Nathan Manning

This professor has taught: CMSC456, EDSP652, ENEE456, MATH140, MATH140H, MATH141, MATH141H, MATH220, MATH240, MATH241H, MATH310, MATH401, MATH403, MATH405, MATH406, MATH410, MATH445, MATH456

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Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A Anonymous 04/19/2023	I loved having Manning for MATH240. He was a passionate and engaging lecturer, and was always enthusiastic about answering questions. He never came off as condescending whenever asked questions. He put a large emphasis on the theoretical side of linear algebra, so if you want to come out of this course not only knowing how to do the computation but also understanding the concepts of linalg, I highly recommend taking Manning.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A+ Anonymous 04/12/2023	I have no idea why people dislike Manning so much. His lecturers are very engaging and you can tell he's really passionate about what he's teaching. As long as you attend class, do all the assignments, and study a bit before the quizzes/exams, you should be fine. Though, I do admit some of the questions on his exams were kind of "gotcha" questions, especially the true and false ones. But a lot of those questions are just homework problems that he tells you to do anyways, so they aren't terrible. Great professor, would highly recommend taking.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B- Anonymous 02/08/2023	Nathan Manning is a great lecturer and his tests are fair. His class isn't overly difficult, I only got a B- because I didn't complete all of the MATLAB assignments. He articulates his thoughts excellently and by the end you will have a good base for linear algebra. Take him if you have the opportunity.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 01/05/2023	Many reviews on here are surprised that Manning has a low rating but its not because of an easy A or things just given to us as students. I feel like out of all the professors who teach Lin. Algebra, if you're going to give hard exams that are heavily theory based, then it would be nice to have things that help us know if we are on the right track like practice exam answers. The TAs for this class all teach a bit differently and some are more helpful than others in preparing them for quizzes and material which leaves those with different TAs to fend for themselves almost. I feel like most people who say the class is great are naturally good at math already or come in with some knowledge that prepares them better. I learned a lot no doubt by taking this class and I always enjoy a challenge, but not at the risk of my grade being UMD has a +/- system. For the sake of maintaining your GPA AND learning the material, I suggest another professor. He is a great guy but for me personally, I don't really plan on being friends especially if its just to help my grade. That just seems shallow to me so I rather learn, get my grade, and move on.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A- iapyges 12/23/2022	I concur with the overall consensus that Nathan is a great guy, and echoing another reviewer, he's also based: he plays video games, thinks that covid is real, and hates Nazis. As for his lecturing style, I found it to be animated and engaging, although his presentation of proofs was sometimes hard to follow for someone with no proof-writing experience. The weekly quizzes, of which two are dropped, are pretty much free points, as are the four Matlab assignments. Exams are fair and very similar to the practice exams, although practice exam answers aren't given out to encourage students to come to office hours and ask questions. Overall, this was a fair but rigorous course with a solid professor who I'd be happy to have again.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/17/2022	Worst professor in the Math department, exams are too hard.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 12/09/2022	Gave pretty engaging lectures was overall a pretty enthusiastic teacher. The way he taught however was theory heavy which is not my specialty. The one time I interacted with him over email, he just offloaded questions to his TA's and replies honestly made him feel like a douche. Overall, quizzes and exams was fair but most of my learning came from the textbook instead of actual lectures.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/07/2022	Very enthusiastic and positive guy, but a terrible professor. Lectures often confuse more than teach with more focus on high level extensions of a topic than on the simple topic we're supposed to be learning. Seriously, the content of the class is easy, but the combination of terrible lectures and tests intentionally written to be more difficult than most homework and practice problems makes it difficult to do well even if you have a good TA and can self-study the content well. Honestly, he's a really nice guy, but don't take this class with him.