<p>Hello everyone,</p>
<p>I’m currently a sophomore at Penn State, and I’m considering taking an online substitute for Ordinary and Partial Differential Equations (MATH 286 at Illinois Urbana-Champaign in place of MATH 251, to be precise). Taking it over the summer would really lend some flexibility to my fall schedule. Nonetheless, as a prospective chemical engineer, this course is somewhat foundational for my future classes, and I don’t have the money to take it twice. </p>
<p>I would say that I’m a fairly driven student (Honors College, etc.) and would love to hear whether any of your kids had any similar experiences. It’s one thing to take a gen-ed online, but what are your thoughts on an advanced mathematics course? Yay or nay? Your time and thoughts are much appreciated.</p>
<p>Our son took 241 (Calculus III) and 415 (Linear Algebra) via NetMath at UIUC. Back then you had to purchase or rent a Mathematica license and install it on a local machine. It appears that they have changed things so that you run the courseware in an online environment with Mathematica.</p>
<p>Our son found the courses challenging and a fair amount of work. The courseware modules cover far more than the course itself so you can explore lots of other topics if you wish. One thing you will need to learn (if you haven’t already done so) is how to program in Mathematica. If you already have a programming background, it shouldn’t be difficult - they have an introduction to programming in it. If you don’t have any programming experience, then it can be a little harder coming up to speed on the courseware and how you answer homework questions.</p>
<p>You will need a proctoring arrangement. We used our local library. Some local libraries will provide this service free of charge. Some colleges provide this service too though I don’t know if you are local to your college in the summer.</p>
<p>Save all of the username/password stuff that you will get as you will need it in the future to get transcripts and deal with any administrative stuff. They might also want to see your current college transcripts to ensure that you have the prereqs to take the course.</p>
<p>They use peer tutors to answer questions. Our experience back then was that it would take one to three days to get a question answered. Suffolk University also offers variants of these courses online but they charge twice as much as you have a professor answering student questions and they’re a private university.</p>
<p>I think that their program is well-done but you have to be self-motivated to do the work with nobody pushing you and no classes to attend. Also, make sure that your school will accept the credits ahead of time. Our son’s university did accept them but nobody had transferred in credits from UIUC before so it took them a little time to examine the program before adding it to their transfer matrix.</p>
<p>And please do remember that for the rest of your life whenever you apply for a job that requires all of your academic records, or for admission to a degree program at an accredited college or university in the US, you will have to request an official copy of your transcript for this one course from UI-UC. Lots of people forget that kind of thing.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies. These are some facts I hadn’t considered.</p>