
throughout the year, you will be fine.
Lecturers/Tutor: Bob Crossman 0/10, Zhou Zhang 9/10, Andrew Papanicolaou ?/10, John
Nakhoul 5/10
Avoid Bob Crossman like the plague. My timetable put me into his lecture stream, and after that very
first lecture I had already seen enough. He spent most of his time telling off people for talking or
having their phones on, and his teaching style was very unenthusiastic and quite often tangential to the
actual content. Thank God there was another stream on at that exact same time, otherwise it would
have been a painful few months.
Zhou Zhang was one of the better lecturers I have had this semester. He sets out his notes in an easy to
follow manner and explained them quite well, plus he was a very nice guy who was more than willing
to answer any questions you had after lectures. He has a little bit of an accent which at times was a
little difficult to understand, but it wasn't too much of an issue most of the time. I would definitely
recommend him as a lecturer for this subject if you can help it.
There was one more lecturer for this course, Andrew Papanicolaou, who I'm not familiar with,
however his lecture notes do seem quite good in terms of teaching the content.
John Nakhoul was an OK tutor, however the tutorials mainly consisted of working through one
question together on the board, after which you completed the rest individually. So while Nakhoul
was obviously quite knowledgeable of the content and was willing to help if you asked, I really think
the way he structured his class made his role relatively redundant, especially when worked solutions
to the tutorial questions were made readily available. Of course, as this was the first junior maths unit
I have done, I do not know whether this happens regardless of the tutor, but in any case, Nakhoul
didn't really aid my learning as much as Zhang or the textbook.
Interest: 9/10
Obviously there will be differing opinions on this matter, but at least for me, I found the subject
matter to be quite interesting and engaging; especially with the modelling section of the course. I
guess with mathematics you either love it or you hate it, and this subject is no different. Nevertheless
the mathematics that you learn in this unit is crucial for many second year units both inside and
outside the Department of Mathematics, and I think the universality of the content in this unit just
makes it all the more interesting for me.
Overall: 7.5/10
It was a good, relevant course that was quite pleasurable to study. Just remember to study consistently,
and not to let Crossman ruin it for you.

Semester 2 2009
Ease - 10/10
LOL, some of the course revisits stuff from Extension 1/2 Unit HSC Mathematics.
Lecturers - 10/10 (Andrew Crisp, Chris Cosgrove)
The 1st lecturer (Andrew Crisp) was really good, he explained concepts thoroughly, and I wish I
could have him again, the 2nd guy (Chris Cosgrove) took a bit of getting used to seeing as he did
things differently compared to Andrew but I was able to understand him.

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Interest - 10/10
t was very enjoyable.
Overall - 10/10
Can be a good subject if you study from the 1st day.

MATH1004 - Discrete Mathematics

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 7/10
I actually found this subject a little challenging despite so many people saying it's a "very easy"
subject. Especially some of the combs/perms and things involved with sets and number theory with
prime numbers and such. (though hasn't been assessed in the past exams I've seen) The final exam
was fairly easy this year, seeing as how they didn't include a comb/perm question in the short
response.
Lecturer - 9/10 (Stephan Tillman)
Stephan makes an interesting lecturer.
Interest - 7/10
The logic/truth topics and number theory were interesting.
Overall - 7.5/10
It was ok, I think MATH1905 might've been more useful to me and most people though.

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 9/10
Combinatorics problems can be made arbitrarily difficult, but apart from that, the problems are quite
simple.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Stephan Tillman)
Stephan Tillmann never fails to entertain.
Interest: 7/10
The course content was absolutely fascinating - Boolean algebra, classical logic, set theory, generating
functions, etc. But the treatment was too shallow.
Overall: 8/10
They should reintroduce MATH1904.

Semester 2 2014
Ease - 9/10
The topics themselves are not too difficult, and apart from one or two questions on the assessments,
most of the calculations and questions you are given are pretty standard, or are at least are easy to
figure out once you've interpreted the question. There is a whole topic on proofs which is probably the
hardest thing you will learn, but even then, the mechanics and common methods are explained quite
clearly, and while many of the questions provide an interesting challenge, many are also relatively
straightforward. All in all if you do all of your tutorial questions, problem sets and practice questions
before assessments you should be all good.
Lecturer/Tutor - 8/10 (Oded Yacobi)
I'm not sure why, but from my experience, American lecturers seem to be very good at simplifying
content so that it can be more easily learnt. Maybe that says a lot about the type of people they have to
teach back home haha. In all seriousness though, I really couldn't have asked for much more from
Oded; he was a nice guy, he knew his stuff, and he taught it well. He went a little too slow at times for
my liking, but the course only assumed a 2 Unit background, so I guess he had to cater to some
fundamental stream students as well. I was lucky enough to have him as a tutor too; the tutorials
consisted of him going through the week's set questions, asking the class for possible approaches and
giving us a few minutes here and there to go do some of the steps for ourselves. Unfortunately for me,
my eagerness led me to complete all of the questions before the tutorials, and I also had already

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checked my answers with a copy of the tutorial solutions from last year. This, in combination with the
general ease of the course, kind of made tutorials a little redundant for me. Nevertheless, when a
difficult question did arise from time to time, Oded was good at explaining it. All in all Oded
definitely made the course worthwhile. The only other department member I really had any
experience with for this unit was an honours student named Sampson Wong, who filled in for tutorials
one week when Oded was sick. I rarely heard him speak throughout that whole tutorial, plus he gave
out a sort of nerdy-pretentiousness vibe that I really don't have any patience for. Those types of people
should not be teaching. If he ends up doing his PhD at USYD, and is one of the tutors for any of your
subjects, I would advise you to avoid him if you can.
Interest - 10/10
Naturally, as this is mathematics, it is impossible for it not to be interesting. This course in particular
tends itself more to pure mathematics, and most of the topics come under one of 4 major areas: set
theory, counting principles, logic or sequences/series (more specifically for the latter you learn about
generating functions and recurrence relations, not the type of stuff you do in high school). Some of the
concepts may seem a bit abstract, but I found them interesting nonetheless, and in general quite fun. It
really made studying for this subject quite easy to do.
Overall - 9/10
I would definitely recommend this unit to anyone. If you are intending to major in mathematics, then
this would serve as a great elective outside of the more common Calculus/Linear Algebra/Statistics
first year mathematics courses, and provide you with some useful knowledge for 2nd and 3rd year
pure mathematics. It would also serve as an easier/valid alternative as a maths prerequisite unit for
those of you in the science faculty not interested in maths beyond first year. Either way, this was the
best first year mathematics course I have done, and I was very impressed by it.

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 9/10
Concepts were straightforward and a solid 60% of the course was high school content. The things that
were new weren’t too complex to understand. The thing that I think made this unit easier than all
other first year maths courses is that the content is less abstract and more concrete, and hence easier to
grasp. There was a reasonable level of challenge in this unit, which made it all the more enjoyable.
Lecturer/Tutor: 10/10 (Oded Yacobi)
MATH1004 has a very strong lecturer. He would cover some theory, then follow up with several
examples to cement in the knowledge. The way the unit was structured make the content come around
in a circle so we were back at the beginning in the end. It was brilliant. Unlike my other first year
maths courses, it was specified that we had to do the tute questions before the tute, although by
halfway through the semester, it was clear that not many people did.
The lecturer was also my tutor, and I found the tutorial as a great way for me to go through the
answers and revise the content. I was pleasantly surprised to find that unlike advanced levelled
tutorials which are more like studying sessions where you have access to a tutor to ask questions,
normal stream tutorials go through the tutorial sheet questions together. I really enjoyed that and went
to every tutorial even though they were sometimes a little bit slow for my liking.
Oded also had a pretty cool accent, so that helped.
Interest: 9/10
Let me be honest. I was one of those people that didn’t even dream of doing maths again after high
school. After the horror of MATH1901 and MATH1902, I was even less keen on doing any more
maths. I took MATH1004 because I really really really didn’t want to take MATH1003. It was
refreshing for me to find out that I could actually enjoy maths again. This was my favourite subject of
the semester (along with INFO1103), and it’s made me reconsider taking second year maths.
(MATH2969, come at me. <3)
Overall: 9.5/10
Great subject. Amazing lecturer. Awesome content. Best first year maths unit I’ve taken by far.
Absolutely no complaints.

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Semester 2 2013
Ease: 9/10
An easy course for those who took MX1 and or MX2. Some of the concepts are tricky at first except
once they have been drilled things get easy.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Oded Yacobi)
Oded Yacobi is an enthusiastic lecturer from Canada. I found his style a bit predictable but he was
good at explaining counting problems.
Interest: 5/10
Boring, for me. I don't like discrete mathematics ... Prefer my dose of continuity.
Overall: 6.5/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer - 11/10 (Koo-Guan Choo)
Dr Choo or Uncle Choo as he prefers to be called, is a legend
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 8.7/10

MATH1005 - Statistics

Semester 2 2014
This is coming from a person who isn’t mathematically inclined
Ease: 6/10
The lecturer made it seem more difficult than it actually was so props to my tutor for pulling the
knots. The other lecturer, Dr Di Warren, had an amazing set of notes that simplified everything and
she doodled things that would help us understand better.
Interest: 4/10
Lecturer: 4/10 (Nicola Armstrong)
Not a good lecturer tbh - she fails to explain properly so I had to resort to Youtube and the other
lecturer’s notes for help. In most of her lectures, I wasn’t even listening because it felt like she was
going on and on. I did wish she would write on the projector more and actually go through the process
of how to get to the solution. There was one lecture where Dr Di Warren filled in for Nicola and I
must say, she was really good (10/10). I have never seen a really engaging math lecturer.
Overall: 5/10
I am not a math person so stats was a pain. If the lecturer was good enough to explain the content then
I would have given this course a 7/10.

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 8/10
Statistics in my experience was basically probability in high school and a pinch of permutations and
combinations. Some of the questions that were in the final were quite dodgy, but overall it's quite
straightforward.
Lecturer - 10/10 (Di Warren)
What a passionate lecturer! I absolutely ADMIRED her enthusiasm. It's always great to see a lecturer
who truly enjoys what he/she is teaching and personally, I was inspired to do better in statistics. Her
explanations and examples were great as well as her notes. However, her notes can be too detailed
which can be a negative to some.
Interest - 8/10
Well for the first half of stats, I just found it tedious but by the second half, it definitely picked up! I
never thought I would've found such a unit interesting but here we have it - thanks to Di Warren.
Overall - 9/10

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I highly recommend statistics. Not too difficult and fitted in with a wonderful lecturer!
Ease: 6.5/10
Beginning is pretty simple and a lot of HSC probability. Picks up a lot with the statistical inferences
and different tests.
Lecturers/Tutor: Di Warren 7/10, Emi Tanaka 2/10, Ray Kawai 0.5/10
Warren is pretty enthusiastic and a fairly decent lecturer. Some things were explained very well others
were left a bit lacking. Did go on the odd tangent when using an example.
Emi Tanaka filled in for a week and it was a challenge to stay awake. Notes were decent but delivery
of lecturers was horrible and did not learn anything that week.
My tutor was Ray Kawai. While the rating is harsh because there was definitely bit of a language
barrier, if you asked him a question he would make you more confused. Would rub off the notes left
on the board from the tutor before but in the semester he maybe went through 2 questions and would
normally just stand around and magically disappear when you wanted to ask a question (although I
learnt quickly to not do that)
Interest 8.5/10
Found this subject a lot more interesting than expected. It’s also a very applicable subject.
Overall 7.5/10
Would have been nicer with a better tutor but otherwise a nice subject.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 8/10
The first section of this course starts off with really basic mean/median/mode type stuff, but
obviously, it gets tougher as you go along. Probability may cause some problems if you are not
prepared, and for statistical inference sometimes the choice of hypothesis test can be quite subtle.
However, if you remember the theory, doing all of the questions shouldn't be too much of a problem.
Lecturers/Tutor: Di Warren 9/10, Emi Tanaka/Nicola Armstrong ?/10, Gemma Moran 8/10
Di Warren was a great lecturer; very enthusiastic, explained everything very well, and had nicely set
out lecture notes. Problem is, her notes are too good and detailed that a lot of the time you can afford
to skip lectures. Still, it's worth going to the lecture just for that extra bit of clarification.
I'm not too familiar with the other two lecturers, Emi Tanaka and Nicola Armstrong, however their
lecture slides both seem quite well organised also.
Gemma Moran was a great tutor; she made key summaries of all the concepts on the board before
each lesson, which made it quite easy to answer all the questions and understand the content at a much
deeper level. In fact you could probably get away with skipping all lectures and relying on her
summaries as your main source of reference (of course I definitely wouldn't recommend that you do
this ). Only criticism of her is that her tutorials were clearly aimed towards the needs of the average
student, which although not a bad thing (in fact this probably benefits much more people), it did mean
that she worked through the questions at a somewhat slow pace. Still it's easy enough to work through
the questions at your own leisure, and she is more than happy to help you out if you have questions.
Interest: 8/10
I was actually surprised how much I enjoyed statistics, so much so I might actually consider it as a
major. Everything you learned had an obvious practical use, and it was very interesting to see how
certain hypothesis tests or data analysis skills could be applied to real life situations. Some may argue
the great simplicity of the content at the beginning of the course may get a little tedious, but in my
opinion this course was quite fun throughout.
Overall: 8/10
Quite a solid introduction to statistics which was informative and also quite manageable to learn.

Semester 2 2009
Ease - 8/10
Some stuff was good some wasn't
Lecturer - 5/10 (Michael Stewart)
Michael Stewart wasn't that great, although some stuff did get through to my head

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Interest - 6/10
The only reason I went to lectures(apart from actually trying to learn) was because of a really
beautiful girl lol.
Overall - 6.3/10
Can be a good subject but can be bad also

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7/10
Starts out really easy, then gets hard in week 6
Lecturer - 7/10
Interest - ????
Depends on how interesting you find statistics
Overall - 7/10

MATH1011 - Applications of Calculus

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 5/10
This is framed from someone with a 2 unit background, the course builds on from a 2unit calculus.
Obviously, if you did 3U or 4U in school you would rate the ease much higher. This ease is
comparative to the biostatistics course-both quizzes in calculus are decent difficulty, and the
assignment requires a little thinking, but they are quite pedantic in the marking. The final, the thing
that brings the ease down is the timing to do all the question, as although the paper is MC, the MC
take a bit of thinking/working and put you under a crunch in 1.5 hrs.
Lecturers - 7/10
Emma Carberry is quite good, and plus is her notes are quite nice. However on the whole, I preferred
Clinton Boys explanations. I don't know how Ross is.
Interest - 5/10
Well it's calculus, if you really like calculus you should obviously be doing a higher maths because
this will be a formulaic approach maths for you, where you'll want elegant proofs and what not. To the
mathphobes who need the 24cp, chances are there will be parts of it that gel with you more than
others. I was quite neutral towards it, hence the rating. I liked the partial differentiation and the
series/sequences, wasn't as keen on other things.
Overall - 6/10
Basically, do this if you did 2 unit or above. You'll find it fair as long as you didn't bomb 2unit in HS.
3 unit/4 unit it should be quite straightforward for you but don't zone out completely. If you did
General, I'd strongly encourage MATH1111 because this would be hard without having done 2u.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 4/10
I know that I'm going to either fail, or pass my an incredibly small margin, but regardless of that the
course wasn't really all that hard. Reading through the resource book is probably enough to get
anyone through the course, provided that they have a bit of a clue about HSC Mathematics. The
examples exams are essentially identical to the one that's you're assessed on, so there's no lateral
direction - study the manual and look at the exams and you'll do fine (and by that, I mean learn the
questions in the past exams off by heart). Still, the shoddy lecture format, uninspiring content and the
fact that it's a uni maths course means it's not that easy (then again, I'm no math whiz).
Lecturers: 1/10 (Bill Palmer, King-Fai Lai, Ruibin Zhang)
God awful lecturers, God awful lecturing format, God awful lecturing style. There's nothing that can
be learned from some waffling old man by the name of Palmer (funny as he was) at 8am in the
morning writing on endless PowerPoints, nor is there anything that can be learned from two Asian

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men (Lai, Zhang) who've barely mastered phonics, droning on about some garbage that I couldn't care
less about. No effort was made to make things interesting, none at all. I can respect that they don't
give their best lecturers to the life science students, but God, give us something. Breaking it down:
Palmer: Funny, quirky old man but he was unfortunate enough to occupy the 8am slots, which I gave
up on attending after week 2.
Lai: Funny, kind of cute guy (in a totally heterosexual way) but incredibly hard to understand.
Zhang: Hopeless, unintelligible lecturer. His lectures consistent of re-writing the resource book
(which the other two mostly avoided, as best they could), pacing back and forth, laughing at the most
incoherently unfunny things and yelling at people for talking. I cannot fault them, as Zhang is the
most mindless, hopeless and awful lecturer I've encountered at USYD.
Interest: 0.5/10
It's maths. I liked it in the HSC because it was new. This was advanced HSC work, presented in an
awful format. Kudos to Palmer for making things practical and interesting in his lectures, but as I
said, there was no way I could keep going to them.
Overall: 2/10
It's a maths course, it's compulsory, it's shit.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 5/10
It is almost like HSC Calculus, but taught it a much harder way. Basically wasn't as
difficult as I thought considering I only went to 4 weeks of lectures. If you enjoy maths then this is
easy for you, if you are like me and really do not like maths, then this is going to be hard. Passing isn't
as easy, but as long as you go to the tutes and attempt to do some and study, then it should be no prob.
I only studied the night before, so I guess getting a pass is something I deserve. It is almost all
differentiating. 3D though, I don't like 3D personally, and never learnt it, only figured we did 3D 2
weeks before exams. So, yes... not that easy!!
Lecturer: 2/10 (Bill Palmer)
I got Palmer at 8am, and no way was I to make my way out in the cold mornings of Thursday and
Friday to go to a MATHS lecture. Stopped going in week 4 and never bothered again. He really tried,
but he thought it in a format I didn't enjoy (use to my HSC teachers and tutors) so yes, he over-
complicated EVERYTHING. And sometimes refused to use a microphone. For 8am lectures, where
you are half asleep, and overdosing on coffee, microphones WILL be appreciated.
Interest: 2/10
The is harder HSC Maths, if you are like me and used the Cambridge 2U book, then it is like the
Challenge Q but harder. If you enjoyed maths, then this might be ok. But I really enjoyed HSC maths,
and this wasn't that enjoyable. But still, it is not too bad if you don't bother turning up and use what
they teach you back in HS with just a bit more new knowledge. You can pass with that.
Overall: 3/10
It is compulsory. I really hate maths thanks to the Life Science maths... Such a pity for someone who
really enjoyed maths....

MATH1013 - Mathematical Modelling

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 3/10
This is framed from someone with a 2 unit background. Yes, I'm one of those people just doing maths
because it's compulsory for my degree. The quizzes and the online homework are relatively easy, but
the final written Q in our exam was absolutely brutal and beyond what we'd looked at in Qs. And the
saddest part was that it wasn't a 'Prove the model is this' so then you couldn't just pick up the result for
the later parts. So in short, do well in the quizzes and do your online h/w because the written part of
the exam can be quite tricky under time! (if you aren't maths inclined/good like me)
Lecturers - 8/10 (Mary Myerscough, Andrew Crisp)

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Mary Myerscough is an encouraging sweetheart. She's like a kindly old HS teacher feel. Shows some
interesting model examples from her psych papers.
Andrew Crisp gives a maths lecture the best theatric projection you could hope for. He's probs my
fave lecturer though, and you'll hear more about him below [MATH1014 Review].
Interest - 5/10
Well some parts of it are interesting (with the iterations), but I really couldn't care about a peak oil
example. Logistic function and epidemic models are interesting if you are bio inclined. So I'd say
you're likely to find different parts appealing-I was much better at the second half of the course with
the first and second order DEs, and APs/GPs etc. than the first half.
Overall - 5/10
Well if you didn't like MATH1011, you'll hate this more (general consensus). Likely you're taking this
to fulfil your 12CP of maths required, but it's not a bad course. The being able to solve a pair of
first/second order differential/difference equations is fine if you are competent at basic algebra.

MATH1014 - Introduction to Linear Algebra

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 8/10
A very doable course that is straightforward and you instantly just ‘get’ it. Although, the second half
of the course got more harder and difficult to grasp.
Interest: 7/10
Probably my favourite math course. I really liked solving vector equations - it felt like second nature
and I found it fun.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Brad Roberts)
Decent lecturer
Overall: 9/10
Not a hard course and I enjoyed it.

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 8/10
Oh doth hail my favourite fundies maths unit. Even though you'll have never done linear algebra in
HS (2 unit background), this is the most intuitive to me and made immediate sense. Then it's just
some practice. First quiz super easy, second quite easy, and assignment just a little bit of mulling but
very achievable. Final exam is fair, MC section not too taxing and the written section is ok.
Lecturers - 8/10 (Brad Matthews, Andrew Crisp)
Brad Matthews has a monotone voice but is good at explaining and goes through lots of examples.
Nothing more or less than what you expect.
Went to a few of Andrew Crisp’s lectures when I couldn't make the other lectures and he's great. Also
total props if you can get him as a tutor, he's really great at explaining things after the lecture or the
tute, or where things are applied. He will actually answer a Q that's beyond the confines of the course
for your interest. (Opposed to some tutors being like 'Go away fundies student, you are below me
maths scum' attitude and not being able to explain something)
Interest - 8/10
Well it was my favourite fundies maffs course <3 I'm probably just a weird sort that finds EROs
soothing like how I find micro-pipetting really peaceful. I liked the working in different Z planes, the
error code checking and the Gauss-Jordan elimination problems. It all just made a lot of sense to me,
which as a normal maths blonde was nice haha.
Overall - 8/10
To summarise, I found this the easiest fundies maths unit, followed by MATH1015, MATH1011 and
then MATH1013.

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 MATH1015 - Biostatistics

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 7.5/10
It's easier than MATH1011 (surprisingly as the last time you touch stats in NSW schooling is like Year
8), you start off with easy mean/medium/mode stuff, the assignment you can easily get close to
full/full marks and the first quiz is very, very easy (basic probability and stuff). Second quiz is harder
due to time crunch and just having to use R a bit which you don't use in the final exam. Final exam is
similar deal to MATH1011, timing as the MC can munch up time because you'll be referring to the
four statistic tables a lot (Standard, Binomial, t-test, Chi)
Lecturer - Jen Chan 1/10, Shelton Peiris 8/10
I don't feel it is fair to do this as a combined one, I mainly did 8AM due to my experience in 11AM.
Jen Chan can't explain a thing and you will be struggling to hear her as she speaks so softly, fast and
unclear. Shelton Peiris-8/10 He's nice, explains things well and makes stat the most absorbable that is
possible at 8AM when you may still be half asleep. Gives revision tips, wishes you luck, a nice touch.
Interest - 6/10
Again, it's just a first years fundies maths course. It's introductory, there's a formula sheet et al. Higher
on interest because it was something different for me because I hadn't done stats for ages, and you got
to play with R for the quizzes. I liked the regression modelling part and elements of hypothesis
testing. Also, I did better in it, so it will always have that slight preference for me :P
Overall - 6/10
Again, go do harder maths if you have the backing for it. Also, the MATH1005 (normal stats in
second semester) looks very similar to this course, they only go slightly more in depth, it may have
slightly more favourable, not sure. If you just want the maths credit points fulfilled, it's good to do
this.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 1/10
This is HARD. I never liked Stats so it made my life hell. Plus you have crap lecturer (I did) so it was
totally off putting. I managed a Pass with 50 (say I am lucky) I really didn't get more
than half the paper. I didn't bother going to lectures coz I didn't get the lecturer anyway. And I didn't
understand the textbook. I resorted to getting my HSC private Maths tutor back in to tutor me for 4
hrs and finally got something. So it is HARD. Unless they change the bloody lecturer and tutors. I
never knew so many tests for stupid stats, T- test, Z- test, Sign - test, P- test. etc.
Lecturers: 0/10 (Jennifer Chan)
I got Professor Jennifer Chan with a PhD in Maths who really didn't know how to speak ENGLISH! It
was SO HARD trying to get her Canto accent. I am really use to the Chinese accents since I know so
many overseas students and everything, so I can usually understand everything, but this is an
EXCEPTION. She is terrible. Took me 2 lectures to know Pond = Plot, Err... rah = Error and Owl = R.
So yes... her teachings I didn't get either, try asking her a question and she doesn't answer it properly.
Hope she is never back again. She is terrible.....
Interest: 0.5/10
Terrible. I gave it 0.5 coz I got the Median, Mode, Mean and Box Plot, those easy crap we did back in
HS. Anything harder than that got me headaches. It is NOT interesting. It is hard, it is hard to
understand. Everything about it sucks. I hate maths thanks to this...!!
Overall: 1/10
It is compulsory. I hate it with a passion. I always had something against stat... so this was terrible to
the limits.

MATH1901 - Differential Calculus (Advanced)

Semester 1 2016

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Ease – 9/10
Most of this unit is fairly straightforward. Some aspects of limits and functions may prove to be
challenging. Despite this unit being relatively straightforward for the mathematically inclined, the
second quiz had an average less than 50%. The final exam was perfectly manageable.
Lecturer – 10/10 (James Parkinson)
Parkinson teaches in a highly effective manner. His lectures are well structured, engaging and
definitely worth attending. The only objection I have is the fact that he cut his beautiful hair during
the last week. It doesn’t take much to work out that a huge portion of the cohort (female and male) are
too lost in his handsomeness to focus on understanding multivariable calculus.
Interest – 10/10
This course has a heavy emphasis on proofs and theorems, thus making it more abstract than your
average first year differential calculus course. I’d definitely recommend this course to anyone who
takes an interest in mathematics.
Overall – 10/10
Amazing lecturer. Organised content. Perfectly manageable assessments. Mathematics. What more
can you ask for?

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 8/10
The first parts of the subject (complex numbers, injective and bijective functions, limits) are generally
easier to grasp than later topics. A part that most students struggled with was the epsilon-delta
definition of limits (future students BEWARE!); I only managed to partially grasp the concept after
several consultations with the lecturer and my tutor. Other than that, if you consistently keep up with
the lectures and tutes, and clarify your doubts before they snowball into an endless list of questions,
you should be fine.
Assessments: the quizzes are much easier than the finals since the better-mark principle is used to
calculate your final score, try to grab as many marks as you can for the quizzes and the assignment. It
won't put as much pressure on you for the finals. Personally, I couldn't finish the final exam (left
around 1-1.5 questions blank) so time management is really important. Don't spend too long on the
multiple choice part! Another tip is to rigorously complete past exam papers (time yourself if you
need to) and the online quizzes posted on the math website (these will help with the multiple choice
component).
Lecturer: 10/10 (James Parkinson)
A great lecturer - his lecture notes are clear and concise, and he is really good at explaining new
concepts in an interesting manner. His proofs of theorems are really clear too (even at 8am in the
morning), which definitely help when you're revising/studying for the subject. He's also really
friendly and approachable, so don't hesitate to ask questions after lectures/at his consultations.
Interest: 7/10
Most topics/theorems were exiting to learn (eg L'Hopital's Rule, directional derivatives) while some
proofs were somewhat dry/did not make much sense to me. If you're having problems understanding
the proofs, attend a consultation.
Overall: 8/10
The lecturer made the content interesting to learn, and it was pretty cool seeing the linkages between
math concepts. If you consistently work hard in tutes and complete the tute sheets (I didn't do the
questions with **, they were too difficult), you should be alright.

Semester 1 2012
Ease - 6/10
This is the easier of the two Maths units in semester one and isn't that difficult as long as you
consistently practice and you make sure you understand the content.
Lecturer - 1/10 (Chris Cosgrove)
The lectures were terrible. 8am. Ugh. And the lecturer was bad at explaining things, the lectures just
turned into "copy what he's writing." They were kind of pointless.

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Interest - 6/10
I'm not a very Maths-y person but I found the course slightly interesting. But, being the easier of the
two Maths units it is also the less-interesting which made it boring in comparison.
Overall - 4/10
If the lecturer wasn't bad I would give it 6/10 or higher.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
The more you don't do the tutorial sheets, the more confusing the course gets. Also, the practice
quizzes are diabolical.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Chris Cosgrove)
Chris Cosgrove was frequently talking to the board, while most of us looked on in confusion. He sure
knows a lot, but whether that translates to good teaching, I'm not too sure.
The tutorials were very helpful though. (thanks Justin!)
Interest: 6/10
Eh, it's maths. It's a compulsory part of my degree.
Overall: 7/10
It scaled alright, so I'm not too fussed.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
Started off with complex numbers. I don't know, it all felt like we were doing the HSC course again
with a different perspective or something but it seemed a lot harder now.
Lecturer: 4/10 (Chris Cosgrove)
Chris Cosgrove was alright at first but after a few weeks, I just showed up to the lectures for the notes
because he just stopped making sense to me. The tutorials helped though because the tutor somehow
manages to give us the gist of the two lectures in a few minutes.
Interest: 8/10
It was good once I finally understood what was happening.
Overall: 8/10
Interesting, makes compulsory first year maths not feel so bad. Lecturer could be better. Awesome
scaling.
Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Started off easy with complex numbers and went through functions and limits and completely re-did
them. Derivatives was the same stuff and partial derivatives just follow on easily. Just the functions
you work with get much more difficult.
Lecturer: 3/10 (Chris Cosgrove)
I started off not minding Chris Cosgrove, but as he went along, his lectures just got more and more
ridiculous to the point where half the lecture theatre had no idea what he was talking about and the
other half was too busy having a conversation to bother about what he'd said (The average for quiz 2
was 4/10). I don't think he ever did one simple example question, he likes his "pathological" functions
though. Luckily, I had an excellent tutor who straightened things out.
Interest: 9/10
I've always liked this area of maths so I was naturally interested in it. There were some parts which I
just found boring because they were. If you were interested in high school, you'll be interested now, if
you weren't interested in highschool then you won't now.
Overall: 6/10
Good material, bad lecturer. That about sums it up.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 8/10

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Lecturer: 9/10 (Jenny Henderson)
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 8/10
The first few weeks are mostly revision work with a few new topics, such as the complex exponential
function. The course is led on to more interesting topics later on, all presented by an excellent lecturer.

MATH1902 - Linear Algebra (Advanced)

Semester 1 2016
Ease – 6/10
The content wasn’t too difficult, albeit the difficulty did notably increase towards the end with
diagonalization and whatnot. The tutorial questions can get quite challenging (got into a routine where
I stopped every week at 80-90%) The assignments and quizzes weren’t that difficult. The final exam,
however, destroyed me (along with the rest of the cohort). The extended answers section of the exam
is quite abstract and really tests you on areas of the course that were glossed over. A massive contrast
to the difficulty of the final exam of MATH1901.
Lecturer – 8.5/10 (Holger Dullin)
A friendly lecturer who presents the content in a comprehensive way. Considering the difficulty of this
course towards the end, it would be a mistake not to take advantage of his lectures.
Interest – 8.5/10
Linear algebra is definitely different to the maths most students hitherto have been exposed to, so
some may find it’s foreignness dry, particularly since there were very little opportunities to apply the
theory in a practical context. However, if one persists, one can really get into it (particularly towards
the end).
Overall – 8/10
This is definitely harder than MATH1901. While this course is quite difficult and few students can get
upwards of 80, it’s a course well worth doing, especially if you expect to encounter more maths in
later years.

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 6.5/10
This course started off easy (vectors), but its difficulty increased exponentially (haha). Once you get
the hang of matrices, they are easier to tackle and questions (the basic questions) are generally kind of
standard. The worst topics were eigenvalues and eigenvectors and Markov processes. The lecturer
didn't explain these clearly in the lectures, and it is imperative to clear all your questions on this topic
asap especially since there is very little time to do so. The textbook is therefore really important for
this subject (written by David Easdown who is awesome). There was 1 entire question on the
eigenshit in the exam and it was awful Although I attended consultations, I never really grasped the
abovementioned concepts and had to resort to rote learning eigenvalue/eigenvector questions from
past papers. I didn't bother about Markov processes.
Assessments: Same format as MATH1901, study hard for the quizzes and put a decent amount of
effort into the assignment and you'll be ok. The last question of the final exam was difficult and there
is always at least 1 part of 1 question in the entire paper that is of a very different style to usual
questions (aka never seen before and very difficult).
Lecturer: 6.75/10 (Holger Dullin)
Lecturing was slightly above average for the first part of the course, but it was problematic for the
second half (especially the eigenvalue/eigenvector topics). It also didn't help that people at the back
kept talking loudly, making it difficult to hear him at times. Precious lecture time was also
consistently wasted because the lecturer had to keep telling people to shut up, causing him to rush
through the remaining content in the last 10 minutes :/. On a positive note, the lecturer is generally
approachable and friendly, and is willing to answer questions after lectures/during consultations.

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Interest: 6.5/10
Not as interesting as MATH1901, but it’s not too bad. 3-D vectors were somewhat interesting.
Overall: 7/10
Not my favourite subject in the semester, but it’s mostly manageable. Pay attention in the lectures and
tutes and do the tute sheets (again, ** questions are only for the brave-hearted) and you should get at
least a credit.

Semester 1 2012
Ease - 4/10
This is the more difficult of the two first semester of first year Maths courses. It is very different from
the stuff we learn in high school Maths and you're required to think a bit differently, but it is
interesting which helps you want to put in the time and effort to do well.
Lecturer - 9.5/10 (David Easdown)
He is the best lecturer I had in first semester and probably the best I will ever have. He was very good
at explaining things and seemed very approachable and stuff too.
Interest - 7/10
It's a fairly interesting unit since it’s so different and new and stuff.
Overall - 7/10
I'd probably give it a ranking of 5 or less if it wasn't for Easdown.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Slightly easier to grasp than differential calculus.
Lecturer: 8/10 (David Easdown)
David Easdown is a great lecturer. Although there were points where I was lost and confused, his
teaching style is engaging and humorous. His review questions before the quizzes/exams, and the fact
that he rand an additional class the week before was also extremely helpful.
Interest: 6/10
Same as above.
Overall: 8/10
It's better than Differential.
Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
Lectures, tutorial sheets, quizzes and assignments were pretty alright. I died in the final exam though,
probably because I didn't look at the asterisked questions of my tutorial sheet. Again, thank goodness
for scaling.
Lecturer: 8/10 (David Easdown)
David Easdown was so enthusiastic it was almost scary. Almost. He explains the content well and it
makes sense.
Interest: 6/10
I didn't really like it that much. I was so happy that I understood what I was doing, but matrices aren't
fun.
Overall: 5/10
Not that interesting, good lecturer, lectures make sense. Do the harder questions or die in the exam.
It's not as straightforward as Differential Calculus where the exam isn't too bad once you know
basically what you're doing.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
The material is usually straight forward and your major problems are numerical errors. The only area
where it gets hard is when you have to prove abstract things, but you get so many chances to practice
that it becomes more natural as you get further into the course.

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Lecturer: 10/10 (David Easdown)
What can I say, it's David Easdown. He managed to keep me interested and his enthusiasm for the
subject made it a lot easier. He's an excellent teacher and can deconstruct concepts very well. The one
problem I had was that I felt a little bit ripped off with the tute sheets, which were basically the
textbook exercises (he wrote the textbook). The last two lectures of the course (Fundamental Theorem
of Algebra and the Cayley-Hamilton theorem) pretty much convinced me to do Algebra (advanced)
next year, even though I'd crossed it off my list.
Interest: 7/10
There are some good, relevant examples (generally in the form of thought experiments), but otherwise
pretty basic material when can get dry.
Overall: 8/10
Great lecturer, simple assignments and a good tutor really helped me with this subject.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: 7/10 (Bob Howlett)
Interest: 6/10
Overall: 7/10
Personally I did not find Howlett's lecturing style very interesting, although I have been assured by
the postgrad maths community that he is very good. The material isn't too hard, just algebraically
messy, with multiplication of matrices.

MATH1903 - Integral Calculus and Modelling (Advanced)

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 9/10
Probably the easiest first year math subject. The weighed quizzes were almost identical to the sample
quizzes. The assignment was a little more difficult, but you have a long time to figure it out. The
finals were just a speed race. There's some form of scaling involved in this subject, otherwise I
probably wouldn't have gotten a final mark in the 90's based on how I went in the finals.
Lecturers – 8.75/10 (Anne Thomas 7.5/10, Florica Cirstea 10/10)
Florica's a great lecturer. Have only been to 1-2 of Anne's lectures, but she's good.
Interest - 7/10
Content seemed a little dry and repetitive, but I enjoyed it for the brainless algebra/integration and
lack of rigour.
Overall - 8/10
You don't have to be all that "mathematically inclined" to do well in this subject but I think I'm going
to quit math while I'm still ahead.

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 7/10
It's certainly a lot easier to wrap one's head around this compared to, say, linear algebra.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Anne Thomas, Florica Cirstea)
Anne is fantastic, and Florica has a nice accent.
Interest: 8/10
I'd give it a nine, but it seems to tease one about second year maths units slightly too much. Integral
calculus is definitely interesting, whilst modelling was perhaps slightly more mechanical than it
should have been.
Overall: 8/10
Made me keen to take some intermediate units.

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Semester 2 2013
Ease - 7/10
Most of it is pretty straight forward if you have done MX2 in Year 12 - a large chunk of it is very
similar (only slightly extended). However, there are some concepts that are effectively brand new. I
was crap at MX2 and still found it challenging but it’s definitely not a hard course. I got 7/10 and 6/10
for the quizzes, respectively.
Lecturer - 4/10
It was okay when I went but since it was 8AM, I effectively didn’t turn up to most of them (actually, I
didn’t turn up to all of them except the in-lecture quiz). Lost 5 for being at 8AM, lost 1 because
Daniel Daners has doctor handwriting and from the in-lecture quiz.
Interest - 2/10
I had no interest in this, at all. I’d recommend doing MATH1003 when possible.
Overall - 5/10
Lame course.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 8/10
Most of the content has been done in HS (especially if you've done 4U), but I felt that some of the
final exam questions this year were tricky, so that's why I gave it a 8. It's not that bad. The quizzes
were too easy.
Interest: 5/10
It's boring when you have to relearn most of the material.
Overall: 7/10

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 8/10
Most content is from high school - integration and applications of it. Modelling is done in some detail
but examples are quite simple. Methods are straightforward. A relatively easy course.
Lecturers: 9/10
Dave Easdown and Daniel Daners are two of the greats. Can't really fault them. -1 point for 8AM
starts..
Interest: 6/10
Quite bland at times since most content done at school.
Overall: 8.5/10
Good first year course.

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 4/10
Harder than 1901, this unit is pretty much a build upon that and most of the stuff is easy to
understand, but it's still a bit of a pain to learn all of the content. It definitely should be worth 6CP not
3. Ugh.
Lecturers - 8/10 (Neil Saunders - 7/10, James Parkinson - 8/10, Daniel Daners - 8/10)
We had Neil for the first two lectures. He was pretty good. Kept interested. Engaging. Attractive.
James was pretty good. Some of the stuff escaped me. This was the more difficult part of the course.
DO NOT FORGET YOUR GLASSES!!! He writes on the boards and at times it can be terribly
difficult to read even if you don't need/do have your glasses. Also attractive. I was really upset when
he cut his hair.
Daniel’s part was the easier part of the course. I found myself not going to most of the lectures and
still being able to do all of this part of the unit.
But, when I did go DanDan was a great teacher and lecturer and his accent is pretty hilariously great
too. Not very attractive though.

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Interest - 8/10
It's a fairly interesting unit. This is probably the first UoS I've done at uni that I've actually voluntarily
studied for outside of uni.
Overall - 7/10
It's pretty interesting, the lecturers are great, but it's difficult to get a good mark so study hard.

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 9/10
If you liked Mathematics Extension 2 and did well in it, then this course may seem too easy. About
80% of it covers material already learnt in the HSC course. The only new stuff was solving linear
differential equations and second order differential equations. However, looking at the proposed new
Mathematics Extension 2 syllabus it appears that this ENTIRE uni course will soon be incorporated in
the HSC. (i.e. making it even easier for future students) The quizzes were a bit of a joke since we did
the same quizzes as the normal level. Just to give an idea around half of the total candidature were on
full marks before the final exam in 2007. The only reason I stopped short of 10/10 for ease, was
because the final exam was difficult (understandably).
Lecturer: 8/10 (David Galloway)
David Galloway explains things very clearly. However, sometimes when he does a worked example,
he diverges into irrelevant contexts of the example rather than the maths. Also, he does not know how
to be assertive in the lecture room which results in everyone talking and him losing his temper at
times.
Interest: 10/10
Only because I like Maths, especially this type of calculus...
Overall: 10/10
Easy stuff...possibly the easiest uni course for my entire degree.