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B Anonymous 12/05/2022	I don't know why some people dislike Manning. There's a lot of good things about his class, like getting practice exams nearly identical to the problems on the actual exams. He also gives partial credit for problems, so getting the steps right and the numbers wrong still gets you a fair amount of points. The exams are definitely fair, and you have everything you need to succeed on them. Just do the practice problems, study regularly, and understand the concepts, then you'll be fine. You won't get by without understanding the concepts, since this is a very conceptual course. Those who complain probably have never been asked to do that before. Also, previous lecture videos were given and lectures are not mandatory at all. Practice exam answers are not released, but checking with other people is just fine. If you want an easy A, don't take Manning, but his class is good preparation for the kinds of classes you'll see later.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B Anonymous 11/27/2022	I don't want to hate on Nathan. He's a fantastic lecturer (very well organzied) who wants his students to learn the ins and outs of linear algebra. He also tries to lighten up the mood during lecture by saying or doing something funny (got on his knees and begged for us to memorize the rotation matrix). Occasionally, he goes on tangents about a proof or some student's questions. His exams are fair (3 plus a final), there's weekly quizzes, 4 matlab projects, and homework isn't graded. However, I just wish he gave answers to practice exams. That way we would know if we did the problem right. Other than that, good professor.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/17/2022	Manning is a nice and passionate teacher with exams on the same level of difficulty as practice problems you'll do in discussions. Unlike other classes, the exam questions are not multi-step derived forms of problems, they are literally exactly the same problems you will do as practice/review (aka ezpz). There are a few flaws, but I think the class is good enough to warrant a 5/5. For example, it's not always entirely clear what the point of some part of a lecture is because he likes to go on tangents based on student questions and/or some proof that likely won't be that useful to you. That being said, I found his lectures more than adequate for understanding the subject. You can kind of get a sense of what will be helpful. Write down the important parts, don't worry about writing every detail of the proofs, and the class will be easy.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 11/15/2022	I was really surprised to see the negative reviews here because I really love this professor and Linear Algebra. I'm honestly not that great at math but I think Manning is an incredible professor and very clearly knowledgeable and passionate about what he's teaching, and if I'm ever confused I just watch previously recorded lecture videos and everything starts to make sense. His exams have gotten easier and more reasonable, though they are still somewhat harder than other professors. He makes them super similar to the exam reviews he puts out on ELMS so if you just study those questions you can ace the exam. He's also really accommodating with your circumstances; I was out with COVID for two weeks and he was super reasonable in helping me find time to make up my work and exams. Overall, don't trust these super negative reviews on here, I had a great time in Dr. Manning's class and I'm not any kind of math nerd, I was just there to pass the class and move on with my degree.
Nathan Manning MATH406 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/02/2022	Nathan is one of the best professors I have had. Don't be fooled by the low reviews; they're probably from 240 students who were upset that they couldn't get an easy A. He is very knowledgeable and cares a lot about his students. His tests are sometimes tricky but definitely doable if you go to lecture, study, do the homework, and go to office hours. He encourages students to ask questions and is always accessible via office hours and email. I have also had him for 240 and 310 and my math thinking and appreciation has grown so much thanks to him!
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 06/02/2022	Knows his stuff and you will learn a lot if you take him. However... his exams are MUCH more difficult than every other professor, and he refuses to curve with exam averages of 65%. Not accommodating at all, and is slightly egotistical when you interact with him. Take any other professor if you care about your grade and want a kind professor. Also releases the study guide key midnight BEFORE the morning of the exam because I guess he likes making his student's lives more difficult.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/20/2022	Highly underrated professor. I learned very well in this class just from the lectures, even though he tells you to read the book and do the homework I was able to get an A with only lectures. His exams are far from difficult, the person below me mentioned a difficult question with a fraction but the next class after you could tell he felt bad, he made an error when making the exam and because the numbers didn't work out how he thought they would he grade extremely leniently on that question. I'm really not sure why he's so lowly rated, after seeing these reviews and then taking the class I was surprised what a great professor Nathan was. Unrelated, but he even plays Elden Ring, so he's very based as well!
