MATH464 | PlanetTerp

Information	Review
Andrew Lawrie MATH464 Expecting a B- Anonymous 12/12/2025	ANDREW LAWRIE: The content of this course is difficult, but it isn’t bad when you put in the effort and study. Dr. Lawrie makes this course more enjoyable and less of a nightmare than other profs, and it’s his first semester teaching at UMD! LECTURES (Rating: 5/5): The lectures had a nice twist to them. As the previous reviewer said there were a lot of historical facts being brought up about the mathematicians behind the various identities we learn, and Dr. Lawrie also goes on some tangents to get us excited about the content. HOMEWORK (Rating: 5/5): There were a few 5-problem homework assignments to be turned in via Gradescope. They’re not bad at all, but they do take time! EXAMS (Rating 5/5): The exams are easy if you understand the logic behind the questions. The only reason why I couldn’t understand them was because I’m an idiot. But he will give you an idea of what will be on the exam on the study guide. Did you master those problems? Yay! Here’s your free A. OVERALL RATING: 5/5 Structure for Fall 2025: - Homework (15%; lowest is dropped, we had six) - Midterm (35%) - Final Exam (50%)
Andrew Lawrie MATH464 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 12/10/2025	Professor Lawrie has, in effect, hijacked the entirety of MATH464. Nobody in the class has taken MATH464 before, so none of us knew what the class was supposed to look like, what content we were supposed to go over. However, the astute among you may be able to look at the COURSE DESCRIPTION in the SCHEDULE OF CLASSES and note that Lawrie only covered exactly TWO (2) of the topics listed in the description: the fourier series, and the fourier transform, the two most fundamental ideas to the course. Everything else: discrete fourier transform, poisson summations, sampling, laplace transformations, you know, the stuff that is actually important to the applications of transforms, were all completely missing from the class. So what, pray tell, did he replace it with? He, entirely of his own volition, changed the "Transform METHODS" class into a "Transform THEORY" class. Notice the difference: methods and theory are FAMOUSLY two diametrically opposed areas of study, they may as well be antonyms. And yet, tell me why in the METHODS class, we spent the entire class learning the proofs, derivations, and theory behind the fourier series and transform, ignoring every possible application. We barely even covered the one or two application examples that we did discuss in any sense other than theory, certainly not enough to be able to apply them in the real world. I took this class because I wanted to AVOID all the theory, and in every past semester the course was, you know, accurate to the description. However, Lawrie just decided that he wanted to teach theory and here we are. Mind you, he made no indication that he would make this change from the usual course, I had to find this out by looking at the course description, past syllabi, and talking to people who had taken the course in previous semesters. The absolute audacity that this man has to change the course, without telling anyone, in such a way that actively harms my education is astounding. I have absolutely no use for any of the concepts we learned in class and I am LITERALLY going into signal processing as a career path. Now, there's the issue of his teaching. When I say that not a single person was able to follow what he was saying, this is not an understatement. After repeatedly asking him to slow down earlier in the semester, most students just gave up. He talks fast, explains concepts very hand-wavingly, and tends to ramble and go on tangents all the time. You can imagine how much that helps an already highly theoretical and abstract class where you already struggle to hold it in your mind what all is happening the proof (not that the class should be like that anyway). It takes a certain degree of skill to decipher what he means when he is trying to make a point but has to change the wording of his sentence every two or three words. He is one of the people who are prime examples of the common math adage "as soon as math starts to make sense to you, you lose the ability to make sense to other people". The only redeemable quality of this class, and the reason that people liked him as a professor, was because he made sure to give all the exam questions beforehand, and the exams were a large portion of the grade. However, in my opinion, this does nothing to redeem the absolutely abhorrent bastardization he made of MATH464 as a course. Not to mention if you are one of the unlucky people to do poorly on the exam despite being given the questions, you are beyond cooked.