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 9/10
Lecturer: 10/10 (David Easdown)
Interest: 10/10
Overall: 11/10
Easdown is a highly commended lecturer, and many who have been taught by him regard him as one
of the best. The material is largely irrelevant as he has an amazing ability to make everything
interesting and appealing, as well as simplifying the most complex problems. A level above the other
10s.

MATH1905 - Statistics (Advanced)

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 7/10
This is definitely not an easy subject. There are horror stories around this unit, but I figured I’d take it
anyway to maximise my learning. I didn’t understand how anything we were learning in the first half
of semester fit together until I finally studied hypothesis testing for the final (which had basically no
formal hypothesis testing, very unlike the past papers). I think the 2014 final was particularly difficult
simply because it was so different to the past papers. Having said that, the quizzes were rather
straightforward if you knew how to do the sample quizzes since they were basically identical.
Lecturer: 3/10 (Michael Stewart)
Note: I slept through or skipped through at least half of the lectures.
I don’t think the lectures were structured well in that we covered a lot of content, but a good portion
of it wasn’t tested. There was a lot of overlap week-by-week and it inflated how much content there

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really was. However, consultations were very helpful and the lecturer was decent at answering my
questions.
Tutor: 1/10
I had an external tutor who was terrible. I went to my lab in the first week, and she said things like
“I’ll get back to you on that” when we asked questions and it really seemed like she had no clue what
was going on. My tute transfer didn’t go through successfully so I had to go to that lab for my
quizzes, and when I did, she gave me quite a bit of attitude and was rude.
Interest: 7/10
I was actually a bit hyped up to start statistics, since a friend of mine had done MATH1005 in Winter
School and had only good things to say about it. The first few weeks on data analysis were alright –
some year 10 statistics, but when we got into the second part, the lectures were too confusing and my
interest dropped to a solid 2. It was mostly theory and I couldn’t grasp its relevance. But! When it all
came together with hypothesis testing, I was pleased to start enjoying the subject again, and now I’m
considering taking second year stats.
Overall: 5/10
The subject content itself isn’t too bad, and I can see it being useful in the future. The lecturer wasn’t
very engaging, the way the unit was set out wasn’t great either, but having said that, I’m not sure how
it could be set out much better.

Semester 2 2014
Ease - 6/10
Most of the statistical tests are the same shit over and over again but the way to teach you is really
dodgy and doesn’t solidify or make you understand well enough.
Lecturer - 4/10 (Shelton Peiris 0/10, Garth Tarr 8/10)
Shelton left out gaps in the notes, making it a total pain in the ass for me, since one lecture was 8AM;
I didn’t go to that shit.
Interest - 0/10
Crap course, doesn’t teach you anything interesting and you can just bull shit your way to a decent
mark. In the final exam, there was shit that wasn’t in the textbook so I didn’t have much clue about
how to do it…cool.
Overall - 4/10
I’m being very, very generous - if you don’t need statistics for later years, it might be a bit nicer to do
MATH1004.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 9/10
I surprisingly found this easier than MATH1903; was exposed to statistical inference in psychology.
Lecturer: 5.25/10 (Shelton Peiris 1/10, Garth Tarr 9.5/10)
Shelton really could have done his lectures better - why were their gaps in his notes? I want to see the
working out. I understand if he wanted to do the questions (which he did...except went super fast on
the hard bits, and super slow on the easy bits ). He missed a lecture and NEVER went back through it.
Can't even learn it because he didn't even have a recording and there were gaps in the notes.....
Garth has his notes structured, actually revised with us with past papers. His lecture style is relatable
to us (probably because he is young). Sometimes he went a bit fast with concepts, but it's stats so
there's a lot of info to go through. But most importantly, he was passionate about stats - that's essential
for a lecturer, or any person in their respective field.
Interest: 9/10
I actually like stats. It's extremely useful in psychology (my degree). 1st half was boring because of
the lecturer than anything, but 2nd half was highly motivating and actually fun (I have no life )
Overall: 8/10.

Semester 2 2013

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Ease: 7/10
The course is easy once you get statistical inference properly. More than 2/3s of the course is devoted
to this - probability and data account for much less of it. Do all the tutorials and you should be set.
Lecturer: 5.25/10 (Shelton Peiris 1/10, Garth Tarr 9.5/10)
Shelton Peiris is a deceptive lecturer. He seems like he is making sense, yet he is just repeating words
over without any context or motivation. His notes are badly structured (LaTeX doesn't make the notes
good - good notes make the notes good) and are largely unmotivated. Garth Tarr is a young lecturer,
finishing his PhD this year. He is motivated and knows how to lay out content and concepts properly.
His notes are structured and provide for good revision tools. His lecture style is relevant and relatable.
VERY good contrast to Shelton. We should have had him for 13 whole weeks.
Interest: Up to 8.5/10.
Discrete valued function f(X) = X^10, 0<X<1. When Garth came along things picked up and I was
motivated to take 2nd year stats.
Overall: 6.5/10
First half was terrible. 2nd half better.

Semester 2 2012
Ease - 1/10
The first two weeks are easy. After that I was FUCKED.
Lecturer - 0.1/10 (John Ormerod)
The lectures were terrible. And the lecturer was bad at everything. No one paid attention and pretty
much everyone stopped going. He was boring, monotonous, and just terrible. Worse than Santa.
Certainly not attractive at all.
Interest - 1/10
So boring. Just terrible.
Overall - 0.7/10
The worst subject I have ever done.Worse than English and Religion in high school. If possible do
MATH1005/1015/1004. If you need stats then do 1015 or 1005, if you don't then just do 1004.

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8/10
The only difficult part is understanding the concepts in the first place. Once you've done that, the rest
is just easy routine applications.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Marc Raimondo)
Marc Raimondo is monotonous and his accent doesn't help either. Even if you can get past that, the
explanations themselves are just slightly better than mediocre.
Interest: 8/10
It's actually interesting in a mathematical way as well as its relevance to many contexts. The central
limit theorem is quite an interesting theorem. Unfortunately, the lecturer doesn't portray it that way.
Overall: 7.5/10
It's alright I guess and it is useful in real life situations.

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: 4/10 (Marc Raimondo)
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 5/10
While the concepts and methods are relatively easy, the way it is presented could be improved upon.
Raimondo's voice aids sleep rather than study, not to mention the lecturing material is copied in
verbatim from Primer. The book, however, is just as boring as the lecturer, and anyone who can
venture beyond a page or two without feeling sleepy or lost will be appreciated for their efforts.

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 MATH1906 - Mathematics (Special Studies Program) A

Semester 1 2016
Ease – 8/10
The content itself can get quite abstract and difficult to follow. It’s not uncommon for the class to get
completely lost during seminars. However, since all assessments are take-home assignments, getting
high marks in SSP isn’t difficult (most people did). Regardless whether you understand the seminars,
you’ll always receive notes for every topic, so no biggie. That assignment on cardiac arrhythmia was
probably by far the most difficult assignment all semester.
Lecturers – 9/10 (Daniel Daners, Martin Wechselberger & Florica Cirstea)
The topic on maps by Daners was brilliant. Cardiac arrhythmia by Wechselberger was also somewhat
interesting, however he had to go through some background biology context. Furthermore, since the
algebra was very long and messy, it was really easy to get lost during his seminars. Fractals by Cirstea
was also fascinating, however once again, some parts of it were quite difficult to follow.
Interest – 10/10
I mean seriously, where else in an undergraduate course will you learn these kinds of maths…?
Overall – 10/10
Highly interesting, challenging and rewarding course. Furthermore, considering that the extra-credit is
easy to get, and that you can’t do worse than your MATH1901 mark, why wouldn’t you do this
course? We even threw Dr. Daners a class party for his 18th birthday. (It wasn’t actually his birthday,
but at least we got to party for an entire tutorial… with Cirstea too.)

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
Got quite curly at times, especially with the last assignment, where we'd had a single seminar before
the assignment was due.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Martin Wechselberger, Daniel Daners, Anthony Henderson)
Martin Wechselberger and Daniel Daners were good, made it interesting and set pretty straight-
forward assignments. Anthony Henderson's material was dry and I went through an entire notepad
before I even got anywhere towards answering one of the 3 assignment questions he set.
Interest: 8/10
You do 3 sections: Cardiac Arrhythmias, Regular Polyhedra and Maps. The first and last topics were
interesting. Regular Polyhedra with Henderson felt like we were in kindergarten again counting edges
and corners of solids. It also got confusing when we moved into 4-dim space.
Overall: 8/10
I quite enjoyed it and will definitely do it again next semester.

MATH1907 - Mathematics (Special Studies Program) B

Semester 2 2005
Lecturers: 7/10 (Sanjeeva Balasuriya 7/10, John Robinson 8/10, Donald Cartwright 8/10)
Ease: 8/10, Interest: 7.66/10, Overall: 8/10
Vibrations and Waves is an extension on use of calculus to solve differential equations, without much
difficulty. Once past the stereotypical view on stats being boring, Ancestral Trees contains harder
Markov chain but the assignment is straight forward and easy. While Bernoulli Numbers is an
interesting topic, most people would find the algebra involved intimidating, where Mathematica
would come in handy.

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 MATH2061 - Linear Mathematics and Vector Calculus

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Nothing too difficult in this course. The linear maths in particular is pretty straightforward (mainly
just plugging numbers into formulae). Vector calculus is a bit more complicated, but not too bad either
once you get the hang of it. The final exam, though, is pretty intense, and the assignments are marked
in the most anally-retentive manner possible.
Interest: 7/10
Vector calculus was the more interesting half, because you can at least see how it might be applied to
a real-world problem. Otherwise, just more maths.
Lecturers: 7/10
Most maths lecturers are pretty much the same, it seems. None of them are too hard to understand,
which is the main thing.
Overall: 7/10
Not too bad a course, and there are definitely worse ones out there. If you want to do physics in third
year, you need to do this unit, but fortunately, that's not so bad.

MATH2065 – Introduction to Partial Differential Equations

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 8/10
Not particularly difficult by any means, but the assessments, particularly the exam, did throw quite a
few curve balls. That ended up affecting my mark a little bit. If you keep on top of the work then you
should be fine; the tutorial questions cover a wide range of styles so you should get some good
practice.
Lecturer - 7/10 (Peter Kim)
Peter Kim was a decent lecturer; he had very nice written lecture notes and was able to explain
concepts quite well. Unfortunately he would have to have been a very exceptional lecturer to keep me
motivated to come to 8am lectures every day, which he wasn't. But he kept his online resources well
organised and up to date so I can't complain too much.
Interest - 8/10
Differential equations play a very important part in the study of applied mathematics, and there are
many different applications in a wide range of areas from science, engineering and finance. That was
enough to keep me interested in the course. You'll review ODE's from first year, and be introduced to
transforms, convolution, PDE problems and Fourier series, the latter I particularly liked. After this I'm
definitely looking forward to MATH3063 and MATH3078.
Overall - 8/10
Would definitely recommend. The course would benefit from a better timetable and slightly better
lecturer, but it's much too crucial a subject in the study of mathematics to ignore.

MATH2069/2969 – Discrete Mathematics and Graph Theory

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 7/10
The discrete mathematics part of the course is a rehash and extension of what you learned in
MATH1004. But if you haven't done MATH1004 then it's no problem; the content isn't particularly
difficult anyway. Graph theory is totally new, but it’s not too bad if you can remember a lot of the
theorems. The quizzes, shared between the two streams, were pretty easy. The only difference
between the regular and the advanced stream is a 10% assignment and 2 out of the 6 questions in the

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final exam. I found the assignment a bit more difficult than usual, but my place in the cohort after that
assignment was lower than what it normally is, so I don’t know, maybe it was just me. The exam
questions weren’t too bad though; they were reasonably difficult, but not ridiculous.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Alexander Molev)
I didn’t think Alexander was particularly good, but he wasn’t particularly bad either. He got the job
done. I’ll admit the lectures were at a bit of an inconvenient time for me, so I don’t really have too
many lectures to go on. In fact I didn’t end up going to any of the graph theory lectures, so I’d be
interested in how he might have taught that. But on the whole he definitely knows his stuff and
explains things relatively well, so I wouldn’t be unhappy if I had him again.
Tutor: 1/10 (Natalie Aisbett)
Pretty much all that she did was write the solutions up on the board, and since I already had the
solutions anyway from previous years, tutorials didn't really serve much of a purpose to me. Her
explanations were average at best, and it was very difficult to get what she was saying a lot of the time
because other people in the class would be having really loud conversations, and she wouldn't make
any effort to make them quiet (although I can’t really blame the talkers, the tutorials seemed a bit
pointless anyway).
Interest: 8/10
I enjoyed MATH1004, so the discrete mathematics part was OK for me. It was a little tedious at times,
seeing as I had done a lot of it before, but it was nothing too major. Graph theory, on the other hand, is
unlike a lot of stuff that you have probably learnt before, and it was that that really got me interested
in that section of the course. It would have been nice to have been taught about practical applications,
seeing as graph theory is used a lot in computing, and we weren’t really given too many examples of
that, but despite that I was quite happy with the content that was being taught.
Overall: 6/10
I probably would have done the normal stream if I had to go again, the differences between the two
streams were minimal and I would have gotten a much better mark in normal. But the content and the
subject itself was great, and most of the assessments were fair. Just avoid Natalie as a tutor if you can
help it.

MATH2070/2970 - Optimisation and Financial Mathematics

(Regular/Advanced)

Semester 2 2015 (Advanced)

Ease: 7.5/10
All assessments were ridiculously easy, the final was fair but very hard. Luckily they marked easily so
I did quite well.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Georg Gottwald)
Didn't go to many because I fell behind in material but he seemed quite good and funny. A touch hard
to understand but not too bad. His lecture notes was really hard to read because of his poor writing
though. I think buying the book might help.
Interest: 8.5/10
As someone with a finance background, i found the course quite interesting and the material was
good.
Overall: 7.5/10
If you have an interest in finance and strong maths background I'd recommend this course. It was
quite challenging to stay on top of all the material though as was the final.

Semester 2 2015 (Regular)

Ease - 9/10
This subject was a lot easier than it could have been. Quite a few topics, particularly the Capital Asset
Pricing Model, had been left out of the exam. Which isn't too tedious to learn, it's just all of my
lectures clashed for this subject so I was slightly behind in teaching a lot of the concepts to myself. In

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any case, the optimisation sections are just about following certain steps, and the financial maths
questions could be in a style that you perhaps may not be used to, but it's not extremely difficult at all.
Computer labs weren't difficult, but were a little tedious. You're taught to use MATLAB, but in the
end it's easy enough to Google all the relevant commands you need when you get to the final project.
Lecturer - 9/10 (Georg Gottwald)
Unfortunately I didn't get to see much of Georg due to clashes and work commitments. But when I
was there, he was extremely helpful in explaining new concepts, and I couldn't really ask for anything
more. I agree with Phyre that his lecture notes are a little hard to read, but really, they're more or less
copies of what is in the lecture notes, so you can get by with those just fine.
Interest - 8/10
It's always good to learn maths that is directly useful to things. A lot of the optimisation strategies you
learn can actually be put to good use in day to day activities if you feel confident enough to formulate
your own problems. And the financial mathematics section is quite interesting too, and would be very
useful if your career prospects are that way inclined.
Overall - 9/10
Definitely would do again. Probably the easiest 2nd year maths unit you can do, so you could
definitely use it for a WAM booster if you are good at maths.

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 10/10 then 0/10
And the change is not a smooth limited growth function... it's more like a step function... all of a
sudden it gets impossibly hard
Lecturer: 4/10 (David Ivers)
He's not bad... just he's not good either... overall doesn't have too good of a good impression of him...
Ivers I think his name was... he tries hard a lot already, but I just feel not loved in financial maths.
Overall: 8/10
Important subject for finance students/those who want to progress into risk assessment etc...

MATH2961 - Linear Mathematics and Vector Calculus (Advanced)

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 7/10
Difficulty can be a little deceiving, since the majority of lectures and the course notes go through
proofs/theory and hardly any examples are covered and your left to figure out a lot of stuff on your
own. Vector calculus was mostly just computations and number crunching and learning when or
where to apply stoke's/divergence theorems. Linear algebra (L.A) was definitely harder, a lot more
proofs were involved and definitions to learn. There were some concepts in L.A that took ages for me
to even understand, and others that were just a struggle to interpret, like generalized eigenvalues and
nilpotent matrices. The final exam however, made the course alot easier.
Lecturers: Ruibin Zhang: 6/10, Daniel Daners:9/10
Both lecturers were very friendly and willing to answer anything questions you had after lectures. Was
a bit of a struggle trying to understand Ruibin's accent, but i think most people got used to after a
couple of days. Some of the things he explained though weren't very clear, and i don't think anyone
actually understood his example on multi variable Taylor polynomials. Daners was pretty good, but i
think he covered things a bit too slowly, and rushed alot of the linear algebra section in the last week.
Ruibin Zhang's laugh: 10/10
Tutorials: Had Daniel Daners: 10/10
Daners was a wonderful tutor.
Interest: 7/10
It was alright, some of the proofs for theorems in vector calculus didn't seem very rigorous though, a
lot of them were just approximating things with shapes which i thought was a bit bizzare. I think in
this course you finally see some actual applications of linear algebra/matrices in real life.

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Semester 1 2015
Ease: 7/10
This subject was a lot easier than what it could have been. If you were to go through the course reader,
particularly for the linear algebra part of the course, you'd be forgiven for thinking a whole lot of pain
would be coming your way. And indeed, the tutorial questions varied in difficulty and some required
quite a bit of work. However, both of the quizzes were the same as the sample ones except with
different numbers, the assignments were certainly doable, and the final exam was so similar to the
2013 one that I did a double take during the reading time. So for me this subject turned out to be
relatively straightforward, but I guess it will depend on which lecturers you have.
Lecturers: 3.5/10 (Ruibin Zhang 2/10, Bob Howlett 5/10)
Maybe it's just me, but I have great difficulty interpreting thick Asian accents. In one of my first
lectures with Ruibin, it took me a couple of seconds to realise that "foongsheh" means "function", by
which time he had already finished the point he was trying to make, and I had totally missed
everything else he had said. I gained nothing from his lectures, so I stopped going to them.
Fortunately, he did have quite nicely organised lecture notes and set quite easy assessments. That's
what the two marks were for, otherwise I would have gave him 0. I don't rate him as a lecturer at all.
I have mixed opinions on Bob Howlett. He's one of those lecturers whose lecturing style you are
either going to really like, or really dislike. Unfortunately for me, I fell into the latter category. His
scanned lecture notes were a bit too messy and wordy for me; I preferred just reading from the course
reader. Plus it was difficult making out a lot of structure in his notes and lectures; he just moved on
from one thing to the next. But while his lecture style didn't suit me, he was a nice enough guy and
did explain things reasonably well, plus after 6 weeks with Ruibin he was a breath of fresh air.
Tutors: 6/10 (Chris Thornett 7/10, Bob Howlett 3/10)
I had Chris Thornett (a.k.a. Ned Kelly) for the vector calculus section in the first six weeks. He largely
left us to our own devices and worked through some questions on the board that we were all having
problems with, which in my opinion is the best way to structure the tutorials. Plus he was quite
approachable and good with helping you out if you had any individual questions.
Bob took over once the linear algebra side started. At times it felt like the tutorial was a mini lecture,
which I wasn’t particularly happy about, and like his lectures, he did go off on a few tangents.
Additionally, the tutorial questions that he personally wrote were in my opinion not as good as the
ones that have been used in previous years, and at times he used his own notation which was
confusing when compared to what was in the course reader. He wasn’t the worst, but I would
probably avoid having him as a tutor again.
Interest: 8/10
I really enjoyed the vector calculus part, it was a shame that Ruibin was the lecturer, but the subject
itself was very interesting. It extends the calculus you learn from first year into higher dimensions,
after which you are introduced to multiple integrals, integrals of lines and surfaces, and key theorems
such as Greens and Stokes Theorems. There was a lot of computational stuff that I really liked,
without being too simple. Linear algebra introduces concepts such as linear operators and bases, and
extends a lot of the knowledge you got from MATH1002/1902. It was a bit abstract at times, but it
wasn’t too bad.
Overall: 7/10
A good, interesting subject, but it would have benefited from better lecturers in my opinion. It's pretty
much one of the fundamental courses for a mathematics major, so I would definitely encourage taking
it, just be wary that it could be much harder in the future, depending on who is administering the
course.

Semester 1 2006
Lecturer - 6/10
Ease - 6/10
Interest - 8/10
Overall: 7/10

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8am maths lectures are even worse than in first year.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 6/10
Easy stuff
Lecturer: 5/10 (Ruibin Zhang)
Not the best, but alright... have to say, a lot are having difficulty understanding Ruibin Zhang's
accent...)
Interest: 9/10
Interesting stuff
Overall: 7/10

MATH2962 - Real and Complex Analysis (Advanced)

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 2/10
Oh dear lord. I’m no slouch at mathematics, but I’ve got to say, this subject is hard. MATH2962 is one
of the subjects, along with MATH2968, that is recommended for further study in pure advanced
mathematics. It is very much proof based, and while computational aspects do occur, a lot of the
emphasis in assessments and lectures is based on proofs, or the methods underlying the proofs. I
found a lot of the proofs a bit abstract and complex, and I’m more of a computational type of person,
so I had to work pretty hard to understand things. It’s not undoable, but you definitely have to put in a
lot of effort in to do well in this unit.
Lecturer/Tutor: 8/10 (Florica Cirstea)
Florica was probably the best lecturer I had this semester. Despite the difficulty of a lot of the content,
she managed to explain things really well. She certainly made it worthwhile coming to uni at 9am
four mornings a week, instead of reading the course notes yourself. However, her assessments were
quite difficult. Well, certain people might disagree, but they certainly are in comparison to previous
years. Teaching of MATH2962 year to year alternates between Florica and Daniel Daners (in fact we
were supposed to have Daners, but he went on sick leave so Florica took over at the last minute). And
having had a look at the assessments that Daners has set over the years, they are much much easier
than anything Florica sets. Given that, I think I would probably have preferred to have had Daners,
seeing as in terms of lecturing quality they are both top notch.
Interest: 7/10
Putting it as simply as possible, analysis is everything that you've ever taken for granted in calculus
being proved in a mathematically rigorous manner. This does give rise to computational aspects, such
as finding various convergence properties of mathematical objects, or finding complex singularities,
but like I said, it is very proof based. I did find a lot of the proofs interesting, and I certainly
appreciated everything that it was setting out to achieve, but the difficulty got in the way sometimes.
Overall: 5/10
Definitely the hardest course I have completed at uni so far. While it is interesting, and pretty much
necessary for people wanting to do honours or advanced maths, it’s not for the feint hearted. Proceed
with extreme caution.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 0/10
Definitely the hardest sub in first semester
Lecturer: 10/10 (Daniel Daners)
You can't argue with Daners
Interest: 10/10
Very interesting stuff

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Overall: 10/10

MATH2965 - Partial Differential Equations Intro (Advanced)

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 1/10
Didn't think PDE was going to be so hard
Lecturer: 4/10
Didn't really liked the lecturer... not as much as the first semester one's any way
Interest: 9/10
Especially for those doing physics, you need it... even some economists need it.
Overall: 7/10
Good call...

MATH2968 - Algebra (Advanced)

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 0/10
Definitely the hardest subject I have done yet...
Lecturer: 2/10
Poor... very poor, tho his weekly review session is a good practice... at the end, didn't even bother to
turn up to tutes... maybe that explains my poor grades.
Interest: 8/10
Not as an interest in subject as analysis... but still quite fun to do.
Overall: 6/10
Didn't enjoy it as much... after final exam I felt like shit.
MATH3061 – Geometry and Topology

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 7/10
Being a pure mathematics course, the lectures are quite focused on theory. Even though this is a
normal stream course, you do go through quite a lot of proofs in lectures which don't really show up
in the assessments too much at all. I would definitely focus on the tutorial questions, and old
resources if you have them, in order to practice your understanding of the theory you go through. If
you can understand the content then the assessments are really not that bad, topology particularly so.
Lecturers - 5.5/10 (Laurentiu Paunescu 3/10, Andrew Mathas 8/10)
Paunescu took the geometry section, and I didn't like his lectures at all. He didn't really bother to
implement any sort of structure within his lectures; he just rambled on from one concept to the next,
and his explanations were quite hard to follow. Plus he didn't upload any lecture notes, so you were
pretty much forced to go to his lectures. Mathas was a lot better; he took the topology section which
was a bit more theoretical, but he gave everything context which made his lectures far more engaging
than Paunescu's.
Interest - 7/10
It's interesting thinking about space and objects from mathematical standpoints you haven't really
considered before. Geometry, particularly transformations and isometries, and topology introduce
ways of seeing such things as movements, change in state or formations from a mathematical
perspective, which I enjoyed. The depth you cover the material is a little more shallow than what you
would expect in the advanced stream, and it does get a little abstract at times, but it's certainly
interesting to learn.
Overall - 7/10

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Good course. If Paunescu's not lecturing then definitely consider it. If he is, be wary that you may
have to put in a little more effort to understand things.

MATH3063 - Nonlinear ODEs and Applications

Semester 1 2016
Ease - 7/10
The content isn't too difficult; the quizzes in particular just focused on theoretical concepts and they
were quite easy. The three assignments were based around formulating mathematical models of
different biological phenomena which were discussed in a particular journal article, and due to the
fact quite a few of the questions were different to what was taught in lectures and tutorials, they were
a little difficult at times. The exam also seemed to pick the hardest questions from each topic. So
overall you will need to put some effort in to do well, but it is definitely not unachievable.
Lecturer - 8/10 (Leon Poladian)
Leon was very good at explaining all of the concepts, quite often they were more clear than what his
notes were. So for that reason I would definitely recommend going to his lectures instead of trying to
teach yourself.
Interest - 8/10
This is very much a "real world" type of unit, and you learn how a lot of mathematical models and
concepts can be applied to biology. This was definitely enough to keep me interested.
Overall - 8/10
Comes highly recommended, especially to biology students. Just make sure that you don't take the
unit for granted and slack off, because it does require constant effort.

MATH3066 - Algebra and Logic

Semester 1 2016
Ease - 8/10
Logic has always come pretty naturally to me, so I found I picked up that section quite well. Algebra
was a little more difficult, and there was a lot of theoretical concepts and proofs involved in quite a
few of the questions. However, it is definitely doable, and is certainly a whole lot easier than
MATH2968. The assessment questions had quite a mix of easy and harder questions, but if you spend
enough time on the latter you can generally produce something that would give you at least some
marks.
Lecturer - 9/10 (David Easdown)
While he's not a very animated speaker David certainly gets the job done. His explanations and notes
were very detailed and clear, and his administration of the course was excellent. Definitely one of the
better lecturers in the Maths department.
Interest - 10/10
Like I said, logic is my forte, and while I've spent most of my time learning it in the Philosophy
department, the approach the Mathematics department took in teaching the material was quite
refreshing. The algebra was a little abstract but it was certainly interesting to see how all of the
concepts could be used.
Overall - 9/10
I'm looking forward to studying more logic in the semesters to come. It's a shame the university
doesn't offer as many courses on it as it should.

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 MATH3962 - Rings, Fields and Galois Theory (Advanced)

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 2/10
Probably the most difficult of the 3rd year maths courses I've done. That said, based on the
understanding I did have I could answer 90% of the exam so it balanced out ok.
Lecturer: 4/10 (Adrian Nelson)
Adrian Nelson didn't really do it for me, but then very few maths lecturers have. You can tell he
genuinely enjoys the source material though.
Interest: 7/10
Some of the ruler/compass construction stuff was pretty cool, and it was certainly more interesting
than metric spaces or analysis.
Overall: 6/10
If you're doing a pure maths major, this is one of the two advanced units (along with Measure Theory)
that I'd recommend you do.

Mechatronic Engineering (MTRX)

MTRX1701 – Introduction to Mechatronic Engineering

Semester 1 2016
Ease: 8/10
The course content was extremely eclectic and briefly touched upon various topics which will be
covered in more detail in later years, hence was at times difficult to grasp/understand. Many students
had no clue what they were learning since the course content is for the most part, irrelevant to the
assignments, especially the first one. The assignments do seem extremely daunting at first but it’s
mostly self-research and once realising that it’s not impossible to do, everything somewhat starts
making sense. Getting high marks also isn’t too difficult so long as one spends the time and effort on
it, adding in as much detail as possible. Having said that, a lot of time was spent on this unit outside
the tutorials, the assignments were essentially released one after another and so I couldn’t focus as
much on other units are preferred (but then again there are no final exams). The 40% workshop
component was also alright, can be somewhat challenging but workable.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Dr David Johnson)
He did a pretty swell job for his first time teaching, although it was predominantly reciting off power
points at amazingly high speeds, tantalising our futile attempts to keep up with him. He’s quite apt in
replying to emails and questions, but then again most of his answers are “whatever you want”
(although such is the ambiguity of the unit).

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Interest: 7/10
Personally I enjoyed the unit, but if you came into the course expecting literally robots, then you’ll
probably be disappointed and lose interest quickly. It’s literally an introduction to the field, so races
through many topics which may come off as boring, the majority of the cohort didn’t attend the
lectures, but the main purpose of the unit is to foster a design approach. The assignments I found were
quite interesting and at times absurdly amusing.
Overall: 7.5/10
Pretty sick stuff.

Media and Communications (MECO)

MECO1001 - Australian Media Studies

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 3/10
Lecturer - 9/10 (Worst tutor ever)
Interest - 3/10
Overall - 5/10

MECO1003 - Principles of Media Writing

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
If you are genuinely interested and actually put a bit of work in you will breeze through this subject.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Catherine Lumby 9/10, Anne Dunn 5/10)
I rate lecturers purely on how they conduct a class, and whether or not they can interest me. Lumby
made it easy for me to go to every one of her lectures by having a whole range of material we could

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discuss in different formats and shit which was cool. Whereas Dunn ensured I didn't rock up after her
first lecture, because her monotone is too much for me to handle, she is the most perfect speaker ever,
NEVER and I mean NEVER makes any linguistic mistakes whatsoever, she's a machine, but a boring
one at that. However, We only had her for like 3 or 4 lectures so it was all good.
Interest: 10/10
I love it, I’m passionate about it, and the practical tutorial system was the best idea ever.
Overall: 9/10
Just a fucking awesome subject.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
The lecture material was fairly tedious, but interesting nonetheless and a good background to the stuff
that will be studied in later years. assessments are relatively easy for those skilled enough, and are
rather fun to do (go get interviews, read up articles, then write your own) except for the final exam,
which consists of two essays based on lecture material. Easy and doable nonetheless.
Lecturer: 6.5/10 (Catherine Lumby 8/10, Anne Dunn 5/10)
Catherine Lumby did a great job and made things exciting with her involvement of the group. So it
was cool, but she's leaving for UNSW and thus she sucks a bit. Anne Dunn is very knowledgeable and
her expertise invaluable, but when it comes to the lectures she just read off the readings (which she
wrote), so there wasn't much point to her lectures in this subject.
Interest: 8/10
The theoretical aspects which you learn during the lectures and readings are probably worth 3/10, but
the tutorials are so much fun due to their practicality and it really works your mind having to write a
news story in 20 minutes or so. Interesting.
Overall: 8/10
All round generally awesome. The setup is great (lectures - theory, tutes - pracs) and most of it is fun.
Plus, seeing as only MECO students can do it, the people are great fun to be around. And pretty hot.

Semester 2 2005
Ease 7/10 - Lecturer 7.5/10 (Catherine Lumby) - Interest 9/10 - Overall 8/10
Catherine Lumby is an arrogant pain in the ass
Molecular Biology (MBLG)

MBLG1001 - Molecular Biology and Genetics

Semester 2 2014
Ease : 5/10
MBLG…. Definitely the hardest first year course. There’s so much content to know and that practical
exam was hell… The final exam wasn’t too bad overall but they had to include a practical
component?!
This subject requires a lot of dedication and effort so don’t slack off.
Because of the difficulty of this course, there’s heaps of resources online for the practicals and theory
work.
Interest : 8/10
I really liked learning about the central dogma and the applications of molecular biology (probably
because those lecturers were the best). I did not like the first topic about the chemistry of DNA.
Lecturers :
Dr Dale Hancock: 8/10

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Dale made her topic (chemistry of DNA) simple to understand with her supplementary lecture notes
and she would bring in models to consolidate the content.
Prof Gareth Denyer: 9/10
Another top notch lecturer that presents with enthusiasm. His lecturing style is a bit unconventional in
which he teaches through lecture quizzes rather than first teaching the content. But I found that to be
refreshing.
Dr Danny Liu: 10/10
Danny is the best. His lecture slides were engaging; packed with animations and videos which were
really helpful in trying to visualise the processes and applications. Along with Gareth Denyer, I really
liked his use of Socrative.
Dr Jenny Saleeba: 5/10
She basically read off her lecture slides in a monotone voice. I would have liked her topic, forensics,
if it wasn’t for the ‘dull textbook style' type of presentation.
Also her lecture questions were easy and not as challenging compared to Gareth and Danny’s.
Overall : 6/10
This course will toughen you up and make you appreciate your other subjects. The subject is overall
interesting and does teach you to be an independent and mature learner, as well as to think critically.

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 5/10
What a course! Talk about throwing first years in the deep end. Study hard from day 1 guys, do not
mess around with MBLG1001! It does get easier as the weeks go by. I found protein structures and
such to be the hardest part of the course! The fortnightly 4 hour labs were a pain in the ass and the
skills test....don't mention that thing again. The final was actually okay but I had to study pretty hard
for it!
Lecturers - Danny Liu 11/10, Gareth Denyer 9/10, Vanessa Gysbers 9/10, Sashi Kant 2/10, Jenny
Saleeba 2/10
Danny Liu was one of my favourite lecturers so far in my degree. He knew how to make his lectures
enjoyable. He knew how to apply everyday actions into concepts to make it clearer to the cohort about
what was going on. The polls he used during the lectures actually made it more enjoyable since it
involved active learning and of course, there were some students who entered stupid choices for shits
and giggles.
Gareth Denyer was also a pretty good lecturer too as well as Vanessa. They were just engaging in my
opinion and I found them quite entertaining!
Sashi and Jenny weren't as good - inaudible, monotone and simply reading off the slides. I was quite
disappointed.
Interest - 10/10
Some of my peers know that I've said "Fuck MBLG", "OMG I HATE IT" etc. etc. but by the time the
finals rolled in, everything clicked. I just loved everything about it! It was really interesting in my
opinion - so interesting that I considered doing MBLG2971.
Overall - 9/10
Okay listen, MBLG1x01 is difficult. However, I recommend this to anyone! It is a common pre-
requisite for intermediate and senior units so you might as well do it. By far one of the most difficult
1st year courses, this will challenge you quite a bit - whether you're naturally inclined or not. It will
make you experience true pain but as Danny Liu said, it'll help you appreciate the other units you do
that aren't so bad relatively. The only final thing i can say is that I survived MBLG1001 and in
retrospect, I wish I did MBLG1901 purely out of interest and a tiny bit of scaling.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 5/10
Four hour prac exam you say? Some horrific lecturers, very tough content.
Lecturers: Danny Liu 7/10, Gareth Denyer 4.5/10, Sashi Kant, Vanessa Gysbergs, Jenny Saleeba
all 1/10

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Lecturers will be drab monotones making it their life goal to bore you to death and make fairly
interesting content painfully boring
Interest: 7.5/10
Subject itself is pretty interesting. How its run though is not
Overall: 6/10
Horrible lecturers destroying interesting content

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 6/10
Generally difficult subject, heaps of concepts to understand. Hated genetics.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Dale Hancock, Gareth Denyer, Bruce Lyon)
Dale Hancock was pretty good, but Gareth Denyer had to be the best. Bruce Lyon spoke very fast and
sometimes couldn't hear him properly.
Interest: 7/10
Hated genetics, always have. The whole DNA/Proteome part dragged, but was OK.
Overall: 7/10
I can't say I ENJOYED this subject too much. The 5hr labs were really exhausting, content dragged a
fair bit, and don't think many others fancied it either.

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 6/10
The exam was quite hard.
Lecturer - 8/10
Gets bad towards the end, though.
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 7/10

MBLG1901 - Molecular Biology and Genetics (Advanced)

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 5/10
There is a RIDICULOUS amount of work for the marks that were assigned. Why was the prac exam 4
hrs??? And then we had a prac component in the final exam? There is a lot of material (although most
didn't get tested in the final exam).
Interest - 8/10
Unlike many other of my friends, I liked the last lecturer's content - I really like the idea of
epigenetics and genetic counselling/profiling (she had a monotone voice though). I went into MBLG
thinking it would be more like this. The first 7 lectures on protein folding/biochemistry was boring,
but I really enjoyed the central dogma content
Overall - 7/10
It's ok...but don't pick it as an 'extra' subject. It's NOT NOT NOT easy. definitely requires effort

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 2/10
No ease, the way the prac book is set up has to be one of the greatest hindrances of ease because
going through it to actually find the 'In your lab notebook' things is very annoying. Ideally you'd do it

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after taking an organic chemistry course too(instead of concurrently like most people), that would
make a lot more sense. Calculations are hard in my opinion, because you are expected to convert very
well. Conceptually, it's not terrible difficult, it's just tedious with things due everything fortnightly in
labs. The final exam is quite a drainer though, a long MC section for theory, and then theory of prac as
well as written theory Qs. There's also negative marking that will make you a little paranoid. Also, the
prac exam is long and tedious with the calculations work, but the Excel and Spectro section are
straightforward. I found the theory assignments fine however, as well as all the little lab reports. The
greatest resource is the Piazza though, that thing was great to look up student/prof responses when I
didn't get something. Danny is a legend for answering so many questions on that. So pro tip: Make
your practical class not one of the first few of the week, as a 2nd week prac class I could often look up
any concern Qs well in advance of my class.
Lecturers - 6/10 (Sashi Kant, Danny Liu, Vanessa Gybers, Jenny Saleeba, Tony Weiss)
Okay Sashi is a terrible explainer and rushes through things. Had to go over the protein stuff
extensively by myself to get it.
Danny is a legend, his tetris animation will make you understand restriction enzymes for life. Also a
nice interesting section explaining applications, as well as getting the class to participate through
asking MC questions throughout.
Vanessa Gybers is also a great lecturer and explained things like pKa well in her tutorials.
Jenny Saleeba who talks about DNA and I am name blanking on at the moment is ok, albeit a bit
monotone.
Tony Weiss is very knowledgeable but does rush through the content a bit and is monotone.
Interest - 5/10
It's a hard course, but I did find the applications and DNA parts interesting. I'm not much of a protein
biochemist though, so ehh that part not so exciting.
Overall - 5/10
Well, yes it does have tedious 4 hr fortnightly labs and is a hard subject, but getting 6cp of molecular
biology down is needed for a lot of intermediate/senior units. Don't enter if you are umming or arring
over doing it-don't go in half hearted. It's definitely the hardest first year bio course by a long shot.

MBLG2071 - Molecular Biology and Genomics

Semester 1 2006
I enjoyed everything except Iain Campbell's lectures. No matter how many times I read over them, I
couldn't understand anything. The lectures are fairly detailed, but the practicals are very enjoyable,
especially the DNA Fingerprinting prac where you analyse your own DNA sample.

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 Music - Arts Faculty (MUSC)

MUSC1503 - Fundamentals of Music 1

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
Assessments are weekly online quizzes, two aural tests (LOTS of in-class practice is given), 1 written
exam, 1 composition, 1 chordal analysis assignment.
It's a lot of work, but each individual task is very straightforward. (Plus exam is in W13!)
A complete lack of any prior music knowledge is completely OK, although there is a pretty sharp
learning curve & it gets complicated fast.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Matthew Hindson)
Matthew Hindson is great. Lectures are interactive and well-structured. Daniel R. (sp?), the tutor and
secondary lecture, is also great. 1 mark off because you have to attend every single lecture (and tute),
and also you have to write EVERYTHING down, although they make that as easy as they can.
Interest: 9/10

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It's all about How Music Works! It's very very interesting!!! Overview of Western music notation
system, harmony, orchestra instrumentation, and a little bit of super friendly basic composition. Your
mileage may vary on the rote learning exercises.
Overall: 9/10
Fantastic introductory course. You do have to put in a lot of work, but it doesn't require much
thinking, which is great for me, although you are allowed to disagree. Lectures and tutes are friendly
& awesome.