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a B- Anonymous 05/18/2022	Manning is a great teacher but he is veery strict about all his examinations even though they are very tough compared to other professor's exam. No matter what is the average of the exam he will not curve it and at the end of the semester his curving will be bare minimum. If you want to really learn linear algebra in-depth take him. But if you want a A in the class I'd suggest some other professor. He knows the topic really well and will go out of his way to teach but at the same time to get a good grade in his class is tough!
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 05/17/2022	He is an outstanding lecturer. His exams can be difficult, especially one that was arguably downright unfair, but he apologized for it afterward so it's all good in the end. He is an underrated instructor, if you consider yourself good at math or you're willing to put in the work don't be afraid to take Math240 with Manning.
Nathan Manning Anonymous 05/16/2022	I had Dr. Manning for both 240 and 310 and he is the best lecturer ive ever had. His lectures are very engaging and interesting, and it is clear that he is extremely passionate about math. In addition, he is very accessible and his office hours are very helpful. Even though his exams are somewhat "difficult" they are fair based on his lectures and he prepares you very well. The only warning I would give is that If you don't actually care about learning and just want an A take someone else. Even though I probably won't get an A in 310, i feel like i am a much better math student now and i feel way more confident in my abilities and prepared to take 410 :)
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 05/11/2022	Manning is genuinely passionate about the subject, and it is very obvious that he's incredibly knowledgeable in the topic of linear algebra. Also usually a very nice guy, but that's about where the positives for this dude's class end. I'm going to preface this review by saying I had Hatice Sahinoglu for Math141 (look her up if you've never had her), so I'm absolutely not exaggerating when I say this man is so much worse in almost every way. Firstly, his entire course is structured terribly. Taken directly from his canvas page/syllabus, he expects you to 1) read and take notes on the subject to be covered before class for a half hour at least, 2) come to class and take detailed notes, and 3) do all of the homework problems for every lecture. While 2 and 3 are very reasonable requests, there is absolutely no excuse for telling students to learn the curriculum outside of lecture BEFORE he even goes over it. We pay an incredibly large amount of money to learn from experienced, knowledgeable professors at a flagship state university, and Manning's inability to cover the entire curriculum in class is not even close to a relevant excuse to requiring his students to learn the content from a BOOK before lectures to simply pass the class. Moving on from his general course structure, many students find his lectures themselves to be incredibly unhelpful. Manning moves VERY fast, mainly resulting from a promise he makes to his students that he will never be more than 10 minutes off from his course schedule. Everyone finds the chapter very easy? Too bad, you're gonna be spending a full 50 minutes on it. Insanely difficult topic that nobody understands (aka most of the class)? Sucks to suck, you're gonna be moving on after just one lecture. He very clearly prioritizes being on schedule over ensuring his students actually understand the subject, which he cleverly disguises by asking students "Everybody good?" after covering a main idea. He then glances around the room, and if he sees a SINGLE thumbs up he will move on immediately. His lectures are also incredibly theoretical, and I can barely remember a single time he has provided a solid, concrete example of a topic. There were multiple occasions where students asked "Can you give an example?", and his response would just be a confused look, clearly thinking "Why would you even need an example of this?" when many students clearly did. Even when he agreed to do an example, he'd go off on a 20 minute proof of a theorem that's far beyond the scope of the class, and then never actually specify whether or not we would be tested on it. Discussion sections will be your best friend for actual example problems, since Manning either has the inability to make them, or simply doesn't care about his students enough to do so. Truly the final nail in the coffin for this guy is the exams. As if this class couldn't possibly get any worse, his exams are BEYOND difficult, and Manning clearly enjoys the idea that his exams are regarded as way harder than other professors. As an example, on our third and final exam of the class, we were asked to orthogonalize a basis for a vector space. Since anyone reading this likely doesn't know what that means, just know that it involves fairly tedious computations that get exponentially more difficult throughout the problem if fractions are involved. Of course, in typical Manning style, he gives us a fraction of 14/13 very early in the problem. My final answer (which got full credit)? A vector with massive numbers, subtracted by the fraction 208/6578. His exams prioritize giving problems that extend the topics in class by an amount that makes them barely recognizable. Any problem that you happen to know how to solve is almost guaranteed to require computations that make it impossible to complete within the time limit. Although he does provide practice exams before