Andrew Lawrie MATH464 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/04/2025	Not going to lie… this class has just worn me down. I’ve tried so hard to keep up, but it feels like nothing clicks anymore. I honestly don’t think I’ve learned much since the first day, and it’s really discouraging. The professor is a genuinely cool person, I can see how he could be fun? But he speaks so fast that I can barely process anything before he moves on. The homework is where it really hits. It’s so difficult that half the time I’m staring at the problems wondering if I missed an entire chapter somewhere. Nothing we do in class seems to actually prepare us for what we’re expected to do on the assignments or exams. It just feels… impossible. Unless you’re studying nonstop and doing every textbook problem like it’s your full-time job, it’s so hard to keep your head above water. You have to come into this already pretty experienced to survive it. At this point I’m just exhausted. If you’re taking this class, I honestly wish you the best. You’re going to need it.
Andrew Lawrie MATH464 Expecting a B- Anonymous 11/05/2025	Andy / Dr. Lawrie is a wonderful professor. He adds some history (like how mathematician Paley met his tragic fate in a skiing accident) and some small tangents from his excitement in the class to make it interesting, which is quite nice because it keeps me engaged with the course's rigorous and academically challenging material. While the exams make up 85% of our course grade (with 50% being a final and 35% being a midterm), he provides nice study guides with similar questions that help us prepare for the exams. I didn't do as well as I thought I should (this blame shouldn't be on him, but rather on me); however, I know you will all succeed with Dr. Lawrie. Would recommend him for a future MATH 4XX course!
Shiferaw Berhanu MATH464 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 05/23/2025	There are alot of good things to say about this class. It is extremely clear that Dr. Berhanu is extremely enthusiastic about the material he teaches, which is extremely refreshing (at least for me). Also, the grading was the fastest I had ever experienced out of any class I had taken (all exams including the final were graded within 3 hours of the test being taken and all homeworks were graded within one day of the deadline). Each exam had a healthy amount of review questions (around 10 for midterms and 20 for the final). The review questions were consistently more difficult than the exam ones so studying those often made me overprepared for exams. There is one gripe I have with this class. First is the fact that the only way to get course material is through lectures (basically no assigned textbook) and the lectures were not recorded. This means that missing lectures could really impact the ability to succeed in this class. In conclusion, go to lectures and this class is fine.
Shiferaw Berhanu MATH464 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 05/22/2025	As others have mentioned, the current experience taking Dr. Berhanu's class is far from that described in his Math410 reviews. He cares deeply about students' learning and engagement, and all assignments and exams were very reasonable considering the wealth of exercises given in homeworks, lectures, and exam reviews. Also, exams are graded within a few hours, and are graded considerably fairly. One note is that attendance should be considered mandatory and students should avoid showing up late when possible.
Shiferaw Berhanu MATH464 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/22/2025	Prof. Berhanu understands that this class is taken by both math majors with experience and engineering majors who have little to no previous experience in formal math concepts needed for MATH464. He walks through every new concept and introduces material as necessary, while avoiding bloating the course material. In addition, the exams and homework are very straightforward and application-based, which is invaluable for engineering. He goes over application in class, unlike most math professors, so studying isn't a mad scramble for finding examples on how to do real problems. If you're an engineering major who wants to get an actual deep understanding of Fourier Analysis and beyond, I highly recommend this class.
Shiferaw Berhanu MATH464 Expecting a B- Anonymous 05/19/2025	Excellent lecturer that cares about student's learning. Put a lot of effort into this class and you will walk out as a more informed individual. He is generous and reasonable with HW and exams.
Shiferaw Berhanu MATH464 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/17/2025	Berhanu is a good professor that's passionate about the course. The review problems he provides are very helpful for doing well on exams, they are slightly more challenging but still doable and representative of the content. A small critique is that he goes through proofs very fast and it can be tough to keep up.
Radu Balan MATH464 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 06/24/2024	Course is pretty easy but very time consuming; balan is an awful lecturer and it's much more effective to just read the textbook rather than go to lecture. He does give out a study guide before the midterm and the final, which is helpful, but the final is 50% of your grade which is quite stressful. I would recommend taking this class with another professor.
Radu Balan MATH464 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 05/16/2024	Do not expect a curve. Professor is good. You are not over worked but the homework are very challenging. -1 midterm -homework per week (avg 8-12hr commitment) Content is pretty deep but fun. His class is a gpa killer thats the biggest setback.