MUSC1507 - Sounds, Screens & Speakers: Music & Media

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
The assessments are pretty straightforward and the marking is fair, once you get used to the lecturer's
expectations.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Charles Fairchild)
Dr. Fairchild was engaging, humourous and intelligent. Not once did he present boring subject
material, and his analyses are enlightening. Possibly a little too much reliance on DVDs for some
tastes - but really, who's going to complain about watching DVDs when they're related to the topic.
Interest: 9/10
This subject was never boring. Towards the end, it may have got a smidge on repetitive, but overall
it's a great overview of the last century in recording technology and music media.
Overall: 9/10
I couldn't recommend this subject enough. It's given a tiny little paragraph in the Arts handbook, and
no publicity otherwise, but it's most definitely worth it. You don't even need the most basic of
backgrounds in musical theory.

Performance Studies (PRFM)

PRFM2601 - Being There: Theories of Performance

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
Like the above, it's not hard if you keep up with the reading. Some of the concepts take a
few goes to fully wrap your mind around but it's not impossible. Assessments are frequent but not
worth much. Hand in exam. Word limit for assignments tends to be too low (1000 words for an essay)
so if you like to waffle on you'll have to curb the habit.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Amanda Card, Tim Fitzpatrick, Glen McGillivray)
We had a few. Amanda Card took most of the ones I went to, she's great. Nice casual lecturing style,
clear. Tim Fitzpatrick was particularly engaging as was Glen McGillivray who was incidentally also
my tutor and did a great job. There were a couple of guest lecturers but I think I missed/skipped those
lectures so I have no opinion.
Interest: 7/10

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Despite the subject title I wasn't expecting it to be quite so theoretical. We did a few practical
activities but they were pretty much just demonstrations of a theory we were looking at. However
despite this it is actually pretty interesting especially the Embodiment paradigm which I found most
interesting.
Overall: 8/10

PRFM2602 - Performance: Production and Interpretation

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
It's by no means hard, but settling into the way of thinking you're supposed to use in this subject was a
bit hard at first. You do a lot of practical stuff in tutes, just theatre games and stuff, nothing scary or
hard. And more fun than sitting down talking about theories (which you will do but towards the end
when they're like omfg exam time). Exam is an essay, and if you've done well in the previous
assignments you should do okay here as all assignments for the course are a lead up to this essay.
Lecturers: N/A
I wouldn't know, I had a clash and only went to about 2 or 3. Those ones were ok though.
Interest: 6/10
The theoretical side of it was a bit dry but not tragically boring. The practical side was lots of fun.
Overall: 7/10
I'm not a big fan of how this university does performance studies to be honest but compared to last
semesters unit it's not at all bad.

Pharmacology (PCOL)
PCOL2011 - Pharmacology Fundamentals

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 5/10
It’s one of the medical sciences so you know there’s a lot of content and a huge amount that needs to
be rote-learnt. Unless you bother to do the pre-readings before the lecture, you will have no idea what
the lecturer is going on about for the first topic because none of the terminology is familiar. Even then
you still will be lost because so many new terms are used and either never introduced or just briefly
mentioned. 4th module is made easier if you’re doing 2nd year chemistry but a strong knowledge of
first year organic will suffice. I felt the final exam wasn’t too bad. You’re given a choice between 2
modules for each module which makes it a lot easier. MC in the exam was much easier than the
quizzes which was a welcome relief. The lab reports were marked extremely harshly. Reports and
presentations for tutes were far easier but annoyingly some tutors marked easier than others. I felt this
it was at least on par with MBLG in terms of difficulty.

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Lecturers: 5.8/10 (Brett McPharland 5/10, Michael Murray 5/10, Slade Matthews 7/10, Tina
Hinton, Rachael Codd 5/10)
Maybe Wallace theatre didn’t help me but I felt the lecturers and the way their lecture slides to be
poor.
Brent McPharland struggled to finish his lectures on time and rambled a lot (though his ramblings
included tips on studying).
Michael Murray was just boring. Not attending his lectures and instead playing them back at a faster
speed makes him more bearable. I’d even consider giving him a 6 or 7 if his lectures were at that
speed. Not sure if it was him or the atmosphere in Wallace that put me to sleep.
Slade Matthews was a good lecturer but the fact he was using someone else’s lecture notes (who was
on maternity leave) meant he was not as good as he could have been. To the other lecturer’s credit, I
felt she had the best lecture notes out of all PCOL lectures and it’s a shame she wasn’t there.
Tina Hinton took experimental pharmacology lectures and while she is a good lecturer, she seemed
very unorganised.
Rachael Codd took the 4th module and was simply dry and unengaging. I felt like I got very little
from all the lecturers which discouraged me from attending lectures.
Interest: ?/10
Maybe it was largely to do with how the subject was taught and the fact you have no idea what is
going on for so much of it but it made me wonder if it’s such a good idea to major in this subject.
Interest may have been higher if I’d put in more effort throughout the semester since I would have
understood the lecturers better. Don’t feel comfortable giving this a rating but it would definitely be in
the range of 5-7.
Overall: 6/10
Doing physiology and chemistry will help with the 3rd and 4th modules respectively but the focus in
PCOL is on knowing drugs. These subjects aid in understanding the basics so you’re less caught up in
understanding these relatively basic concepts and can focus on understanding the later lectures. The
assessments were marked quite harshly (harder than PHSI) and this was the first subject in uni in
which I’ve been dragged down by my assessment marks. Will reserve my judgement on this subject
area until after I’ve done PCOL2012.

PCOL2012 - Pharmacology: Drugs and People

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 9/10
Much less content than PCOL2011 and easier. Concepts and terms are explained much better.
PCOL2011 is not a prerequisite but helps a lot. If you don’t do PCOL2011 or BMED, I’d put ease at
7.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Jonathan Arnold, Tina Hinton, Brent McPharland)
Lots of different lectures. Jonathan Arnold was the best and most interesting. Tina Hinton was quite
good. Brent McPharland wasn’t as bad as last semester. Overall I was satisfied with all the lecturers.
Interest: 8/10
Content was more interesting than first semester. Best was recreational drugs, specifically
cannabinoids. I found herbal medicines quite interesting too but I’m probably alone in that. Everyone
found the rest of the 4th module dry. Still quite an interesting course on the whole.
Overall: 8/10

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Much better course than PCOL2011. Even though most have done PCOL2011, you’re not thrown in
the deep end like in PCOL2011. Workshops were also better structured and aided in learning. Dry labs
were boring but useful if you pay attention (and stay awake). The rest of the course was organised
poorly. Online quizzes were dodgy repeats of last year even though content was changed resulting in
questions being removed after the quizzes were already open. Sample MCQ and SAQ for the final
exam were largely out of the course and there were even a handful of questions in the final MCQ that
I don’t believe were covered, either in PCOL2012 or in PCOL2 at all. However, this is still a great
choice for medical science students looking for an elective in 2nd semester. Helps if you also do
PHSI2006 due to cross-over in content. I’d recommend the combination of PHSI and PCOL in 2nd
year since it’s easier to remember how drugs work if you understand the normal physiology, less to
learn that way.

PCOL2605 - Pharmacology for Pharmacy

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 6/10
Not easy, lots to remember just like physiology especially drug names. Estimated 120 Drugs and their
mechanisms of action to remember for final exam.
Lecturer: 9/10
Good lecturers.
Interest: 910
Good content, good focus but exam was a little tricky.
Overall: 9/10
Excellent

Pharmacy (PHAR)

PHAR1811 - Foundations of Pharmacy

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 9.5/10
The only reason I don't give 10 is because of the large amount of content.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Erica Sainsbury and others)
Erica Sainsbury was really good, great lecturer and course coordinator. We also had some other good
lecturers.
Interest: 7/10
Some of the course was really boring. eg. History of Pharmacy...
Overall: 8/10

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Fairly good course structure, and had an awesome final exam which I def. passed.

PHAR1812 - Basic Pharmaceutical Sciences

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
The final exam was quite hard, and some concepts were quite difficult to tackle.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Lenka Munoz, Dai Hibbs)
I would give a 10/10 to Lenka Munoz, but Dai Hibbs annoyed me with his teaching in
thermodynamics.
Interest: 9/10
Would give it a 10/10 if there was no bloody thermodynamics. The content of the course really aimed
at what I wanna do with my degree when I finish i.e. industry.
Overall: 9/10
I enjoyed this subject, Lenka Munoz was an awesome course coordinator and I think the course was
well-balanced.

PHAR1821 - Social Pharmacy

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 9/10
Mainly required a lot of memorising. Lecture content was mainly psychology-based.
Lecturers: 9.5/10 (Lorraine Smith)
Lorraine Smith was really good, I enjoyed her lecturing.
Interest: 7/10
I personally don't really find much interest in psychology... BUT the self-management, chronic illness
stream was definitely quite interesting.
Overall: 8/10
I'd say I enjoyed this subject.. but at times the content dragged.

PHAR1822 - Physical Pharmaceutics and Formulation A

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 8/10
The concepts were a little difficult (it’s a 2nd year subject put into 1st year), but I got the hang of it
towards the end.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Paul Young)
Paul Young is OK I guess, he is quite good at explaining things.
Interest: 10/10
Has to be my favourite subject this semester.. the labs were good, and just enjoyed the subject
structure and content overall.
Overall: 9/10
Favourite subject this semester, has a fair and non-intense assessment structure. I guess I only disliked
the maths component.

PHAR2811 - Drug Discovery and Design A

Semester 1 2010

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Ease: 7/10
Certain aspects of this course are a little tedious in terms of content density, particularly the
Metabolism and Genetics topics.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Gareth Denyer, Dale Hancock and others)
Gareth and Dale were excellent, most Pharmacy lecturers were good as well.
Interest: 8/10
Pharmacodynamic and pharmacology aspects towards the end of the course were interesting, and the
metabolism content as well.
Overall: 8/10
Some aspects of the course could be improved a little, such as the lab course, but overall this UoS is a
fairly important Medicinal chemistry subject.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
Subject had a lot of content to absorb in a relatively short amount of time. Lots of new concepts to
understand meant spending a lot of time on it.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Dale Hancock, Gareth Denyer)
Dale Hancock fantastic, Gareth Denyer also fantastic.
Interest: 6.5/10
It was okay, lots of medicinal chemistry, biochem and stuff got pretty intense.
Overall: 7.5/10
Good

PHAR2812 - Microbiology and Infection

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8.5/10
The content and concepts were not really difficult or challenging, although just required a lot of
memorising in order to do well.
Lecturers: 7/10
There can be some improvements with some of the lecturers.
Interest: 7/10
The initial microbiology content wasn't that interesting, but the latter half of the course with sterile
pharmaceutical manufacture etc. seemed more relevant and interesting.
Overall: 8/10
An overall decent, solid course with fairly interesting labs.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Quite a bit to remember, but not very hard.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Ramin Rohanizadeh, Stephanie Blankenburg)
Ramin did get tricky to understand at times but otherwise a good lecturer. Blankenburg was a good
lecturer. I forget her first name.
Interest: 8/10
Good content, lots of things to remember although but overall good.
Overall: 7.66/10
Good.

PHAR2813 - Therapeutic Principles

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Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
This is a very challenging course hands down. Completely new concepts of pharmacy are introduced
in this UoS and it really requires you to work hard to understand the concepts well. But once you
understand it properly, questions aren't that hard to tackle.
Lecturer: 8/10
I was generally satisfied with the way lectures were given.
Interest: 10/10
In my opinion one of the most interest subjects in the Pharmacy course up until this point, and also the
most relevant and important to drug therapy as a whole. I guess I found the
pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics aspects of the course most interesting.
Overall: 9/10
Great course, well-organised and good structure. The most relevant and useful UoS in pharmacy up
until 2nd year 1st sem. Although, this course is very challenging and you really need to put in effort to
understand the concepts.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 5/10
Lots to understand, lots of calculations but was evened out in the final exam being easy. Lot of new
concepts being brought into this.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Mary Collins, Murray Thomson, Romano Fois, Fan Fan Zhou)
Mary is good lecturer, Murray Thomson was good and so was Romano Fois. Fan Fan Zhou is terrible,
very difficult to understand and she had one of the important parts to teach including
pharmacokinetics and monoexponential pk etc.
Interest: 6/10
It was okay, wouldn't call it my most interesting subject.
Overall: 5.66/10
Average

PHAR2821 - Drug Discovery and Design B

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 4.5/10
Lots and Lots and LOTS of stuff to understand and waste time on, the sheer content is quite huge and
their expectations in the exam are ridiculous. Especially the QSAR. They expect us to complete a
drug with 5 metabolites and give them the predicted models within 20 minutes. (usually given as a
group tutorial comprising of 5 members given 3 hours in practice). absolute fail of a subject.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Brett Church)
Brett Church just barely scrapes okay, his voice is largely very monotonous although his notes are
very good.
Interest: 4/10
Not interesting.
Overall: 4.5/10
Just pray you passed. If not, my sympathies.

PHAR2822 - Pharmacy Practice

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7.5/10

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Generally a good interesting, easy subject.
Lecturers: 9/10
Good lecturers. Synthia is a good lecturer, although does not like people mucking around.
Interest: 9/10
Good content, good focus but exam was a little tricky// with the oral component.
Overall: 8.5/10
Very good

PHAR2823 - Physical Pharmaceutics and Formulation B

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 6/10
Not easy, but passable, quite a bit of content.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Kim Chan, Henk Roubos and others)
Good lecturers. Kim Chan fantastic, Henk Roubos Excellent. They are the only two good lecturers.
Interest: 7/10
Good content, good focus but exam was a little tricky. Definitely not easy, but not that hard either.
Overall: 7.33/10
Decent

PHAR4812 - Integrated Dispensing Practice

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
A lot of work during semester. You've got a minimum of 5 dispensing records to complete each week,
and even though it sounds like copying off the AMH should be easy, it's just so time consuming. One
time I think I spent 6 hours on dispensing homework in total, so even though I know I'm slow, I don't
know of anyone who finishes dispensing quickly, put it this way.
Labs are much less stressful than 3rd year dispensing, because you only do one extemp (i.e. one
compounding product), and one proprietary (i.e. pre-made, so anything like Diabex, Ventolin, etc). It's
easy to pass once you get the hang of what the marker(s) are looking for in terms of counselling
points, but be prepared to get a few Us (unsatisfactories) at the beginning of sem.
1st prac exam--too pressed for time. 2nd prac exam was good timing. Final written exam--it's like
medicinal chemistry, in that if you do your past papers, you'll be fine. Just don't be freaked out by the
500 something posts you'll get on WebCT.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Erica Sainsbury, Ian Dean)
Erica Sainsbury is great as always (even though I think she only took one lecture?) and Ian
Dean...aww, he's the sweetest, cuddliest old gentleman ever. The lectures are actually interesting
because they relate to real life. Even though none of his stories are examinable (lol, but that's what his
lectures are), Ian Dean has plenty to tell, e.g. pseudoephedrine diversion, professional misconduct (or,
as they call it, unprofessional conduct now), etc. Erica was also kind enough to have guest lecturers
on other miscellaneous topics, e.g. the PGTC guy (I think that's his position?) from the Pharm Board
of NSW came and spoke to us about obtaining a prereg position, and just what the prereg year is all
about.
Interest: 10/10
This was the only subject I really enjoyed (despite the stress!)
Overall: 8/10

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 Philosophy (PHIL)
PHIL1011 - Reality, Ethics and Beauty

Semester 1 2012
Let me start off with: WTF? You’re going to have to attend all the lectures in order to understand what
is going on or at least carefully analyse and critique your understanding of the reading materials. You
cannot (most of the time) BS your way out of the questions they set you. Only commendable aspect of
this unit would be the final exam where you are given a set of essay questions to prepare for in which
four or so of these questions will appear in the final exam. Hence it is no excuse to fail the final exam
since you are given so much to prepare for. [Ease: 4/10 | Overall: 7/10]

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Semester 1 2010
This subject is split into 3 sections. Each is worth 30% and class participation is worth 10%
Ethics: 9/10
Lecturer: Caroline West
I found this section of the course really interesting, and Caroline is a really good lecturer. The content
is interesting and easy to understand, and she explains everything well. Assessment for this is a 2000
word essay.
Metaphysics: 8/10
Lecturer: Adrian Heathcoate
This section is quite interesting, but gets pretty confusing at times. I didn't understand a lot of the
content the first time around, but when you read over it again it starts to make more sense. There are
some very interesting topics such as free will and God. Adrian's very good, although his lectures were
a bit confusing. Assessment for this is two short essays in the final exam.
Aesthetics: 7/10
Lecturer: David Macarthur
This was the least interesting of the topics, but still wasn't too bad. I didn't go to a lot of the lectures,
but David was pretty good in the ones I went to. Assessment for this is two essays in the exam.
Overall: 8/10
Solid first year course

Semester 1 2009
Ease : 7/10
There were A LOT of readings. Most of the readings were easy to understand, but you'd have the
occasional philosopher who just rambles on about something you have no clue about.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Caroline West, John Grumley, David MacArthur)
Caroline West was a great lecturer for the first week or so, but afterwards I found her so unbearable
and annoying.
John (something) showed no emotion or expression in his lectures. In other words he was quite
boring. Although, I was quite interested in his topic.
Surprisingly I thought David MacArthur was the best lecturer of the three. I say surprisingly because
most people found him to be the worst. Perhaps it was because his topic was the most interesting.
Interest: 9/10
Both the reality and beauty component were quite interesting topics. Ethics really got you thinking
and questing.
Overall: 7/10
Although the lecturers weigh the subject down, I'd recommend this subject to anyone with even a
slight interest in philosophy. It really opens you to philosophy and it's many gateways.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
Course material is pretty simple to grasp and even if you don't understand the basic ideas
for the essay/exam, so long as you explain why they're confusing you'll get good marks. There's
nothing too difficult about understanding how to write an argument, or anything from the ethics and
beauty section. Hardest part are some of the bamboozling things about God and Mind/Body from the
reality part of the course, but that's expected.
Lecturers: 7/10 (David Braddon-Mitchell, Caroline West, David MacArthur)
David Braddon-Mitchell who you'll have for about 5 weeks was a pretty fantastic lecturer. Funny and
interesting. Caroline West for the ethics part was also fairly interesting, and in addition did great
lecture slides. Bit boring though and sometimes engaged a bit too much with philosophical wankery
which pissed me off to no end. David Macarthur wasn't as bad as everyone has said, but he wasn't

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great either. I found his material boring, not so much as his style boring, so I didn't attend those
lectures.
Interest: 6/10
Reality was fairly interesting, but far too much of it was too wanky to be really interested in. Ethics
was practical and intriguing, so I liked that. The beauty part was awful - fap fap.
Overall: 7/10
Well-structured course, interesting overall, competent lecturers but a little too wanky and/or dull in
some places. I'd recommend it though.

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 9/10
Easy to talk about, mostly easy to explain, sort of easy to write argumentative essays on.
Lecturers - 8.33/10
Reality guy 10/10, Ethics lady 8/10 (got boring after a while), Beauty guy 7/10 (very boring, but
covered everything we needed to know very well).
Interest - 8-9/10
Great stuff.
Overall - 9/10
Tutorials were great fun - easy to make friends, easy to discuss. Exam wasn't too bad either.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
It's easier than it initially appears. Once you get your head around the leading theorists and concepts,
the rest falls into place. The exam is a bitch, especially since it's worth 60% of the final mark,
although to be fair we got the pool of questions well in advance.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Stewart Saunders, John Hadley, David MacArthur)
It's really a mixed bag here. Stewart Saunders (reality) was brilliant and hilarious, John Hadley
(ethics) was dry and disorganised and MacArthur (beauty) sort of fell between the two in terms of
competence.
Interest: 9/10
This is where it's at for your interest points. Questions regarding the existence of God, anyone? What
acts are moral/ethical and who, if anyone, deems them so? Are there populist standards of morality or
is it all just a culturally relativistic quagmire? Is beauty really in the eye of the beholder, or are some
things universally beautiful? What is art? There are important philosophical questions in this course
which will suit pretty much everyone.
Overall: - 7/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 7/10 (David Braddon-Mitchell 10/10, Caroline West 8/10 David MacArthur 3/10)
I didn’t like MacArthur’s subject
Interest: 6/10
Offset by Beauty, which I didn’t like, otherwise an 8/10
Overall: 7/10 (again, offset by the yucky bits)
This course is essentially your sampler plate for the wonderful world that is philosophy. As an
introductory, first year course, the delights to sample are: metaphysics (which deals with what is real
and what isn’t), ethics (which deals with what is right and wrong) and aesthetics (which deals with
what art is…..)
Metaphysics (Reality)
David Braddon-Mitchell comes and equal first to Frank Stilwell in best lecturer stakes. He is a
brilliant speaker, engaging, entertaining and making the information which needs to be divulged a
pleasure to learn. However, for those of you who like details which you can sink your teeth into,

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Metaphysics is not the kind of subject for you. It deals primarily in hypotheticals, often asking “what
ifs” to give possible scenarios many different situations. The major essay in this course is derived
from the metaphysics section so a good idea of what metaphysics is all about (which shouldn’t be
hard if you go to lectures) is advisable, as the essay makes up 30% of the course. (although the essay
plan which precedes it is worth 10% so really, Metaphysics has a 40% weighting)
Ethics (well…. Ethics)
Caroline West (who is not the same Caroline West from Sex Life) was, for me anyway, a fairly good
lecturer. Some people think that she was crap, or rather, that her subject matter was crap. Either way,
she was nowhere near as bad as what was to come. This section of the course is worth 2 essays and
30% of the course, assessment of which occurs in the final exam. From an educational perspective,
the ethics section is useful because it brings up words and themes that you will, inevitably encounter
in other areas of study - phrases like cultural relativism which may arise in other, social science type
subjects, are philosophically explained here. If you got impatient with the wishy-washyness of
Metaphysics, Ethics only gets worse.
Aesthetics (Beauty)
What is beautiful and what isn’t? How does one define beautiful? How does one ascertain the true
meaning behind art itself? If you like that kind of thing, good on you. For the vast majority of us
though, we hated this section. Jhakka and I went to the first of this lecture series and didn’t attend
another lecture the whole semester. The lecturer, David Macarthur managed to make dry subject
matter unbearable, and made airy-fairy subject matter stratospheric. Luckily, cramming as much
information from scant readings 2 hours before the exam can scrape you through find. It’s so vague
that it doesn’t really matter anyway. This section also accounts for 30%, so if you don’t like Beauty,
but like the idea of the other two, work really hard in the others to offset this.

PHIL1012 - Introductory Logic

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 7/10
I’d say that this is a very underrated course - it’s very easy at the start but later on, the teaching gets
really poor and very confusing. Logic is not easy but this level isn’t quite hard, yet. Don’t miss
lectures and don’t fall behind in this course, or you’re fucked.
Lecturer - 5/10 (Nicholas Smith)
He was decent at the start but towards the end, he made no sense and started talking to himself and not
really teaching. Our tutor always tied the loose ends so props to him.
Interest - 1/10
It gets 1 because it was more interesting than physics - actually, both were equally balls but physics
was much harder - either way, only do this as a WAM booster. Don’t expect to be blown away with
“interestingness”?
Overall - 5/10
Eh, not all that great but good enough for me to go to lectures and do my shit.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 9/10
This subject seems to attract quite a few students from outside the Arts faculty; it's lack of essays and
usefulness in areas such as mathematics probably being the cause of this. The content builds on week
after week, so if you keep on top of it, you will find this subject to be quite easy. 50% of your mark
comes from 10 weekly problem sets which are short and quite straightforward to do, at the end of the
last set I ended up only dropping about 2 or 3 marks out of 50. The other 50% comes from the exam
which, while it does have some tricky bits, is certainly doable. If you are more of a humanities person
you might find this subject a little difficult, because even though there isn't any maths involved, logic
is very different from most other arts subjects and would appeal to a more formulaic mathematical
brain. However this subject is certainly within the reach of anyone, regardless of their degree or
faculty.

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Lecturer/Tutor: Nicholas Smith 6/10, John Cusbert 8/10
In addition to being the lecturer, Nicholas Smith also wrote the textbook for this course. The textbook
is excellent, and as you would soon find out, Smith comes across much better on paper than he does in
person. Smith's voice was a bit dull, however, he taught the content adequately, and his train of
thought was easy to follow. You can get by with only reading the relevant chapters in the textbook,
however, his lectures are still worth going to for purposes of consolidating the content.
John Cusbert was a great tutor, he summarised the course content well in his tutorials and was able to
clear up a lot of ambiguities. The tutorial classes themselves were relatively small which I thought
was a good learning atmosphere.
Interest: 10/10
While the content does come across as a bit abstract and at times a bit useless, I actually found this
subject to be extremely interesting with the way everything worked, and particularly how you can
prove the validity of arguments. It's such a shame that there probably isn't a wide range of use for this
outside academia, otherwise I would definitely have continued on to further study . Nevertheless, this
was a very interesting subject, and it is a really satisfying feeling when you complete a particularly
long truth tree.
Overall: 9/10
Would definitely recommend this subject to anyone looking to boost their GPA, or just for fun. And
while I know this subject is not for everyone (I would imagine that someth1ng's review will probably
be a bit more negative than mine ), I really think there's no harm in giving it a try.

Semester 2 2009
Ease : 7/10
I found incomparable to calculus in Maths. It involved a lot of formula memorising as we weren't
provided a formula sheet in exams. You were given exercises each week to do. Everything you learn
accumulates from what you'd learned from the previous week. The tasks and final exam were fair.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Nicholas Smith)
Nicholas Smith was an informative lecturer. The theatre was absolutely packed in the first lecture,
from then onwards less than 1/3 of the students filled the room. The lecturer was somewhat not
needed at he pretty much followed the text. Although he was informative, he was boring. To make
matters worse it was a joint 2hr lecture at 3 o'clock.
Interest: 8/10
It was definitely challenging. I found it rather interesting as it was extremely different to the other
subjects I was taking.
Overall: 7/10
My tutorials were optional, which was handy. If you feel like a challenge this is definitely for you. If
you feel lazy and want a subject with the least amount of work, stay clear!

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 8/10
Personally I found it pretty easy, although lots of people struggled. Assessments were basic, two
assignments worth 25% each, and a final worth 50%. Some of the questions were challenging, but
were doable if you understood the content.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Nicholas Smith)
Nick Smith is a good lecturer. Although he isn't particularly entertaining, he explains things very well.
He also photocopied his textbook and had it distributed as a reader, rather than making us buy the
actual book.
Unfortunately, my tutor was terrible. He often contradicted himself, confusing everyone. He often
seemed like he had no idea what was happening.
Interest: 8/10

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A lot more interesting than I was expecting, I really enjoyed it.
Overall: 7/10
Very good course, slightly let down by my tutor. Would recommend it.

PHIL1013 - Society, Knowledge and Self

Semester 2 2009
Ease - 7/10
Lots of ready and pretty weird content
Lecturer- 4/10
Pretty horrible to be honest
Interest - 7/10
If you like academic wanky stuff it’s pretty cool
Overall - 6/10
Decent

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 9/10
I didn't understand a third of the course, as the theory was ridiculous and the presentation absurd. I
still managed to nearly get a HD. The other two thirds are good fun, and easy too. They give you the
exam questions before the exam, and the essay questions are pretty wide in their reach.
Lecturers: 5/10 (Thomas Besch, David Braddon Mitchell and others)
Besch is decent and his notes are great. But he's a bit boring, which is a shame because political
philosophy is about as interesting and relevant as philosophy comes, in my opinion. The
phenomenology lecturers were as boring and ridiculous as the subject matter was. DBM is a legend so
he pulls the mark up, but not by much since he only takes the last two weeks or so.
Interest: 6/10
Society (political philosophy) is pretty decent and the readings are fun. Good tutorial discussions were
had. As I've mentioned, phenomenology is the theory of retards so no interest to be had (honestly, it's
the most ridiculous piece of tosh I've ever engaged with). Knowedge is pretty good, but the lecturer
makes it more interesting than it really is, in my opinion.
Overall: 6.5/10
Not the greatest subject. Wasn't that interesting, lectures were mediocre and a third of the course is
unbearable.

PHIL2600 - Twentieth Century Philosophy

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
1 essay, on Ayer's book Language, Truth and Logic. Great book, sadly also, very wrong, which is even
more fun. No research, just re-explain Ayer's ideas. (EDIT: It's a *small* book, and it's very clearly
written, stay calm :-))
Exam, write 3 40min essays. All 10 possible questions are given in the last lecture and explained in
detail.
Readings, sometimes difficult, sometimes not. Usually entertaining. You can get away with not doing
them, because the lectures are so good.
Pretty solid course, some tough concepts, but explained clearly in lectures.

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Lecturer: 10/10 (Michael McDermott)
McDermott is pretty awesome, he totally knows what he's talking about! His lecture notes AND audio
recordings are all put up on WebCT pronto. He explains things clearly and is entertaining as well,
although can be a bit intimidating in tutes, because he knows everything. (I'm serious)
Interest: 9/10
History of rise & fall of empiricism / analytic philosophy. Very interesting, some fun concepts. The
logical positivists (1st half of course) are pretty hilarious. Middle stuff is a bit tricky before finishing
with resurgence of metaphysics, fun stuff. Covers important ground.
Overall: 9/10
Really liked this course, some work involved though.

PHIL2606 - Knowledge, Reason and Action

Semester 1 2010
Forget reason and action, this is all about knowledge.
Ease: 7/10
7x 500-word exercises, 1x 1000-word essay, all handed in end of Stuvac. Exercises look easy to start
with (but aren't) and definitely don't look easy at the end (they still aren't). Generally based on 1
reading each, which allows you to really 'get' the material. 500 is nicely bite-sized and 1000 is pretty
manageable.
Lecturer: 7/10
Wylie's lecture notes are so good, you don't need to go to the lectures, just print them off. They're
fantastic, very clear. He expects YOU to write in the same way. Sadly his lectures are not fantastic,
he's just reading out his lecture notes. Oh well, can't have everything. Lots of free-for-all discussion
though, pretty good. Tutes are a bit annoying, if you find arguments annoying, but then why are you
doing philosophy.
Interest: 7/10
Some of it seems a bit hair-splitting, but hey, the cases and countercases are always at least mildly
interesting. Useful intellectual exercise.
Overall: 7/10
Pretty good, recommend if you want a lighter course load during semester. Clear explanation of
concepts, learned a lot.

PHIL2610 - Exploring Nonclassical Logic

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 3/10
MUCH more difficult than Introductory Logic. No friendly weekly exercises. Assessments seemed
pretty indifferent - 2x 50% assignments, no feedback, just raw marks. No scope for improvement
either - each assignment tested a separate half of the course.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Nicholas Smith)
Beautiful clear explanations, encouraged questions, wrote everything up on the whiteboard at the
PERFECT speed (a rare talent!), put up WebCT handouts as well. The negatives: Cancelled the

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weekly tutorial in favour of making it a 3-hour lecture, so it's harder to ask for help if you're
struggling. Also, did I mention the 3 hour lecture.
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 5.66/10
I dunno. Obviously a great course, but in hindsight, not the one for me.

PHIL2617 - Practical Ethics

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Essay questions were straight forward and lecture slides were pretty obvious. Presentation was boring
so if you tune out due to boredom you'll probably not do as well.

Lecturer: 3/10 (Caroline West and other)

Caroline West was pretty good in first year, but she took a year off this year so I was stuck with some
woman. She was pretty boring and most of the lectures were tutorial-esque Q+A sessions, but more
awkward and out of place owing to the jumbo sized lecture theatre.
Interest: 2/10
Readings were long, and pretty basic. No new insight will be shed, no controversial opinions will be
reviewed. Lectures were boring, tutor (Dejan) was shit. He interrupted and operated the tutorials like a
lecture. Plus he was a douche.
Overall: 4/10
Nowhere near as good as it sounded, but perhaps Caroline West would make it better.

PHIL2620 - Probability and Decision Theory

Unknown Date
Ease - 9/10
It really strikes me how easy Art subjects are in comparison to say my Commerce subjects (not being
a wanker...just my experience). Maybe they have lower standards and expectations for the students.
Lecturers - 9/10
All really really good. Especially enjoyed the last guy. Really knew his stuff and posed some
fascinating philosophical questions.
Interest - 10/10
Arguably the most interesting subject I've done at university. Really made me regret not doing more
arts subjects.
Overall - 9/10
Really really hope to HD, will be disappointed with anything less. Cannot fault the subject on
anything. The contrast between the type of thinking required in such philosophy and arts subjects
versus commerce subjects is also a welcome and worthwhile change.

PHIL2622 - Reality, Time & Possibility: Metaphysics

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 4/10
Jesus, I had no idea what was going on half of the time. What is this four-dimensionalism crap you're
on about? Sadly, the course is kind of progressive, meaning that the early stuff is needed to understand
the later stuff. I guess the point is that none of the material is terribly difficult, but it's simply hard to
get in the door. Once you're in, it's easy...ish.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Kristie Miller, Sam Baron)
Kristie and Sam are fine lecturers. Extra kudos for their use of webCT, and online lecture recordings.

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Interest: 2/10
Yeah this is too wanky for my liking. It's unlike anything in first year as well, which makes it hard to
judge before you enrol, if you want to do it. Bit boring. Sorry I can't give more info, lol. :rofl:
Overall: 5/10

PHIL2623 - Moral Psychology

Semester 1 2010
Ease 9/10
Very easy subject, only really need to focus on half the course. But having said that if you want a
D/HD you'll need to do some proper thinking to get a critical response down.
Interest 8/10
Some parts interesting (error theory) some parts not (forgiveness and abortion).
Lecturers: N/A
Didn't go to lectures so unsure, however my tutor Daniel Wodack was pretty good and interesting.
Overall 8/10
Do this subject if you want a reasonably low workload that is often interesting and insightful.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Not a difficult subject, the content is pretty easy to understand, and the workload is very reasonable.
There's a 2000 word essay, and a 2000 word take-home exam (2 essays) both worth 50%.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Luke Russell)
Luke is a great lecturer, and he was one of the reasons I picked the course. He explains things well,
and is entertaining. Also provides very detailed lecture notes, and replies to emails quickly.
Interest: 9/10
One of the most interesting courses I've done. Highlights were the lectures on evil and forgiveness,
but almost all were interesting. The assessment structure means you can basically ignore the ones you
don't find interesting (which shouldn't be too many).
Overall: 9/10
Very enjoyable, I'd recommend it.

PHIL2634 - Democratic Theory

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 8/10 (Duncan Ivison)
Interest: 9/10
Because I like Politics but you should do if you’re going to do this unit anyway.
Overall: 8/10
This subject was a deeper exploration into the “Society” section of PHIL1010 and was fantastic in the
investigation of social contract theory, majoritarianism, utilitarianism etc. It does, focus primarily on
democracy, its origins and the aspects of it and not so much on anything else (hence, the name of the
unit) Its second semester counterpart, Contemporary Political Philosophy is more focused on a
broader range of ideology if that is more your thing.
Duncan Ivison is a good lecturer. Because the class size is relatively small, he’s able to interact with
the class using a combination of slides and the black board. He is Canadian and is actually a visiting
fellow from the University of Toronto, which means that many of his empirical examples are,
naturally, drawn from Canadian examples.
I felt that assessments in this topic didn’t really allow for you to do much research - Ivison preferred
to merely test us on the content of the reader, which is fine if you are a lazy sort of person, but not so
good if you enjoy the research aspect of essays.

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There is no final exam for this unit, but just a take-home exam worth 40% which literally can be done
with just your reader and a word-processor.
Another disadvantage to this unit was the lack of WebCT, meaning that slides are e-mailed to the
class on a weekly basis as well as the tutorial papers from that week. Just means more e-mail really,
but it’s still a little annoying nonetheless.
I strongly advise only taking this topic if you have an interest (academic or otherwise) into politics,
because if not, it’s a real snore. This is the same with most Senior Units though, unless you possess an
interest, there isn’t any real reason to do it as the units are very much more specialised.

PHIL2642 - Critical Thinking

Semester 2 2014
Do not be fooled. This unit is NOT a bludge unit. Neither is it that philosophical as previous PHIL
units either. It is a mixture of WRIT, English and PHIL. This unit is still however, quite easy if you are
able to catch up with the content which can prove to be useful when writing future academic essays or
reviewing them. [Ease: 5/10 | Lecturer: 8/10 | Interest: 6/10 | Overall: 6.5/10]

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 8.5/10
I found this course to be ridiculously easy, compared to more formal logic courses (Intro. Logic) and
even junior PHIL units (e.g. Reality, Ethics, Beauty). If you memorise the lecture notes and do the
weekly exercises you're set for the final exam.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Luke Russell)
Luke Russell was the lecturer for this unit (I'm pretty sure he always is...) - had he not been the
lecturer I'm pretty sure I would have dropped this subject within the first few weeks. He makes a few
lame jokes, interacts with students but most importantly he makes lecture notes which are almost a
word-for-word transcript of the lecture. You could basically do this course without attending more
than one lecture (compulsory test), as I did.
Interest: 6/10
Basically this subject just gives new, philosophical terminology to things which you may have thought
looked erroneous in certain arguments. You will become a bit more wary of statistics and get a decent
understanding of common logical fallacies (straw man, tu quoque, appeal to the majority etc.) after
the course but there's probably not going anything 'amazing' in the course which you would have
never thought about.
Overall: 7/10
If you're looking for a D or HD without having to do excessive amounts of work, this is your subject -
if you're looking for something challenging, inspiring or more than moderately interesting: look
elsewhere.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 8/10
I found the content all very easy to understand, and all the assessments were very reasonable.
Assessment is a midsem exam, which I found really easy, but apparently a lot of people failed; an
essay, and a final exam, which was very similar to previous years (about 20% was word for word
from past exams).
Lecturer: 9/10 (Luke Russell)
Luke Russell is a great lecturer, explains things really well, and made his lectures interesting and
funny. Also had a really good tutor
Interest: 8/10

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There's a lot of interesting content, and there were really interesting essay topics to choose from
(conspiracy theories, intelligent design, etc.)
Overall: 8/10
Enjoyable course, also pretty easy

PHIL2643 - Philosophy of Mind

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 10/10
Piss easy. Fork out $60 and you can write your essay and take home based off the relevant chapters by
rewording the textbook. Questions are straight forward and there are no surprises.
Lecturer: 10/10 (David Braddon-Mitchell)
DBM is well known for a reason: He's excellent. Engaging, funny, unique and quirky. Friendly bloke
too, plus he takes a lot of the tutorials.
Interest: 9/10
It's easy so it's interesting. If you're into philosophy of mind then you'll be interested for sure, since it
covers pretty much the whole philosophy of mind landscape. His lectures make things better.
Overall: 9/10
Easy and interesting, so I was pretty pleased.