every exam, for whatever reason he is completely against providing answer keys to them, and the entire class had to practically beg him before he finally agreed. As other reviews mention, his "answer keys" to these practice exams are barely more helpful than the problems themselves. Most of them simply state "put it into MATLAB", and in one problem where students were asked to compute the null space, simply stated "do the null space thing" (I'm not kidding, that's actually what it said). For our third exam, he put out the answer key 2 HOURS before the exam started, and was accompanied by a simple canvas message essentially stating "sorry, my bad". Manning also doesn't curve (even when the exam averages are in the 60s), and doesn't drop any exam grades. For anyone that made it this far, here's my recommendation to you: It's just not worth it. Manning has single-handedly plummeted my GPA, and nearly made it impossible for me to pursue my intended major. Pick ANYONE else, and if there's no other option, just wait another semester. You have to have a strong background in linear algebra and/or theoretical math and proofs to do well with Manning, or put in an INSANE amount of hours outside of class, which is entirely unacceptable for an introduction to linear algebra class.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a C- Anonymous 05/05/2022	He expects you to speak in linear algebra at the end of his course. So get ready to learn a new math language. His exams are really tough and how questions are formatted is confusing. You might know the answer but the way questions ask you makes you forget everything you know. He usually asks some weird questions that you have never seen in exams that are worth more than half of the exam so even if you knew everything else that 1 question will make you get 50 percent. The positive reviews here are only there because he is a cool and likable person and makes some jokes but I am not taking this course to like the professor I am taking it to pass it and learn something.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 04/29/2022	Manning seems like a great guy, but it's a completely different story when it comes to him as a professor. He very clearly understands the material, but he goes through it at such a rapid pace and in such abstract terms that it makes it difficult to follow along in class. His exams are also insanely difficult. On Manning's second midterm, the average was a 65. For reference, the second exam average for Long (another professor, highly recommend you take him instead) was an 80. My friends in Long showed me their practice exam and it was miles easier than any of the questions we had on our practice exam. Manning is also highly averse to posting answer keys to his practice exams. We had to practically beg him to do it for the first exam, and he still only released it the night before the exam. This, at least, was better than what he did on the third exam, where he literally released the answer key solution 2 hours BEFORE the test. At least the final is supposed to be easier because of all the exams that Manning throws at you. Overall, the Nathan Manning Linear Algebra Experience™ is not something that I would recommend embarking on. The only pros are that he's more than happy to help out during office hours and that the final is considerably easier since other professors put their input into the exam as well.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 04/29/2022	Manning is a terrible professor for linear algebra and you would be much better off taking the course with literally anyone else. For starters, his lectures are unusually abstract and fast paced. Rather than using concrete examples, he wastes too much time going over proofs and expects that his students understand them right off the bat. A vast majority students fail to understand what Manning is trying to explain and end up spending a significant amount of time outside of class to understand the linear algebra concepts. He also becomes somewhat passive aggressive when students don't understand what he is explaining. The main issue with Manning is his exam difficulty. Exams are either extremely conceptual or require ridiculous amounts of computation. Linear algebra is not a hard topic, but Manning takes exceptional pride in making his exams more challenging than usual. While other professors (such as Terence or Wisely) tend to keep the arithmetic and concepts needed for exams on the low, Manning's exams are so computationally demanding or theoretical that you won't have enough time to finish your exam in the given 50 minutes, meaning many questions will be left only partially answered. The exam practices he gives are barely related to the real exams, and he doesn't provide answer keys to the practice exams until THE DAY of the real exam (answer keys DIDN'T EVEN CONTAN ANSWERS, they merely said to use MATLAB to find the computation, and when they contained numerical answers, they often contained errors). When using Manning's practice exams as a study guide, I found some of the questions to be very difficult and time-consuming, but when I take a look at practice exams from Wisely and Long, I am able to solve them mentally in the blink of an eye. Averages on the exams are typically between 60-70%, which is much lower than what other professors have which is around mid to high 70%'s. In summary, if Manning is your only option, waitlist for another professor or take 240 a different semester. You will save yourself a lot of stress and time if you do so, otherwise prepare to have your mental health and gpa plummet down the drain.