Radu Balan MATH464 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 05/14/2024	His lectures aren't very good; he usually starts by explaining a concept briefly and then doing an example. These parts usually make sense, but then afterwards he starts to ramble about different extensions of the problem, which becomes extremely confusing. It also doesn't help that he mumbles at the board a lot so it's hard to make out what he's saying. In terms of grading, he's extremely lenient though, as homework assignments are basically a free 100 for submission. His midterm and final were extremely straightforward and made up 75% of your overall grade. If you can do the homework for the class, the midterm and final are free As. The textbook does help a lot with understanding the material, but it does go extremely theoretical with its explanations. Also, Balan tends to reuse test questions from his past tests, so reviewing from testbank is really effective.
Radu Balan MATH464 Expecting a B Anonymous 04/01/2024	Lectures can be difficult to follow as he trails off into mumbling or side tangents into content that isn't relevant to the coursework. Coursework is designed to be encouraging memorizing trivia rather than memorizing problem solving tools. If you are an extreme math enthusiast and spend 20+ hours a week studying and understanding the content, he will be a decent professor. If you are a normal student with a life and other things to worry about, avoid this professor.
Todd Rowland MATH464 Anonymous 05/20/2023	Super nice professor.
Todd Rowland MATH464 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/23/2021	He hosted office hours 4/5 days of the week and provides practice exams for each midterm and the final. The grading on tests is very fair, and the lowest homework and half of lowest midterm were dropped. The only criticism I would give is that the lecture was not very engaging and there was too much emphasis on computer demonstrations in Mathematica.
Tobias von Petersdorff MATH464 Anonymous 05/18/2021	At the beginning of the semester there were quizzes based on each class, which was fine, but those stopped after the first few weeks. The problem was there were almost no practice problems or homework's the entire semester. He decided to assign our only homework during finals weeks and it was worth 30% of our grade. He finally provided a few practice problems for the final exam, but most of the class was unprepared for the final since we'd had almost no other practice with the material all semester. Although the theory was well explained, he did almost no examples in class, so no one in the class really learned anything. The whole semester was basically a waste. Would not take this guy again or advise anyone who wants to learn the material NOT to take him.
Kasso Okoudjou MATH464 Expecting an A skinter 05/21/2012	First of all: accent and handwriting are difficult at first, but most people were able to get used to it; if you can't, find a different prof. Otherwise, Prof Okoudjou is excellent. Explains fully, very helpful with questions. Exams extremely straightforward and he did a ton of practice for them. Strongly recommended.
Wojciech Czaja MATH464 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/02/2010	Czaja did a very good job of explaining the conceptual basis of Fourier, wavelet, and wavelet packet transforms. He also did a good job of keeping the target of any proof present in the students' minds, but sometimes proofs were a little hard to follow anyway, and some proofs left me with a feeling of "so what" afterward (that is, some proofs seemed to add nothing substantial to my understanding of the nature of the proven proposition - I would've been content with accepting a statement as true and perhaps seeing some cases of it being true or a brief explanation of the gist of the proof). It was also a little hard for me to discern what the instructor expected us to be learning at any given moment. It seemed the exams often were not clearly connected to lecture material (usually there was relevant class material that one could use to solve exam problems, but problems were often presented with notation that hadn't been used in class, such as the use of "inverse Fourier transform" instead of "synthesis formula", so some extra cognitive overhead had to be taken into account). Also, as a student who had no prior experience with Matlab, homework assignments to be complete in Matlab seemed a bit open-ended (though I scored highly on all the ones I've received back), and most of my challenge with the homework came not from my lack of understanding of the mathematical nature of any given transform but rather from particular difficulties of implementing them in Matlab (converting infinite sums over finitely supported sequences into finite sums, making sure that indices of sequences always started at 1 so that calls of values from a sequence would work, etc.). Overall, I learned a lot, and I thought a lot about transforms, but I also spent a lot of time thinking about things that seemed to have little to do with transforms.