PHIL2644 - Critical Theory: From Marx to Foucault

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 6/10
Readings from this course were very difficult. The reader is wholly composed of primary texts from
Hegel, Marx, Horkheimer, Habermas, Foucault - and, as insightful as these philosophers may or may
not be, they are not clear writers. Having said that, the lecturers discussion of the texts and
philosophers were generally more accessible. Assessments were a 2000 word essay, a 2000 word take
home exam and a 5-10 minute tutorial speech.
Lecturer: 8/10 (John Grumley)
I liked John Grumley for a number of reasons. His lectures were clear and organised, he speaks slowly
to allow me to write notes, he puts his lectures online and he gives back helpful comments re:
assessments. He is a little boring as a lecturer, but he does a very thorough and clear job.
Interest: 7.5/10
Looking back at this course, I'm quite glad I took it. It looked at several thinkers who I've encountered
before, and examined them in more detail (Marx, Frankfurt School, Habermas and Foucault). The
readings are quite difficult, and the lectures are not exactly "fun", but I feel I got quite a lot from this
course.
Overall: 7/10
Solid

PHIL2645 - Philosophy of Law

Semester 1 2011
Ease: 7/10
50% essay was pretty tough - present arguments relating to a Real Academic Article (choice out of 4).
Positives: No research required. Negatives: Tricky, required a lot of analysis. 50% exam was fine,
they gave us loads of hints about the questions.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Kyla Reid)

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Very enthusiastic, encouraged class discussion, but sometimes talked too fast and didn't record audio
on WebCT.
Interest: 7/10
A lot of it was pretty abstract, I wouldn't say 'boring' but it was a bit tough to get through.
Overall: 8/10
I learned a LOT. I guess that's a good thing :P

PHIL2647 - Philosophy of Happiness

Semester 1 2016
Ease – 7/10
The assessment load was quite manageable; all that needed to be done was a short analysis, a research
essay and a take home exam. It is definitely accessible to those who haven’t studied philosophy
before, but just be wary that writing essays in philosophy are quite different to writing essays in any
other subject areas. It took me a bit of time to get accustomed to what they wanted at first.
Lecturer/Tutor – 9/10 (Caroline West, Anthony Hooper)
Caroline was probably my favourite lecturer of the semester, she was quite friendly and was able to
make even some of the drier concepts of the course that much more interesting. Anthony was an
excellent tutor too, he would often revise key concepts from the lectures with his own take on things,
so it was good to get varying perspectives on the content. Plus the tutorials were quite small and
intimate, which made it much easier to engage with everyone in class discussions.
Interest – 7/10
Similar to HPSC1000, you start by learning about different theories of happiness, and then go into the
impact that these have on areas such as religion, politics and our general quest for happiness. Some of
it was a little dry at times, but it definitely challenged my notions about what happiness is and gave
me quite a bit of food for thought.
Overall – 7/10
I originally did this subject thinking it would be a WAM booster. It was a little harder than I thought,
but it was still quite an entertaining subject.

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
This was the first PHIL course I've ever done and I didn't find it too difficult. Mostly the content was
very clearly explained in the lectures, and the readings were well chosen. Some weeks the amount we
had to read was excessive. Assessments were a 2500w essay and a 2500w take home exam.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Caroline West, David Braddon-Mitchell)
We had two main lecturers for this course - Caroline West and David Braddon-Mitchell. Both were
very informative and entertaining to listen to. Lectures were generally well structured, and were
actually worth turning up to. Almost up to Frank Stilwell standard. We also had quite a few guest
lecturers, who were all good as well.
Interest: 8/10
There were a lot of interesting issues/questions covered by this course. The first half of the course is
devoted to the philosophy of happiness - and basically involves running through the various theories
that different philosophers have provided. This does get a little dull after a while, but by the middle of
the course you turn to more interesting questions like the psychological research about subjective
well-being and the social correlates of happiness etc.
Overall: 8.5/10
Highly recommended. As an aside, there are no prerequisites for this course, so you can enrol in it
without having done any philosophy before.

PHIL2649 - The Classical Mind

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Semester 2 2008
Ease: 8/10
The course depended entirely on primary sources, which were fascinating. However, I had *major*
panic attacks with the assessments, especially as it was 50% essay and 50% exam. Lots of pressure.
Luckily we were encouraged to have our own interpretations of the source texts, so it was doable.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Rick Benitez)
I enjoyed the lectures and the smaller lecture class. Great stuff. He really seemed to care whether we
turned up or not, which is rare sometimes.
Interest: 10/10
Primary material was great. ~$70 for the textbook, a bit annoying but turned out to be worth it.
Tutorials were fun.
Overall: 9/10
I'm sure the second and third year students had a great time, but it was a bit of a shock for me.

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 Physics (PHYS)

PHYS1001 - Physics 1 (Regular)

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Generally fine. Be prepared for maths and calculus though. Content is all reasonably self-explanatory.
Lecturers: 7.66/10 (David Reilly 7/10, Pulin Gong 8/10, Dennis Stello 8/10)
David Reilly made an absolute hash of one derivation, but was otherwise humorous (NOT ha ha
funny!) and seemed like a nice enough and interested teacher.
Pulin Gong is good at maths, explained stuff well even though he had a thick accent. Funny guy.
Dennis Stello explained material in a clear and concise way.
Interest: 4/10
I found this unit incredibly boring. Thermodynamics was ok, but mechanics and waves were
monotonous.
Overall: 6/10

PHYS1004 - Physics 1 (Environmental & Life Science)

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 6/10
It was of okay difficulty except for when it came to currents and electromagnetism. Damn, I hated
that. I just suck at physics anyways and found it so boring, but many people found the content quite
easy.
Lecturer - 7/10 (Pulin Gong)
Explains the content pretty well except he has an accent that may bother others.
Interest - 0.1/10
Sorry physicists, I just found the content extremely, extremely dry and had literally no motivation to
study for it.
Overall - 4/10
If you're interested in physics, go for it. I'm just not interested in physics and had no motivation.

PHYS1500 - Astronomy

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 7/10
There's a lot of content to remember and most of the concepts aren't too difficult to understand, except
a few things that are just really confusing if you made an attempt to learn the mechanisms. The 2 hour
computer labs are easy; the manual will guide you through how everything works, you can work
ahead and avoid going to the labs for the last 3-4 scheduled weeks. The mid-semester test and lab test,
both weighed 10% are fairly simple, the latter is an open book test, and your allowed to google info,
though you probably won't need to. Finals are worth 80% and consists of 20 MC and 80 marks in
short response. Despite cramming 13 weeks of missed lectures and content into a span of 3 days, I
still scraped an 80 for this subject, so if you’re worried you haven't caught up the entire semester, just
skim over everything, do the past papers they give you, and you should be set for at least a pass.
Lecturer-?/10 (John O'Byrne & Guest Lecturers)

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Haven't been to many lectures to give a fair review.
Interest - 6/10
I like space/cosmology, but the way the course is made makes it feel more suited for an arts student.
Some of the tutorials are reasonably interactive/discussion based and involved some role playing and
was fairly relaxed. The night viewing wasn't too spectacular IMO.
Overall - 6/10
You can do this subject from any faculty really. I wouldn't say this subject is a WAM booster though.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 8/10
Most of the content is basic rote learning type stuff, however, there is quite a substantial amount of
content. If you are not on top of all the content you need to learn, you will struggle come the final
exam. Fortunately, the other assessments are much easier than that final exam; online quizzes can be
completed at any time and you can refer to the textbook, laboratory exercises are straight forward
enough, and tutorials are easy to follow. The final exam itself can have a few obscure questions
(fortunately for me that wasn't the case this year), however I would highly recommend that you do the
past papers that they provide you, as they do tend to reuse a few multiple choice questions, or ask
extended response questions of a similar vein to those of the years before. But on the whole, it was
quite an easy subject; there is a little bit of maths but it doesn't require much of a science background
at all, so I would definitely recommend it to anyone.
Lecturers/Tutor: John O'Byrne (7/10), Elaine Sadler (7/10), Andrew Jacob (8.5/10)
The lectures for this course took the form of two normal lectures per week, taught by either John
O'Byrne or Elaine Sadler in the second, and one extra Special Lecture every week on more specific
content, with a different lecturer each week who was an expert on that particular field. Both O'Byrne
and Sadler were good lecturers, not extraordinary or anything, but they both taught the content well
and made an effort to engage with the students. There weren't any particularly bad lecturers from the
Special Lectures either.
The tutorials for this subject were discussion based activities based on the content we learn in class,
and Andrew Jacob did a great job in directing the discussion, and also teaching us all of the content.
He was also the director of the Night Viewing sessions, which ran smoothly and were quite fun. He
was supported in the tutorials and lab sessions by various PhD students, too many to really remember
or name, however I would like to give an honourable mention to Joseph Callingham and Ben Jelliffe
for being very helpful in tutorials and computer sessions, and for evidently being the two best ones as
I remember who you are.
Interest: 8/10
As a child I was always interested in space, and this subject really gave me the opportunity to learn
about it in an academic manner that I found really enjoyable. While you probably won't enjoy every
single topic you learn, I can still personally vouch that on the whole it is a very interesting subject. I
mean, it's astronomy. It tells us the story of the universe and how we came to be. I can't see how that
wouldn't spark anybody's interest.
Overall: 8/10
I found this to be a truly stimulating subject, and as long as you don't fall behind on the content this
subject should be relatively straight forward. Make no mistake though, you will have to put some
effort to learn the content in order to do well, so I would only recommend PHYS1500 if you have a
true interest in astronomy. Otherwise, you may find dedicating 6 hours a week to this subject quite
tedious.

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 9/10
But there's a lot to remember
Lecturer - 8/10
Interest - 7/10
I did astrophysics in year 12, so not many things new to me

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Overall - 8/10

PHYS1901 - Physics 1A (Advanced)

Semester 1 2013
Ease - 3/10
It was an incredibly difficult course - it was pretty much the difficulty of all my other courses added
into one course. There is a LOT of maths that you need to know. 4U students are at a pretty big
advantage over 3U students due to the mechanics topic in 4U. The lab was difficult and more boring
than the chemistry ones as it didn’t have clear steps on what to do but my group was quite good - at
least it wasn’t all bad!
Lecturers - 8/10
The lecturers were mostly quite good (around equal level) but it did involve a lot of watching the
lecturer solve questions which was quite boring. The problem of the lecture theatre (I think it was
lecture theatre 2) was that it was quite warm and made excellent sleeping conditions. Tim Bedding
gave us some more demos than the others which made it a bit more enjoyable.
Interest - 6/10
I didn’t seem that interested because it was quite boring but I think it was good enough for me to do it
for another semester to give physics another chance. A lot of the interest was lost due to the sheer
difficulty of the course and the labs took away from it even further.
Overall - 6/10
I would say, overall, it was an okayish course but I would definitely say it wasn’t my favourite course.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 5/10
I found it quite hard
Lecturer - 7/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 6/10
I found it too stressful

PHYS1902 - Physics 1B (Advanced)

Semester 2 2015
Ease - 6.5/10
The main difficulty came with quantum physics, a lot of the concepts I just took for granted, and
didn't bother to understand much of it at all, but still managed to pull off an HD. Electromagnetism
was initially a bit difficult to understand as some of the ideas were quite abstract, but everything kind
of falls into place once you get the gist of it. Fluids wasn't too troubling. I don't think your math has to
be that great to get through this course, you only need to know how to make some lengthy algebraic
manipulations and know how to integrate/differentiate with some simple trig identities/substitutions.
So if you didn't do math in high school, you’re probably doing some kind of math unit at uni for your
degree that will cover what you need to know. Also for some reason they decided to remove scaling
this year.
Lecturers – 7/10 (Geraint Lewis 9.5/10, Helen Johnston 8.5/10, Mike Wheatland 3/10)
Geraint and Helen explained things reasonably clearly and were very knowledgeable. I think someone
mentioned this in another review, but Mike mostly just teaches himself physics in the lecture, hogging
the right side of the lecture room for some reason and nothing was really explained properly, it didn't
help that most of the lecture notes he went through were derivations and he just scrolled through them
on the PowerPoint, it just felt really rushed.
Interest - 8/10
A lot of this course had to be learned from scratch, and most ideas can't be figured out using your
common sense, you probably won't enjoy this subject if you don't enjoy physics.

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Overall - 7/10
I still don't know what a particle in a box is.
Semester 2 2013
Ease - 0/10
This is a very hard course, there is no doubt that this is one of the hardest, if not the hardest course in
first year. A friend of mine said that this makes MBLG1901 a “walk in the park” - if that puts things
into perspective. If you do this course, don’t expect to feel like you know your work - it’s a really
tough course and most, if not all students struggled. Oh, and if you want to do this, be VERY good at
maths.
Lecturer - 6.33/10 (Geraint Lewis 8/10, Helen Johnston 8/10, Mike Wheatland 3/10)
Mike didn’t really teach - he just talked to himself and made it incredibly boring and annoying to be at
class - enough said.
Interest - 0/10
I’m not doing any more physics - enough is enough.
Overall - 4/10
Hardest course ever. Period.

Semester 2 2013
Ease: 4/10
A very difficult course. Most concepts in the 2 topics (Electromagnetism and Quantum Physics) were
done at high school, but in a lot more depth and a lot more mathematical. Integrals, probability
distributions, uncertainties were the least of the story - most of the problems are DIFFICULT.
Lecturer: 6.83/10 (Geraint Lewis 7/10, Helen Johnston 8/10, Mike Wheatland 5.5/10)
Geraint was a Welshman who has a good way of explaining things. (Electromagnetism)
Helen Johnston was a motivated lecturer - very good. (Fluids)
Mike Wheatland mostly talked to himself about quantum physics. Concepts are difficult but it was
just a bad experience. Aided sleep.
Interest: 5/10
Concepts were beat to death - ESP in EM which was 3/5 the course. I was sick of it after the first few
weeks. Some cool things in fluids and quantum but that was it.
Overall: 3.5/10

PHYS2911 - Physics 2A (Advanced)

Semester 1 2016
Ease: Optics- 8/10 Thermodynamics- 5/10
Optics was on mostly diffraction through slits, resolution, thin film interference and polarization.
Thermodynamics involved a whole range of proofs on the corollaries of the 2nd law of
thermodynamics for heat engines then a range of topics covering internal energy, entropy,
thermodynamic potentials and more entropy. Also might just be me, but I thought the final exam was
a bit long for two hours.
Lecturers: Tim Bedding- 9/10 Martjin De Sterke - 9/10
Of the lectures I went to, they were good and most explanations were reasonably easy to understand.
Computation lab: ?/10
I really can't assign this one a rating, I really slacked off here (tried cramming 13 weeks into one
night) and I’m pretty sure I failed the last lab test. Was the first time I had any programming
experience but people with experience coding shouldn’t have much problems with these labs.
Experimental lab: 5/10
Everyone hated these. Main problem I had was the marking system they had, the experiments
themselves though weren’t very exciting either.
Interest: 6/10
Optics was a little dry, but thermodynamics was quite interesting.

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Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8.5/10
I found this course a lot easier than first year physics. Nuclear in particular was very easy (a lot of it
was a rehash of HSC physics), and optics wasn't too bad either. There are only two lectures a week in
this course.
Interest: 9/10
Definitely more interesting than the first year material (seems like they wanted to get motion and
other boring stuff out of the way last year). There are two topics- optics and nuclear physics, both of
which are interesting and fun.
Lecturers: Tim Bedding 9/10, Reza Hashemi-Nezhad 6/10
Tim Bedding is very good. His lectures are great, and he has a set of lecture notes specific to the
course that he puts on WebCT, which is really handy when it comes time to prepare. I'm glad he's
taking us again in later years.
Reza is unfortunately, his polar opposite. He is so amazingly slow it's not funny, and it's hard to hear
what he's saying half the time.
Labs: 6.5/10
Physics labs are still not great, but they're better than 1st year. You have three weeks per experiment,
but if you're quick you can finish them in two and take the third one off. There's also a computational
lab every week, which is rather boring but straightforward.
Overall: 8.5/10
All in all, a very good course.

Semester 1 2006
Ease - 9/10
Lecturers - 9/10, 7/10
Interest - 9/10
Overall - 9/10
Good, although the Nuclear and Particle Physics (only three weeks) gives minimal new information.

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 Physiology (PHSI)

PHSI2005 - Integrated Physiology A

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 7/10
A lot of content but like with any of the medical sciences, nothing complicated, you just need to try
and memorise everything. The things you need to learn are largely logical so as long as you bother to
try and understand them, trying to memorising everything is made much easier. Review lectures at the
end of each topichelp to make things easier. It helps to have subjects that link in such as
pharmacology and immunology which mean there’s less content to learn.
Lecturers: 6.66/10 (Max Bennett 5/10, Bill Phillips 7/10, Atomu Sawatari 6/10, Stuart Fraser
8/10, Sharon Herkes 7/10, David Allen 7/10)
Prof. Max Bennett took CNS and was extremely old school, no lecture notes put online. He gave time
to copy down the diagram from the lecture slides and then he would talk and if you wrote notes when
he talked, he’d stop and tell you to stop writing. He only allowed you to write when he dictated notes
to the lecture. Extremely smart guy and has an interesting history, some of which he’ll go on about
during the lecture. He’s been teaching the course for 46 years and from what I can tell still teaches the
same way he did 46 years ago.
Bill Phillips took neurophysiology and was a good lecturer. His learning objectives were provided in
the form of questions you could answer and gave you a good idea of what you did and did not know.
People liked Atomu Sawatari who took muscle physiology however I felt he made things a bit more
complicated than necessary.
Stuart Fraser took haematology and made his lectures pretty interesting.
Sharon Herkes took the CV system and covered the content really well. It really helps if you
memorise the Wiggers diagram the first time it’s covered.
David Allen took exercise physiology and his lectures were a welcome relief in pace from Sharon’s.
They were all good on the whole.
Interest: 9/10
A subject that I’m quite interested in though my level of interest varies from topic to topic and people
I know had similar experiences to me.
Overall: 8/10
There’s a lot of content so make sure you keep up with it. At least 25% fail the mid semester quiz
every year (higher in previous years) but I didn’t find it particularly difficult. Simply people don’t
bother putting any effort in and think they can cruise through it like first year subjects. Our tutor
described MBLG as a good warm up in terms of how much content is covered. A tough course but
quite interesting. I could’ve done better if I’d put in more consistent work and tried harder but I found
getting into the 75+ range is significantly harder than any of my first year subjects.

Semester 1 2010
Ease - 5/10
The content itself isn't that hard to understand, it's just taught so poorly. What's worse is the mid-
semester examined us on stuff we'd never seen before. They warped the questions so that we just
couldn't understand them with the knowledge we had, hence why the average was a fail. There was a
lot of content shoved into a few lectures, like for haematology and the autonomic nervous system,
though we were supposed to know a LOT so that we could answer a range of questions by the exam.
If you do pharmacology, psychology or immunology it would be a little easier because there's a bit of
content that crosses over.

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Lecturers - 3/10
There were many lecturers, but I give them this rating overall. The worst lecturer didn't put any notes
up, just the recordings. His lectures were just diagrams which he would talk about, and he got angry if
anyone took notes while he was talking, plus he didn't even cover everything he was supposed to.
Interest - 7/10
I found the content was actually very interesting when I started studying by myself. The lecturers
make it seem a lot more awful than it is.
Overall - 4/10
Just because it's the most poorly run unit of study I have come across so far. They cancelled a lecture
without telling us once. The discussion boards were just constant complaining about how bad it is. No
past exam papers, just a few short answer questions. There were a LOT of cardiovascular multiple
choice, which helped though. The tute/pracs are a snore fest. There are only three actual pracs the
entire semester, one of which I spent running on an exercise bike... the rest are 3 hour long tutes. The
first two were on statistics - so painful. The demonstrators in them never seemed to agree on anything
which made getting answers for anything extremely difficult. Any assessment took as long as possible
to come back to me. When I got it back, I just didn't care anymore. The marking schemes for the
assessments were ridiculous as well, on top of us not being able to format our reports because we had
to use a template, which made them look disgusting. My advice, avoid this subject unless you
ABSOLUTELY have to do it.

PHSI2006 - Integrated Physiology B

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 7/10
Much less content than PHSI2005 but the IBLs are extremely time consuming, especially when you
only have less group members than other groups. Just hope your group members don’t drop the
subject or switch tutes. Concepts are even simpler than first semester and a lot of the lectures aren’t as
content heavy. There’s also less lectures. Most of the marks for the IBL are free marks. Lab report
isn’t that hard if you follow the marking guidelines they give you.
Lecturers: 8/10 (Meloni Muir, Sharon Herkes, Rebecca Mason, Phil Poronnik, John Hearn)
Whilst Meloni Muir is definitely not a bad lecturer, it would help if she put less content in her
lectures. Sharon Herkes was amazing and her lectures were really interactive. There was a huge
amount of content but it both was taught and structured well. Whilst I really hated Rebecca Mason’s
slides, she was a great lecturer who explained concepts very well. Phil Poronnik’s renal lectures were
quite good. John Hearn needs to make what needs to be learnt more clear and was probably the worst
of the bunch. A greater lecturer but I did not enjoy the way he set up his slides and made it hard to
figure out what we needed to know. However I did enjoy listening to his lectures, but only online at
2x speed (which is the fastest the system allows, you cannot download lectures, 2.5x would’ve been
preferable for him).
Interest: 9/10
I find physiology really interesting and I enjoyed learning the content. I’d give this a 10 if it wasn’t
for the tedious IBLs.
Overall: 8/10
There is not as much content yet still I found the workload more overwhelming than first semester and
many students referred to it as a 9 or 12 CP subject, mainly due to the IBLs. The subject requires
application of knowledge, not just rote-learning so the final exam is quite difficult but only worth
37.5% (mid sem = 12.5%, IBL = 20%, report = 15%, lab book and prepac sheets = 15%). I’d say out
of all the 2nd year subjects I’ve done, PHSI is probably the hardest to obtain good marks in. It was the
one I studied hardest for this semester and also my lowest mark. Whilst I’d recommend physiology
because it’s quite interesting, do not do it as your bludge/easy subject like some people I know did.
Only do it if you intend to major in physiology or want 2nd year physiology knowledge for whatever
reason.

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 PHSI2601 - Physiology for Pharmacy

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Content and concepts were not very difficult to understand, although memory consolidation was
tedious with the huge volume of content. Tricky exam questions.
Lecturers: 9/10
Most lecturers taught very well.
Interest: 9/10
Physiology always seems pretty interesting, and this course covers pretty much all main human body
systems fairly well.
Overall: 9/10
Challenging, but very well-organised and interesting course. Practical classes could be improved.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6.5/10
Lots to understand, lots to remember, and very very loaded course, atleast BIOL1003 Level if not
more.
Lecturers: 8/10
Lecturers were usually very good. With good notes.
Interest: 9/10
My most interesting subject.
Overall: 7.83/10
Good

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 Political Economy (ECOP)
ECOP1001 - Economics as a Social Science

Summer School 2014

Ease: 9/10
This course is very well structured and easy to follow, regardless of your background in economics,
and it’s easy enough if you do the weekly readings to participate in tutorial discussion and understand
what is going on. Assessment wise it was pretty straight forward too; the three take home assessments
(two mini essays and one essay) were all easy to understand and plan, as most of the questions were
on pretty general topics that left it open to interpretation. For the final exam, in the end we were
actually given the questions before we sat the exam, so it was pretty easy to study for. I guess there’s a
risk of getting complacent with this subject, but really, if you did well in HSC English or any other
essay writing subjects it shouldn’t be too much of a step up. Just make sure you write essays the way
they want you to and you’ll be fine.
Lecturer/Tutor: 9/10 (Thomas Barnes)
I did this subject through summer school and had a cohort of about 20 people; so naturally, it made it
a bit easier to learn in a more intimate environment where everyone knows your name. But even
besides that, Thomas Barnes was a great lecturer, his slides and lectures couldn’t have explained the
concepts any better, and he made an effort to get everyone involved in discussions. If I had any
criticism at all, it’s that his handwriting, particularly in regards to feedback on assignments, is at times
a little hard to read, but really it’s nothing in the scheme of things. He really made the subject
worthwhile for me. We also had Emeritus Professor Frank Stilwell deliver one lecture, he’s a legend
within the political economy department and I can understand why; he really knows his stuff, and he
has a very engaging lecture style. Unfortunately he’s retired so future cohorts may not see as much of
him anymore.
Interest: 8/10
Personally I found the course very interesting, and it was a great introduction to heterodox economics.
It gets you to really challenge your assumptions of all the things mainstream economists take for
granted, and provides you with some viable alternatives. I think there’s quite a few preconceptions of
the department from outsiders, believing them all to be Marxists and radical leftists and what not, and
yes, even though Marxism is one of the schools you will study, there are four others you will look at
as well (Classical, Neoclassical, Institutional and Keynesian) which all vary in their underlying
political philosophies. All this subject really teaches you to do is consider the economy from many
different perspectives, and when you end up studying the schools and all its different features it does
end up becoming quite interesting, leaving the door open for some stimulating debates.
Overall: 8.5/10
I really only took this subject as a way to keep my brain engaged over the holidays, but this subject
has definitely made me consider the possibility of pursuing further study in political economy. The
Political Economy Department at Sydney is very unique, and it is a type of learning experience you
won’t get at many other universities. I would highly recommend this subject to anybody, especially if
you are studying mainstream economics, as this unit would complement it well.

Semester 1 2011
Ease - 8/10
This is my fault, because I hardly went over the content and when it was exam time, I was rushing to
comprehend everything. But once exams were over, I did a second take and read over everything once
again and it was relatively easy to grasp. Contest of Economic Ideas is an ace book.

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Lecturer - 9/10 (Frank Stilwell)
Frank Stilwell is fucking amazing - funny, critically engaging and amicable. He's like a genuinely
cool grandpa. I'm so glad he was my lecturer, because apparently 2011 is the last year he'll be teaching
ECOP1001. Tim, my tutor, was also great. Knowledgeable and laid back. Hot, as well.
Interest - 8/10
I like political economy because it focuses on the social and political aspects of economics. So if
you're interested in that...
The tutes could've been more interesting - no discussion, and the tutor resorted to picking on people to
answer questions.
Overall - 8/10
Solid content, man.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Some aspects can be really difficult, especially for me not having done HSC Economics, so some
terminology is difficult, as is some of the more detailed aspects of Keynesian policies, but the text is
written in a way which makes it easier to understand. Each tutorial has a quiz, which are actually easy
but nerve wrecking.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Frank Stilwell)
He is really interesting, and explains things really well through examples and metaphors, and he is
really amusing too.
Interest: 7/10
I liked exploring the different schools of thought, but I did not like some of the aspects on alternative
economic views such as environmentalism and feminism.
Overall: 8/10
The lecturer is really great and the content is interesting, but it can be very stressful, but rewarding

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
The material is covered very nicely, lectures are worth attending (although the textbook is pretty much
a hard copy of them). The readings were quite reasonable in terms of content and size.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Frank Stilwell)
Frank Stilwell lives up to his reputation. Truly the best lecturer I’ve had at USYD so far. He’s witty,
funny and his lectures are excellent in regards to the material he covers and the style it is presented it.
Even worth going to at 5pm.
Interest: 7/10
Not a big fan of economics-related things, but I chose this as I need to do ECOP as a minor for my
degree. However, Frank made the subject quite entertaining.
Overall: 8/10
Interesting content, good readings and a wonderful lecturer.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Overall it’s was pretty easy, I found it super interesting so I reread the textbook without being asked.
Lecturers: 10/10 (Frank Stilwell, Joy Paton)
Frank = A Plus, A Double Plus! Joy (coordinator) is really nice too, I accidently missed the exam and
let me re-sit it with no penalty because she is nice. I had a rad tutor too, Mark, awesome stuff!
Interest: 10/10
Lefty economics.
Overall: 10/10
Very very good.

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Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 100/10
Frank deserves the highest praise imaginable
Interest: 9/10
Overall: 10/10
They say that the ECOP faculty has had to fight for survival. It shouldn't have to, because the
introductory subject, ECOP1001 was amazing. Hopefully the move to the arts faculty will
secure it's place, 600+ students were enrolled this year.
The course is engaging, you look across the history of economic thought, most significantly classical
political economy, Marxism, neoclassical economics, institutional, Keynesian and modern political
economy.
The subject matter allows so interesting discussion in tutes, which are normally fairly relevant to
what's going on in the lecture, each tute also has a representative who looks after you at faculty
meetings- there was a very caring, sharing feel in the course and the tutors and Frank really looked
after you.
Lastly, Frank. Frank Stillwell is without a doubt the BEST lecturer I have encountered so far at
Sydney. He's witty, intelligent, imaginative, engaging...I can't explain how great he is.
YOU MUST DO THIS COURSE. I can't recommend it enough. 5 stars.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
The content is simple enough to understand, it's just actually knowing how to answer broad
ECOP1001 tutorial/assessment questions properly that is difficult.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Frank Stilwell)
Frank Stilwell is a nice person that cares about students and the academic standards of the discipline
and faculty. He's the most helpful and friendly staff member I've known so far at the university. He
used to lecture in microeconomics, then together with some other people founded the political
economy discipline at USYD. His lectures though are extremely similar to the actual text (that
he authored), I remember him even using the exact same examples/jokes from his book in lectures.
So you really can replace lectures with the text. I found that the only thing extra in lectures were fun
cartoons he put up on the overhead.
Interest: 6/10
I was interested in the beginning, but by the end it just seemed so pointless. Why learn about Marxist
solutions to economic problems when the entire world operates within a variation of the neoclassical
model? Do the policy rectifications hence not come from that?
Overall: 5/10
The whole subject is a general overview of the oh- so complex conflicting forms of economic thought.
Political economy isn't that extraordinary. There is no direction in the unit other than a limited
examination of classical political economy, Marxism, Keynesianism etc. in a chronological sequence.
It was very difficult for me to understand exactly what we were meant to analyse in assignments/ the
exam. It is based in theory, but tutorials/lectures encourage a personal individual relation to such
concepts rather than collective economic. Examining the Marxist labour theory of value, neoclassical
quantity theory of money etc. seemed pointless to me without any clear relation to policy. But I
assume it will become more focused in further ECOP units (which i will not be taking).

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7.5/10
There is quite a lot of content here too. Its presented very well, but for people like me who did
economics at high school it can be hard to adjust your brain into a Marxist/Institutionalist/Classical
economic analysis
Lecturer: 10++/10 (Frank Stilwell)

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Frank is the best lecturer ever.
Interest: 9/10
A great course for getting into arguments with your liberal voting buddies. Reading the neoclassical
theory sections is a drag though
Overall: 9/10
Great course. Everyone should do it.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
After having done HSC economics, and having Keynesian/neo-classical theory hammered into you as
absolute fact, it is interesting having it all challenged with alternative views.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Frank Stilwell)
Stillwell is one of the best.
Interest: 8/10
Interesting content, certainly gives a great overview of economic thought. I found some of the
discussion in tutes to be quite left-wing though...
Overall: 8.5/10
Definitely something you should do if you get the chance.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 8/10, Lecturer: 10/10, Interest: 7/10, Overall: 9/10
Frank Stilwell is possibly one of the best lecturers you will have. Very funny guy, and presents
material in a way which is engaging and interesting. Be wary of course, of the bias of any university
lecturer. Frank, for all his legendariness, is no exception. As an Economic Advisor to the Australian
Greens, be prepared for a strong politically leftwards bias in this course.
As for subject matter - ECOP 1001 provides a good, solid overview of different strands of economic
thought, including classical Political Economy, Marxian Political Economy, Institutional Political
Economy, Keynesian Political Economy, Neo-Classical Economic thought (often referred to as
orthodox economics) as well as discussion about alternative Political Economy such as feminist and
green.
Many students enrolled in the Bachelor of Economic and Social Sciences will take this course, and it
provides a broad overview of the discipline in general. No requirement is needed in terms of math, or
previous experience with Economics as HSC level. Those who have taken Economics in the HSC
may be placed at both an advantage and disadvantage. The advantages include that you will be
familiar with terminology that arises from the course and your grasp of the Neo-Classical section will
be excellent. The disadvantage is that the patterns of thinking are very different and a strict adherence
to what has been taught at HSC level will possibly result in less than desirable results, if only because
of the aforementioned left leaning of the course (and indeed, the entire department)

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: 10/10
Interest: 9/10
Overall: 10/10
Can't recommend this enough, I'm sure everyone will agree.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 10/10
Interest - 9/10
Overall - 9/10

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Semester 1 2005
Ease - 10/10
Lecturer - 10/10
Interest - 9/10
Overall - 9/10

ECOP1003 - International Economy and Finance

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 9/10
It's very broad. You can talk about anything that has to do with 'international economy
and finance'. There's little analysis of the international situation in political economy terms. There's a
stupid tutorial presentation (based on the certain week's readings.. you're not expected to go any
further than that in research), a stupid essay with very general questions, and an even stupider exam.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Bill Dunn)
As much as Bill Dunn seemed a nice person, he came to lectures unprepared and talked about nothing.
Really nothing.. he would speak so generally. It was painful listening to him trying to make a point.
The lecture slides were a few random points that seemed only helpful in guiding him in his talk. I
remember a few times students asking him questions, and he'd ask the rest of the class if anyone knew
the answer, or the 'specifics' of what he himself was talking about. I still can't believe it.
Interest: 9/10
International trade, development objectives.. it's interesting.
Overall: 6/10
The readings provided were absolutely irrelevant. Some just detailed historical events,
like the development of imperialism or the world trade organisation that didn't really critically analyse
anything at all. The tutorial questions were also very broad.. and it was impossible to answer them
with the content of tutorial readings or the lectures. Stuff like 'can the WTO achieve a fair trade
regime?' or 'who cares about the exchange rate?' Though my tutor was really good, and brought
forward new questions and sort of guided us through discussion. The final exam was absolutely
ridiculous. One of the questions was 'Is financial globalisation reversible?'. How the fk could anyone
reasonably answer that?? If you have room for a spare subject, like i did, before you can start senior
units in areas that you want to continue, do not choose this subject. Though the content is interesting
and relevant to economics + business etc.. the course structure and teaching is horrible.

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
Personally, I found that this wasn’t the most easiest course, but that’s probably because I never did
economics in high school, or was ever that economic-literate (if you know what I mean). But after
reading over everything I found that most of it was pretty straight forward, well, that’s until you get
down and dirty into the advanced elements. And the exam would have been hard, if Bill didn’t
generally outline what to expect in the exam.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Bill Dunn)
I liked Bill, he had a passion for what he was teaching, and he was never really boring to listen to.
Interest: 8/10
I’ve never been that economic-literate, so studying this was in my interest just to learn the basic of
international economics - and I did. It was really interesting in the end.
Overall: 8/10
Definitely recommended.

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 ECOP2011 - Economic Theories of Modern Capitalism

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 4/10
Very difficult. Lots of algebra and heavy logic. It is not too bad if you keep up with everything but the
sheer amount of reading and coursework makes this nearly impossible. Assignments however are not
too bad.
Lecturer: 9/10
I really liked Joseph. He is unbelievably smart. I think sometimes he made stuff sound more
complicated than it was to scare us off. Brilliant man.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting and important to know the theory behind everything. Joseph many times quoted
another economist saying "You need to understand economics so you are not fooled by economists", I
tend to agree with this.
Overall: 7/10
Difficult course but I think if you get through it you are better off.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 2/10
Apparently the hardest Political Economy course, and now I've been through this rite of passage, I
can see why too. However, they don't pretend that it's an easy course. Readings were thick and often
cryptic. The algebra scared everyone. Lecture content is complicated, everything was just so damned
confusing, you try and try and then just give up, bloody economic theories.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Joseph Halevi)
Some may see this is as a bit conflated, and I was tempted to give a 2 because of the perceived
suffering we felt we had to endure. At the same time I feel this is not enough and fear it would do too
much discredit to a man who we are actually privileged to be taught by (but we're just too selfish,
hedonistic and confused by the course to see this). It's weird, in lectures Joseph Halevi seems to make
things sound even more complicated than they really are, but then what he's teaching is complicated
enough as it is. However, he writes the most useful 20 page lectures notes week by week (and even
more simplified course summaries at the end - not that we didn't have enough reading with such a
massive 555 page reader). And apparently with lectures, he just speaks off the top of his head, totally
extemperaneously. Some hate him with a passion, others absolutely love him, but make no mistake, he
is quite an enigmatic, peculiarly brilliant man.
Also a noteworthy mention, albeit for all the wrong reasons, was tutor Roni Demirbag. From what I
gleam, not the most helpful tutor in the world - ask him for clarification on something, and his stock
standard response, in a rather frustrated tone, is 'it's actually really easy, just do the reading again (you
lazy fool (under his breath, I presume))'. Had him for the first tute, Dr. Halevi substituted for two
weeks, and suddenly became our permanent replacement, which was probably a good thing, albeit
intimidating (regrettably, he had that effect on me).
Interest: 2/10
Inherently boring, sometimes demoralising. For most of the course, I just didn't 'get' economic theory.
No matter how much I wanted to work on it more, it was just too off-putting (again, it was that 555
page course reader).
Overall: 5/10
I've probably written so much because I've felt so strongly about this course. However, when the
semester's over, and/or you come to do other senior ECOP units, it's only then that you'll realise the
incredible value of what ECOP2011 taught you.... if you manage to understand any of it.

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Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 8.5/10
Interest: 8.5/10
Overall: 8.5/10
Pretty fun, good lectures, good content, fairly bludgy

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 4/10
But only if you stick to Marxian Political Economy, if not it’s more like 1/10
Lecturer: 2/10 (Joseph Halevi)
Interest: 3/10
Overall: 3/10
Joseph Halevi is an interesting character. Advance skill and copious quantities of caffeine are
required to maintain consciousness in his lectures, as accent, monotone and dry subject matter
combined do not make for a very appealing combination. However, the discussion on fairies and
dragons was insightful and interesting.
Bias from Joseph lies in his Communist past - and hence, a great love for Marx. The course material
is similar to ECOP1001, except more intensively focused upon the ACTUAL economics rather than
the theory. Indeed, the course is focused upon outlining the economic rationale behind each school of
though - then systematically deconstructing the paradigm to prove how and why it is incorrect. It
seems that the eventual conclusion of the course is again, a variation on the same thing
1. All schools of economic thought are deficient in accurately accounting for the human element in
economic function.
2. Attempting to factor in this as such, inevitably leads to a deficient framework by which to analyse
the economy effectively
3. Thus, Neoclassical Economics is still the best thing we’ve got, so put up and shut up.
There were copious quantities of algebra in this course as well, of which many of the students did not
understand AT ALL. For a discipline which trumpets the fact that no maths skills are required, there
was a large amount of algebra. Despite the tutors best efforts to emphasise that the need to understand
all the algebra was not necessary, it seemed that making an effort to learn it is what separates the
students in this course. This, again, is another reason why to stick to Marxian Political Economy in
this course - it minimises the amount of algebra that needs to be learnt.

ECOP2911 - Political Economy Honours II

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
Pretty easy, although there is a lot of reading and many assessment tasks. There is only one 1.5 hour
seminar which is awesome.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Joy Paton)
I liked Joy, she basically just had to guide discussion as it was a seminar with a small number of
people talking about class for a while. She was good at connecting the fragmented ideas about class
into one tool that is not caught up in Marxist preconceptions.
Interest: 10/10
I loved talking about class for an hour and a half. It is important to see class as an analytical tool
rather than a topic dominated by Marxists. This course allows political economy kids to use class in
research as a critical concept rather than a preconceived Marxist notion.
Overall: 9/10

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I really like the seminar style of learning, small class numbers and learning guided by discussion; this
is how university is meant to be. It is a prerequisite for doing honours in PE obviously and it is easy to
see why so when finishing the unit.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
It's all about class theory, but so relevant to the real world. No final exam, just a seminar + paper,
essay, tute participation, and most interestingly, an imaginary piece where you critique/outline your
vision of a 'good' society' (no marks lost for totalitarian ones either, seriously, most people had
centralised control in societies.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Elizabeth Hall)
Elizabeth Hill is truly one of the greatest, oh-so kind. The 'seminar' style class was basically what a
tute should really be, small class numbers, learning through discussion, that sort of thing which
doesn't happen enough.
Interest: 9/10
In short, people just come together, sit in a room, and talk about class analysis for an hour and a half,
once a week (no lecture). Believe it or not, class theory is a lot more complex than one would expect.
A couple found class theory discourse a tad 'wanky', maybe because it was more arts than economics
in part, but the course really does encompass all types of political economy, sociology, history and
philosophy all in the one course. The perfect antidote to ECOP2011.
Overall: 10/10
I have to give it full marks, truly one of the best and most useful units I've ever done. Also one of the
classes where everyone spoke, one of the best tute classes I've had to date in terms of members, kudos
to all 10 of them, never a moment too awkward or silent.

ECOP3014 - Political Economy of Development

NOTE: ECOP3014 will not be offered in 2015, however, the unit itself has not yet been
discontinued. It may be offered again in the future (2016 onwards).