Nathan Manning MATH140H Expecting an A- Anonymous 04/26/2022	Super good professor in a small class setting. Very personable and easy to talk to before class and during discussion, and is able to flip the switch for lecture very quickly. His lectures are engaging and really well planned, only downside is exams are very challenging. If you are looking for an easier A, don't take him, but if you are looking to learn and be challenged, I would highly recommend him
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A Anonymous 12/17/2021	Underrated professor. People didn’t like him online but his in-person lectures are good and you can tell he’s passionate about the subject.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A- Anonymous 12/13/2021	Unlike what you would expect from his PlanetTerp and RateMyProfessor reviews, Manning is a very good professor for linear algebra: his structure for the course accommodates different learning approaches / styles, his lectures and additional materials were very effective at gradually building an understanding of the subject which is markedly more abstract than calculus, and his office hours were very accessible and helpful. Pros: + Lectures are well structured, very accommodating to questions on lecture material during lecture or office hours + Lectures were optional in person and asynchronous lecture videos were always an option, however in person lectures were very engaging and well tailored to students' needs + Office hours also provided a very versatile option for learning material at your own pace, if you are having trouble with content he's happy to help you through it, and if you are interested in learning concepts ahead of time you can always ask about more advanced concepts, and his explanations here are very useful. + The textbook and 3Blue1Brown videos were very useful in providing additional computational / visual examples and exercises for the lecture material, for you to fill in the gaps between lectures. + Quizzes (graded) and homework (optional) are very useful for reinforcing the content. Cons: - The most significant issue with the course is the exam difficulty, though coming to the end of the semester this can also be somewhat of a benefit if you put in enough work, is the exam difficulty. Manning's exams are notoriously difficult, but by comparison it very much prepares you to crush the final.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 06/29/2021	Manning is a bad professor for linear algebra. I took this course in Spring 2021, and there were several issues with this course. One issue was that nothing in the course was easily accessible. You had to ask or email for almost everything, including things like previous midterms because they never stayed published on ELMS. While this wasn't a huge issue, it was tedious and time consuming. Additionally, previous quizzes could sometimes not be given back to students at all depending on your TA. Answers and answer keys for quizzes or exams were also never released or given to students. Other issues about accessibility included the fact that some critical course policies were never written down and published on ELMS. Things like 'how much the curve will be' or 'what material will be on this week's quiz' were questions whose answers were confusing and never clearly explained and always had to be asked about in office hours instead of Manning making an announcement. All of this made it very difficult to study and learn from mistakes and improve on them or understand the course structure in general. Another issue was the lectures. Manning's lectures were often much longer than they needed to be and filled with confusing terms and vocabulary. He actively stayed away from using examples to illustrate key ideas and instead used ever changing linear algebra specific vocabulary to explain things that could've been done much more simply. This makes lectures almost useless because of the difficulty caused by trying to understand what Manning is talking about. My biggest issue with this course was the tests. Manning purposefully designs his tests to take at least 10 minutes longer than the allotted time. This meant that there was at least one question on the test which was impossible to answer properly, or parts of it had to be left blank. This happened on all of his midterms. You almost have to approach it more like a standardized test like an AP test or the SAT or ACT because it requires a strategy on how to manage your time and answer questions in a way that might not be completely correct but will maximize your points. Every course has this to some extent but I've never seen a need for testing strategy as much as for Manning. Manning also does not curve much, if at all despite pretty low test averages (60-70%). This semester he curved 1% or less. Overall I don't think Manning is a terrible professor, but a bad professor for linear algebra. Linear algebra isn't a terribly hard course, and if you take it with another professor or at another university even, you would find this to be true. But Manning makes linear algebra much more difficult than it should be with the way he abstractly explains things and his course policies and structure. Positives about Manning are that he was very personable, easy to like, and his final was pretty fair compared to his other tests. My advice is waitlist for another professor, even if their sections are full because there is a good chance you'll get in, and if you don't, wait another semester, it's not worth it. If you somehow have to take Manning, use the textbook and do the homework because it was the thing that helped the most, more than watching all the lectures.
