Professor Atkinson was great at making the material understandable and was very helpful in office hours. The material was very difficult, and a lot of students struggled in the class. He also assigned an excessive amount of homework. However, all of that being said, the class was really fun with a great teacher overall.

This class is a great deal of work (44 homework problems a week, 40 hard ones online, 4 easier ones written). Atkinson is pretty good at explanations, but his lectures consist of copying the book to the board, which just won't work for some students as a teaching method, but it's at least adequate for seeing the book translated into a more consumable form. There are 10 minute quizzes at the end of discussion each week. Discussions are an opportunity to get more comfortable with the material with better explanations of the concepts. The TA, Mark Schrecengost, was really good at explanations and very helpful. There are three tests, which consist of two midterms and a final. The final was much harder than the previous two midterms. If you keep up with the homework, which can take a great deal of time to complete, and make sure you're comfortable with the material each week, you will do well on the tests.