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
Well structured. Covers a few of the same themes as P.E of Human Rights. Typical Assessment
structure (1000w paper 20%, 2000w essay 40%, participation 10%, 90 min exam 30%). Could change
with the new lecturer. Dr. Engel seemed to mark easy (or the cohort was just smart, there were several
90+% essays). Only a couple easy, relatively short tute readings each week.
Interest: 9/10
Highly relevant and interesting (poverty, trade, urbanisation, informal economy, public health, global
warming debates), particularly in the context of concurrent food, economic and financial crises. Some
great, heated debates were had during the global warming weeks, which was a nice change from the
general cluelessness and apathy in other weeks.
Lecturer: 7.5/10
Dr. Engel has moved to another university, so the lecturer will be new. A couple of guest lecturers,
they were fine. I had Susan for tutes, so I saw a different side to her, and genuinely liked her. Not sure
what the other tutors were like. Like Liz Hill before her (who will probably resume teaching the
course upon her return in 2010), Susan was incredibly nice, but some found she tended to read off
scripts in lectures. Unsurprisingly, she was at her best whenever she'd finally ad-lib and revert to her
(thankfully) slightly irreverent self. Lecture slides were posted
Overall: 9/10

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Recommended for the content. Lots of second years. Dare I say there was a higher concentration of
wankers (given the profile of students subjects with the word 'International' tend to attract -
diplomat/NGO wannabes, of which I am probably one too).

ECOP3017 - Human Rights in Development

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
Assessment marking was explicitly strict on extensive use of data/empirical evidence, as the Social
Sciences would be, but they were very clear on it here, which is probably a good thing. However, got
a shit mark for an essay seemingly because my sentences 'were too long' and made it difficult to
follow my arguments, yet the marker was still able to understand my essay enough to comment that
my use of 'evidence' to substantiate my arguments was 'one of the better' instances she'd seen (I'm
having the essay remarked).
Lecturer: 7/10
Some found Tim Anderson slightly uninspiring as a lecturer. Lots of short film documentaries in
class, controversial lecture content, but it all came across as somewhat dull. However, this may have
be intentional on Tim's behalf, to appear more balanced and avoid coming across as a ranting,
cliched, anti-establishment leftie, which could've easily happened.
Interest: 9/10
Really does open your mind to human rights atrocities, even if you're already 'predisposed' to this sort
of thing. Some of the best tute discussions too, even got heated at times, but never any hard feelings
(except for this dickhead fascist who wasn't even in our class but would just rock up from time to
time, it was as if he hadn't learned anything all semester, I'd like to think he was just a great actor, but,
no).
Overall: 8/10
Had high expectations, and they were generally met. Interestingly, it really crossed over well with
other units I was doing, particularly GOVT2119.

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 Psychology (PSYC)
PSYC1001 - Psychology 1001

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 6/10
The amount of content is massive, if you don't consistently keep up with the content, stuvac will be a
nightmare. There are 6 components in total D: On the other hand, the online quizzes are an easy way
to get marks - unlimited attempts. The 5 hours of research participation is also an easy way to grab
5% of the total marks for the course. The final exam was a pain to sit through, felt like 10 years of my
life had passed when the paper ended :/ Additionally, the essay assignment was difficult to complete
because there was no way you could get feedback on your written drafts. Everything had to be done
verbally. Unlike BIOL1001, there weren't many platforms available if you needed help.
Lecturers: Caleb Owens (Science and Stats): 8.5/10, Lisa Zadro (Social Psychology): 15/10,
Celine Van Golde (Forensic Psychology): 6/10, Ian Johnston (Neuroscience): 9.5/10, Niko
Tiliopoulos (Personality): 7/10, Micah Goldwater (Developmental Psych): 6/10
For some reason, many students don't really like Caleb’s lecturing style, but I found it rather
engaging. Plenty of examples and analogies used in his lectures, which are important for the final
exam. This was, in my opinion, one of the clearest components of psyc1001 in terms of content and
what we were expected to know. The final exam for this component had no surprises.
Lisa is an outstanding lecturer (as many would agree). Dr Z is lively and energetic during her lectures,
and if you make the effort to rock up to her lectures, you will be prepared for the exam (many
analogies and examples were given in the lectures). Content was delivered in such a unique and
interesting way, studying for her component is much easier than the others (you will remember most
of the theories and examples just by turning up to lectures). No surprises from this component in the
final exam. This is the component most students excel in (with many scoring full marks or close to
full marks).
I found it difficult to stay awake during the forensic psychology lectures, as Celine just reads off the
lecture slides (which are not uploaded prior to the lecture). However, on a positive note, everything
you need to know for this component is on the lecture slides, just study for them and you should do
well for this component.
Ian is yet another great lecturer in this course. He prepares key questions for each topic, making it
easy to study for neuroscience. As long as you can answer all the key questions, you are set. However,
there are many scientific names/terms to remember in this component, so start revising early or you'll
get confused between terms. Ian is also very approachable, so if you have any questions, don't
hesitate!
I personally found the personality component to be the most challenging due to its abstract nature.
Nothing made much sense to me so I had to rely on rote learning to get through this part. Niko is an
eccentric lecturer and he is definitely engaging, but I found the content difficult to understand. My
performance on his component was the worst out of the 6 Tip: remember all the names of the
different scientists on the last slide of each of the lecture slides, they will come in handy in the final
exam.
The developmental component was very similar to forensic psych in terms of delivery, except that
more videos were shown during lectures, which were helpful in consolidating information.
Interest: started off as 8/10, dropped to 6/10 by the end of the semester

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The crazy load of content made the subject a pain to get through. By the end of the semester, this was
the subject I liked the least out of all my other subjects.
Overall: 6.5/10
Not a great subject, although it is certainly one of the most popular subjects taken in first year (>2000
students).

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 8/10
PSYC1001 makes it extremely clear how to get good marks. If you do the research participation and
get full marks on the quizzes, you should have no problem getting a D or above. I personally failed
the assignment, which I found difficult because there isn’t much guidance/explanation as to what to
do…and I just suck at essays.
Lecturers: 6/10
Social: 10/10
Forensic: 7/10 (Really boring but at least she was on topic)
Science/Stats: 6/10 (Okay lecturer, although many people say that he is condescending and arrogant.
Personally, I found him a bit annoying but not too bad. Not much of what he says is examinable,
mainly because he gives a lot of examples, details you don’t need to know. Very little content to know
for exam.)
Neuroscience: 10/10
Personality: 1/10 (Don’t go to lectures..it’s a complete waste of time. Just memorise bolded terms in
slides)
Human development: 7/10 (Similar to forensic)
Interest: 6/10
Liked 2 sections. Was okay with 2. Hated 2.
Overall: 7/10

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 6/10
Loved forensic psychology and social psychology, neuroscience (feel like doing BIOL1003),
others.....
Lecturers: 6.4/10
Lisa Zadro 11/10, Caleb Owens 7/10, Celine Van Golde 9/10, Others 5/10, Nikolaos Tiliopoulos 0/10
Interest: 5.8/10
9/10 for social psychology, 8/10 for neuroscience & forensic, 6/10 for science statistics &
development, 0/10 for personality.
Overall: 6.5/10
Pass is survival!

Semester 1 2013
Ease: 8/10
Getting a good mark is simple but not easy. On one hand, all you need to do is volunteer for
experiments, do the quizzes (unlimited trials so there is no excuse for bad marks) and memorize
everything in the lecture slides. This way, you'll almost be guaranteed a D if not more. On the other,
lecture slides are often 60+ slides long for one lecture and you get three lectures a week. And there is
around twelve teaching weeks in a semester. So yeah, if you leave all the memorising to the last week,
have fun staying up till 3am.
Lecturer: 6-9/10
Depends on which lecturer you are talking about as the course covers six sub-topics (e.g. statistics,
social learning, human development, forensic science) and they are all taught by different people.
Overall, the quality isn't too bad though- sure, you've got those who like to read off from the lecture

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slides (e.g. the human development lecturer) but the slides are actually quite informative/interesting
which makes lectures tolerable. Then, you've got lecturers like Lisa who are absolutely amazing. You
laugh your head off and somehow you still end up getting 19/20 for her section (social learning).
Highly recommend her.
Interest: 8.5/10
Very interesting. There is a bit for everyone out there. The tutorials are also more engaging than most
though I found my class to be quite quiet.
Overall: 8/10
Semester 1 2012
I personally enjoyed all the lecture materials. However, though the lecture materials are engaging and
insightful into Neuroanatomy etc. be mindful that there are a lot of readings to do in order to
understand the material. Bro Tip for this unit of study is be prepared to do readings because they will
help a lot with the final exam and if you’re struggling be sure to complete all the non-compulsory
units to make up for the marks. [Ease: 5/10 | Overall: 7.5/10]

Semester 1 2012
Ease: 5/10
A broad sweep over almost all of the aspects of Psychology. But don't be fooled by the word broad,
there is a heck of a lot to learn. You are given well over a month to do your 1000 essay, but you need
to learn all about APA style and presenting an argument. If you purchase the recommended book and
absorb it you will have no problems. As for the exam, 100 multiple choice questions is definitely not
easy, especially since they are designed by Psychologists who take delight in tricking you.
Lecturers: 9/10
7 Lecturers in total, one for each field in Psych. The standouts are easily Dr Caleb Owens, who is
funny and interesting while lecturing about the worst part of Psychology: Statistics. And of course, Dr
Lisa Zadro!!! Trust me, she will make studying Psychology worth it. The other lecturers are great,
although one did put me to sleep, but I will leave that snooze-fest as a surprise.
Interest: 9/10
My favourite subject. From an Arts perspective, it was a little bit difficult to adjust to the level of
Science involved. But once you are brought into the Psych world, with the help of lecturers like Lisa
Zadro, it is interesting and thoroughly enjoyable.
Overall: 9/10
Highly recommended and rewarding. But do your readings!!

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
I guess essays aren't my thing. Also there was so much to memorise so even the exam being all
multiple choice was no good to me.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Lisa Zadro, Caleb Owens and others)
There were 6 of them. Lisa Zadro was really good. I thought the neuroscience lecturer was good too
but I forgot his name. Caleb Owens was a good lecturer I think, but the content was a bit boring. The
personality lecturer, whose name is in the back of my head, was pretty insane. I found him funny at
first but I quickly got bored.
Interest: 5/10
I say half the stuff was interesting like neuroscience, social psychology, half of personality and half of
applied psychology. The rest didn't appeal to me.
Overall: 5/10
Interesting at times, some good lecturers. Need to be able to write essays and memorise a lot of
information.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10

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Easy enough to do well in. 10% is basically given to you: 5% for weekly quizzes which can be taken
unlimited times for a week, and 5% for doing 4 hours of research participation. 1000 word essay
worth 25% - I was kind of annoyed with this, because your tutor picks 2 topics, of which you have to
choose one, and he picked the two topics I least wanted to do. Was still alright though. Then there's a
100 multiple choice final worth 65%. None of the content is particularly hard to grasp.
Interest: 9/10
Neuroscience: I found this topic interesting, although for me it was the hardest. Justin's a good
lecturer, the only problem I had was that he struggled getting through all his info. Besides that, no
complaints.
Social: Really interesting topic, and Lisa is a fantastic lecturer, absolutely hilarious. Really can't fault
this section for anything.
Stats and science: A lot more interesting than I expected, there really isn't much stats in this course,
and it was all easy enough to understand. Caleb's another great lecturer.
Forensic: I personally found this really interesting, and it's an area where I would consider pursuing a
career in, although a lot of others didn't like it. Helen's not bad, basically just reads off the slides
though.
Personality: I didn't like this as much as most other topics, although it was still quite good. Niko's a
funny man, seemed like an absolute nut in the first lecture, but turned the crazy down as the course
went on.
Language: Didn't enjoy this section, it just wasn't interesting to me. Karen's not bad, nothing special
though
Lecturers: 9/10
Overall: 9/10
Very good course, I really enjoyed it

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
It can be easy, but you really have to try in it. I managed a high pass with minimal work, but it is still
challenging if you are not naturally gifted.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Nikolaos Tiliopoulos, Caleb Owens, Lisa Zadro and others)
Some were good, some were bad. Niko was my favourite because each lecture was like he is tripping
on acid. Caleb was cool but he needed to be more radically scientifically minded to piss more people
off. Lisa tried too hard to be cool. The rest were forgettable.
Interest: 9/10
Interesting stuff (except for the linguistics baby shit)
Overall: 8/10
Pretty challenging but the course is pretty cool it keeps you motivated.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 6/10
Let no one make you believe 100 Multiple Choice exam is an easy one. It isn't, but it isn't bad either.
But try not to cram in the last minute as you end up falling asleep in the exam. Try your best in the
Essay, it is one of the 1st essays you do in Psychology so get the book which tells you how to write
one. You will get the marks if you follow it. Make sure you do the work in the semester, try NOT to
forget the tutorial quizzes, or if you do, remember to do experiments. Then it can it up for some silly
mistakes.
Lecturers: 7/10
Lisa Zadro - 10/10 lecturer. Ok, I am also biased coz I went to her High School but
that is a different story. She is a BRILLIANT lecturer who really gets you interested in Psychology.
The most claps and the one lecture which is FULL and isn't attended by 20 or 30 people like
Conceptual Issues in Psychology.
Caleb Owens - 9/10 lecturer. Brilliant one. But too much in the Stats got me bored, but still. He is
good, just not as good as Zadro.

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Neuroscience dude (John?)- 7/10. I never remembered his name, but he was good. He really tried to
be funny but lost to Caleb and Lisa. But neuroscience was interesting. It gets better as the lectures go
on.
Applied Psychology woman (Szabo?) - 8/10. Brilliant lecturer. I loved the way she spoke about things
and everything was really interesting.
Personality - 6/10. Not bad, he was funny, but he made the exams really hard. But yes, the issues
about Freud was the only good thing he made.
Conceptual Issues - 3/10 (Fiona). She was. I didn't get her lectures. And never bothered to go.
Explained why I did so bad in her section, but surprised that my guessing still got me the mark I got.
She should stay sober in her lectures. Might help us understand.
Interest: 8/10
Zadro made it all worth it, so did Caleb. All the others were quite good Minus Fiona's conceptual
issues. It is a good course to do, but don't think it is too easy. But it is enjoyable, and you really learn
so much about Psychology from a different aspect. The boredom did happen, and sleeping
wasn't un-usual. But since Zadro and Caleb really made it so good, the 8/10 is worth it. Without them
it might be dropping to a mere 5/10.
Overall: 7.5/10
Good and enjoyable. Minus the crappy bits and you will learn to love Psychology

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7.5/10
I found it relatively straightforward, so long as you made sure you did work throughout the term, with
the tutorial quizzes etc. I'm also a big fan of multiple choice exams, so I liked the final.
Lecturer: 7/10
Some were absolutely amazing (Caleb Owens, Lisa Zadro), some were really solid and interesting
(Szabo), some were a tad repetitive, and some drove me insane with boredom and annoyance. But the
good lecturers made up for the bad ones.
Interest: 8.5/10
I love psych, and I found basically all of it really interesting (except for conceptual issues- die!)
Overall: 8/10
Very enjoyable.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 6/10
Lecturers - 8/10
Most were really good, some not so good
Interest - 10/10
Overall - 8.5/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 5/10
Lecturer - 7/10
I liked some and hated others. The "better" lecturers made their topic 10 times more interesting.
Kudos to Lisa Zadro. I did the best in her topic
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 7/10
Too much science and maths for my liking

PSYC1002 - Psychology 1002

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Semester 2 2014
Ease: 6/10
At the beginning of the semester, I thought that this would be an easy HD. Assessments were split into
5% research participation, 5% online quizzes with unlimited attempts, 25% research report and 65%
100 MCQ final. Easy, right? NOPE.
The research report was incredibly hard to digest and understand even before I started writing it. It is
possibly the worst assessment I’ve ever had to write in my life (tied with BUSS1001 Essay).
Lecturers:
Ben Colagiuri (Learning and Motivation): 9/10
LAM ended up being one my more favoured topics. It probably helped that there were two weeks of
tutes dedicated to this topic (vs. one for the rest), but Ben was also a very engaging lecturer. There
was a solid amount of sexual innuendos, which were hilarious and really made his lectures worth
going to.
Bruce Burns (Mental Abilities): 6/10
I found the content of this very interesting, which made it a bit more fun to study. It talks a lot about
IQ testing, how and why there have been changes, and a few other notable things. From my (terrible)
memory, I do believe Bruce seemed a little bit ‘frail’ in his lectures, but he did a decent job covering
all the content. I particularly liked his lecture notes because he gave an outline of everything that you
needed to know from a particular lecture.
Marc De Rosnay (Emotion): 7/10
Marc is a decent lecturer and you’ll enjoy his lectures if you like babies. I actually enjoyed his
lecturing style and his lectures, but there is a LOT of complex content in this topic that’s hard to
understand. If there are any topics you don’t want to cram before the final, this and cognitive
processes are it.
Caleb Owens (Cognitive Processes): 7/10
There are a lot of comments on Caleb Owens, most of them not good – probably because he’s a bit on
the inflexible side in terms of administration, but as a lecturer, he’s decent. He’s a very straight
forward guy that outlines his expectations and what to do. You simply have to follow them. This topic
was very content heavy, and Caleb succeeded in making me very nervous for his section of the final.
Marianna Szabo (Abnormal): 5/10
Abnormal Psychology has the least content of all 6, and that’s partially helped by previous awareness
of some mental abnormalities. I personally didn’t like Marianna’s lecturing style, mostly because it
was hard for me to understand her accent. There’s not much to say about this.
Frans Verstraten (Perception): 6/10
Lectures were always interesting, especially the last one! They tended to include a lot of examples
that we didn’t need in the final. The textbook reading is a must for this topic. There is a reasonable
level of memorising needed for some sensory organ pathways, but on a whole, I enjoyed this topic.
Interest: Dropped from 8 to 4/10
I actually started Psychology incredibly enthusiastic. I had planned a Psychology major because it
seemed so interesting, and it was! The content is very stimulating. The only problem was studying for
the final took all the joy out. There is a LOT of content, and it was incredibly daunting needing to
remember that amount. I ended up vowing that I would never take psychology again. The stress of
needing to rote learn all that content was far too much. Also, the research report sucked. The topic was
terrible. Writing it was terrible. Everyone thought it was terrible.
Overall: 5/10
My scoring is tainted by the fact that I didn’t put as much effort into learning all the content during the
semester than I should have, so I was incredibly stressed about learning everything before the final. It
didn’t help that there were no past papers so it seemed like the final could really be about anything
and everything! Basically, don’t expect this course to be a walk in the park. It covers a lot of content
with an extraordinary breadth in a short amount of time, but the content is definitely interesting.

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 7/10

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Not a difficult course but there's HEAPS of content to learn - 6 topics in total so make sure to stay on
top of the work to reduce cramming for the final exam. Final exam is 100 MCQs but is not easy; lots
of distractors and head banging but overall doable if you know your stuff. It's also easy to gain marks
from research participation (5%) and the online quizzes which have unlimited attempts. But, the
psychology report was a pain if you start it late, and it was hard to know what you had to do.
Interest: 10/10
I love learning about psychology! Except I’ve realised how much I hate psychology reports and
essays…
Lecturers:
Prof Frans Verstraten: 6/10
I found that he had difficulty explaining concepts and struggled to articulate his thoughts (not sure if
it's because English is not his first language). However, I found his topic - sensation and perception -
to be the most interesting. I enjoyed learning about illusions. I didn't like studying for this though
because his lecture notes were mostly images so it was difficult to understand when I missed a lecture.
Dr Caleb Owens: 7/10
Caleb always delivers his lectures with enthusiasm but I'm not into his style of teaching - it's as if he
complicates the content in my opinion, when in fact it isn’t really that difficult.
Dr Bruce Burns: 6/10
Found him to be the least engaging lecturer since he read off from his slides, so nothing was really
gained from actually attending the lectures. It was also hard to hear him. Overall, I just didn't like his
topic (intelligence) which required lots of memorising.
Dr Ben Colaguiri: 10/10
Probably my favourite lecturer of the entire course. He's very engaging and makes his lecture slides
entertaining with lots of images and animations. Plus, he had a lot of funny stories which reinforced
the content.
Dr Marianna Szabo: 7/10
Decent lecturer that adds onto her lecture notes with examples and stories, but she has quite a heavy
accent.
Dr Marc De Rosnay: 10/10
Another really engaging lecturer who presents a thought provoking subject - emotion. He makes the
content relatively easy to understand especially since it is primarily conceptual.
Overall: 9/10
Great subject to take as an elective and also very interesting with its broad topic areas.

Semester 2 2013
Ease - 7/10
Contrary to popular beliefs (and the sheer amount of people doing 1st year psychology) it's not as
easy as it may seem. There is a lot of material - rivals MBLG and Living Systems. The report this year
was brutal for 'artsy' students, because we ourselves had to review evidence and provide theories to
explain results in a report. It was scientifically rigorous, especially since it was about learning
principles. Also since they are psychology lecturers, their 100 final mc exam was designed to
mindfuck. Trust me - if you don't know your material well enough to recall adequately they will screw
you over by presenting distractors (which vary by one or two words). They also present a LOT of
'none of the above', 'all of the above' and 'A and B but not C'. You have to know your material. In
chemistry/physics you might get partial marks for working out or showing you remember some
formula but not in psychology.
Lecturers - 9/10
This semester's lecturers have been good - except maybe Bruce, mainly because he was a bit too soft.
Not a problem since I sat at the front.
Interest - 10/10
Psychology is always fun - never a boring moment Except the amount of studies you have to
memorise...
Overall - 9.5/10
It's a good subject - you need this for any psychology major.

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An extension to the materials learnt from PSYC1001. It is not necessary to study PSYC1001 before
this unit but it will definitely prove useful during the final exam when you need a saving grace. Like
PSYC1001 I would recommend reading the textbook material (and other optional readings). Same tip
for PSYC1001; you must be prepared to fulfil your shortfalls if you do not gain the necessary marks
in both the final exam and research report. [Ease: 5/10 | Overall: 7.5/10]
Semester 2 2009
Ease : 7/10
For one subject, psychology demands a lot. If you attend most of the lectures and do the required
readings, it will get you more than half way. It's that last multiple choice exam that's worth 60% that
requires the ultimate attention. Plus, it helps to have done PSYC1001.
Lecturer: 8/10
If you'd done PSYC1001, you'll see Caleb again. I found him to be far more interesting this semester.
Similar to PSYC1001, you have 6 lecturers for 6 subjects. Overall the lecturers were slightly more
interesting and passionate about their subjects. One lecturer (the one for emotions) even records his
lecturer, it's something you don't see enough in Psychology.
Interest: 9/10
I preferred these subjects to last semester's. You'll find a lot of overlapping from PSYC1001. The
highlights include Caleb's subject and Ben's subject.
Overall:8/10
Psychology is interesting most of the time. You'll always learn something new. It complements a lot of
subjects such as health, arts and other sciences. Highly recommended.

Semester 2 2009
Ease - 5/10
Pretty difficult content, not as interesting as last semester so it’s harder to stay on top of it all... I guess
if you do the work you are alright though.
Lecturer - 5/10
Some were really good (e.g. Caleb), some were horrible (e.g. human development person).
Interest - 8/10
Interesting content generally... but some of it does get dry at times.
Overall - 6/10
It’s not really an easy subject...I don't know it was ok.

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10
Fairly straightforward assessments, very similar to PSYC1001. 10% is basically given to you again, in
research participation and online quizzes. There's also a report worth 25%, and a multiple choice final
worth 65%. None of the content is especially challenging.
Lecturers: 8/10
A bit of a mixed bag, but they're mostly very good, and as a whole I think they're better than in first
semester.
Interest: 9/10
Cognitive processes had a lot of interesting stuff in it, and Caleb's a really good lecturer.
Learning and motivation was also really good, both interesting and pretty easy to understand, and
can't really complain with Ben's lecturing.
I was expecting mental abilities to be really boring, the idea didn't interest me at all, but it was
actually probably my favourite topic, I found it really interesting, and Leo was great.
Perception was probably the hardest, but was also really interesting.
Emotion was alright, nothing special though.
And human development was pretty boring in my opinion, and the lecturer wasn't that good either.
Overall: 8/10
I enjoyed it.

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Semester 2 2005
Ease - 8/10
Lecturers - 8.5/10
Better than last semester
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturers - 7/10
Majority of lecturers were better this time round
Interest - 9/10
Overall - 8/10

PSYC2011 - Brain and Behaviour

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
There is a lot of content to learn, so the exam's a bit of a bitch, but it's mostly multiple choice, with
two short answers (one of which is taken from a pool of ten which you're given in advance). There's
also a lab report, which is similar to what you do in first year, again it's pretty hard to do in the word
limit. There's also a multiple choice tute quiz which had a few tricky questions.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Ian Curthoys, Bart Anderson, Ian Johnston, Alex Russell and others)
There are 6 lecturers, the first five of which are really good, the last one is pretty boring though. Ian
Curthoys and Bart Anderson were highlights for me; Ian Johnston and Alex Russell were also great.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting course, its split into three sections.
Behavioural analysis follows on from learning and motivation in first year, and is basically an
extended look at operant conditioning. I enjoyed it, though it did get a bit repetitive. The first 6 tutes
covered this section, doing prac work attempting (usually unsuccessfully) to condition rats to turn in
circles, etc. That part was really interesting and fun.
Neuroscience was a bit hard for me, but was still really interesting.
Perception was the best section imo, and had the best lecturers. Follows on from visual perception in
first year, but you also do taste, smell, audition, vestibular, and touch perception.
Overall: 8/10
Really good course with (for the most part) excellent lecturers.

PSYC2012 - Statistics and Research Methods for Psychology

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 9/10
Basically revisits MATH1005 content. The research methods part is a minor component of the unit,
and recaps experimental design, eg, independent and dependent variables, true and quasi experiments,
etc. The only potentially tricky topic is ANOVA which was covered towards the end of the semester.
Highly organised unit, plenty of revision quizzes and extra practices were available on Blackboard on
a regular basis throughout the semester. There was very little time to complete the in-class quizzes but
they were open book. Mid-sem and finals were multiple choice.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Dan Costa 9/10, Ilan Dar-Nimrod 3/10)
Dan is a great lecturer, explains concepts very well and is quite funny too! On the other hand, I had a
hard time staying awake in Ilan's lectures, they were dry and boring.

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Interest: 8/10
Research methods part was boring, but I liked the stats
Overall: 9/10
Overall a highly enjoyable and interesting subject, would recommend as an easy elective if you've
done an introductory stats course before.
Semester 1 2014
Ease: 10/10
Not to be arrogant, but this course had less material than the MATH1905 statistics course - it got
challenging when we got exposed to ANOVA, etc. but overall, if effort was made, it went well. Not to
mention that the exam was on multiple choice: it would have been MUCH better if it tested us on how
to use the statistics tools we learnt. It did not test our knowledge at all. Quizzes were too short and
easy - should have been made longer and more difficult.
Lecturer: 8/10
Dan was great - went through concepts clearly with loads of examples. Would have given it 10/10 if it
wasn't for Ilan - though props to him because he taught research methods (which is the MOST
POINTLESS component of the course. Should be deleted in my opinion).
Interest: 6/10
Mainly because most material has been learnt before, interest was not high... Research methods
lectures were the MOST USELESS + POINTLESS. It was just a waste of time, and really should be a
1st year course. If one doesn't know the difference between independent and dependent variable by
the time they got to second year, they should not be doing psychology. At all.
Overall: 8/10
Compulsory for students wanting to major in psychology, but many components were too
straightforward and really did not have to be taught. Statistics component would be a breeze if
MATH1905 is done in 1st year. This course should have been made much harder - that would help
weed out the high competition for psychology honours spots.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
I didn't think it was too difficult, but it does require you to work throughout the semester. It gets
steadily harder for the first 9 weeks, but then gets easier after that imo. There are 3 in class, open book
tests, which I found were not too hard, there is a bit of time pressure though (you only get 15 minutes
for each iirc). The mid-semester was pretty hard, it was multiple choice and partial open book, but
there were some tricky questions. The group assignment requires quite a bit of work, and you can't
really start it until the last 2 weeks of semester, so it was a bit hectic finishing that. And the final was
very reasonable imo, multiple choice and closed book, but most required formulas were provided. You
really need to understand all the tests conceptually, rather than just memorising formulas.
If you do struggle in the subject, there are a lot of resources to help you.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Dan Costa, Alex Russell)
Dan Costa takes the stats lectures, he's pretty good, explains everything well, and is quite funny at
times. He provides good lecture notes, but you need to go to the lectures to get them.
Alex Russell teaches Research Methods, and he's great, and very entertaining. He also does a few
revision lectures before assessments, which really help to clear everything up. He puts notes for RM
lectures online.
Interest: 8/10
I was really surprised by this, but I actually enjoyed the subject. Research methods was really
interesting, and even the stats component is taught in an interesting way.
Overall: 8/10
Much better than I expected, and I found it really helped with my other psych subject.

PSYC2911 - Brain and Behaviour (Advanced)

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Semester 1 2014
Ease: 9/10
Although there is even more content than the PSYC1001 + PSYC1002 courses, the concepts were
much easier to grasp if you have background in biology. BEWARE you have to do another APA report
- it's all self-directed this time, so many people had no idea what exactly they had to write about.
ALSO there is short answers in the final exams... you will have to pay VERY close attention to the
perception lectures, they're not easy.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Ian Johnston and others)
Most of the course was lectured by Ian, who is great! Most of the other lecturers were ok...except
maybe Holocombe. Sorry he stated he was new, but that is no excuse for him to be...unprepared? It
was hard to grasp concepts that he talked about.
Interest: 9/10
It would have been nice if neuroanatomy was made a prerequisite - it was hard knowing the brain
parts, especially when some are exactly the same but with different names (ventromedial prefrontal
cortex and orbitofrontal cortex......). But material is GREAT and the interactions between psychology
and biology is fully demonstrated in this course. Would highly recommend for those who like the
more 'sciency' side of psychology. Also you will be working with rats, albeit in tutorials only. I wished
that there was more time we could have spent with them in the tutorials - it really would have been
great to learn dissections for example...
Overall: 9/10
Good course - I wanted more things to learn!

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 Social Policy (SCPL)

SCPL2601 - Australian Social Policy

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
This course is quite easy. Apart from the week on new public management, everybody I talked to
thought the content was straightforward. Lectures and readings are clear + well chosen. Especially
easy if you have done the first year ECOP courses.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Amanda Elliot)
Amanda Elliot is definitely an engaging lecturer. She manages to walk the fine line between putting
too much information into her lectures vs. putting too little into them. We had a couple of guest
lecturers who were also good.
Interest: 7/10
It isn't as uninteresting as it sounds, however I felt like I knew most of the content from this course
already. The readings can feel a bit repetitive, and the tutorial discussions were a little dull due to the
lack of right wingers who are willing to come near the sociology faculty.
Overall: 8/10
Solid, but not fantastic

SCPL2602 - The Principles of Social Policy

Semester 2 2007
Interest: 6.5/10
This course is fairly interesting. The content is a theoretical approach to social
policy - so a lot of political philosophy type stuff is looked at. Quite a bit of the content will already
have been covered in SCPL2601 - so it is a little repetitive. The readings are mostly good.
Lecturer: 5.5/10 (Gyu-Jin Hwang)
I had him for two subjects this semester. Again, he isn’t a very engaging lecturer, he tends to drone a
lot, his lectures seem to take a v. long time and they aren't very well structured. Also, the lecture room
for this subject (I think it’s the Quad History room) is AMAZINGLY uncomfortable.
Ease: 8/10
Assessments are great (one 1500w essay and one 2000w take home exam). The content covered in
lectures and readings are clearly communicated - apart from the week on policy implementation.
From what I’ve heard, the marking for this course was fairly generous as well - because the number of
people taking it was so low, the markers were under no obligation to follow the bell curve.
Overall: 6.5/10
Not bad, not great

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 Socio-Legal Studies (SLSS)
SLSS1003 - Law and Contemporary Society

Semester 2 2012
Completed legal studies during the HSC or attempted the studies in the preliminary year? SLSS1003
is a great unit which combines everyday legal issues such as white-collar crime, family law, cultural
defence etc. and societal morphing. In the two hour lecture you are sitting through an hour is given to
regurgitating the readings and the lecture material; the other is given to watching an insightful
documentary which is relevant to understanding how such controversial legal issues are judged upon
in society. The assessment is heavy in weighting but it is very easy to gain a credit grade or above as
long as you know what you are talking about. The final exam was straight-forward but the structure
will no doubt change in the years to come. [Ease: 5/10 | Overall: 9/10]

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 Sociology (SCLG)

SCLG1001 - Introduction to Sociology 1

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 9/10
I didn’t really try at all and I got a distinction.
Lecturer: 6/10
Francis was pretty boring (both my tutor and lecturer), but he is organised!
Interest: 8/10
Interesting stuff
Overall: 8.5/10
An interesting, easy, mainly enjoyable course which you can go well in with minimal effort.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
I found it kind of tricky, but I got a distinction, so obviously it wasn't too hard. The essay at the
beginning of the semester was a bit daunting because it was early days and I didn't know what was
expected, and the topics were on issues that we had to research independently, i.e. they weren't
discussed in lectures. The final exam was a take home which involved writing 4 mini-essays in 24
hours. It was full on and draining, but I got it done by like 5pm the first day, and I did well.
Lecturer: 7.5/10 (Catriona Elder)
I quite enjoyed Catriona Elder's lecture style, and most of the guest lecturers (there were quite a few)
were quite good. One point to mention, however, is that there was a bit of disorganisation with the
publishing of lecture notes on WebCT, so even if they say the lecture notes will be put on WebCT,
write the stuff down anyway, because often they aren't put up.
Interest: 7/10
I thought all the topics were very interesting, but they tried to cram too many into one semester, which
meant you were unable to go into much depth at all. This also made it feel a little frantic and rushed.
Also, you have to keep up with your readings!
Overall: 7/10
A solid subject. I didn't like it at first, but I settled into it as the semester progressed and I did well.

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8.5/10
Lectures and texts are clear and not difficult to understand. A fair amount of content - but it is
definitely possible to waffle through the course.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Fiona Gill)
Love Fiona
Interest: 9/10
Very interesting, also good for getting into arguments with people. There is a lot to read, but it isn't
boring.
Overall: 9/10
Love this course.

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 SCLG1002 - Introduction to Sociology 2

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 7/10
Lecturers: 7/10
Except for that quantitative guy who deserves a 1/10. I avoided all his lectures except for the first and
last ones
Interest: 7/10
I found the subject went from interesting to boring. The beginning stuff on consumption, culture,
celebrity, community etc. was all fun to learn about but it ended on a bad note with all that stuff on
learning how to do sociology. The ending I found was both confusing and dry.
Overall: 7/10
It wasn’t a hard subject I suppose but it was bad enough to put me off from choosing another
sociology subject, at least for the time being. I was annoyed with the confusion over the course
readers. They made us buy 3' 'parts'. The second one was paper thin and consisted only of journal
articles you could retrieve yourself on the internet. I didn't buy the 3rd part because I found most
online. The exam was pretty straightforward. 4 parts covering the 4 main areas of the subject.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7.5/10
The lectures were well explained and easy to understand, but some of the readings were horrible.
Many sociologists take the stance that "the more people who can't understand what I write, the
smarter I am", and as a result, there were many articles in the reading brick that were really dense and
badly explained. The assessments were fairly easy though.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Catriona Elder)
I really liked Catriona - she made things from the readings that were difficult to understand easier. A
couple of guest lecturers appeared throughout the semester, and they were not as good (the lectures on
subculture were really amazingly awful).
Interest: 8/10
I thought most of the material covered was interesting. The most boring module was
the one on risk, but I liked the ones on celebrity, consumption and community.
Overall: 8/10

SCLG2601 - Sociological Theory

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 6/10
Difficult! All the readings were primary sources from sociological heroes (Marx, Weber, Foucault
ect.). They are difficult to grasp. Lectures helped a little in getting an overview of the different
theories and theorists.
Lecturer: 5/10
Craig was boring but at least I could tell he tried. Every week is a 2 hour lecture covering a different
theory or theorist. My tutor was a weirdo....
Interest: 7/10
Some topics are more interesting than others. Personally I liked rational choice, phenomenology and
critical theory they were cool topics.

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Overall: 6/10
It is a prerequisite for a sociology major, I would not recommend it to anyone else. I do think it will
be useful for other sociology units however.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 6/10
The actual content isn't that difficult, but all sources of information in this course are vague and
incoherent. The readings are texts that are written by Durkheim, Weber, Marx etc. and these sociology
gods are generally not great at communicating clearly. Lecturer (see below) is also annoying. The
assessments are fairly straightforward (2500w essay, 5-10 min speech, 2000w take home exam,
participation).
Lecturers: 4/10 (Craig Browne, Alec Pemberton, Amanda Elliot)
Craig Browne is very rambling and difficult to follow. He doesn't use PowerPoint, and his speeches
seem to move around in circles so that, when you look at your lecture notes, you've written the same
thing over and over again for two hours. He did get better towards the end - he does another course in
contemporary social theory, so he seemed more at ease in the later weeks. The guest lecturers were
always a relief - Alec Pemberton is solid, if dull, and Amanda Elliot's feminism lecturer was nice.
Interest: 6.5/10
I doubt anybody would ever love this course, and pushing yourself through the readings/lectures is
tough, but I think that the course is quite valuable. Knowing all the theoretical arguments that
underpins sociology makes it easier to tackle any sociology course you do at university.
Overall: 6/10
Not awful, and fairly useful. Don't do it if you don't have to do, but if you do have to, it isn't that bad.

SCLG2602 - Social Inquiry: Qualitative Methods

Semester 2 2007
Interest: 7.5/10
This course was surprisingly interesting. The weeks on ethnography, interviewing, and ethics were
excellent - and even the weeks on quantitative methods were OK. There isn't too much reading to do
for this course - and the readings that are chosen are good.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Fiona Gill)
Fiona is mostly fantastic - funny, informative and engaging. She also did a good job giving us
information about the assessments and is very responsive to questions and emails. She does have a
tendency to rush the final quarter of the lecture - especially when she was discussing quantitative
methods.
Ease: 7.5/10
Some non-maths people found the quantitative section of the course confusing - but truthfully, if you
could manage year 9 maths you won't have a problem. Assessments were 5 online exams, a
participant observation exercise and a research proposal. The exams are straightforward, but I found
the participant observation exercise and the research proposal difficult.
Overall: 7.5/10
Surprisingly good course

SCLG2603 - Sociology of Health and Illness

Semester 1 2014
The lectures were interesting and it was made better by the fact that there are students from diverse
faculties sharing their thoughts on the current sociological theories and biological theories which

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structure how medicine is perceived and engaged with in today's society. There are three main
assessments: a minor essay, a debate (in the last three weeks of semester) and a final essay due in the
last week of semester. (Ease: 7/10 | Interest: 8/10 | Lecturer: 9/10 | Overall: 8/10)

SCLG2604 - Social Inequality in Australia

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
This course is pretty average in terms of difficulty. There are a few weeks where you will be going
through stuff you've already learnt, so these rehash weeks are pretty easy. There was one week in
particular that was very difficult, when we were learning about the political theory of Ranciere. But
mostly it’s fairly standard difficulty wise. Assignments were a 2000wd essay, two short 750 word
essays and tutorial participation.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Melinda Cooper)
Melinda Cooper is a very good lecturer. She actually puts a fair amount of effort into coming up with
the course content. She doesn't just summarise the readings for the week, or recite some sociology
textbook, but actually gets some interesting/new content that she's been looking act and talks us
through it. She isn't the most engaging speaker in the world, but I didn't find her difficult to listen to at
all. My main gripe with her is that she takes forever to get assignments back to you.
Interest: 7/10
I was expecting this course to be much less interesting than it was. There were really interesting issues
covered regarding the history of racial science, clashes between cultural and human rights and the
move towards recognition as a political goal. However, as I said earlier, there was bit of repeated
material, which wasn't the most interesting.
Overall: 7.5/10
Solid course, better than I expected.

SCLG2605 - Social Justice, Law and Society

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 6.5/10
This course requires a lot of reading and the first half is v. theory heavy. A lot of people found
themselves completely lost after two weeks of lectures, and many seemed to think the course was
about "inequality". Having said that, I found the readings/lectures fairly clear and not too difficult.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Danielle Celemajer)
Danielle Celemajer is a good lecturer who really know her stuff and explains ideas clearly. She's
engaging most of the time, and fairly easy to listen to. My only criticism of her is that sometimes she
puts too much content into her lectures, and to compensate for this she has to race through the slides -
which can be annoying.
Interest: 8/10
This course is v. interesting - it isn't so much a course in sociology as one in political philosophy. Lots
of interesting debates are covered. If you're not scared of the theory, and you put the effort in, you can
get quite a lot out of this course. Assessments are straightforward again (1500 word take home exam,
2500w essay and participation)
Overall: 7.5/10
Definitely a valuable course.