Nathan Manning MATH405 Expecting a B+ Anonymous 05/21/2021	Fantastic professor. You will need to be comfortable with abstractions should you decide to take his course because he is (surprise!) an abstract algebra researcher. Can be difficult to get an A but the grades themselves are fair and apt. Handled going online very well and uses ELMS/Gradescope in a good way. Based on the MATH240 students it sounds like he cares more about upper level classes than lower level ones, so it might be worth being careful about that, too.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/20/2021	I took this course in Spring 2021 So looking at some of these review, I guess this review will be a bit of a hot take. While I do have some criticisms of Manning, I generally believe that he's a pretty good teacher. Pros: + His asynchronous videos are detailed enough so that you get enough content out of them, but concise enough that they don't take up too much time. + Manning was more than happy to answer most questions that students had during office hours + Exam question difficulty and partial credit is fair. Not generous, mind you, but I believe that the majority of questions asked were completely in the realm of possibility. + Weekly quizzes offer a simple way to slightly boost your grade. They are also not that hard, and serve as a great assessment of what you know, and what you should study prior to the midterm. Cons: - I do agree with most reviews here that exams (mostly talking about midterms here rather than quizzes or the final) are very hard. However, I believe that most of this can be attributed to exam time rather than exam questions. For all 3 of the midterms, I found myself thinking that if I had just 10 more minutes, I could have aced the exam. Luckily, the final does not have this problem (5 problems in 50 minutes for midterms vs 8 problems in 120 minutes for the final). So for the midterms, just make sure that you not only understand the concepts, but also that you can solve problems quickly. - Jumping off the last point, one thing that causes the midterm time crunch is the sheer amount of computations that are required to be done. This became a large problem during the 3rd midterm, but was also an issue during the other two midterms. While I understand that this is a Linear Algebra class and computations for row reductions are necessary, the amount of fractional computations that can pop up can be insane. I feel like this issue could be solved quickly if we were allowed access to basic calculators for the exam.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A- CrazeddRabbi 01/13/2021	Seemed nice, and held office hours for an hour every day, so definitely a plus there. However, his lectures (asynchronous) weren't great. They sometimes run long which was annoying, but the real problem was that after the first unit he stopped using examples as often. Even when he did examples, they were often still very theoretical instead of numerical, so if you didn't understand the concepts the examples really didn't help you at all, and would often just make you more confused. He would also frequently make mistakes in his videos, and he would catch most of them after a minute or two, but some slipped by - again, normally wouldn't be a huge problem, but if it's one of his few numerical examples (where most of the mistakes happen) and you're already struggling to understand, him making and uncaught mistake will just confuse you even further. Finally, his quizzes and exams were insanely difficult. I got Bs and Cs for most of them. Luckily, there was a standard final exam given to all sections of MATH240 regardless of the instructor. When I was taking the old finals in the testbank as practice, I was surprised at how much easier they were. Whereas most exams I would spend the whole time only to get ~80, I got a 96 on the final with ~40 minutes to spare AFTER checking my work. For another perspective on how ridiculously hard the quizzes and exams were, up until the final exam, my grades within MATH240 and MATH310 were always within less than one percentage point of each other - and considering that MATH310 is an upper-level weed-out class for math majors with a "C" average, that really, really, really should not have been the case.