Andrew Lawrie
MATH464

Expecting a B-
Anonymous
12/12/2025

ANDREW LAWRIE: The content of this course is difficult, but it isn’t bad when you put in the effort and study. Dr. Lawrie makes this course more enjoyable and less of a nightmare than other profs, and it’s his first semester teaching at UMD! LECTURES (Rating: 5/5): The lectures had a nice twist to them. As the previous reviewer said there were a lot of historical facts being brought up about the mathematicians behind the various identities we learn, and Dr. Lawrie also goes on some tangents to get us excited about the content. HOMEWORK (Rating: 5/5): There were a few 5-problem homework assignments to be turned in via Gradescope. They’re not bad at all, but they do take time! EXAMS (Rating 5/5): The exams are easy if you understand the logic behind the questions. The only reason why I couldn’t understand them was because I’m an idiot. But he will give you an idea of what will be on the exam on the study guide. Did you master those problems? Yay! Here’s your free A. OVERALL RATING: 5/5 Structure for Fall 2025: - Homework (15%; lowest is dropped, we had six) - Midterm (35%) - Final Exam (50%)

Andrew Lawrie
MATH464

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
12/10/2025

Professor Lawrie has, in effect, hijacked the entirety of MATH464. Nobody in the class has taken MATH464 before, so none of us knew what the class was supposed to look like, what content we were *supposed* to go over. However, the astute among you may be able to look at the COURSE DESCRIPTION in the SCHEDULE OF CLASSES and note that Lawrie only covered exactly TWO (2) of the topics listed in the description: the fourier series, and the fourier transform, the two most fundamental ideas to the course. Everything else: discrete fourier transform, poisson summations, sampling, laplace transformations, you know, the stuff that is actually important to the applications of transforms, were all completely missing from the class. So what, pray tell, did he replace it with? He, entirely of his own volition, changed the "Transform METHODS" class into a "Transform THEORY" class. Notice the difference: methods and theory are FAMOUSLY two diametrically opposed areas of study, they may as well be antonyms. And yet, tell me why in the METHODS class, we spent the entire class learning the proofs, derivations, and theory behind the fourier series and transform, ignoring every possible application. We barely even covered the one or two application examples that we did discuss in any sense other than theory, certainly not enough to be able to apply them in the real world. I took this class because I wanted to AVOID all the theory, and in every past semester the course was, you know, accurate to the description. However, Lawrie just decided that he wanted to teach theory and here we are. Mind you, he made no indication that he would make this change from the usual course, I had to find this out by looking at the course description, past syllabi, and talking to people who had taken the course in previous semesters. The absolute audacity that this man has to change the course, without telling anyone, in such a way that actively harms my education is astounding. I have absolutely no use for any of the concepts we learned in class and I am LITERALLY going into signal processing as a career path. Now, there's the issue of his teaching. When I say that not a single person was able to follow what he was saying, this is not an understatement. After repeatedly asking him to slow down earlier in the semester, most students just gave up. He talks fast, explains concepts very hand-wavingly, and tends to ramble and go on tangents all the time. You can imagine how much that helps an already highly theoretical and abstract class where you already struggle to hold it in your mind what all is happening the proof (not that the class should be like that anyway). It takes a certain degree of skill to decipher what he means when he is trying to make a point but has to change the wording of his sentence every two or three words. He is one of the people who are prime examples of the common math adage "as soon as math starts to make sense to you, you lose the ability to make sense to other people". The only redeemable quality of this class, and the reason that people liked him as a professor, was because he made sure to give all the exam questions beforehand, and the exams were a large portion of the grade. However, in my opinion, this does nothing to redeem the absolutely abhorrent bastardization he made of MATH464 as a course. Not to mention if you are one of the unlucky people to do poorly on the exam despite being given the questions, you are beyond cooked.