SCLG2606 - Media in Contemporary Society

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Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
Relatively easy, even though they gave me a crap mark for my essay. Don't need to do any readings.
Lecturer: 1/10
I hate her. She invented her own referencing system. She has only ever published one academic work.
She believes the Redfern Riots didn't happen; how it was all some conspiracy. She randomly wouldn't
come in for her own lectures and tutes. She didn't respond to emails because she broke her arm (even
though it wasn't even her writing arm). She included the bibliography in the word count.
Interest: 4/10
Would have been much more interesting if I didn't have her as my lecturer
Overall: 3/10
My first arts subject and I hated it.

SCLG2607 - Social Movements and Policy Making

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
We covered so little substantive content in this course that, as long as you turned up to the first few
lectures, you will know everything you need to know. The ideas were really shallowly developed. On
the flipside, the marking criteria that Annette uses is a mystery, so it can be difficult to get good marks
because you don't know what you are meant to be doing.
Lecturer: 2/10 (Annette Falahey)
Annette Falahey is by far and away the worst lecturer I have ever had. Her lecturers were rambling,
she would spend 5 seconds talking about a theory and then spend the next 20 minutes talking about a
tangentially related example, she included the bibliography in the word count for one of our
assessments and gives 5 seconds notice when she cancels a class. She spelt embassy "embassey" on
the chalkboard at the front of the lecture theatre. The comments she gives on assessment tasks were
very unhelpful, and left me wondering where I had gone wrong. I would thoroughly recommend that
people avoid any course run by Annette.
Interest: 4/10
I don't know why I chose to do this course. It really wasn't interesting at all. Readings were long and
repetitive, lectures were poorly structured and rambling, tutorials involved listening to classmates and
no group discussion at all. The content was really not engaging.
Overall: 3/10
Really useless course. Do not do it.

SCLG2611 - Welfare States: A Comparative Analysis

Semester 2 2007
Interest: 6/10
Interest level was quite volatile from week to week. The readings were generally OK, although
sometimes in social policy it can seem like you're reading the same article over and over again. There
is quite a lot to be gained from doing this course - but I wouldn't say its 'interesting'.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Gyu-Jin Hwang)
I ended up with a slight crush on Jin - he was my tutor as well, and he's quite funny and sweet.
However, his lectures can feel very long - he doesn't structure them very coherently, and sometimes he
can fall completely off topic (especially the week on labour markets).
Ease: 6.5/10

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There wasn't anything especially hard. Some of the weeks on quantitative comparison shook the non-
maths people, but if you're competent with maths/numbers, you should be fine. The assessments tasks
were a tutorial facilitation, a 1000w country case study and a 3000w comparative essay.
Overall: 6/10
Solid - if you're interested in social policy its fine. But I wouldn't really recommend this that much
either.

SCLG2631 - Sociology of the Environment

NOTE: This review was written for the unit SCLG3605, “Environmental Sociology”. This unit
has since been discontinued, however, as the existing SCLG2631 has very similar content, it
should serve as a suitable review of the current unit.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 8/10
This course was pretty easy. It was just one 2 hour seminar with Dr Fiona Gill. As long as you did the
readings and knew a bit about environmental issues it is easy. The major essay is a research task
where you get to create the question to answer!
Lecturer: 10/10 (Fiona Gill)
Fiona was awesome! Her job was pretty easy just guiding the conversation as it was a seminar.
Basically it was 15 people coming together to talk about greeny issues for 2 hours a week, she didn’t
follow any particular structure but that was the point I guess. Unfortunately the course won’t be
offered any more as the department saw it as a waste of resources. (so few enrolments).
Interest: 10/10
You cover everything! It was really interesting, discussion can go from heavy Marxian ecology to the
consumption of vegan food. Radical!
Overall: 10/10
If this course comes back and Fiona runs it, enrol enrol enrol!

SCLG4011/4012/4013/4014 - Sociology Honours A/B/C/D

NOTE: At the time these following reviews were written, doing honours in sociology required
the completion of specific coursework units. The two following reviews were for older versions
of SCLG4011 and SCLG4012 entitled “Practicing Sociology” and “New Debates in Social
Theory” respectively. As of 2015, all coursework and research tasks required for sociology
honours are classed under four general units; Sociology Honours A, B, C and D (SCLG4011,
4012, 4013 and 4014). So while the following reviews offer an insight into the coursework one
might have to do for honours in sociology, the administrative aspects of these reviews may no
longer be relevant.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
The assessments were generally marked very generously - getting marks in the 90s was not
uncommon. There were, however, a lot of assessment tasks to do (nine in all), and we had to give four
presentations throughout the semester.
Interest: 7/10
The assessment tasks were basically designed to get you started on your honours thesis; so if you
picked an interesting subject for your thesis, the assessments were both useful and interesting. In class
every week, we had a guest sociologist come and speak to us about their work, and about one journal

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article that they had published. This was reasonably interesting, but it felt a little beside the point
given that no major assessment tasks were based upon these classes.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Salvatore Babones)
I've never had such a conscientious and helpful lecturer before. Always got assessment tasks back
only a few days after they were handed in, gave out substantive feedback, replied to emails quickly.
Excellent.
Overall: 8/10
Pretty good course overall.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
The assessment for this course was slightly nightmarish. We had to try and combine a discussion of
three radically separate subject areas into a single coherent essay. Very difficult. Course content was
well explained, and the readings were pretty well chosen.
Interest: 7/10
We looked at six modules throughout the semester - the new capitalism, the field of cultural
production, the network society, power, knowledge and Northern theory. I enjoyed some of these a lot
(the knowledge claims module was great); and others not so much.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Karl Maton)
Karl was quite a good speaker, and he managed to convey the content of the course clearly. His replies
to my emails were never massively helpful however, and he tends to complain a lot in class.
Overall: 6.5/10

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 Spanish and Latin American Studies (SPAN)
SPAN1621 - Level 1 Spanish

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
The grammar at first is slightly confusing but you get it soon. It helps if you are already bilingual,
which I am. The assessments for the lectures on Spain are very easy, and internet based.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Kathryn Crameri)
Usually, lecturers add things extra to lecture notes; interesting comments, own analysis etc. But Dr
Crameri does not; so basically, the lectures seem rather arbitrary and without enthusiasm. Dr Anne
Walsh was slightly better.
Interest: 8/10
Well 10/10 for the language part but much lower for the lectures. As I said they were not presented
with enthusiasm, and it would have been more interesting if it was more about culture than just
textbook like history.
Overall: 7/10
The tutorials are the main part that’s where you learn the actual language, and those are good. But the
lecture aspect is rather lacking. Also, I really dislike how internet based it is - you have to do Web CT
exercises as part of your tutorial mark and 3 of the assessments are done through computer only. I
think with a language course more real contact is important.

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 2/10
Fucking hard, really bad! Don't do this course, they don't explain anything and expect you to pick it
up. They expect way too much too quickly. I managed to pass (50 exactly, don't ask how).
Lecturer: 2/10
My tutor (substitutes for lecturer) was terrible. If anyone asked a question she would say "what are we
talking about?" and continue speaking in Spanish, explaining nothing. The Spanish history and culture
lectures (different person) was good, but you didn’t really need to go to lectures, I learnt everything
from lecture notes she made.
Interest: 1/10
I lost total interest at about the point when census withdraw date was over and I realised that I am
learning nothing and bound to fail.
Overall: 0/10
DO NOT DO THIS COURSE

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 Statistics (STAT)

STAT2011 - Statistical Models

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 4/10
Challenging subject. Although it was pretty manageable until week 7, it got impossibly confusing and
difficult after that week. In my opinion this unit requires continuous effort and hard work throughout
the semester, otherwise finals will be a nightmare. However, assessments overall were pretty ok/easy
if you kept up with lectures and tutes.
Lecturer: 6/10 (Michael Stewart)
Michael is a very knowledgeable lecturer but his lectures could have been structured better. The way
in which they were structured greatly inflated the perceived amount of course content, causing a lot of
panic towards the end of the semester. However, Michael was really approachable and his
consultations were really helpful in clarifying course content.
Interest: 8/10
This unit explored constructing appropriate statistical models involving random variables for a range
of modelling scenarios and accessing the goodness of fit of these models. Some of it is hard to grasp,
but when you finally get it, it's pretty interesting stuff
Overall: 7/10
STAT2011 stressed me out the most this semester, but when all the pieces fell in place and I started to
understand the course material, I began to enjoy this unit. But don't pick this unit if you are looking
for an easy elective.

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 8/10
Everything seems insanely hard from the lectures to the weekly computer labs but the actual exam
and computer lab exam were very doable and ended up doing well in the subject. If you want a HD
then try stay somewhat on top of the material (calculations etc.) and then learn the proofs before the
exam. Quizzes were identical to the practices so a free 15% there.
Lecturer: 6.5/10 (Michael Stewart)
He seemed to assume we were all genius and went pretty fast through the material and wasn’t great at
explaining. But at least he spoke well and seemed reasonable.
Interest: 7.5/10
Moderately interesting at times. Especially the estimator stuff
Overall: 7/10

Semester 1 2006
Quite a difficult course. Didn't enjoy it that much, especially when the lecturer is a deadshit.

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 STAT2012 - Statistical Tests

Semester 2 2015
Ease: 7.5/10
The course is exceedingly easy to stay on top of, and do well in the first 35% of the course. It is well
structured and taught well in terms of assessments. I thought the final was a little tricky but very
doable but after receiving my mark I was quite disappointed so i'll check my paper tomorrow. Some
friends did very well though.
Lecturer: 4/10 (Jennifer Chan)
Jennifer Chan was impossible to understand and her English was quite poor. Went to 1 or 2 lectures in
week 1 and never again. Lecture notes was amazing, best i've ever used so they were more than
enough for me.
Interest: 7.5/10
If you like stats, the course is reasonably interesting. A bit theoretical though, not much application.
Overall: 8/10
Good and useful course, not too difficult either.

STAT2911 - Probability and Statistical Models (Advanced)

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 1/10
Quite hard stuff...
Lecturer: 8/10
Robinson's not bad
Interest: 9/10
Interesting nonetheless
Overall: 8.5/10
Hey, you can't argue that stats is useful

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 Studies in Religion (RLST)

RLST1002 - A History of God, Deities and Demons

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 5/10
It was extremely difficult for me to follow some of the topics covered in this subject. It's quite an
extensive unit, covering major past and current religions in a matter of weeks. It was a good thing the
exam was a multiple choice, because I don't know how I would have survived if they asked for essay
responses.
Lecturer: 3/10
I found that on a whole the lecturers were hard to follow. Given they were lecturing on such broad,
dense topics, many of the lecturers were way too fast and full-on in their explanations of things. I
suppose they couldn't help it. They know so much, and want to convey so much to us in just 2 measly
hours. The only topics I could follow were the ones where I had a sound prior knowledge of. That is
why I would only recommend this subject to people who have a good understanding of at least one or
two religions covered in this unit.
Interest: 5/10
I find this one too subjective to judge. It all depends on whether you have an interest on the religious
traditions that will be covered. More likely than not though, you will find some blander than the
others.
Overall: 6/10
The major essay is king in this subject. Do well in this essay and you should get an okay mark in the
end. Choose something you're most interested or knowledgeable about and hit it. Multiple choice
Exam was pretty straightforward. The rest of the marks went to tutorial participation and presentation.

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 Writing (WRIT)

WRIT1000 - Writing: Style and Method

Semester 1 2014
Ease: 10/10
Easiest subject I have done by far, can be a bit boring at times. Great WAM booster. If you bother to
turn up to tutorials, complete the online tasks and make sure there are no stupid mistakes like
grammatical and referencing errors in your assignments, you should easily get a distinction. Helps
that in arts you only lose 2% for each day the assignment is submitted late.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Lindsay Tuggle)
Lindsay was a good lecturer.
Interest: 6/10
Many find this subject dry and extremely boring and the tutorials largely are despite Janice’s energy
and desire to make the tutorial engaging. If you have a slight interest in the arts, especially
philosophy, the lectures can be interesting though I often didn’t bother to turn up and don’t feel I was
negatively affected by a lack of attendance. If you want, just listen to the recording on 1.5x speed.
Still, I did find the subject somewhat interesting on the whole.
Overall: 8/10
Course was a bit disorganised because it was the first time Lindsay was running it which was
frustrating however people in the future shouldn’t have this problem. The tutor pretty much told the
tute what she wanted you to include in your essay. Just remember to reference the course reader,
lecture notes or links to articles from the notes. Read your feedback and act on it, it helped me
increase my marks by 20 marks from my first assignment to the final essay.

WRIT1001 - Writing and Rhetoric: Academic Essays

Winter School 2015

Ease: 10/10
This is by far the easiest unit I have done at university. The course basically works up to the
submission of a 1500 word essay on a topic of your choice. Apart from the final submission, you'll
have various short writing tasks to complete which show the process of you compiling your essay, and
also a group oral presentation where you analyse particular rhetorical strategies used in a film shown
in class. 20% of your mark (which includes the oral presentation, so don't worry if you aren't good at
speeches) is automatically given to you for simply doing the assessment. Other assessments involve
learning referencing strategies, essay plans and paragraph drafts. Really, you can get a distinction in

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this unit without much effort at all. And if you put in some effort, a High Distinction is certainly
achievable.
Lecturer/Tutor: 8/10 (Lili Paquet)
It's a bit hard to really go above and beyond when lecturing for this subject, because so much of the
content is very cut and dry, and while I didn't find the content particularly boring, I don't think it's the
type of material that would benefit from a particularly flamboyant or enthusiastic lecture style. Having
said that, I couldn't really ask too much more from Lili, she did everything I expected her too. She
was quite approachable and gave quite helpful suggestions towards my essay, and also offered some
extra helpful information in regards to the content on the lecture slides.
Interest: 7/10
I didn't expect this course to be particularly interesting, and a lot of the content that was taught
seemed to me like common sense. That being said, there were a few different essay approaches that
they taught which was new to me, and I enjoyed learning quite a bit. There were some topics, like
cross-cultural communication, which were a little dry, but overall the lecture content wasn't too bad.
Your interest in this course is really going to be what you make of it; for me, the choice of my essay
topic really sustained my interest. Plus it was fun preparing for the oral presentation; I like doing
speeches.
Overall: 8.33/10
Apparently WRIT1000 is easier, but I haven't done it so I can't really comment. Even so, WRIT1001
is still very easy, and is arguably much more useful than WRIT1000 for university work. Despite the
dryness of the material at times I would definitely recommend this unit, if not for the interest, then
definitely for the WAM boost.

Semester 1 2015
Ease: 8/10
Almost like HSC English (Advanced), except you got to choose what you write and how you wrote it.
Everyone was pretty much given full marks for the first 5% of the course no matter how bad your
essay was and another 5% was for the academic honesty module. Then another 10% was given for the
speech (as long as you showed up to present it - doesn't matter if you had a shaky voice or no eye-
contact etc...) Just make sure you have your grammar and sentence structure correct beforehand or
just take WRIT1000 instead if they're a bit shabby. No final exam, just 4 x 500 words essays worth
and 1 x 1500 word essay.
Lecturer: N/A (Frances Di Lauro)
Didn't go to any lectures so I wouldn't really know but I've heard great things about her. Except for
when I went on two occasions when they were screening the movies : Thank You for Smoking (pretty
good) and The Sapphires (not so good). Tutorials were just simple writing and reading exercises to
help you prepare for your essays.
Interest: 1/10
Overall: 6/10

Semester 2 2014
Ease 10/10
As long as you get your short writing tasks (worth 10% each) done throughout the semester, the final
essay (worth 40%) is a breeze. Your mileage may vary for the group presentation - fingers crossed you
get a good group and an even better topic. On the whole however, people really aren't lying when they
say this is a WAM booster.
Lecturers: ?/10
I only ever attended three lectures, and they were completely pointless. I didn't even bother reading
the lecture notes. Arts lectures are weird...
Interest 1/10.
I honestly don't think I really got anything out of this unit at all, except a higher SCIWAM.
Overall: 7/10

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Semester 2 2014
Ease: 10/10
Extremely easy if you’re coming from WRIT1000 but quite easy regardless. Great WAM booster but
not as much as WRIT1000.
Lecturer: 6/10
Attended the first lecture, hated the lecturer and never turned up again. I listened to 2 lectures online
and one lecturer was quite good, the other one appalling. I’d give an even lower rating if 4 lectures
weren’t spent watching movies.
Interest: 4/10
Maybe I was sick of WRIT but I found it really dry, both the 3 lectures I listened and the tutes.
Overall: 7/10
I felt there was a fair bit of marking discrepancy between tutors and a friend in another tute was
marked more fairly though I could be wrong. My tutor was definitely a harsher marker than the one I
had in WRIT1000. If you have done WRIT1000, unless you somewhat enjoy writing essays, I’d
recommend you do PHIL1012 or some other light subject since it’s largely the same thing. WRIT1001
is more useful and helps more if you want to improve essay writing in than WRIT1000.

Semester 2 2014
Ease: 9.5/10
Make sure you address every dot point on the requirements they give you for every assessment and
you really can’t do badly.
Lecturers: 2/10 (Various)
I admittedly did not go to very many lectures and found them very boring. Tutorials were better and
more engaging.
Interest 2/10
It is student lead in the sense that you pick what you want to prepare and essay on and what your
group wants to do your group presentation on but I was never really engaged with this course.

Semester 2 2012
This unit is made to boost the WAMs of any student. It is almost like we are back in the tables and
chairs of our stuffy high school English class waiting for the period to end. Many of us (who studied)
have admitted to not even attending the lectures and still achieve a final grade of distinction and
above. This unit is commendable for the fact that you are in control of what you would like to centre
your research on from the start! For the whole semester you will be focusing on how to write your
essay and how you could better it. Sound easy? You better enrol! [Ease: 8/10 | Overall: 9/10]

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
Moderately easy for those who can write essays and adhere to the lecturers' and tutors' strict marking
regimes, which aren't really reflective of essay marking across the rest of the university.
Lecturers: 4.5/10
I'm not going to lie - the lecturers were boring and their lectures were completely monotonous. In the
context of most of the assessments, the lectures seemed almost pointless. I think I attended a grand
total of four. The lecturers seemed desperate to try and link the content with the assessments but it
seemed a lot of the time like they were grasping to fill time with useless babble which appeared to be
irrelevant to anything - even their own course guidelines.
Interest: 2/10
Almost everyone I know who did this course found it incredibly boring and, as I mentioned,
monotonous. Most people stopped attending lectures after week 2. I'm lucky to have had a great tutor
who tried to make it as 'interesting' as possible despite it being such a dry subject.
Overall: 4/10

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I wouldn't recommend it. Probably the best thing I took away from it was learning proper citation
techniques pretty early in my first semester, although I don't doubt I would've been able to learn these
on my own in no time anyway. You can do well if you put in the work, but honestly, I think that most
people's lack of interest had an adverse effect on how much they actually wanted to work in the
subject. Very often I ended up avoiding it and putting more time into others. Very dry.

WRIT2002 - Advanced Writing and Rhetoric

Winter School 2016

Ease: 9/10
The course is not difficult at all. It is slightly harder than WRIT1001 as they expect a higher standard
of writing, but overall it is still quite straightforward. The only assessments were daily journal entries
(weekly if you do it during normal semester), a critical analysis of a text of your choosing, and a final
research project. These were quite easy to do provided you had a clear idea of what you wanted to talk
about.
Lecturers: 10/10 (Steven King, Lucinda Holdforth)
Both Steven and Lucinda did everything we could have asked for, and I have no complaints for either
of them personally. In Winter School you’re really able to engage with your lecturers more, which I
found to be quite helpful.
Interest: 5/10
Some of the psychology aspects of essay writing was a little dry, but it wasn’t too bad. My main
problem with this unit was that, unlike in WRIT1001, the topic for your research project had to come
from a list of conflicts (Occupy Movement, Syrian Civil War, Feminism etc.). Unfortunately none of
the topics really interested me personally, so it was a little bit dull from that standpoint. But the good
news was that in Winter School everything is over with rather quickly, so I didn’t have to dwell on the
issues for too long.
Overall: 7/10
If I had my time over again I probably would have asked permission early on to do a topic outside of
the list provided to us. But the unit itself was very good, and outside of class I was also given some
pretty valuable advice on possible future degrees I could do. I’m definitely glad I took this unit.

Semester 1 2014
A step up from WRIT1XXXs. A unit that is bent on refining your skills in writing by applying rhetoric
use at a more advanced level. The lectures are constructed to act as mini tutorials in the space of an
hour where you are placed in a group to discuss the relevant issues of rhetoric etc. in accordance to
the topic of the day. (Ease: 9/10 | Interest: 5/10 | Lecturer: 10/10 | Overall: 9.5/10)

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DISCONTINUED
UNITS

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 Accounting (ACCT)
ACCT1001 - Accounting 1A

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 7/10
IA covers mostly financial accounting - transactions, journals, GST, inventory, internal control.
There's a fair amount of tutorial homework every week, but if you do that then most of the course
becomes clearer.
Lecturers: 7/10
Sharron O'Neill/Abdul Razeed: 9/10. Fantastic lecturers, explained the content clearly and gave good
examples. Abdul is a little harsh with crowd control though.
Peter Edwards: 6/10 He tries, he really does. But nothing really made all that much sense. (maybe it
was the topics - internal control was especially boring and confusing)
Clarke/other guy week 2 history lecture: 4/10 What a useless lecture. The history of accounting - and
we could barely hear one of the lecturers, making what they were saying also nonsensical. Yes, they
might be smart, but this lecture was a bore.
Interest: 7/10
Is there anything to really be excited about? Debits, credits, inventory cards...
Overall: 7/10
It's an introduction to financial accounting. Having an essay for the mid-semester exam though was
completely irrational.

Semester 1 2010
Ease: 5/10
The lack of ease has 2 components: 1. the tedious, boring subject matter. 2. The lecturers. The practice
set is a PAIN IN THE BUTT! However, it is good for you. I picked up mistakes I would rather make
there than in the final exam! Also, Acct hw is a MASSIVE PAIN! However, once you get it, it's the
time factor which is the pain not the work itself. Gah!
Lecturers: 1st 2 weeks: 0/10 Sharron O’Niell: 8/10. Abdul Razeed: 8/10. Peter Edwards: 3/10
The first 2 weeks of accounting are THE TWO WORST lectures you could possibly attend. THERE
IS NO CONTEST! LAW HAS NOTHING, PHILOSOPHY HAS NOTHING, MATHS HAS
NOTHING, ENGLISH HAS NOTHING ON THE HORROR THAT IS THE FIRST 2 WEEKS OF
ACCOUNTING! Who cares about the history of accounting??? THEY DO! Who knew that the
Babylonians had accounting methods? THEY DO! Sharron gets it back on track with some
fundamentals though. Whew... Abdul then takes over. He's good, but doesn't like chatter. Just sit at the
back, problem solved. PETER IS PATHETIC! He is BORING, talks about irrelevant stuff and doesn't
explain things we need to know. Gigi is a good tutor though. She explains things.
Interest: 4/10
What did you expect? It's accounting. Get a friend and play games or whatever. But do remember to
actually pay attention otherwise you're screwed. I find connect 4 pretty good.
Overall: 4/10
SOME lecturers do a good job at making the subject bearable. Otherwise, bleagh! And HOMEWORK
IS A MASSIVE PAIN!

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
If you study consistently the whole way through and actually do the homework, you'll be

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fine. Mid semester exam was quite tough, but it wasn't too bad. Will be interested to see what my final
exam mark will be.
Lecturers: 7.5/10 (Abdul Razeed 8/10, Sharron O’Neill 6.5/10, Rosina Mladenovic 8/10)
Abdul is a good bloke, although it pisses me off that he kept lying about the average mark for the
mid-semester (to get people motivated to study harder he reported it at around 15 marks higher than
the true average).
Sharron O'Neill is easy to understand, but the problem is that she liked finishing an hour
earlier. Which isn't too bad, but a lot of the stuff was too rushed.
Rosina Mladenovic is as good as an accounting lecturer could be. Although she was just too
happy and cheery, which pissed me off at times.
Interest: 8/10
Whoa. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I liked this subject. It was very different to all my other
subjects (essay-based and subjective). It was kind of cool having a correct answer to every question. It
was also good to think in a completely different manner, to what I was used to. Although, if I had to
do accounting for more than 2 subjects, I'd probably die from boredom. A catch-22, if you must.
Overall: 7.5/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 8/10
Gets a little trickier at the end, but it's manageable
Lecturer: 3-7/10
They got through the material well, too bad the lecturers are cunts
Interest: 7/10
It's relevant stuff, but a bit dry at times
Overall: 7/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 6/10
This really depends. I'm doing it for the second time, so i give it an 8.5 for ease (yeah, I'm an ex-
failure), but the first time i did it, it was bloody hard and so i give it a 3.5/10 for first-time ease.
Therefore, I've averaged it out and given you 6.
Lecturers: 7/10
Abdul & Sharron are fine. They're not amazing or brilliant, but they're not crap.
Interest: 1/10
This rates as one of the most uninteresting subjects ever.
Overall: 4.6/10

Semester 1 2006
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: 7/10
Interest: 3/10
Overall: 5/10

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 7.5/10
Gets harder gradually
Lecturers - 7/10
Interest - 7.5/10
Overall - 7/10

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Semester 1 2005
Ease: 7/10
Not hard if you just do homework regularly towards the end.
Lecturers: 5/10
So slow and boring, stuffy theatre didn't help me stay awake
Interest: 4/10
Content absolute shit, hated it
Overall: 5/10

Unknown Date
Ease: 8/10
Lecturers: 7/10
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 8/10
Pray to God ur practice set balances

Unknown Date
Ease: 8/10
Not too difficult if you just do the work
Lecturer: 4/10
Uninspirational, nothing special
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 7/10

ACCT1002 - Accounting 1B

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8/10
Most people were on close to full marks out of 40 before the final, and the final exam was not
challenging at all (although there was some time pressure). Marks were also left unscaled, which was
surprising. The difficulty lay in remembering the material from all weeks of the semester, as there was
no mid semester exam splitting the topics. Although you do need to work hard to get good results,
hard, in this case, alludes to consistently each week. In ACCT1001 I was overwhelmed by all the new
concepts and the plenitude of homework. Here, the homework load is greatly reduced, and you are
simply adding to the skills learnt in 1A rather than learning a new way of thinking.
Lecturers: 6/10 (Rosina Mladenovic, Paul Blayney, and others)
Rosina, although annoying, is a great lecturer. Paul Blayney was also decent and had his unique
teaching style, which was welcomed. However, the other lecturers were of relatively poor calibre.
Nonetheless, it was taught significantly well.
Interest: 8/10
I can't believe I found the course 'fun'. I guess it balanced my very creative humanities oriented units
that I have done in the past. It was awesome knowing that you have a right answer. Whilst doing this
sort of stuff over and over again would bore me, in the short term, I quite enjoyed this unit.
Overall: 6.5/10
Overall, though, the unit wasn't that great. I know my above comments were quite positive, but they
also didn't take into account the more boring things we had to learn (such as financial statement
analysis) and the horrible lecturers we sometimes had to endure. I can certainly see the relevance to
my career though (even though I'm in marketing). Management accounting (the second part) was
sadly boring, but relevant for me. Financial accounting was more interesting, but not really relevant.

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Semester 2 2007
Ease: 9/10
Compared to 1A which I did with Abdul in Semester 2 last year, this is a cakewalk. I used to have to
do all the homework every week to keep up with 1A but with 1B, the first few weeks was a rehash of
basic concepts in 1A and needed little effort. Things got trickier once new concepts like Management
Accounting came in but basically so little ground was covered that I hardly believe this deserves a
whole module.
Lecturer: ?/10 (Rosina Mladenovic, Paul Blayney)
Lecturer was ... wait I didn't attend a single lecture for the whole semester. Just took everything off the
slides and textbook. Sorry but someone has to help me out here. Anyway the lecturers were Rosina
who lectured for most of the unit and Paul Blayney who did only the Management accounting
sections I think.
Interest: 6/10
Accounting - Either you love it or you hate it. How interesting can it get? The tutor I got did her best
to liven things up and pass on her knowledge though, kudos to her.
Overall: 7/10
Core module for graduating in B.Com once again I believe. I'm probably not the best
person to rate this module but I personally think it’s easy if you have the fundamentals from 1A in
place. Forgot to add, the coursework component was useless for marks. Everyone I know went into
the final on 40+%. Check out the UOS for the coursework marks allocation there are way too much
freebie marks.

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7.5/10
Lecturer: 6/10
Interest: 3.5/10
Overall: 5/10

Semester 2 2006
Ease - 9/10
This subject is ten times easier than ACCT1001. The exam questions are just tute questions with
different numbers. If you can do the tute questions you can do the exam questions.
Lecturers - 8/10 (Rosina Mladenovic, Paul Blayney)
Rosina explained things very well so did Paul who also gave away what was going
to be in the exam.
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 8.5/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 6.5/10
Lecturers - 6.5/10
Interest - 7.5/10
Overall - 7/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 6/10
Noticeably harder than 1A
Lecturers - 5/10

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Hate the lecture notes with half-finished sentences so you have to copy down so much during lectures
Interest - 4/10
Overall - 4/10
Unknown Date
Ease - 6/10
Lecturers - 5/10
Interest - 5/10
Overall 5.5/10
Mikes Bikes = waste of time

ACCT1003 - Financial Accounting Concepts

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9.5/10
The content is not exactly easy but the mid semester exam is 120 repetitive multiple choice questions.
The assignment is pretty much a copy and paste exercise. The final exam is so easy! its 50 multiple
choice and a few short answer questions which are tutorial questions with different
numbers!!!!
Lecturer: 10/10 (Frank Portelli)
FRANK PORTELLI IS A GOD. He makes accounting somewhat interesting and funny. The lectures
are so funny and entertaining
Interest: 5/10
The content is somewhat useful but if you’re not doing an accounting major it’s not much use.
Overall: 10/10
It was a great subject. Frank is the best lecturer even though accounting is boring.

ACCT1004 - Management Accounting Concepts

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8/10
Not as easy as 1003 was but still VERY easy. Its 1 multiple choice midterm. 1 assignment, 1
presentation where if frank likes you you get 10/10. and a final where its tutorial questions with
different numbers.
Lecturer: 10/10 (Frank Portelli)
Frank Portelli is why I took this subject. He is wonderful 10/10.
Interest: 4/10
Accounting isn’t very interesting but Frank makes it interesting somehow
Overall: 10/10
I really liked this subject. It was easy and the lectures were so entertaining

Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources (AFNR)

AFNR1002 - Climate and the Environment

Semester 2 2011
Ease: 7/10

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Interest: 5/10
Overall: 6/10

Ancient History (ANHS)

ANHS1003 - Foundations for Ancient History: Greece

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
In terms of assessment load, this was the easiest subject I did this semester. There's only one piece of
non-exam assessment, other than tute participation, which is a 1500-word essay on one of the tute
subjects. Unfortunately they do the stupid thing where each essay topic is due in a different week,
corresponding with the topic of the week's tute. This has the effect of discouraging people from doing
the earlier topics, some of which I would've liked to have done, but I didn't feel confident enough to
write a 1500-word analytical essay in my first couple of fortnights of university. Literally half the
people in my tute did the final week's essay. In terms of content, I don't think it's really that difficult a
course. Some of the lecture material can be a bit difficult to start off with, because it does challenge a
lot of the assumptions you have from HSC ancient history. In particular there's more focus on looking
at how objects and ideas functioned within society, which can be a bit hard to start off with, and in
your essays you need to focus a lot more on critical analysis of the sources than at high school. In the
end, though, you don't really need to know all the content, because in the exam there are questions
from each lecture and tute and you just pick two. So all you really need to know are your essay topic
and one other, and the reading lists help out a lot with researching them.
Lecturers: 8.33/10 (Alastair Blanshard , Julia Kindt 8.5/10, Ben Brown 7/10)
Alastair is a fantastic lecturer. He's very funny and he has a flair for explaining things with real
clarity, and he was probably helped out by the fact that he had some of the most interesting topics.
Julia is also very funny - once you work out her accent (Bavarian), which might take one or two
lectures - and she has a real passion for her speciality, the Delphic Oracle. She also kept us awake
during less interesting lectures by interspersing them with amusing stories from the ancient texts.
Ben... oh, Ben. I hated him for most of the course, because I thought his lectures (particularly the ones
on Homer) dwelt unnecessarily on meaningless abstractions, but listening to them again while
preparing for the exam I realised that he actually has a lot of really interesting things to say. Approach
his lectures with an open mind. He's an appalling tutor - just talks for the whole hour instead of trying
to stimulate discussion, so I gave up on doing the readings eventually - but some of the things he said
in tutes were quite handy, like demonstrating to us the process by which the Cyreneans might have
rewritten their history with reference to the example of Gallipoli.
Interest: 8/10
The course focuses on late dark age and Archaic Greece, a period which I and probably most other
HSC ancient history people didn't have much experience with. (For the record, we pretty much start
with Homer and Hesiod and then proceed thematically, but roughly chronologically, to the Persian
Wars.) It's great to learn about this period, which had previously been pretty neglected academically
but has more recently been acknowledged as the period in which a lot of the features of the better
known classical period developed.* There's no real thread joining together the lectures, which is
frustrating at first, but then I took a look at the course title and realised that the point of the course is
really to introduce us to the key features and concepts in the study of ancient Greece, as a foundation
for further study. I thought it did that pretty successfully.
Overall: 8.5/10
Pretty easy, good lectures in a good lecture theatre (Eastern Avenue), reasonably interesting. No
major complaints.
*I'd recommend reading over an introductory text about this period before starting the course, just to
get an idea of how this period fits in to earlier Greek history. They don't really put it in context

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fantastically in the lectures. Try Pomeroy et al, Ancient Greece: a political, social, and cultural
history, from the section on Homer onwards for a few chapters. The actual course textbook, Greece in
the Making (which isn't at all necessary for the course), might also be good - I don't know, I've never
laid eyes upon a copy.

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 8/10
1 essay and an exam on only 2-3 areas
Lecturer: 8.25/10
10/10 for alistair and 6.5/10 for jimmy
Interest: 7/10
Overall: 8/10

ANHS1004 - Power and Persuasion in Rome

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8.5/10
Conceptually, it was nowhere near as hard as ANHS1003, because it focused more on political events
than on cultural and sociological stuff. I thought it got a bit trickier towards the end because of the
insane complexity of the imperial family tree, where the emperor's son's wife's stepsister's brother-in-
law decides to make a power play by assassinating his brother's granddaughter's aunt's ex-husband's
lover or whatever, but because of the structure of the course you could ignore a lot of topics that you
weren't keen on. Assessment-wise, ancient history was again my lightest subject for the semester. A
fairly short (1500 words) essay was the only hand-in assessment, and then there was just the exam
(OK if you prepared enough for it, no real tricks) and tute participation.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Kathryn Welch)
Kathryn was really excellent. Well-spoken, good sense of humour, illustrated her points with reference
to both ancient sources and modern historians (which is a pleasant change for a history course). Plus,
lecture recordings synchronised with the slides on WebCT! The guest lecturers, who were the tutors
talking about periods or people related to their PhD theses, were pretty good too.
Interest: 9/10
This is a really interesting period of history (roughly from the Gracchi to Emperor Tiberius, with a
tiny bit of the rest of the Julio-Claudians), and the engaging way in which it was taught made the
course pretty good. I liked the way they threw in a few tutes on non-narrative topics as background to
the political narrative, like how the Romans viewed suicide or how elections worked. It would've been
nice to have a bit more on Roman religion, but I guess that's more the role of classics units.
Overall: 9/10
Really good course, strongly recommend it for ancient history buffs. Unfortunately they're changing
around the junior ANHS courses next year, but I can't imagine that the new course will be that
different.

Unknown Date
Ease: 6.5/10
This honestly should have been much easier than it was, given that it was largely a repeat of
components of the HSC Ancient History course. That being said, the exam was horribly difficult - the
questions were esoteric and I found a lot of them had very little to do with anything we'd done. There
is a 400-page course reader for this course, most of which is ancient sources, so be prepared for a lot
of readings. There is a 20% tute participation component, which I will never understand, because it's
so subjective and it throws your whole mark into the air. There is a policy of being able to resubmit
essays in a different topic should you not do as well as expected, which is quite a relief if you do
badly. However, due to my procrastination I didn't do as well as I should have - so the difficulty of
this subject was due to my lack of effort, not due to real difficulty.

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Lecturer: 7/10 (Sarah Lawrence 5/10, Peter Brennan 9/10)
I didn't really like Sarah Lawrence's lecture style. Although she covered all of the course content, she
did it in a very simplistic way and it often felt as though she was talking down to us. Maybe the
simplistic nature of it was due to the sheer amount of content, as well as the fact that we'd covered a
lot of the material during the HSC. I felt as though she had a very strong political leaning that was
made very plain - for example, lectures on Tiberius Gracchus and on the election process in Rome
were very politically slanted, which I didn't appreciate. I was, however, very glad that she put all of
the notes on WebCT. Peter Brennan is brilliant. His lectures are always fascinating. I would have
given him a 10/10 but I felt he was a better lecturer in ANHS2608 because that course covered his
area of expertise.
Interest: 6/10
While I'm interested in Ancient Rome, I much prefer late antiquity and this course covered a period
too early for me to be truly interested in what it had to offer. I really only chose it
because I'd done Augustus and the Julio-Claudians in the HSC and figured that this course would be
an easy six credit points for this semester as well as fulfilling my junior credit point requirement for
Ancient History. However, this course did have its moments. Some of the content was quite
interesting - I quite liked Cicero and Cato, for one, and Caligula is always amusing. Tutorial
discussions (held by Sarah Lawrence) were much more spirited than lectures, though occasionally
they degenerated into political debate, though I find that interesting in itself.
Overall: 6/10
This was an average course, really. I found some of it quite interesting but I didn't pick it so much on
its merits as a) fulfilling a junior credit point requirement and b) it covering a lot of the same content
as the HSC course. This was significantly helped by Peter Brennan's lecturing, which I felt was the
redeeming part of this course

ANHS2604 - Pagans and Christians in the Roman World

Unknown Date
Ease: 7/10
This wasn't easy but it wasn't overly difficult either. There were a lot of readings and several of the
topics were fairly obscure although others were very well-known. How easy this is depends upon the
topics you choose, really. The assessment for this subject is 40% essay, 40% exam and 20%
participation including journal. I really dislike large participation components but at least it was
somewhat less... completely subjective... than if we didn't have to complete a journal. The essay topics
are reasonable if you choose correctly; though I didn't do as well as I'd liked, you get the opportunity
to submit a second essay on the last day of the exam period, with the best of the two marks counting. I
think that's really fair and really decent. The exam wasn't overly bad. With approximately 30
questions to choose from, if you can't find three you can answer somewhat satisfactorily you haven't
put any effort into the course whatsoever. Be careful of the 400 page reader brick.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Peter Brennan)
I chose this course specifically because he was lecturing it, though I must say I preferred him in
ANHS2608: The World Turned Upside Down last year. I think that was more the fact that I preferred
the course content for that subject. Peter is an awesome lecturer and is very approachable. Regardless
of course content I recommend any subject he takes.
Interest: 7/10
The course was split into two parts - one on paganism and one on early Christianity. The interest mark
for this is bumped because I really enjoyed the second half of this course; late antiquity and church
history are the things I'm really interested in when it comes to history. I found little to excite me in the
pagan section of the course. Although there's a large reader brick, there are some interesting things in
there - Sayings of the Desert Fathers, the sources on the martyrdoms of St Perpetua and Pionius, and
Octavius by Minicius Felix were highlights. Steer clear of the Hellenised Isis readings if you don't
want to be bored to death by overwrought, dull academic writing. This course is closer to religious

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studies than actual history, so be forewarned before you take it. I would have probably preferred more
actual history in it, but it was still a relatively good course.
Overall: 7/10
Solid but I've done better courses. It has a few things going for it, though - Peter Brennan and the later
lectures make this worth it. It was interesting to see the choice of topics - I would have probably
chosen somewhat differently if I'd designed the course.
ANHS2607 - Rome 90BC-AD14: Making A World City

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Basically average difficulty for an ancient history course, although there was quite a bit of reading.
The toughest part was comprehending the ideas behind historical topography and why it's worth
studying: once you get past that there's nothing really difficult about the content. Assessments were
pretty average, 2500 word essay, exam and 1000 word reading journal - it was tough to fit five entries
into such a short space for the journal though, because they asked you to do a lot in 200 words.
Lecturer: 7.5/10 (Kathryn Welch 9/10, Frances Muecke 6/10)
I love Kathryn. She's a really clear and intelligent lecturer, she has some fascinating ideas, she's really
willing to go the extra mile to help out and to make life easier for students (her implementation of e-
learning in this course represents best practice in my opinion, really useful without being gimmicky)
and she can also be very funny. It helped that she had what I thought were the more interesting parts
of the course, on topography, architecture and intellectual history. I didn't attend a lot of Frances'
lectures so it may not be fair to judge, but her voice just sends me to sleep. Her lectures also tend to be
a bit unstructured and often don't have much of a point. I also wasn't that interested in Roman poetry,
which is her speciality, so that didn't help.
Interest: 9/10
How space and architecture were used to make political points = fascinating. How
Romans saw themselves, their city and their history, and how this changed as republic changed to
empire = fascinating. Really really great stuff for Rome buffs.
Overall: 9/10
A great introduction to modern academic study of Rome and to the politics and ideas
of the Augustan settlement. Also teaches you a lot about the Roman mindset in the late republic and
early principate. Really awesome course, shame about the poetic sections with Frances but I'm sure
they could have been better had they been done by a better lecturer.