Nathan Manning MATH310 Expecting a C- Anonymous 01/12/2021	Manning makes the material more difficult that it has to be, he speaks in a condescending ish tone to students, in a way that made me feel uncomfortable going to office hours much and asking for help. I wouldn’t recommend him overall. This was the first class I have barely passed.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Anonymous 01/08/2021	The exams Manning gives are very difficult, and I just found that it was very abstract. Don't take him if you aren't trying to challenge yourself. He is nice overall and seems to be a good lecturer, but sometimes I think he just assumes we know a lot more than we really do.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A tybug 12/20/2020	Great lecturer, great person, and funny to boot. The biggest complaint I heard from my classmates was that the exams were too theoretical / abstract. He split our exams into an open-notes takehome portion and a closed-notes in-class portion, and only the takehome was abstract. I don't disagree that the takehomes were more abstract than people are used to, but frankly, Manning is trying to drill some rigor into the students. If you want rigor, Manning is the professor to take. If you don't, he is probably one to avoid.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a C- Anonymous 12/10/2020	If math isn't your thing, avoid him. I admittedly have never excelled in math courses, but I've always gotten by. He makes linear algebra seem like some foreign language. He is a very chill and hip guy, but as a professor he's as low grade as they come. The exams are seriously overwhelming, and he gives you practically no time to finish them. Don't anticipate a curve. If he is your only option, wait 'til the next semester. Heed my warnings.
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/17/2020	One of the most caring, funny teachers I’ve ever had. Very apparent he really cares about the students and makes the course material very interesting. It’s not the easiest course material but if you put in the work you’ll get an A
Nathan Manning MATH406 Expecting an A Anonymous 11/11/2020	Great guy, knows the material well and makes jokes in the class. First exam was too long, he listened and vastly improved exam 2.
Nathan Manning MATH310 Expecting a W Anonymous 10/29/2020	Nice guy, but good luck understanding the material. He does not curve either. Not very clear and assumes a lot of knowledge among students that many don't understand
Nathan Manning MATH310 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 09/16/2020	Pros: - Generally nice guy - Great Lecturer - Will drill a very solid understanding of Mathematical Proof into your head Cons: - At times was very condescending towards some of my classmates, didn't really like the environment it set up in some of the lectures (hence generally nice) - VERY heavy courseload (can be both great and negative) - Tough exams with absolutely no curve. Overall: If you are not taking a heavy courseload for a semester and you need to take 310, take it with him. You'll have a ton of challenging work during his class, but it will set up a very solid foundation for higher level classes and will pay off in the long run. If you have to take a heavy courseload, and need to take 310 (like I had to) then I can't recommend. His 310 course was way too overwhelming with the courseload I already had.
Nathan Manning MATH141 Anonymous 05/15/2020	I was retaking this course in the spring because I didn't do well in the fall, so I expected the course to be much easier. Dr. Manning makes the course so much harder than necessary. The worksheets are graded for accuracy every Tues & Thurs and the TAs grade somewhat hard. His exams are some of the hardest I've ever seen and don't relate to class at all. I got a 100% on Midterm 2 first semester and with Manning I got a 69.5%. That should not be possible. He also isn't great at explaining things and kind of goes all over the place. DO NOT take him if you don't have to
Nathan Manning CMSC456 Expecting an A Anonymous 05/11/2020	(spring 2020, ~ second half online due to COVID-19, expecting A/A+ but also P since I will P/F all my classes) I was going to rate 4/5, but Dr. Manning handled the shift to the online format really well, so 5/5. The first midterm (in-class) was made really easy (mathematically) since a lot of CS majors don't have the sufficient proof-writing experience. Similarly some lectures could be really boring due to the need to explain some math concepts that some CS majors aren't familiar with (e.g. basic linear algebra). Note that on PlanetTerp (as of writing this) MATH456 has an average GPA of 2.93 while CMSC456 has an average GPA of 2.37 even though they are the same class (only math majors / cs+math double majors can register for the class as MATH456). After the class was shifted online due to COVID-19, Dr. Manning provided recorded videos (much better than forcing students to virtually attend at fixed times) and the second midterm was a ~week-long mix of theoretical questions and programming (implementing some of the algorithms described in the lectures).
