Harriet makes a difficult subject very straightforward. His in class demonstrations really help you learn the material. Homework and the tests are very fair. Lecture can be a little dull, but all lecture notes are posted online so it is easy to review later.
Harriot is a great professor. Although his lectures are rather unenthusiastic and monotone, they are interesting and helpful. He always talks about the historical context surrounding important discoveries and formulas, which really helps put things into perspective. If you have to take this course, I would definitely recommend taking it with Harriot. The workload: weekly homework assignments, two tests, and a final. The homework assignments were of very reasonable length—they usually took 3-5 hours, and the grading was very generous. The first test wasn’t too bad; the average was an 86. The second test was terrible; the average was 65 (Harriot did mention in class that he didn’t intend to make the test that difficult, so I wouldn’t expect the average to be that low for future classes). The final was reasonable; Harriot didn’t announce the average, but I’d guess it was somewhere in the 80s. All in all, a pretty reasonable grading scheme. This was a difficult course, but not ridiculously so . . .
Note that this was Harriott's 1st semester teaching EMF, so things were sometimes a little disjointed. Grades were based on HW, 2 tests, and a final. Harriott is pretty good at making the topics interesting even though the course is very math heavy. His asides about the history of electricity and magnetism keep the class bearable despite the dry material. The topics covered in this class are very difficult, but it is part of the core EE curriculum: I wouldn't recommend for non-ECE students.
Harriott is one of my favorite professors in the department. There is no extra fluff in his class, he teaches you what you need to know and why it's important in a very straightforward manner. The homeworks are all very doable and not particularly time consuming, though going to office hours helps a lot. The tests are all pretty fair and not too bad if you study, though it seemed like the second test was way harder than the first. Also, our TA was super helpful (Mikiyas is the man), so hopefully he sticks with his precedent of selecting great TA's.
While Professor Harriott is not the most engaging lecturer (he speaks in monotone), he isn't a difficult professor. He is very open to helping you out.