ANHS2608 - The World Turned Upside Down

Unknown Date
Ease: 7/10
Let me tell you, there is a lot of reading and a lot of Latin (and sometimes Ancient Greek too)
terminology here. Our course reader was 300 pages and a lot of the readings could be rather dense.
DO NOT LET THAT STOP YOU! If you stay on top of the reading, you will be fine. The exam was
very fair and very straightforward - it has one compulsory question on Paulinus of Pella and you
choose two electives out of about thirty different questions, so you have a lot of scope. The essays
were also fine - unlike in first-year Ancient, you are able to hand in the essays the tute after you
discuss the topic, not before you discuss the topic. Also, you can write more than one paper if you're
not happy with your mark. Again, like ANHS1004, there is a 20% tutorial participation mark, but it's
less subjective because you write a journal throughout the semester - a page a week outlining your
response to the readings. As I said before, keeping on top of the reading is essential if you want to do
well.
Lecturers: 10/10 (Peter Brennan 10/10, Lyn Olson, 10/10)
Not only did I get to have a subject with Lyn Olson again (I loved her in the Middle Ages course last
semester), but I also get Peter Brennan, who is made of awesome. I was very lucky to have a course
that not only focused on my favourite period in history but had the two best lecturers I've had so far in

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30 credit points of history taking it. I think this was the only subject this semester where I really went
to lectures regularly and actually absorbed the information. Seriously, I cannot recommend these two
enough (I'm deliberately taking courses run by them next year - three of them as at pre-enrolment).
Interest: 10/10
This is a course on late antiquity, which is my favourite period in history. You cover the period from
150-800, so from the Antonines, or the Golden Age as Gibbon refers to it, through the anarchy of the
3rd century, the fall of the Empire in the west in the 5th century, early Christianity, up to and including
the Carolingian Empire of Charlemagne. I must admit the period up until about Tute 8 or 9, which
was on Italy under the Goths, was the most interesting because I prefer it, but even the later parts of
the course were pretty interesting. The tutes were quite good. You either had Peter or Lyn, so it was
win-win either way. I had Peter, and his tutorials were quite insightful - there was actually proper
historical discussion taking place in them and I learned a lot.
Overall: 10/10
I cannot recommend this course highly enough. It is probably the best Ancient History course on
offer, to be honest (though I'm yet to take Pagans and Christians in the Roman World, which in my
eyes is the only other candidate).

ANHS2691 - Ancient Historians Rethink History I

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
I haven't received any results yet, so it's hard to tell, but just going off the content throughout semester
itself, this course wasn't too horrible in terms of difficulty. It is more philosophy than history, but to
me that was a lot more interesting than lectures full of dates that I would forget anyway. I had done
the history extension course, and postmodernism for English Extension 1 in the HSC so a lot of the
ideas weren't completely new, but what high school made ridiculously boring, this course made really
inspiring. Some of the concepts were different to what we are used to in traditional history, and you
really have to approach it with an open mind.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Ben Brown)
First up, the video lectures were painful at times because the sound was a bit distorted, but they
weren't really boring or anything so I could deal. I've seen someone else complain about Ben Brown
for another course, and I have to say that to me he has been one of the best lecturers/tutors I've ever
had. Yes he does go off topic sometimes in tutes, yes he talks throughout most of the tutorial, but for
me it was really a case of wanting to listen to him rather than the same people argue over and over
about the same thing. I know others would disagree with me, but I feel like these tutorials have been
the most useful I've ever had because he has a lot of interesting ideas that none of us could have ever
thought of, and tutorials were really a case of expanding on lecture material rather than people
guessing things to fill in the silence that I've experienced so often in other courses. We also had to
write a journal which was a good way to get participation marks.
Interest: 9/10
I would encourage anyone who is thinking of majoring in Ancient history (or probably HSTY2691 for
history majors cause I think that is its equivalent) to do this course. You might not like it at first, or at
all, but it is important to know what other theories about and approaches to history are out there. It is
the most interesting course I have ever done and has given me new ideas about how to approach
content in other ANHS courses.
Overall: 9/10
Best course I've ever done.

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 Archaeology - Near Eastern (ARNE)

ARNE1001 - Archaeology of the Near East

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 7.5/10
Utterly shitty and pickily marked assignment in which you had to find an artefact and write about
what it tells us about the society that created it. (And that was all the help we were given.) Had
nothing to do with the rest of the course, which was basically historical rather than focused on
material culture. 2000-word essay, which was pretty standard except for the overly vague and broad
questions (there is NO WAY you can satisfactorily discuss 'trade' in New Kingdom Egypt in 2000
words, and that was one of the more specific topics available). There was a ton of material in the
lectures and not much guidance as to what would be in the exam, but as it turned out you only needed
to know a few areas to attempt it successfully. The content itself was very basic and simple (except for
some difficult tute readings), but there was a lot of it.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Dawn Cropper)
Dawn was clear and concise in her lecturing, which I found a positive after bad experiences with
ramblers this semester, Diarmuid. She had a very familiar style, particularly in the tutes but also in the
lectures, which I think a lot of people appreciated but I found vaguely patronising. This was probably
because I already thought of her as patronising because of her continual and annoying focus on essay-
writing skills and referencing. She spent a full lecture and a full tute on these, time which we could
have used actually learning course material, but instead we were subjected to basic stuff like topic
sentences and 'why is referencing important?' and 'what is plagiarism?' and introductions, bodies and
conclusions (seriously, that's year 7 material). If our writing was really that terrible - and no other
lecturer I've had has ever found their juniors' writing so bad that it justified spending hours of teaching
time on - couldn't she have just directed people to the Write Site or run a voluntary session, rather than
wasting the time of people who are fine with writing essays and making them feel patronised? </rant>
Apart from that, I thought Dawn was fine.
Interest: 7/10
I expected this course to focus on archaeology - the study of material culture - but particularly in the
later part it turned into a very potted narrative history of the ancient Near East. I've always seen the
point of archaeology as revealing how ordinary people lived, especially in the Near East where the
literary record is dominated by the elite, and we studied this sort of thing at first - I found the section
on the early Levantine neolithic fascinating - but after about the Mesopotamian Early Dynastic we got
caught up in a very sparse and shallow coverage of the narrative, without any reference to the
archaeological record except the occasional victory stele or something. If I had just wanted to learn
the political history, I would have signed up for a course that covered it in depth: people did this
course for the archaeology, and there was really precious little of it. So in the second half of the
course, I spent most of my time in the lectures half-asleep (didn't help that they were scheduled at
10am, which means I had to get up at 6.30am and I'm really not a morning person), and most of my
time in the tutes wishing for death to take me away.
Overall: 6.5/10
I was disappointed with this course - it was nothing like it was advertised. Friends tell me that the
equivalent classical archaeology course, ARCL1001, was much better, focusing on building a
knowledge of the archaeology, rather than the narrative. I would have appreciated more linkage to the

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practical archaeological knowledge we obtained in first semester and to the process of finding
meaning from material culture, rather than a dull historical overview.

Archaeology - Prehistoric and Historical (ARPH)

ARPH1001 - Introduction to Archaeology

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8.5/10
Most of the material covered was reasonably basic, and the lack of an exam meant you didn’t need
any deep understanding of it. The two 15% quizzes - which were mainly multiple choice with a few
short answers - weren’t particularly challenging, just going over notes and memorising lists was good
enough to get a decent mark. It probably wasn’t necessary to go to the lectures, since the textbook*
and the notes on WebCT were pretty comprehensive. The essay was OK if you started early and
picked a decent topic - I stupidly chose a complicated topic and started late, but I did it reasonably
thoroughly anyway and got a D. The other element of assessment was a workbook based on the six
workshop sessions. The main thing was not to put it off until later but just to do each workshop’s
tasks soon after the workshop, to avoid it all piling up. The hardest task was Documents in
Archaeology, which took a long time because it actually required thinking.
Lecturers: 9/10 (Martin Gibbs), 6/10 for the guest lecturers
Martin Gibbs is an excellent lecturer who can convey a lot of fairly dry topics humorously and
clearly. He also has a ton of interesting examples from his own research in the Solomon Islands and
thereabouts. Unfortunately, most of the lecturers from the second half of the course, “Themes in
archaeological research”, were guest lecturers from the Department of Archaeology talking about
their areas of expertise. Most of them weren’t much good at lecturing: lowlights were Sarah Colley’s
excruciatingly boring lecture on environmental archaeology, Ian Johnson’s pointless lecture about
computer applications in archaeology, and every lecture by Lesley Beaumont, who has the unique
ability to make it sound like she’s reading her lecture word-for-word off the paper in front of her even
though she actually isn’t.
Interest: 8/10
The first half of the course, „Definitions and techniques in archaeology’, was fascinating - looking at
different aspects of practical archaeology like surveying, settlement patterns, excavation, chronologies
and ethnoarchaeology. The second half varied, as it was pretty much a pick’n’mix of different areas of
archaeological research - the stuff about the development of literacy and trade was interesting, but the
stuff about the archaeology of identity and religion was awful. Some of the workshops were better
than others - Identities in Rubbish, where we looked through people’s household waste to see what we
could conclude about them, was really fun, but the stratigraphy one was basic, tedious and difficult at
the same time.
Overall: 8.5/10
It was an interesting (and easy) course that provides a decent foundation for further study in
archaeology. I’d rate it higher if not for some of the guest lecturers and a couple of boring and fiddly
workshops.
*Don't bother buying it unless you're really committed. I just got it out of the library a week before
each test to go through a few details that the online notes didn't cover in enough depth.

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 Art History and Theory (ARHT)

ARHT2642 - Art in the Age of the Samurai

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
10% for a tutorial presentation, 30% for an essay on that presentation topic, and 60% for a 3000 word
essay. What this meant was that it was possible to present in the second week, then have no
assessments until the final week of semester. It also meant that there was no incentive to read any
tutorial readings beyond that for your presentation as there was rarely any discussion of them.
Lecturer: 3/10
Dr. Ajioka was certainly a nice person, however lectures leant towards incomprehensibility, tending to
be little more than a series of images over two hours without much analysis, meaning they were
extremely forgettable. There appeared to have been no clear themes for the unit, and only a slight
sense of chronology. That attendance was taken for both lectures and tutorials was somewhat of a
mystery, as no mark was given for it.
Interest: 6/10
The fact that Japanese art history really is an incredibly fascinating subject simply did not come
through in the classes, and an interest in the topic was often all keeping one awake. In the end, the
thick, neglected course reader turned out to be quite good, even if unused for the most part.
Overall: 5/10
This was a very unsatisfying unit, when it could have been so much more. Other than for one
assessment there was no reason to buy or read the course reader, and really no incentive to attend
lectures, which tended to be a slow parade of images with minimal explanation or history.

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 Asian Studies (ASNS)

ASNS1002 - Modern Asian History and Cultures 2

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 6/10
The ideas about modernity are rather abstract and complex, more so if one comes from a non-Arts
background, but the morale is clear and simple - modernisation is not static, westernisation was not
modernisation (for the better), and imperialism impeded modernisation for colonies. Tutes were often
embarrassing (the Indonesian ones anyway - one had a choice of Indonesia, Korea and Japan tutes - as
Max Lane constantly made everyone feel stupid by highlighting just how little we knew about Asia ,
and readings were once again, too complex to decipher in one quick skim. A callous bitch that
laughed at everyone's comments in tutes didn't help either. Essays were marked harshly too. Also,
having to learn three separate histories and tying it altogether in a demanding exam is quite a task, so
it's actually not one to be taken lightly. N.B: Colonial history is so depressing (especially Indonesia's).
Lecturers: 7/10 (Pankaj Mohan 5.5/10, Max Lane 6.5/10, Matthew Stavros 9/10)
Pankaj Mohan (Korea) - Incoherent, but too gentle to hate for this. It did make it harder to study
Korea though.
Max Lane (Indonesia) - My own tutor. Admittedly, I rarely went to his lectures and only ever
managed to show up for the last 5 minutes, so I can't really provide an accurate assessment. But I
didn't find him as inspiring as I'd hoped.
Matt Stavros (Japan) - Inspiring, intelligent and interesting American Princeton graduate. Had
him as a substitute tutor in the first weeks, knew nothing about Indonesia but was fascinatingly
(though not disturbingly) quirky.
Interest: 8/10
Thanks in part to Matthew Stavros, but the content is intrinsically interesting, a sobering assessment
of imperialism and westernisation.
Overall: 7/10
Not necessarily a song and dance about 'Asian Pride', but rather a panacea for Asian
inferiority/Western superiority complexes.

ASNS2676 - Gender in Modern Asia

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 5/10
There was nothing too complicated about the unit, though unexpectedly low essay marks have
brought down the score a little. The final exam was worth 40%, too much in my opinion, and essays
were returned afterwards with virtually no feedback. Edit: Brought down due to unexpectedly low
results
Lecturer: 7/10
Dr. Yang was an intelligent, clear speaker, with many interesting anecdotes concerning her own

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fieldwork. My only problem was that too much of the lectures was spent covering the tutorial
readings. Tutorials were also pretty informative and readings often appealing (though it was a bit rich
expecting us to buy four books). The classes would follow a particular theme, like third genders,
commoditised sex, gender in the public sphere etc., and each would be given a few country-specific
examples. The result then was a clearer understanding of the concept, but a bit of a limited vision of
its relevance across Asia, though providing a good basis for further study.
Interest: 7/10
Definitely an interesting unit, with a lot of variety. It also introduced a lot of the basic theories on
gender and sexuality and applied them to different Asian contexts (though an emphasis on China),
usually focusing the changing ways that gender have been controlled and by whom.
Overall: 6/10
Interesting course, informative and lucid lectures and tutorials and more than bearable readings.
Really only held back by poor assessment structure (70% based on in-class tests and tutorial
participation) and some inconsistent grading.

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 Biology (BIOL)
BIOL2011 - Invertebrate Zoology

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 3/10
Too much to remember and barely any of it's interesting. There's only so many body parts to worms
that you can remember without burning out. Two exams worth 60%, one for theory and one for prac
so there's double the amount of stuff to revise. The other 40% worth of assessments were pretty easy,
but those exams were killers.
Lecturers: 5/10 (Liz May, Rosalind Hinde, Adele Pile, Frank Seebacher, Fiona Clissold)
Liz was fine as usual and her lecture notes were superb. Seebacher and Clissold weren't as interesting
but their lecture notes made it easy to revise. Hinde and May were ok lecturers who were let down by
awful notes - you actually have to take notes with these two since they don't publish entire lectures,
just basic outlines. Sadly though the material for the first half of the semester sucked balls, so no
matter how good the lecturers were they couldn't make it interesting. Or maybe they could and they
just failed. Either way, the lecturers aren't that impressive.
Interest: 4/10
First half of semester is horrible. You'll learn about sponges, jellyfish and worms in horrible detail.
After that it goes onto molluscs with Liz which was really interesting mostly thanks to her lecturing.
The material on crustaceans was nice since a lot of it was about general biology (ecology and all that
crap) rather than zoology. The last part on insects started off fine but went on for far too long and
went in to far too much detail to retain interest. They're invertebrates folks, so they're not going to be
too interesting.
Labs: 8/10
Labs were pretty good. You'll dissect a silkworm, garden snail, yabby and cockroach which were all
used in the prac exam. The labs were full of displays and dissections and whatever and the lecturers
were always wandering around talking about their research interests, which was good. As with
vertebrates, for certain labs experts from outside of the uni/other parts of the uni were brought in to
help us learn and whatever, so that was nice. There are new posters and preserved specimens up in the
zoology foyer every week to assist with the labs too. Oh, plus there's the Macleay museum upstairs
which has Australia’s biggest insect collection, so that's cool. Only problem with the labs was that
they sometimes became redundant - you've seen one worm and you've seen 'em all.
Overall: 4/10
Not that impressive. Boring subject material isn't aided by mediocre lecturers. Like vertebrates, it was
very well organised and the labs were good but they aren't good enough to bring the score of this
difficult and boring subject up too far. I don't recommend it unless you really need it (do vertebrates
though).

BIOL2012 - Vertebrates and Their Origins

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 7/10

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Pretty easy if you follow what's happening. There's a tonne of crap to remember though. If you can't
remember specific keywords for topics then you won't like this course. The number of classes, orders,
terms and whatever else you have to remember in 2012 is absurdly high. There's a tonne of learning
material provided for you though. The lab book has material, the course text book is detailed (don't
buy it though, it's not worth it. I didn't), the lecture notes are fantastic, WebCT is filled with
information (videos, lectures, links and animations and whatever else), the lab CD that's given to you
is well stocked and posters are put up in the zoology foyer full of information that are changed every
week or so. The labs and tutorials also have a tonne of information to assist with lectures. So yeah,
there's a lot to remember, but there's a lot of places to source the information from. The assessments
are varied. On one hand, the mid semester test and those multiple choice questions were killers, but
the final exam, speech, poster, essay and prac exam all seemed easy enough. There's a wide variety of
assessment which is good, and exam assessment is mostly minimised.
Lecturers: 8/10 - (Adele Pile, Liz May, Mike Thompson , Michael Letnic, Clare MacArthur,
Chris Dickman)
They're all pretty good. Liz (course co-ordinator) is pretty funny and dropped by every week or so in
lectures to give announcements. Mike Thompson was pretty fantastic and interesting. Chris Dickman
is one of those experts in the field so he's pretty cool. Clare MacArthur's really into her subject so
she's interesting (plus she lectured on mammals, which is easy since they're one of the most
interesting aspects). Adele Pile was ok, but she lectured on the "origins" part of the course which
wasn't that interesting. Mike Letnic lectured on birds. That's unfortunate, given how much I love
birds, because he's an abysmal, boring and monotonous lecturer who doesn't seem at all interested in
what he lectures about. His notes were probably the best though, so meh.
Interest: 8/10
Yeah, it's pretty interesting. As said, lectures were good and so were the learning materials. The
tutorials went through the info in a pretty interesting manner, and the labs were always pretty fun and
interesting. The course material itself is nice as you take a little tour of vertebrate evolution and step
back through time and work your way back up. If you love evolution and zoology you'll love this
course.
Overall: 8/10
I liked it quite a bit. Lots of learning opportunities, lots of fun to be had and only a couple of boring
parts/lecturers. Of note is that it looks as if they've minimised the "walk around and copy crap off
boards" method in this unit and instead have gone to lengths to make labs interesting. You'll be doing
a dissection every other week in this course, which is always pretty fun. The amphibians lab was
awesome, as Australia's leading frog expert (or something) comes in and does it with you, and he's
really awesome. A word of warning: You have to kill a sea urchin and a toad, and the marsupials
really, really stink. If you like chicken you might want to watch out for the chicken dissection to
(although it doesn't really bother me after i dissected one). Those toads that you kill move around after
you kill them too, which is pretty unpleasant in my opinion.

BIOL3011 - Ecophysiology
Semester 1 2008
Ease - 8/10
It's not a hard subject, though there's a lot of detail in the lectures and independent work involved in
the two experiments you design and do. The field trip was easy - do your experiment at your own
pace, and the lecturers are there if you need them (which is how the extended experiment as well).
Lecturers - 8/10
They go slow, they go over the stuff in detail, and they're genuinely passionate about what they talk
about and in helping you learn it. They use lots of real examples to demonstrate theory (often from
their own research) and it definitely helps reinforcing the theory.
Interest - 9/10
If you like biology, this is fascinating and makes a lot of sense once you understand the basics.
Labs - 10/10

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There weren't many, basically only for the independent group projects at the end of semester, which
were "come in if you need to, leave when you're ready." Easy.
Overall - 9/10
Great subject. People who hate group work need not apply, however. The exam was shit easy too.

Computational Science (COSC)

COSC1002/1902 - Computational Science in C (Regular/Advanced)

Semester 1 2006
Ease - 8/10
This subject probably favours people who are strong in maths more than computing. Most students
are computing ones, but there will also be some physics and maths students too. You'll have to learn
C, but it’s just basic stuff like control flow. Pracs are pretty easy, most can be finished within the hour
(of a 2 hour prac). Would give it 9, but the first prac assessment pretty much owned most people. He
subsequently made the 2nd one easy, so maybe he'll continue to make them easy. Most of the final
exam seems to be taken from previous year exams.
Lecturer - 8/10 (Mike Wheatland)
Last year’s lecturer was Mike Wheatland. He isn’t the best lecturer (although he's not bad), but his
notes are awesome and well prepared. Probably the best I’ve seen. PM me if you want the complete
2005 notes.
Interest - 7/10
Found the computing part boring (things about precision, errors), but the maths was pretty good.
Continually solving Des gets repetitive after a while.
Overall - 8/10
If you’re good at maths a decent at programming I’d recommend it as a subject where HD is easily
attainable.

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 Econometrics (ECMT)

ECMT2110 - Regression Modelling

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
This subject isn’t hard when you understand what’s going on. But when you don’t it’s really hard to
understand. It’s pretty much 1020 but strike it up 40% harder with more content. But no time series
crap thank god.
Lecturer: 1/10 (Andrey Vasnev)
He makes good quotes but apart from that you don’t learn much at all.
Interest: 0.5/10
After doing this course I realised I really have no interest or passion for statistics. As much as it is
useful it is boring and dry.
Overall: 5/10
Don’t do this subject unless you like statistics. At least the marks were higher than expected

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
Though the final exam has a lot of content and you need to be totally prepared for that. Make sure you
never forget how to derive the ordinary least squares estimator. There is also an assignment towards
the end of the semester, though Diane Dancer has retired and is no longer taking the course- so I don't
know how it will change in the future.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Diane Dancer)
Interest: 8/10
Good overall knowledge of linear regression analysis. The text book by Gujarati is dense, and you end
up reading half of it. But it is interesting.
Overall: 8/10
You have to take it to complete your econometrics major, or if you intend on doing honours in
economics.

ECMT2120 - Analysis of Discrete Choice Data

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8/10
The hardest thing you need to do is learn how to derive Maximum Likelihood Estimators, but that's
not even hard. The rest is interpretation and prediction. Mid semester exam, tutorial solutions to hand
in each second week. The program that was used is LIMDEP, though SHAZAM has been used in the
past.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Hajime Katayama)

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No text book required, the lecturer goes through his excellent lecture notes each week and that's all
you need to know.
Interest: 8/10
If you're interested in discrete choice data- where the dependent variable is binary, a probability,
multiple choice, a positive integer i.e. not continuous without any limits. Models to suit that- like
tobit, logit, probit, count data.
Overall: 8/10
Final exam was pretty good, compared to past papers. If you learn tutorial questions and what the
lecturer tells you to learn for the exam, then you'll at least pass.

ECMT2620 - Management Science

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 10/10
Maybe because I was familiar with linear programming and Lagrange equations, but all you need to
do is identify decision variables. Then the objective function. Then constraints- for all kinds of
problems, networking, transportation. And you put it in excel solver and it produces a result for you.
The most tricky thing is binary variables.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Daniel Oron)
He went through the text book, and answered questions clearly in class. Tutor is good too.
Interest: 8/10
Very simple problems, though I imagine it would get complicated in the third- year unit. It is
interesting to consider those kind of problems, not unbearable..
Overall: 9/10
Take it as I was also advised for easy ECMT.

ECMT2630 - Managerial Decision Making

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 9/10
I think the easiest second year subject in ECMT, though 2110 was easy as well. If you have done a
few stats or ECMT subjects along with a FINC you won't find any surprises in the course. All the
assignments and exams are relatively straight forward and easy. It's one of those study the night
before walk out with a good mark type subjects.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Daniel Oron)
Daniel Oron is a good lecturer, really fair. I love his Jewish accent he only loses are mark cause he
kept saying eeerrrrrrrrrrrrrr all the time . The tutor who was Prasad this semester is a gun though I did
know the guy beforehand.
Interest: 6.5/10
I had done quite a few things before in the course, so it did get boring at times. Plus I only took the
course since they cancelled the third year financial metrics I wanted to take.
Overall: 8/10
Pretty good bludgy subject, though this subject is my worst ECMT mark though I cbf to do one
question in the exam which I am sure if I was bothered to think about I could have easily solved.

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 Economics and Business Faculty - General (ECOF)

ECOF1001 - Communication & Critical Analysis

Unknown Date
Ease: 7/10
Lecturers: 7/10
She is a bit confusing, but really nice
Interest: 8/10
Overall: 8/10

ECOF3001 - Business Strategy

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Essays given for final. pretty easy same old stuff from previous years - resistance to change etc.
Lecturer: 6/10
Stephen is a wanker the other guy is ok.
Interest: 2.5/10
Like WORK and GOVT subjects = BORING
Overall: 5/10
Assignments are marked too hard. many people just passed the 1st assignment and the 2nd assignment
wasn’t even marked before final

Semester 1 2008
The final project was so much fun! When I did it, it didn't feel like I was just doing an "assignment". I
think I got either the highest or second highest mark for the assignment. If you're not a student who
studies by just MEMORISING everything without actively thinking/considering real life stuff.. then
this subject may be hard for u, and you might think "oh but I put so much effort!" when you get ur
results back.

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 Education - Foundations (EDUF)

EDUF3024 - Adolescent Development

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
Very straightforward. Every topic was presented and addressed clearly, and readings that were
provided were relevant to what we needed to know. Assessment-wise, resources weren't difficult to
come by since I actually know how to use the electronic databases (which is more than can be said for
many education students).
Lecturer: 9/10
Some people didn't like Tracy's style, thinking she was disorganised. I, on the other hand, found her
easy to listen to (if a little repetitive at times), particularly because she spoke to us the way I would
speak to my friends. The lectures themselves were presented in a casual way, with lots of examples,
and were just enjoyable to go to. I also found that Tracy was a good person to just talk to without
feeling stupid or like you weren't worth the time. She was always ready to give feedback, and actually
had a sense of humour (she let me tell an emo joke during my presentation on depression and
suicidality!).
Interest: 9/10
This unit is not only related to the age group I want to teach, but it's also related to a lot of things that
I have gone through in recent years from a developmental standpoint. Because this entire unit was
dedicated to adolescents, it's not just glossed over with a quick reference to Kholberg. Instead we look
at things like sexuality, drug use, depression and suicide, eating disorders and all kinds of other
interesting topics. Assessments were pretty good because everything was pretty much left to us, where
we could focus on the areas we found most interesting, while still getting a lot of info from people
who were interested in everything else.
Overall: 9/10
Most interesting and enjoyable course this semester.

EDUF3030 - Australian Secondary Schooling

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 9/10
If you attend lectures and pay attention you will have no problems. It's basically a history course. You
get given the exam questions beforehand. Assessment is a 3,000 word essay which is probably the
most difficult of the lot and it's a pretty standard essay, albeit longer than I was used to, and they give
you detailed advice on how to go about answering all the questions you can choose from along with a
list of recommended reading so it's kind of like they've done half of it for you (although you do have
to find your own material as well and you have to get to the library early or people will steal all the
books). The other assignment is 3 tutorial reading guides - you get assigned them at the start of

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semester and you read the chapter or article or whatever, summarise it in note form and give copies to
the class and your tutor who marks it. You have to discuss the reading during the tute. Not hard.
Lecturers: 8/10
I don't remember the name of the main guy who did it (sorry dude) but he was fine. Helen Proctor
took some of the lectures and also has an engaging, clear style.
Interest: 10/10
I really got into it. That's really all I've got to say. It was just interesting. I thought it would be a bit
meh and a couple of topics were a bit that way but the interest factor of the rest of it cancels out the
boring bits
Overall: 9/10

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 8/10
Alright, so it was actually pretty tough, but you can tell a whole lot of thought went into the course
structure. What happens is, each person does 3 'reading guides', for 3 tute chapters, over the course of
the semester - so by the end of it, A) you know exactly how to write the big essay, and B) you have
everyone else's reading guides all ready to help you for the exam.
Interest: 8/10
Very interesting historical background, helps with understanding school systems today.
Lecturer: 9.5/10
Practically a 10 for all concerned. Unlike EDUF1018, this course proves that, surprisingly enough,
teachers make good teachers.
Bonus points go to lecturers Proctor and Campbell for being awesome.
Overall: 8/10
I'd give it higher, but I had a bit of a thing this semester and will count myself lucky to pass.

Engineering - General (ENGG)

ENGG1804 - Engineering Disciplines (Intro)

Ease: 7/10
Not too hard but the labs can get a bit confusing. Some fudging and looking like you've attempted the
stuff always works though.
Lecturers: 7.5/10 (Stefan Williams 8/10, Trevor Cole 7/10)
Stefan has a canadian accent and was ok. Trevor knows his stuff but can get a bit boring sometimes.
Nice guy though.
Interest: 2/10
It's a boring subject.
Overall: 6/10
It's a bludge subject which looks at all the stream B disciplines
(Electrical/Software/Computer/Telecommunications/Power + Mechatronics). Most people use it to get
into Mechatronics in semester 2.

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 English (ENGL)

ENGL1000 - Academic Writing

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 5/10
Pretty hard to get a fantastic mark for writing when they mark you down over pedantic crap. Also the
lack of interest.
Lecturer: 5/10 (Rebecca Johinke)
Rebecca did a fine job of writing clear lecture notes, which is good because there aren't any actual
lectures. Still, learning from a computer screen kind of sucks balls.
Interest: 0/10
Online lectures are dull. Essay topics are dull. Marking is anal, and dull.
Overall: 1/10
Easy English credit points lol. Shit subject. Tutor was a self-centred bitch. Tutorial discussion was
dull, duddy and one sided, and worst of all didn't even count towards the end mark. No speech despite
heavy emphasis on public speaking. Essay subjects were shit. Don't do it!

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Online lectures, 20% of your assessment mark based on online discussion posts, an essay plan and
essay based on a ginormous range of questions, and an open book exam to finish. Could you ask for
anything more? The only terribly difficult part of this subject is maintaining an attention span
throughout... more on that later.
Lecturer: 6/10
All the lectures are online, so that's a plus, but they tend to be long-winded and repetitive.
Interest: 4/10
It felt like they spent half the semester telling us all the different ways to plagiarise, and finished up
by telling us not to do so. Everyone already knows what plagiarism is, and if they want to try and get
away with it they will. There's no need to ram it down our throats. A positive, though, is the
aforementioned range of essay topics - if you can't find something to interest you there, you're
struggling.
Overall: 6/10
Positives: easy marks, online lectures. Negatives: boring, boring, boring. I only did this because it was
a degree requirement, and I wouldn't recommend it unless you're the same. Go do something more
interesting.

Semester 1 2008

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It's an online course, so no lecturers.
Ease: 7/10
Lecturer: n/a
Interest: 3/10
Overall: 6/10
This course needs some major motivation on your part to complete the online discussions which
contribute to 20% of your grade. Also, it isn't learning to write an essay. It's learning the god forsaken
history of rhetoric. Final exam should be okay - since I haven't sat it yet - it's open book PLUS you
get the questions. All that's required is you marking an essay written the year previous, then writing
an essay about the one you've read and answering short answer questions.

Semester 1 2008
Ease - 9/10
Incredibly easy.
Lecturer - 9/10
Essentially was my computer. Wasn't a complete lefty nut like my HSTY1045 lecturer and wasn't too
boring like my HSTY1025 lecturer.
Interest - 0/10
Polynesian rhetoric.
Overall - 2/10
Gas yourself to death before you do this subject.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
Would be 10, except the online lecture system makes it a bit difficult to remember that you have to do
it, and I found that id only be doing it 10 minutes before rushing off to uni. That said, the material is
non-existent and it’s pretty much based on your own abilities. You learn a bit about rhetoric and the
philosophies behind different types of rhetoric, and while philosophy is gay, you don’t really need to
understand the stuff to ace this sub.
Lecturer: No marks (Rebecca Johinke)
No marks, because we didn't have lectures, but Johinke co-ordinated the course well, kept students up
to date and gave good feedback on assessments and stuff.
Interest: 3/10
It's really not that interesting. You don't really learn anything and you just read essays and see what’s
wrong with them. Not a subject to do out of interest, which many international students have made the
mistake of doing.
Overall: 7/10
Relatively useful, and the textbook. Soles' Essentials of Academic Writing is useful for everything as
it covers everything you'll need for an essay for future use. A downer is the 2 hour tutorial which you
must attend. Also the online lecture thing - got to be motivated to do them. But otherwise, relatively
easy and you should find easy marks here if you need them.

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 10/10
Lecturer - 10/10
Had her as a tutor - SO NICE! Didn't actually go to lectures
Interest - 6/10
Overall - 8/10

Unknown Date

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Ease: 7/10
Some people say its seriously easy but having to read online lectures is so not motivating, also they
are really anal about the smallest things like word count and referencing
Lecturers: 1/10
That was probably an overstatement cause it was mainly online lectures
Interest: 5/10
Overall: 5/10
Seriously I learned nothing in class, I don’t see how so many people can hate it cause you only have
to attend one tutorial, but still, it’s pretty useless

ENGL1005 - Language and Image

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 7/10 (Nick Reimer)
Nick Reimer was probably the best
Interest - 4/10
The "Maths of English" was incredibly hard. It started off really well, until about week 7-8 when the
topics just started getting tedious and pointless.
Overall - 7/10
Only because my tutor gave me good marks...otherwise I'd give it a 5

ENGL1015 - Inventing Modernity

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 3/10
I didn't understand the first assignment questions at all, to be honest. I guess getting that assignment
was the point where I realised that not only do I not comprehend the subject, I don't want to
comprehend it. The texts were also hard to slog through.
Lecturers: 5/10
There were six; the only one I really remember was Melissa Hardie, who wasn't fantastic but wasn't as
god awful as the one I had for ENGL1002. My tutor was wonderful - she wasn't waffly and she was a
nice woman, so the mark gets bumped here.
Interest: 1/10
As grk_styl said up-thread, it focused way too much on gender/sexuality readings to the exclusion of
anything either interesting or relevant. A lot of the time in the tutes, even those more English-minded
students were like, 'I can't see where we're meant to be reading sex into this!' When you think that
most of us are teenagers/just out of teens and probably all have rather dirty minds and can see sex into
everything, you wonder what kind of crack the lecturers are smoking to see all this imagery. I hated
the texts with a fiery passion... next time I think I'll avoid any course with Virginia Woolf!
Overall: 2/10
I think I was too harsh on ENGL1002 last semester; while it was deadly boring and I loathed it, at
least the course and the assessments made sense, and the texts were generally more interesting if
treated in an odd way. This seems to be one of those esoteric English subjects with little relevance to
anything... I'm guessing it's really just not my thing.
Ease - 6/10
Lecturer - 2/10
I don't remember liking any of them
Interest - 1/10
Pointless, pointless subject. The lectures consisted of finding the sexual undertones in all of the texts
Overall - 1/10

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Semester 2 2005
Ease - 6/10
Lecturer - 2/10
I don't remember liking any of them
Interest - 1/10
Pointless pointless subject. The lectures consisted of finding the sexual undertones in all of the texts
Overall - 1/10

ENGL1020 - Literary Mythologies

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 7/10
Lecturer - 8/10
Interest - 5/10
Boring as bat shit
Overall - 5/10

ENGL1025 - Fiction, Film and Power

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
Essays were straightforward. Plenty of different assignments, so there wasn't too much pressure on
any one thing. Exam was also straightforward. The theory became more difficult as the course went
on, but I got by alright via occasional name-dropping.
Lecturer: 5/10
I don't know because I flat-out stopped going after the first assignment. I don't advise this to anyone
who's not a born-and-bred English nerd, as I struggled to make sense of the sparse and cryptic notes
on the PowerPoints.
Interest: 9/10
Tutorials were great, absolutely fantastic tutors. The texts were challenging as well as (mostly)
accessible. The Day of the Locust, The Talented Mr Ripley, The Big Sleep and Bliss were ALL
interesting texts. Fun stuff.
Overall: 8/10
Great tutorials, really can't say about the lectures. Warning: The film of Bliss is not pleasant, and may
scar sensitive viewers.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 4/10
Couldn't understand what was expected of us for the first half of the semester, and had no
idea what was expected for the exam or therefore how to study for it.
Lecturer: 5/10
Stefan seems like a really lovely guy, but his lecturing style was horrible. Basically he'd write a 50
minute essay and recite it during the lecture, thus giving only one view point that was often hard to
follow or see relevance with the unit overall. He also liked to draw on paintings and convoluted rants
from famous theorists.
Interest: 2/10

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Maybe it would be good if you were a die-hard film noir fan. When I chose the subject, the overview
made the unit sound really dynamic and interesting. Instead it was a lot of 1940s texts with a few
others thrown in, all tenuously tied through links such as "simulacra" or "the panopticon".
Overall: 3/10
Bleuughh. That said, I somehow managed to get a high credit, which was surprising, because I
expected a low pass.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 6/10
Extremely tough going at first and I had trouble finding a distinct thread linking all the waffle together
for the first few weeks. Once you get used to Stefan's lecturing style and come to expect him to pitch
the content at a higher level than you might be used to (especially right out of the HSC) it becomes
easier. There were a couple of concepts which I never really fully understood ("end games" for
example) and if I was to try to give you a summary of what this course is about I would be here all
day, but suffice to say that once you get used to it, it's not so bad. I wouldn't recommend skipping
lectures though for your own sake. Stefan is against WebCT so you won't find any summaries for you
there. Oh, also, Stefan likes to use art to illustrate his points in a roundabout kind of way. Sometimes I
didn’t see the point, other times it was actually pretty cool. But don't freak if you walk in expecting
English and see all this abstract art on the PowerPoint, it's just what he does.
Lecturers: 6/10
Stefan did the vast majority of the lectures. He's a nice guy and all, very friendly and unintimidating.
But his lecturing style can really be a bit confusing/boring/complex/all of the above...you have to
listen hard. If you lack a vocabulary, acquire one, because he has an extensive list of intelligent
phrasing that he likes to use (I was so absolutely lost in the first lecture because of this). But like I
said he's really nice. The other lecturers we had were alright, nothing spectacular. The V for Vendetta
lecturer guy had some interesting points.
Interest: 6/10
It's interesting once you manage to cut through the waffle and actually get a grasp on the concepts. I
found some stuff boring though, notably the simulacra concept.
Overall: 6/10

ENGL2632 - British Romantic Literature

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 7/10
It's not hard but you have to keep up with the reading, of which there is a lot, or you'll fall behind like
I did. Also would help to have a previous interest in the subject matter because the lecturer would
often talk with the assumption that you were familiar with particular poems or authors, which I
personally never was. If you don't like poetry this course is not for you, if you do like it you'll have a
ball.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Will Christie)
Will Christie is awesome. 'Nuff said. He's engaging and witty. Interesting dress sense. The only reason
he's not a 10 is that I felt his lecture style was a bit all over the place. I prefer lectures to follow a clear
structure and the way he just seemed to kind of talk about anything that was even vaguely relevant to
the topic left me with some pretty confused notes lol.
Interest: 6/10
Largely dependent on whether you find Romantic literature interesting and how widely read you are
in it.
Overall: 7/10

ENGL2649 - The World of Fantasy

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Unknown Date
Ease: 6/10
I actually thought this would be a lot easier than it was, but the major essay (2,000 words; 50%) was
marked reasonably harshly. I liked the fact, however, that the essay was the major component of
assessment. The exam (30%) was fairly decent in that you only had to know two texts from a
selection of five in the latter half of the course. We were also essentially given questions and format
prior to the exam, though it's one of those subjects which is difficult to study for because you're not
entirely sure what to study. However, I found the exam straightforward and not particularly difficult -
it was one hour long and was comprised of one mini-essay and one extended response in point form.
There was a 10% tutorial presentation (as is usual with Arts subjects) and 10% participation (which as
usual is useless).
Overall, assessment format was decent, the material was mostly straightforward and if you kept up
with the texts you could do well. It is also entirely possible to do 60% of your assessment on one text,
which is very useful.
Lecturer - 7/10 (Daniel Anlezark)
I enjoyed his lectures very much and they were reasonably decent, however I have very little to say
on the matter as scheduling conflicts (i.e. them being reasonably early in the morning and the first
class of the day) meant that I stopped attending them post-Harry Potter lectures. He was funny and
interesting for the few I attended, though, and most people seemed to be genuinely enjoying the
lectures.
Interest - 8/10 for first half, 4/10 second half
I did this course solely because it offered Harry Potter as a text and I needed some English credits. I
really enjoyed the portion of the course to this point because I'm a Harry Potter-obsessed fanfic geek
and I figured any course which would let me wax lyrical about that fact would be rather wonderful. I
also really liked the 19th century Rider Haggard texts and CS Lewis.
After this I felt the texts went downhill. I really dislike both movie and book versions of Lord of the
Rings, and the fact such a large part of the course was devoted to them meant I spent about four or
five weeks in the middle really bored. Medieval texts were a mixed bag; I enjoyed Lanval but didn't
particularly enjoy Chaucer or Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Lady of Avalon was largely
unreadable for me. However, if you're really interested in fantasy fiction and its historical origins (or
if you really like Lord of the Rings) you'll enjoy this. I'm not a fantasy fan as a general rule so a lot of
the material didn't appeal to me.
Furthermore, there's the usual problem with seminar presentations in that some were incredible
(mostly the first few, obviously, because they catered to my interests) but most of them I spent
watching the clock and wanting to be somewhere else, because I couldn't get into the source material
and listening to people present bores the hell out of me.
Overall - 6/10
Solid but largely uninspired in parts because I didn't enjoy the source material. Lectures were decent
and some tutorials were good, it obviously depends on your group. I'd recommend this course only if
you really like fantasy works though - I really enjoyed the beginning of the course but it kind of gets
repetitive after a while.