Andrew Lawrie
MATH464

Expecting a B+
Anonymous
12/04/2025

Not going to lie… this class has just worn me down. I’ve tried so hard to keep up, but it feels like nothing clicks anymore. I honestly don’t think I’ve learned much since the first day, and it’s really discouraging. The professor is a genuinely cool person, I can see how he could be fun? But he speaks so fast that I can barely process anything before he moves on. The homework is where it really hits. It’s so difficult that half the time I’m staring at the problems wondering if I missed an entire chapter somewhere. Nothing we do in class seems to actually prepare us for what we’re expected to do on the assignments or exams. It just feels… impossible. Unless you’re studying nonstop and doing every textbook problem like it’s your full-time job, it’s so hard to keep your head above water. You have to come into this already pretty experienced to survive it. At this point I’m just exhausted. If you’re taking this class, I honestly wish you the best. You’re going to need it.

Andrew Lawrie
MATH464

Expecting a B-
Anonymous
11/05/2025

Andy / Dr. Lawrie is a wonderful professor. He adds some history (like how mathematician Paley met his tragic fate in a skiing accident) and some small tangents from his excitement in the class to make it interesting, which is quite nice because it keeps me engaged with the course's rigorous and academically challenging material. While the exams make up 85% of our course grade (with 50% being a final and 35% being a midterm), he provides nice study guides with similar questions that help us prepare for the exams. I didn't do as well as I thought I should (this blame shouldn't be on him, but rather on me); however, I know you will all succeed with Dr. Lawrie. Would recommend him for a future MATH 4XX course!

Shiferaw Berhanu
MATH464

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
05/23/2025

There are alot of good things to say about this class. It is extremely clear that Dr. Berhanu is extremely enthusiastic about the material he teaches, which is extremely refreshing (at least for me). Also, the grading was the fastest I had ever experienced out of any class I had taken (all exams including the final were graded within 3 hours of the test being taken and all homeworks were graded within one day of the deadline). Each exam had a healthy amount of review questions (around 10 for midterms and 20 for the final). The review questions were consistently more difficult than the exam ones so studying those often made me overprepared for exams. There is one gripe I have with this class. First is the fact that the only way to get course material is through lectures (basically no assigned textbook) and the lectures were not recorded. This means that missing lectures could really impact the ability to succeed in this class. In conclusion, go to lectures and this class is fine.

Shiferaw Berhanu
MATH464

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
05/22/2025

As others have mentioned, the current experience taking Dr. Berhanu's class is far from that described in his Math410 reviews. He cares deeply about students' learning and engagement, and all assignments and exams were very reasonable considering the wealth of exercises given in homeworks, lectures, and exam reviews. Also, exams are graded within a few hours, and are graded considerably fairly. One note is that attendance should be considered mandatory and students should avoid showing up late when possible.

Shiferaw Berhanu
MATH464

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/22/2025

Prof. Berhanu understands that this class is taken by both math majors with experience and engineering majors who have little to no previous experience in formal math concepts needed for MATH464. He walks through every new concept and introduces material as necessary, while avoiding bloating the course material. In addition, the exams and homework are very straightforward and application-based, which is invaluable for engineering. He goes over application in class, unlike most math professors, so studying isn't a mad scramble for finding examples on how to do real problems. If you're an engineering major who wants to get an actual deep understanding of Fourier Analysis and beyond, I highly recommend this class.

Shiferaw Berhanu
MATH464

Expecting a B-
Anonymous
05/19/2025

Excellent lecturer that cares about student's learning. Put a lot of effort into this class and you will walk out as a more informed individual. He is generous and reasonable with HW and exams.

Shiferaw Berhanu
MATH464

Expecting an A
Anonymous
05/17/2025

Berhanu is a good professor that's passionate about the course. The review problems he provides are very helpful for doing well on exams, they are slightly more challenging but still doable and representative of the content. A small critique is that he goes through proofs very fast and it can be tough to keep up.

Radu Balan
MATH464

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
06/24/2024

Course is pretty easy but very time consuming; balan is an awful lecturer and it's much more effective to just read the textbook rather than go to lecture. He does give out a study guide before the midterm and the final, which is helpful, but the final is 50% of your grade which is quite stressful. I would recommend taking this class with another professor.

Radu Balan
MATH464

Expecting a C+
Anonymous
05/16/2024

Do not expect a curve. Professor is good. You are not over worked but the homework are very challenging. -1 midterm -homework per week (avg 8-12hr commitment) Content is pretty deep but fun. His class is a gpa killer thats the biggest setback.