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 12/24/2019	Good lecturer, exams were too hard and poorly managed. Class average was 20 points lower than the rest of the profesors in our semester
Nathan Manning MATH240 Expecting a D+ Anonymous 12/16/2019	Extremely disrespectful. I attended office hours every week, and he didn't help with any of the material whatsoever
Nathan Manning MATH410 Expecting an A Anonymous 10/18/2019	Great dude and great lecturer. Exams are pretty fair, a lot of homework. He tried not to show his disappointment for our class, but you could tell that he thought we were all idiots.
Nathan Manning MATH403 Expecting an A Anonymous 10/10/2019	Tough as nails but he knows the material inside and out. Obviously passionate about algebra. Proofs are well motivated and he is very good at understanding questions you may have during lecture. Many times after class ended, he would stick around to give advice on both hard and soft problems that arise in the math major. Would highly recommend.
Nathan Manning MATH410 Expecting a C+ Anonymous 09/01/2019	Cool guy, very prepared for lectures, follows the book. I really wanted to like the class but toward the end I was just worrying about grades instead of actually enjoying the contents, so that wasn't great... (the final mark was horrible indeed). the content is not hard but I felt like I didn't grow in the right direction. The homework problems didn't provide too much intuition of what we should be doing -- even though most of the times I did all the exercises without much difficulty I still couldn't get the big picture.
Nathan Manning MATH140 Anonymous 08/15/2019	I will say, he is a nice guy, and has a very friendly / happy attitude during lectures. That being said, his class was horrible. None of the practice exams, worksheets, practice problems, or webassign HW were anywhere close to the difficulty of his exams. I often felt like they differed from each other as well. I frequently felt like what he'd teach in class had nothing to do with what we were going over in discussion the next day. Also manages his time very poorly. Never had to stay late in a class so frequently because he wouldn't have time to go over important material and just try to explain it all in the last 5 minutes. This is partially because I feel like he goes too in depth into questions during class. Don't get me wrong, I love it when the teachers give us a chance to respond to see if we are on page. But he'd spend 10+ minutes answering questions that aren't extremely relevant instead of just teaching the stuff he was supposed to.
Nathan Manning MATH403 Expecting an A- Anonymous 05/12/2019	His lectures are really good. Makes it clear his expectations of the students are in order to succeed in this course (get an A or more). By the end of the first and second midterm it is easy to tell which students didn't follow these guidelines. The class is difficult, but not soul-crushingly so. I would guess that 2 hours a day every day reading the book and thinking about the exercises should be enough for an A. Most people do much, much less than this. He is very helpful in office hours and wants to see his students succeed (provided they are working their hardest).
Nathan Manning MATH403 Anonymous 04/11/2019	Fantastic lecturer. Fair grader. Be warned: he does not pull punches when it comes to exams and is not a fan of curving. If you plan on going to grad school for math, I definitely recommend Manning.
Nathan Manning MATH310 Anonymous 05/11/2018	Really enthusiastic and dedicated to teaching. Fun to talk to.
Nathan Manning MATH140 Expecting a B Anonymous 03/01/2018	REALLY nice guy! charismatic and really good at explaining, especially if you go to office hours. Exams are much harder than other teachers with very little/ no curve, but you will learn a lot from him (conceptually).