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 Environmental Studies (ENVI)
ENVI2112 - Atmospheric Processes and Climate

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 6/10
Ease in lectures: don't turn up. Honestly. You'll never get anything more out the lectures than what is
already on the lecture slides, which are over 60 slides in length, and which rarely get covered properly
in class because of their length anyways. All of it originated from the textbook, so naturally if you get
the textbook and use it then you are set. Ease in assessments: you will be annoyed to no end by
numerous pointless 5% assignments, often asking you to perform menial tasks, such as calculating a
yearly average of coral transport observations, and then writing a page of what you think this means.
In addition to this, there is a field trip report poster, a seminar presentation, and two WebCT quizzes.
These are the things that will take your time, and they have a fair amount of difficulty, especially the
quizzes. The exam is very straightforward, but writing essay length questions quickly may come as a
shock to those without a first year GEOS background.
Lecturer: 3/10
You'll see in the very first lecture that lectures are nothing special. Those who did GEOS1001 will
know the main lecturer, and seen her style before: boring, sleep-inducing, then ultimately rushed
when time runs out. For the most part, simply reads off the notes but occasionally does provide some
extra points. For some weeks in the second half of semester, PhD students take over outlining their
research. Don't expect them to be brilliant, though it is a welcome change.
Interest: 6/10
Understandably, this unit would seem like an interesting one for those with some inkling of interest in
climate change, given the sheer lack of units covering climate science. The first part of the unit, which
covers historical climate change across a number of time scales, is ultimately the core of the unit, but
very full on and can be off putting to those coming from simply a chemistry or physics background.
Those who did first year geos units would be served well here, despite the prerequisites for this unit
being chemistry or physics, as this unit is a taught in the vein of other geos units. The unit goes
downhill in the second half, where topics range from projected future climate change to climate
modelling to coral reefs to politics of climate change. It is a mess. The lecture on political response to
climate change is simply regurgitation of the IPCC and Garnaut reports, don't expect any enlightening
discussion. The field trip, a two hour stroll through a research station at Chowder Bay, Mosman, has
absolutely no relevance to the course.
Overall: 5/10
This unit could've been a lot better. A potentially interesting and highly relevant unit is let down by
poor lecturing, a haphazard assessment program, a pointless field trip and a lack of a focus in the

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second half of the lectures. I don't regret doing the subject, as I managed to bash a good mark out of it,
but it's only my sheer interest in the topic area that outweighed these things.

Finance (FINC)

FINC2192 - Finance Honours

Unknown Date
Ease: 1/10
Possibly failed this course, even though I'm a gun at finance
Lecturer: 6.33/10 (Maurice Peat 3/10, Graham Partington 6/10, David Johnston 10/10)
Peat was weird, Johnston was my favourite lecturer.
Interest: 10/10
For a purely intellectual standpoint most interesting course I've done, especially the Behavioural
Finance part
Overall: 6.5/10
Fascinating subject but deplorably difficult.

FINC3194 - Finance 3 Honours (Securities Markets)

Unknown Date
Ease - 5/10
Challenging...as to be expected by an Honours preparatory course.
Lecturers - 9/10
Not surprising given my favourite lecturer of all time was teaching the bulk of it. Props to Johnstone.
Interest - 9/10
Some really really interesting papers and concepts were discussed.
Overall - 8/10
Hope I HD and have a hope of getting into Honours

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 Gender Studies (GCST)

GCST2601 - Introducing Media and Culture

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
The lectures and readings were fine. The assessments, however, were irritating. Instead of doing a
nice and obvious essay, they make you do slightly off centre tasks like annotated bibliographies and
journal reviews which nobody knows how to do properly (including the tutors). You also have to do in
class writing exercises every lecture.
Lecturer: 5.5/10 (Kath Albury)
Kath Albury is a good speaker, but she tends to be quite patronising, and she isn't great at explaining
the more technical aspects of the course (especially semiotics).
Interest: 4/10
This might seem like a fun course, but it really isn't. Readings and lectures are dull and everything felt
like a rehash of what had already been taught in 1st year sociology.
Overall: 5.5/10
Eh.

GCST3601 - Gender, Race and Australian Identities

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 6.5/10
I always find GCST subjects a little bit difficult - a lot of waffling and painful navel gazing is
required. The earlier readings looking at postcolonial theory, critical whiteness studies and writing
whiteness are quite difficult, and the lectures did not always clarify the problems. Assessments were a
2500wd journal, a 2000wd essay and class participation.
Lecturers: 6/10
We had two lecturers for this course, Ann Deslandes and Adam...Something. Both were OK - but
tended to speak very quickly, making it difficult to make notes. Sometimes the lectures seemed a little
haphazard, other times complex ideas were introduced and not explained clearly.

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Interest: 6/10
I was a little put off by the first half of the course, which is v. theoretical, navel gazing and boring.
However, the latter weeks were orientated around more substantive subject matter - such as the War
on Terror, the NT Intervention, the Stolen Generations and two fictional texts. Readings ranged from
the boring to the fascinating.
Overall: 6/10
I probably wouldn't have done this course if I had the chance to choose again

Government and International Relations (GOVT)

GOVT1406 - International Business and Politics

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 5/10
3 assessments in 5 weeks!!! - also marks very harshly
Lecturer: 7/10
Interest: 5.5/10
Overall: 4/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 8/10
Lecturer - 5/10
Darryl Dickhead Jarvis
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 7/10

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 5/10
Lots of reading if you get an anal tutor, like 200 pages per week
Lecturer - 4/10
You either like his ego, or you don't. i did -penalised him for doing less than half of the lectures. guest
lecturers suck.
Interest - 0/10
Overall - 2/10

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 History (HSTY)

HSTY1022 - Europe in the High Middle Ages

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 7/10
Not simple, nor is it overly hard. Solid in its workload, but you can easily not do any readings except
the one your tute presentation is on for the entire semester, and that’s what I did and still sounded
intellectual in tutorial discussions. Essays are short and straight forward, get some books from the
library and you are set.
Lecturer: 6/10
It's hard for me to judge Pryor as I gave up on lectures after 2 weeks just cause I cbf, no other reason
really. I suppose if he was more engaging I would have rocked up.
Interest: 8/10
I love religious history, ESPECIALLY in the middle ages, which made this course extremely
intriguing for me. The good part is I could just ignore all the other shit and concentrate on those
aspects of the course that I enjoyed.
Overall: 6/10
Solid course, interesting and yeah shame it is being scrapped, which I had no idea about, probably
because it was mentioned in a lecturer that I wasn't at.

Unknown Date
Ease - 9.5/10
Lecturers - 8/10
Interest - 8/10
Overall - 8.5/10
If you can write essays you can win this subject

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 HSTY1088 - Australian History: An Introduction

Semester 2 2007
Ease: 8.5/10
Content-wise, there was nothing that was much of a stretch, although some weeks there was a ton of
reading. (The 'Debating the Bush' tute in particular: there was a massive article about Tom Roberts'
painting Shearing the Rams as well as quite a lot of other stuff, and most people in my tute struggled
to get through it all.) In terms of assessment, the load was pretty average. There was a 500-word
source analysis type thing, which I thought asked us to do a bit too much given the word limit, but it
wasn't really that much of a problem. Other than that, hand-in assessment consisted of a 2000-word
essay, for which there were a lot of questions to choose from (17, to be precise) and handy reading
lists. The exam also seemed fair to me, with a decent balance between broad sweeping themes and
more specific topical areas. Overall, it was about average difficulty for a junior arts course.
Lecturer: 8.5/10 (James Curran)
James really knows his stuff, particularly about national identity and politics (which was his PhD
topic). I felt his lectures were very strong on conceptual issues like identity, national legends, legacies
of colonialism and so on which formed the basis of the course, although he was a bit weak on
providing chronological/narrative background in some lectures. This was a problem because a lot of
people (tons of American exchange students in this course, for some reason) hadn't studied Australian
history before, and no one had studied Australian history before federation, which isn't covered in the
School Certificate course. James also sometimes rushed through stuff - the lecture on Eureka was a
standout in this regard - and there was no WebCT, which meant no recordings or slides to go back to
if you missed it the first time. Those criticisms aside, James is an excellent lecturer and I'd fully
recommend seeking out his other subjects.
Interest: 9/10
The course focused on Australian identity and it how it was imagined and transformed over the period
from the mid-eighteenth century to the present day. This sounds like typical arts wankery, and in a
sense it is, but I found it really fascinating - my particular favourite, which came up again and again,
was the bush legend, the idea that Lawson, Paterson and co.'s disaffection with city life led them to
idealise the bush in their work, and that this led to the idealisation of so-called bush values like
mateship, the fair go, contempt for authority and so on, which still form a key part of 'Australianness',
as well as creating the idea that the 'bushman' is the archetypal Australian despite Australia being a
primarily urban country. I think this sort of thing is fascinating, which is the primary reason I enjoyed
the course so much. I can imagine that people who didn't find this as interesting as I did would rate
the course lower. Other important areas in the course were the White Australia Policy (both
immigration and Aboriginal aspects), the ANZAC legend, Australia as a 'workingman's paradise' and
a 'social laboratory', and how Australian identity is constructed and imagined today. I found all of this
stuff really interesting as well.
Overall: 9/10
This course gave me a new perspective on Australian history and on modern Australia which has
made me more appreciative of the country, which is probably a good thing. I'm now more interested
in studying Australian history and am strongly considering changing my major from ANHS to HSTY
in order to do it at honours level. Really good course, strongly recommended. (Shame they're
cancelling it and replacing it with an entirely new course as of next year.)

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7.5/10
There isn't anything especially difficult about this course. Some of the readings are a little dense, but
mostly the content is easy to understand. I thought the question they gave us for the essay was tricky
though.
Lecturer: 6.5/10
I like Penny - but in a lot of her lectures she planned to say too much, and so she'd have to fit the last
half of the lecture into 10 minutes.

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Interest: 6.5/10
I was expecting this course to be very very dull, but it was actually fairly interesting. The topics and
ideas covered in the lectures and tutorials were mostly entertaining, although there were some weeks
that were just painful.

HSTY2601 - Religion and Society - Conversion and Culture

Unknown Date
Ease: 6/10
There's very little in the way of assessment for this course. The essay is worth 50%, the take home is
worth 40% and tute participation makes up the rest. The essay was okay, but choose your topic
carefully - there are a lot of very obscure questions and not a whole lot of material/sources to study
from. The take home exam seemed to be easy until you actually picked it up. I didn't think it was
possible for there to be so many obscure questions in one paper, but it is a really narrow field of study.
In a word, difficult. I'll allow for slightly higher marks in this category simply because I missed half a
semester out of illness, so undoubtedly it was more difficult for me because I couldn't attend a fair
chunk of it.
Lecturers: 5.66/10 (Lyn Olson 9/10, Ahmad Shboul 5/10, Chris Hartney 3/10)
This course is split into three sections. Lyn Olson takes the first section on Medieval Christianity,
which was my favourite section of the course and the whole reason I persevered with it. As seen in
both my previous reviews of Lyn's subjects, I love her lecturing style and find her to be rather
fascinating. Ahmad did the next section, on Islam, and due to illness I missed most of these. The few I
went to, I found him to be interesting if rather quiet, and he does have a rather heavy accent. The
PowerPoints he puts up are a big help. Chris Hartney does a section on Chinese Buddhism and I
found this to be entirely dull. He rambles, puts up no PowerPoints or anything, and strays from the
topic quite a bit. I gave up on his lectures after the first couple.
Interest: 6/10
I did this course for two reasons: I'm interested in church history and Lyn Olson was lecturing. That
proved to be insufficient for this course to gain good marks. In fact, I'm giving it higher marks than it
deserves simply because I enjoyed her section. I'm not interested in either Islamic or Buddhist history,
to be honest. Islamic history I could deal with because Ahmad Shboul was concise and got to the
point, but the Buddhist section was intolerable. Aside from the fact that Chris Hartney waffles, I could
barely keep up with the stream of Chinese religious figures, and what was said in lectures had very
little relevance to anything at all. I found that part of the course entirely devoid of anything
interesting, though I tried. The closest thing I got to something that piqued my curiosity was seeing
the word 'Draco' nestled somewhere in the notes a friend passed onto me for this section of the course.
Overall: 4/10
If you like thematic courses with a lot of obscure content, this will be wonderful for you. I advise
most sane people to steer clear. Veridis got it right when he called it a 'wanky thematic course' in
another thread. I wanted so much to like it but I just couldn't. The course is piecemeal and has no clear
thread running through it; there are very few resources and it really just overall wasn't what I expected
it to be. Also - WEBCT, people! That would make things so much easier!

HSTY2655 - Race Relations and Australian Frontiers

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
Being a person who is not historically minded, I didn't find the material in this unit too challenging.
Maybe this is because we're only looking at one aspect of Australian history, rather than Aussie
history as a whole. The focussed nature of this unit gave it a common theme (duh) with which to link
all of the lectures, tutes and readings. The assessment was pretty straightforward, with the standard
essay and tute paper, with no nasty surprises in the take-home exam.

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Lecturer: 7/10
Kirsten was pretty cool. She is one of those lecturers who gets annoyed with people who show up late,
but to make up for this she showed a bit of CNNNN in one of the lectures, and the information is
presented in a straightforward manner.
Interest: 5/10
I'm not particularly interested in Australian history, but I skipped surprisingly few lectures for this one
because it was presented in a comprehendible manner, and was made interesting and relevant. The
only reason I didn't score this higher is because of my general lack of interest in history, Australian or
otherwise.
Overall: 7/10
Can't complain. Was easy enough, and there weren't any nasty surprises.

HSTY2678 - Race Around the World

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
This course is fairly straightforward. The subject matter revolves around placing Australian race
relations in an international context - which might sound a bit strange and obscure, but its fine. The
main difficulty I had with the course was that some of the readings were quite dull and long - creating
some concentration problems. Assessments were a 2500 word draft essay, and then a major
assignment that was based upon your draft. For this, you could chose to do a 10 minute speech, a
3000 word essay, an opinion piece, a documentary or a website. The last assessment was a 1500w
reflection on the course, as well as a tute participation mark.
Lecturers: 7/10 (Kirsten McKenzie, Penny Russell)
We had two lecturers for this course. Kirsten McKenzie is definitely a high quality history lecturer.
She structures her presentations well, chooses interesting subject matter and communicates clearly.
Penny Russell is not quite as good. She tends to ramble a fair bit, and tries to put too much content
into her lectures so that she races in the last 10minutes and makes it difficult to concentrate.
Interest: 6/10
There were some really interesting weeks at the start of the course - especially looking at performing
savages, early intercultural encounters and the history of race science. But I found the last half of the
course - which focuses more on Indigenous political activism - to be fairly uninteresting. As
mentioned above, readings could be a little bit dull.
Overall: 7/10
A pretty good course.

HSTY2765 - A House Divided: The American Civil War

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 8/10
Clear, well-structured course. 10% on essay preparation and 40% on the actual 2000 word essay, 35%
on a take-home essay and the rest on tutorial participation. There were a lot of options for essay topics
on each assessment, though still some competition for non-reserve resources. Marking was also quite
generous, but tutorial readings were a bit heavy.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Frances Clarke)
Frances Clarke was a great lecturer, with real enthusiasm for the subject, effectively simplifying and
bringing together all of the social, technological and political aspects of the conflict. Lectures were
also recorded, which was helpful.
Interest: 7/10
The unit was evenly divided between the antebellum, war, and Reconstruction periods, really seeming
to provide the big-picture. Rather than memorizing battle-dates and military figures the unit focused
much more on social and political changes, and illustrating the different kinds of war being fought by

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the different actors, whether politicians, soldiers, blacks, women and those on the home-front,
providing a lot of variety. The Reconstruction section was particularly interesting, leaving the
narrative on a much more negative note than expected. There was also a revealing discussion on Civil
War memory, and the way the event has been manipulated and re-imagined for different purposes in
the popular imagination.
Overall: 8/10
A very good course. Well organized, great lectures, with assessments evenly spaced throughout the
semester. Perfectly fine choice even if you have no background in American history.

Industrial Relations and Human Resource

Management (WORK)

WORK1001 - Foundations of Industrial Relations

Semester 1 2005
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 10/10
Interest: 7.5/10
Overall: 8.5/10
Great lecturer. Hilarious

WORK1002 - Foundations of Human Resource Management

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 8/10
Lecturer: 7.5/10
Interest: 6/10
Overall: 7/10

Law (LAWS)
LAWS3403 - Advanced Corporate Law

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Semester 1 2010
Ease: 9/10
Lecturer is extremely laid back and doesn't record attendance. If you do attend class, you don't need to
worry about the content (no need for typing it down) - all assessments are entirely research based and
have an extremely narrow focus. You can choose from A) Presentation and short summary (100%) OR
B) Research essay (8000 words) (100%) OR C) Take-home exam (4500 words total) (100%).
Lecturer: 9/10 (Saul Fridman)
Interest: 9/10
Overall: 9/10

Linguistics (LNGS)

LNGS1005 - Structure of English

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
I felt the concepts in this unit were easier to grasp than the similar ones in ENGL1007, but my marks
weren't as good. Go figure. The assessment in this unit is non-stop: there's no single high-pressure
tasks, but the continual work is a pain.
Lecturer: 2/10 (Ahmar Mahboob)
10 minutes into the first lecture, I realised that Dr. Ahmar Mahboob's lecturing style would make for a
long, long semester. He moves terribly slowly through simple concepts, and expects you to
immediately understand the higher-end theories to which he's dedicated mere seconds of a lecture.
Several lectures went by without him mentioning anything that seemed relevant to the unit at all. And
his communication skills are terrible - often, related material for assessment tasks would be placed in
some teeny nook or cranny of WebCT, a couple of days before the task was due...never mind the week
that had already passed since the assessment was handed out. I may be a nerd, but these are the only
lectures I walked out of this semester - on repeated occasions.
Interest: 5/10
The mark I'm giving here for 'Interest' is partially saved from the lowly clutches of the lecturer by the
contributions of Peter and Namali, the seminar leader and tutor respectively. The tutes were
sometimes irrelevant and basic, but the seminars were generally enlightening. Shame about the
lectures.
Overall: 5/10
You could take this unit and achieve reasonable marks, but don't expect an exciting semester. In fact,
you could miss most of the lectures, just attend the seminars and tutes, and get the same results you
would have done anyway. But a better idea? Do something else. NB: I understand this subject isn't

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being offered for the next couple of years. I can't say I'm surprised. But for those of you who are
offered this subject when it returns - if Dr. Mahboob is still the coordinator, steer clear!

Marketing (MKTG)

MKTG1002 - Marketing Research

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 8/10
But you'll have to do a harder course combining 1002 and 3001
Lecturer: 7/10
A bit quiet but a top bloke
Interest: 6/10
Overall: 6.5/10

MKTG2010 - Marketing Channels and Logistics

Semester 1 2008
I really like the lecturer's way of teaching.. makes the lectures so lively. Not hard to do well in your
group assignment unless you're unlucky and/or too lazy.

Semester 1 2007
Ease: 8/10
Don't ask me why but I did this module in my first semester in first year (which was 1 year ago). Got
a distinction so I think the grading is rather lenient. Textbook is rather dry but the mid semester and

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exam only covered basic knowledge and basic marketing concepts. If you have a strong marketing
background you will surely score for this.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Charles Areni)
Lecturer was Charles Areni who was rather I felt was rather good at presenting the lecture. However I
stopped attending lectures half way cos the timings were just inconvenient for me. Charles does give
obvious hints about his pet topics to be tested in his exams though, might be worthwhile to attend.
Interest: 7/10
Interesting marketing module considering I haven't been in any before. Text was rather boring and
content taught in too theoretical in nature but may useful if applied in real situations.
Overall: 7.5/10
Group projects once again kind of luck of the draw sometimes. Made new friends and we worked
together to putting up a decent presentation. Overall, there was only 1 tutor for all the
classes and he kind of just facilitated discussion rather than provided real answers, so everything is up
to the you or the quality of the tutorial group. I took this module because it was a core for my B.Com
till they changed it to MKTG1000 this year.

Mathematics (MATH)
MATH1904 - Discrete Mathematics (Advanced)

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 10/10
Lecturer: 9/10 (Bill Palmer)
Interest: 10/10
Overall: 10/10
Ridiculously simple concepts of the course. Personally every mark lost was due to silly calculation
errors rather than any unknowns. While not a step above the rest like Easdown, Palmer is up there
with some of the best lecturers.

Pharmacy (PHAR)
PHAR4618 - Integrated Pharmacy Practice

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 6/10
It's a lot of work to do during semester. Even though giving a presentation every second week sounds
easier than every week (which it is), it's still very stressful. They give you the case on Wed or Thurs,
depending which slot you're in, and you present on the Mon or Tues. It's stressful preparing for exams
because you have to know everything about the disease state, i.e. causes, symptoms, pathology,

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pathophysiology, treatment, and any associated issues. Though it is easier with it being open book.
But it is a lot of preparation, that's what I'm saying.
Lecturers: 6/10
All guest lecturers, so can't really comment. But Adam Wardell, if you get him, is so completely
hyperactive and over the top, you'll be well entertained during the lectures but won't learn a thing.
You'll fall asleep with Rebecca Roubin lecturing--she reads straight off the lecture notes (btw, she's a
regular--watch out for her in medicinal chemistry).
Interest: 4/10
Oh, some topics were new and refreshing, e.g. HIV, paediatrics. But then, it's so boring and irrelevant.
You are basically expected to diagnose what conditions the person has, i.e. they shove a set of
symptoms at you and we literally have to play doctor and work out what condition(s) the person's got.
We're training to be pharmacists, not doctors. Also, interest is a matter of who you get as your PBL
tutor. Mine was EXCELLENT--she was passionate about the profession and always managed to relate
what we're learning to real life, but I know others haven't been as fortunate.
Overall: 5/10
I agree what they're teaching is relevant, but they're teaching it in an irrelevant way. Like I said, I have
a major gripe with playing Dr (though I think all the med wannabes would love it).
P.S. This is only for the PBL and clinical chemistry part. Placement was good, but again, that depends
on your preceptor and some people haven't been as fortunate. I was fortunate enough to be offered
casual work by both placements this semester, and additionally, I was mentored by the methadone
liaison officer at the Guild in my second placement, (he was working there as one of the regular
casuals) and, having practiced as a pharmacist for many years and percepted as many students, he was
very insightful and very entertaining too!

PHAR4819 - Drug Development and New Drug Technologies

Semester 1 2009
Ease: 7/10
The quizzes are gay. Making you stare at a screen for 2 hours reading a slab of text that's too boring to
be absorbed and then testing you at the end with a 10% quiz. So depending on how good your
working memory is (mine isn't!), could be easy. Only 12 lectures to study for exams, compared to the
usual 39 or so for PSPC and PCOL, and which are much more heavily loaded per lecture, so that was
easy cruising during stuvac time. Exam was tricky, Rebecca Roubin's questions were hard! (which
reminds me, pharmers in the years below, she delights in being hard)
Lecturers: 5/10 (Mary Collins, Rebecca Roubin)
Mary Collins wasn't bad, Rebecca Roubin made a good effort, but the rest were either forgettable or
sleep inducing (and often both). In fact, they're all the medicinal chemistry lecturers, so don't expect
the lecturing to be any different.
Interest: 5/10
It's really boring, but I rate it better than pharm prac because I intrinsically like genetics, biochemistry,
microbiology, that sort of thing. Most of my procrastinating during studying came from clicking on
tangent links on Wiki. However, the way it is taught, again, it's so boring, and it is irrelevant. It's
definitely a filler subject for the non-Hons kids, and seems to be an afterthought of first year bio
(possibly MBLG? since we didn't do that) which I hope for the 1st and 2nd years' sake they never
have to do.
Overall: 6/10

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 Philosophy (PHIL)

PHIL1010 - Society, Knowledge and Reason

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 6/10 (Society 8/10, Knowledge 4/10)
Society is 8/10, becomes so when the readings are done, and one learns how to write a Philosophy
paper, which I never realised, but thankfully discovered, was a cinch compared what I was used in the
social sciences - complete bullshitting, but with close reference to the text, and only to the text. It's all
about rhetoric rather than research.
Lecturer: 6.5/10 (Duncan Ivison 7/10, Anne Newstead 6/10)
Duncan Ivison (Society) sometimes went around in circles, but only to hammer the content into our
heads.
Anne Newstead (Knowledge), like Ivison, another Canadian (what is it with Canadians and
philosophy?). Rarely covered all the slides in lectures, constantly 'ums', but gets the job done I
suppose (meh). Then again, she didn't have a lot to work with.
Important - For tutes, make sure you get Patrick Yong. Avoid Simon Duffy like the plague.
Interest: 5.5/10 (Society 9/10, Knowledge 2/10)
Couldn't get enough of society. Introduces ideas used heaps elsewhere. Knowledge was enough to
induce self-harm during Stuvac, since going through the readings is self-harm in itself.
Overall: 6/10
Would be heaps higher if it was Society alone.

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Semester 2 2005
Ease: 8/10
Lecturers: 6.66/10 (Tim Rayner 8/10, Nick Smith 3/10, Stu 9/10)
Interest: 5/10
Taking into account Knowledge, otherwise, 9/10
Overall: 6/10
Taking into account Knowledge, otherwise it’s a 9/10 So again, this course is another cheese plate of
philosophy, essentially covering Political Philosophy,
Epistemology and basic Logic. For myself, personally, Epistemology was about as interesting as
watching grass grow, so if you factor in MY own personal bias (which is that I love politics and
everything about it) you can see that my opinion of the course may be just slightly screwed.
Tim Rayner was not exactly the most fabulous lecturer I ever had, but he was good enough to keep
me doing the subject into second year. He was a clear, concise and informative speaker and for
someone like myself, doing a government degree, this section of this UOS was EXTREMELY
helpful in providing a solid foundation for a deeper understanding of my area of expertise. The essay
for this topic is again, worth 40% (including the plan) so paying a little attention is advisable
Nick Smith was BORING. I mean, really boring. He wasn’t engaging and, as a typical academic,
laughed at his own jokes, which left the rest of the lecture hall going “huh?!” Unfortunately, unlike
Aesthetics, this section was harder to bullshit in the exam so it’s a choice between two evils - sitting
through boring as all buggery lectures or doing boring as all buggery reading. The choice is yours.
Stu and the Reason section was great. Stu was funny and engaging and the humour he tried to inject
into lectures (no matter how cheap/cheesy) made an otherwise dry topic rather enjoyable. The section
deals primarily with the structure of an argument, fallacies etc. so it is very very useful, especially
when trying to deal with people like waf or Phanatical on these forums

Plant Science (PLNT)

PLNT2003 - Plant Form and Function

Semester 2 2011
Ease: 7/10
Interset: 1/10
Overall: 2/10

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 Political Economy (ECOP)

ECOP1002 - Economy and Policy

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 8/10
I found most of the course pretty easy, despite not having done ECOP1001. Assessments were good, a
mini-essay, an essay, tute participation and a 90 minute exam. The exam was good, just had to pick 2
essays from a list of 7, and we got the essay topics in the last lecture
Lecturer: 8/10 (Damien Cahill)
I thought Damien was really good, he explains everything very well, and gives good lecture notes.
Not the most engaging lecturer, but still very good. Also had two guest lecturers, one of which was
pretty good (Evan), and one was great (Dick)
Interest: 9/10
I found almost all topics interesting, and the assessment structure basically means you can ignore the
ones you don't like. Tute discussions were very interesting
Overall: 9/10
I really enjoyed it, highly recommended

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Semester 2 2006
Ease: 5/10
The actual content isn't difficult to understand, but the course is so dry that it is difficult to concentrate
on the lectures - and I don't think _anybody_ could put themselves through using the reading bricks.
The assessment tasks were fairly standard.
Lecturer: 5/10
I actually didn't find Gabrielle to be the Nazi-feminist everybody thinks she is...I quite liked her, but
her lectures are very dull. Half the time she is just explaining graphs and tables. Too much description
and not enough analysis.
Interest: 3/10
I really loved ECOP1001 - which is an introduction to the economic theories, but ECOP1002 is more
of a practical 'What is actually happening in the Australian economy' course. Very difficult to be
interested in this subject - and I really didn't learn anything this semester that I didn't already know
from studying HSC Economics or ECOP1001.
Overall: 4/10
Very disappointing

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 7/10
I beg to differ with previous posts - though somewhat mundane, all we really had to do was analyse
statistics and data in light of its socio-economic context, then arrive at the oh so shocking conclusion
about the interconnectedness of the state, market and family. By simply taking a typically leftist,
critical stance, it was hard to go wrong, and easier to bullshit in tutes (for me anyway). Results
pending, points are nonetheless lost because of the incredibly demanding exam - too much to write in
so little time and space, and the topics tested in '06 bucked the trend for once and threw everyone off.
Personal exam performance could change my opinion.
Lecturer: 6.5/10
Gabrielle Meagher - condescending, demanding and hoarse-voiced, but means well and knows her
stuff. Her asides may not compare to Frank Stilwell's, but she tries. And yes, some stats are
surprisingly outdated, but she explains why (this doesn't necessarily suffice though for some). A
coffee will do wonders for one's attention span.
Interest: 6/10
ECOP1002 is hardcore, gritty, real-life economics - but doesn't really live up to the excitement of this
character description. In practice, this is where the dryness of economics glaringly shines through, and
does put off a lot of people. I personally feel a lot more enlightened when it comes to economic
issues, but also feel that I've become duller and more boring as a man.
Overall: 6.5/10
Nothing spectacular, just a simple course for ECOP kids to go through the motions, but essential for
future progress nevertheless.

Semester 2 2005
Ease: 5/10
Lecturer: 3/10
Interest: 3/10
Overall: 4/10
Gabrielle Meagher (who was the acting Chair of Department) wins my award for driest, most boring
first year lecturer. In contrast to Frank, there is such a difference between their lecture styles. Most
annoyingly, I found that Dr. Meagher treated us like 4 year olds, insisting upon absolute silence,
attention etc. in her lectures. I mean, okay, most students will accord you that manners anyway, but
she was tough on enforcement and, more annoyingly, difficult to listen to.
Again, Dr. Meagher’s bias lies with feminist political economy (her area of speciality) in particular,
how oppressed and down-trodden women in Australia are (yes, hear the sarcasm dripping from my
voice). Watch out for this in her lectures.

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Speaking of lectures, each week was like a lets-see-if-I-can-beat-last-weeks-record-for-the-number-
of-transparencies-I-can-put-up. It was, ridiculous. Tables and charts flowed freely, but unlike wine,
there was not much fun had by all. If the situation can get more ridiculous, the statistics used in these
lectures are mostly from around 1993, which is pathetic at tertiary level. When you consider HSC
Economics textbooks are updated 4 times a year, you would expect that a research Professor such as
Dr. Meagher could at least make new slides for the new millennium. Apparently this isn’t the case.
The course was difficult only because turning up to and staying away in lectures was difficult. For
someone like me, who is lazy and doesn’t do readings, the reader brick we had to purchase made a
nice paperweight for all the help it was.
The redeeming factor for this course was my excellent tutor, Anna Samson, who at least tried to apply
relevance to the material we were learning in lectures to current political and economic events.

ECOP1004 - Economy and Society

Semester 2 2009
Ease: 8.5/10
If you’ve done ECOP1001, this won’t be difficult at all. It draws upon a Neoclassical understanding
of the economy, while looking at the interrelationship of economy and many other social components
(institutions, class, gender etc.). The size of the readings were actually shockingly small, however this
was the first year that this unit has ever been offered so, it was probably a test-run – future classes of
ECOP1004 probably won’t have this luxury.
Lecturer: 9/10 (Damien Cahill)
Damien Cahill was a very nice guy who was quite passionate about teaching his students – he’d
always have Youtube videos ready to demonstrate what he was talking about, used group exercises
sometimes to break up the pattern of boring, typical lectures and was always ready to talk to students
if they needed help.
Interest: 7/10
Some weeks had interesting topics, but some were quite dull for me – i.e. Australian Labour Markets,
Emissions Trading etc.
Overall: 8/10
Not much to complain about here – good lecturer, easy readings and digestible amounts of lecture
content.

ECOP3018 - Economic Policy

Semester 1 2008
Ease: 6/10
The material seemed straight-forward enough, but the marking criteria standards were a little unclear.
There was a group essay worth 30% (unlike in 2007 under Frank), a 2500-3000 final essay (35%), a
final exam worth 30%, and only 5% of 'bonus' marks for voluntary post-lecture discussions (in lieu of
a tute participation mark). Exam topics were given beforehand, but the marking standards were
perhaps more stringent because of this. It was a really small cohort of less than 30.
Lecturer: 6.5/10 (Evan Jones)
Evan Jones (who came out of retirement to cover for Frank Stilwell, who was inundated with work
from the doubling of enrolments in ECOP1001). Evan is quite a character, full of vitriol and always
explicit about his bias. This got a little tiresome at times, but the man was genuinely concerned for
people's intellectual welfare, and took the time to write up comprehensive lecture notes and
discussions. To the more conservative, I wouldn't say that he shoved his views down our throats (edit:
but if he sensed you may feel this way, he'd announced whenever he was giving his opinion). But he
nonetheless encouraged one to be more discerning with theories (both inside and outside the course).
Interest: 7/10
In true ECOP form, lectures and reading material were a mixture of post-war Australian economic

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history, sociology and politics. Several were a bit of a drone. There were no compulsory tutorials, but
rather post-lecture group discussions that often meandered through awkward bouts of silence and
confusion, or random, less relevant tangents (for instance, private, religious schools vs public secular
education in the week on Privatisation). This was owing to a disconnect from the prescribed readings
(which were rarely referred to in discussions), and perhaps a lack of direction from the lecturer
himself. These discussions only began midway through the course - the first half was devoted to
group work, where groups could remain in the lecture room and discuss projects, or "work elsewhere"
at their discretion.
Overall 7/10
Had high expectations, but finished the course feeling a little disappointed, and feel like I should
probably lower it to 6.5/10. Also, I was doing another ECOP course which covered some more
fundamental topics in a lot more depth (and caused the other 'pass' ECOP courses to pale a little, in
comparison). I guess it's like sliced white bread, it's 'Economic Policy' after all.

Socio-Legal Studies (SLSS)

SLSS1002 - Law as a Language, Culture and Performance

Semester 2 2006
Ease: 9/10
It's easy...don't need to attend lectures...tutorials are a complete waste of time cause the assessments
and tutorials don't even overlap. There's no exam just two HUGE essays. Which are also easy, just got
to do the reading.
Lecturer: 3/10
Omg...just crap! Lectures and Rebecca are just boring; with nothing you don't already know. Only
thing interesting/weird is when she mentions her beloved Buffy and how she's a huge fan...other than
that don't bother with lectures.
Interest: 3/10
It’s boring. Tutorials 'can' make the subject interesting when/if people debate.
Overall: 4/10
Only did the subject because it was mandatory...otherwise would never do it or recommend doing it.

Semester 2 2005
Ease 7/10
Lecturer: 7.5/10

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Interest: 6.5/10
Overall: 6.5/10

Sociology (SCLG)

SCLG3601 - Contemporary Sociological Theory

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 7/10
This is probably one of the harder SCLG units (which for most people probably isn't that hard). The
readings we did on the sociology of space and affect were v. abstract, although other readings were
fine. Assessments were a 4000wd essay, a 1500wd literature review and class participation.
Lecturer: 8/10 (Melinda Cooper)
I like Melinda Cooper. She's not the most amazingly entertaining lecturer in the world, but she
definitely knows her stuff, and she usually manages to make her courses interesting. The seminars for
this course are timetabled as being 3 hrs long, however most went for about 2 hrs.
Interest: 8.5/10
The course was structured around a sociological approach to neoliberalism. We spent early weeks
looking at the neoliberal subjectivity, the sociology of labour, religious revival and the sociology of
migration. The latter part of the course moved away from the focus on political economy - looking at
the intersection between race and gender and the sociology of space and affect. I found this course
very interesting - both readings and lectures were thought provoking and well structured.
Overall: 8/10

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Well worth doing

SCLG3602 - Empirical Sociological Methods

Semester 2 2008
Ease: 5.5/10
Apparently the marks that have been given back have been quite low c/f other SCLG subjects. There
is a fair bit of emphasis upon the philosophy of research in this course (epistemology, ontology,
methodology), which some people found quite challenging. Assessments are a group work interview
exercise, a research proposal speech and essay, and class participation.
Lecturer: 7/10 (Fran Collyer)
Fran Collyer has a good grasp of the methods literature in SCLG. She has a slightly vague and
confused aura, but she is generally well read and capable of explaining complicated ideas clearly. She
was, however, not the best at the organisational side of things - a WebCT site would have made the
group work task a lot easier.
Interest: 6/10
For a research methods course, this wasn't too bad. This subject had two primary aims - to give
students experience at qualitative interviewing and writing research proposals. These were quite
useful in terms of giving us an idea of what real live sociologists actually do. However, the lectures
and the readings were not particularly inspiring.
Overall: 6/10
Not too bad. Compulsory for SCLG honours students

Software Technology (SOFT)

SOFT1001 - Software Development 1

Semester 1 2005
Ease - 9/10
Though only if you actually pay attention. if you don't, especially at the start, obviously you will
struggle. duh. do it only if u actually want to
Lecturer - 7/10
Interest - 7/10
Overall - 7.5/10

SOFT1902 - Software Development 2 (Advanced)

Semester 2 2005
Ease - 4/10

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Workload = immense
Lecturer - 7/10
Interest - 6/10
Began to wane, maybe because of the workload
Overall - 7/10

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