Radu Balan
MATH464

Expecting an A+
Anonymous
05/14/2024

His lectures aren't very good; he usually starts by explaining a concept briefly and then doing an example. These parts usually make sense, but then afterwards he starts to ramble about different extensions of the problem, which becomes extremely confusing. It also doesn't help that he mumbles at the board a lot so it's hard to make out what he's saying. In terms of grading, he's extremely lenient though, as homework assignments are basically a free 100 for submission. His midterm and final were extremely straightforward and made up 75% of your overall grade. If you can do the homework for the class, the midterm and final are free As. The textbook does help a lot with understanding the material, but it does go extremely theoretical with its explanations. Also, Balan tends to reuse test questions from his past tests, so reviewing from testbank is really effective.

Radu Balan
MATH464

Expecting a B
Anonymous
04/01/2024

Lectures can be difficult to follow as he trails off into mumbling or side tangents into content that isn't relevant to the coursework. Coursework is designed to be encouraging memorizing trivia rather than memorizing problem solving tools. If you are an extreme math enthusiast and spend 20+ hours a week studying and understanding the content, he will be a decent professor. If you are a normal student with a life and other things to worry about, avoid this professor.

Todd Rowland
MATH464

Anonymous
05/20/2023

Super nice professor.

Todd Rowland
MATH464

Expecting an A
Anonymous
12/23/2021

He hosted office hours 4/5 days of the week and provides practice exams for each midterm and the final. The grading on tests is very fair, and the lowest homework and half of lowest midterm were dropped. The only criticism I would give is that the lecture was not very engaging and there was too much emphasis on computer demonstrations in Mathematica.

Tobias von Petersdorff
MATH464

Anonymous
05/18/2021

At the beginning of the semester there were quizzes based on each class, which was fine, but those stopped after the first few weeks. The problem was there were almost no practice problems or homework's the entire semester. He decided to assign our only homework during finals weeks and it was worth 30% of our grade. He finally provided a few practice problems for the final exam, but most of the class was unprepared for the final since we'd had almost no other practice with the material all semester. Although the theory was well explained, he did almost no examples in class, so no one in the class really learned anything. The whole semester was basically a waste. Would not take this guy again or advise anyone who wants to learn the material NOT to take him.

Kasso Okoudjou
MATH464

Expecting an A
skinter
05/21/2012

First of all: accent and handwriting are difficult at first, but most people were able to get used to it; if you can't, find a different prof. Otherwise, Prof Okoudjou is excellent. Explains fully, very helpful with questions. Exams extremely straightforward and he did a ton of practice for them. Strongly recommended.

Wojciech Czaja
MATH464

Expecting a B
Anonymous
12/02/2010

Czaja did a very good job of explaining the conceptual basis of Fourier, wavelet, and wavelet packet transforms. He also did a good job of keeping the target of any proof present in the students' minds, but sometimes proofs were a little hard to follow anyway, and some proofs left me with a feeling of "so what" afterward (that is, some proofs seemed to add nothing substantial to my understanding of the nature of the proven proposition - I would've been content with accepting a statement as true and perhaps seeing some cases of it being true or a brief explanation of the gist of the proof). It was also a little hard for me to discern what the instructor expected us to be learning at any given moment. It seemed the exams often were not clearly connected to lecture material (usually there was relevant class material that one could use to solve exam problems, but problems were often presented with notation that hadn't been used in class, such as the use of "inverse Fourier transform" instead of "synthesis formula", so some extra cognitive overhead had to be taken into account). Also, as a student who had no prior experience with Matlab, homework assignments to be complete in Matlab seemed a bit open-ended (though I scored highly on all the ones I've received back), and most of my challenge with the homework came not from my lack of understanding of the mathematical nature of any given transform but rather from particular difficulties of implementing them in Matlab (converting infinite sums over finitely supported sequences into finite sums, making sure that indices of sequences always started at 1 so that calls of values from a sequence would work, etc.). Overall, I learned a lot, and I thought a lot about transforms, but I also spent a lot of time thinking about things that seemed to have little to do with transforms.

Reviews for MATH464