UNSW Math1131 or Math1141

[fkkiwi]

Hi all!

I'm tossing up between doing MATH1131 and MATH1141 at UNSW. I'm doing a Mechanical & Manufacturing Engineering degree combined with Computer Science.

I've been told from current students that for engineering, Math1141 isn't worth the extra effort and stress, but I've read online and the general consensus is that it seems to be worth it (scaling, etc...). I enjoy maths but I'm leaning more towards MATH1131 since I'd rather use the time to do activities in societies, do casual work or just do independent projects. I did Ext1 and Ext2 Maths for my HSC (scores are in my signature).

To anyone who's studying at UNSW and has done either course, what are your thoughts and is it worth it to do MATH1141, especially if it doesn't affect employment prospects?

Thanks!

[RuiAce]

Yeah. It's true that MATH1141 has pretty much zero influence on job prospects.

MATH1141 is designed to reward the students who are genuinely good at math for the sake of math, not just their ability to practice techniques (which is what high school maths mostly did). From what I've seen, MATH1141 gets rewarded with 'some' scaling, but MATH1131 is generally not scaled anywhere (up nor down). However MATH1131 does have a "cap" - for example, any mark above 91 is automatically brought back down to exactly 91.

The purpose for the cap is to provide incentive for those who should be doing 1141 to do it. Those that are really strong at math can do MATH1141, get brought up by scaling to marks like 87 and 93 (or for extremely talented students even 98 range), and essentially be well rewarded. Whereas those that do math purely because they're forced to can do 1131, perform adequately enough it, and not be dragged down by scaling and nor by a cap.

In your scenario, your marks suggest that you're capable of doing 1141, but I would not be able to predict how you'd go with it. If you want to go with the more relaxed option of 1131, nothing's really stopping you.

If you're completely unsure, you can do MATH1141, and then request with the head of first year maths studies to drop back down to MATH1131. Note that MATH1141 and MATH1131 sit the exact same assessment until the final exam, which is why this is possible. Of course, better give him an email first (Dr Jonathan Kress) to confirm this, but to my knowledge there's no problem with it.

[fkkiwi]

Hi Rui,

What are the most significant differences between MATH1131 and 1141? What makes the latter more demanding/time consuming/rewarding than the normal option?

Also, is 91 considered a HD?

[sweetiepi]

Hi Rui,

What are the most significant differences between MATH1131 and 1141? What makes the latter more demanding/time consuming/rewarding than the normal option?

Also, is 91 considered a HD?

I can't answer the MATH1141/1131 part of the question (I'm not Rui obviously), however yes 91 is considered a HD. At UNSW, a HD is considered as score of 85 or more.

[RuiAce]

Hi Rui,

What are the most significant differences between MATH1131 and 1141? What makes the latter more demanding/time consuming/rewarding than the normal option?

Also, is 91 considered a HD?

Content wise, to put it simply 1141 is much more theoretical and also introduces more advanced techniques.

Understanding mathematics from such a theoretical perspective is tough as is, and 1131 still need to do it to certain extents. I took 1151 (which is equivalent to 1141) and found myself rote learning things here and there, not truly understanding it until end of 2nd/start of 3rd year. The learning curve is pretty steep.

The more advanced computations sometimes also require understanding of more concepts in advance.

I’m not at home right now, but if you want to you can look at the MATH1131/41 course outline from last year (should be combined into one). Just search MATH1131, go into the corresponding UNSW maths webpage and open the PDF to see the exact differences.

How is it more satisfying though? Well as a rule of thumb, the harder the maths problems are that you can solve, the more accomplished you feel in the long run, a lot of gaps in my learning from high school got filled and things that didn’t made sense gradually did.