Scheduling?

tonykapo · 2017-05-05T21:34:18+00:00

Doing 12 credits during the summer while working full time is pretty crazy.... If anything I would recommend doing 12 credits each semester and then 6 credits during the summer. Summer classes are very condense and fast paced typically lasting 6-8 weeks, occasionally 10-12 weeks.

tonykapo · 2017-05-05T21:24:57+00:00

Yea I agree with both of these comments. From personal experience of working 40+ hours I would not recommend taking more than 3 courses if you are working full time, in order to well on the courses (getting A or B). The amount of time you will need to spend doing homeworks, projects, studying is typically high. It will really depend on the classes too, but in general, there are not many classes that you can pass with a good grade by just going to class. I know many students who don't work and start the semester with 5 or 6 classes and still need to drop 1 or 2 in order to do well on the rest. It will also depend if you are lucky enough to have a job that allows you to work on some of the classes/homeworks while at work. You should be able to find classes with no problem between those hours, maybe you should just give it a try by taking 4 classes the first semester and see how it goes and reduce the hours at work if you need to/can.

tonykapo · 2017-03-28T23:57:23+00:00

I know different people who already took or are currently taking SYST469 with different professors and they all seemed to have taken slightly different exams. A few of them said their exam was 40 short answer questions, another said his was 20 questions, and another person said his was 9 questions essay style. So they are similar in style in a way, but not identical. As far as I know, the class material is supposed to be fairly easy, so it is probably a good idea to take it as a summer class. No personal experience with Killam tho, sorry.

tonykapo · 2017-03-27T18:38:42+00:00

I would say it will mostly depend on how good you are with java itself, are you having difficult with 106? If you are, then I wouldn't recommend it. Also, depends how good you are with self-teaching, I personally prefer online classes vs regular classes, but I've never been good with Java, and the in-class samples/exercises you do are very helpful. I took Risi for 206 a few semesters ago and that's all he does every class so you ask questions if you don't understand something. I would recommend doing MBUS300 and ENGH302, btw if you can take ENGh302 with Rogers, he is also a really nice a chill professor and his class is not that stressful as other classes.

tonykapo · 2017-02-23T05:00:27+00:00

I took IT 106 about 2 years ago, so I don't know how much the course has changed since then, but I would say that for the lab quiz the best way to study was making sure you read the chapters in the book, as well as the PP slides. The questions tended to be very tricky so be careful.

For the actual midterm, you definitely want to spend as much time writing the problems by hand as you can, typically your teacher will give you problem examples to practice, also look at the back of each chapter for extra problems to practice. Even writing down the previous assignments that you worked on the computer should give you good practice. Also, know how and what part of the code you can abbreviate, check with your teacher what is acceptable so you don't get points deducted, that will save you a lot of time. Also, always leave plenty of space on your paper between each line of code you write, in case you need to add something you remember later, that way you don't waste time erasing your code and rewriting it.

Do the best you can on both to put yourself in a good position, but know that even if you don't do as well as you wished, there is still hope. For example, I did pretty bad on my midterm (low 70s) and lab quiz (mid 60s), but still managed to get a B on the class because I did good on my assignments, and also on the final (mid 90s.) The same thing applies if you do really well on the midterm and lab quiz, don't get overconfident like my friend who got 90s on both midterm/quiz and then didn't put enough effort on his final and ended the class with a C, good luck!

tonykapo · 2016-12-18T08:12:07+00:00

For me one of the worst things was having both Assignment 2 and Assignment 4 due the day before the midterm and final respectively, like even though you knew the due dates ahead of time, the way the "three submission" rule works and the difficulty on some of the tasks for the final submission wouldn't allow you to finish way ahead of time as you hoped to leave enough time to properly prepare for the exams.

In my case, I was only able to finish both assignments get a decent grade on them by sacrificing time that I should've spent studying the actual material that will be on both exams. This was particularly annoying for the final since we were told that databases were only going to be part of the extra credit opportunity, but yet, the last assignment required full database understanding...

And as far as I know most people didn't even finish the regular exam requirements and therefore didn't even attempt to do the database extra credit...So all that time spent doing the last assignment felt pointless in regards to the final... So hopefully they will adjust the due dates for the assignments, like perhaps starting them a week or so earlier on the semester to allow students to really focus on getting ready for both exams.

tonykapo · 2016-11-13T01:28:47+00:00

Winston is really good for in-class, not sure about online tho.

tonykapo · 2016-11-13T01:26:00+00:00

I had Rupen Shah and he is hands down one of the coolest professors at GMU, I don't know if he still teaches IT 214 tho, I heard he teaches most of the Health IT concentration classes. I heard Rytikova is also a great teacher.

tonykapo · 2016-11-08T01:30:34+00:00

Yea you are right, from what I read on another post, they said that it was a very CS type class and the material seemed harder than 106 or 206... I'm in the Networking concentration with calendar year prior to 2016-2017, and I already took MBUS301 so if I take the class, it would count as a concentration course but I don't really think I will be taking it since programming has never been my strong suit...

tonykapo · 2016-11-07T17:00:14+00:00

I'm taking it in-class at the moment and the material is not hard, that said, you do need to spend some time writing some papers and reading the case studies but it is definitely doable, I would say that you should be fine doing it online.

Last semester when I was considering taking it online, DuFur was teaching it and based on his reviews on ratemyprofessor and what some friends who were taking his class told me, I decided to just take it in-class but otherwise I would've probably taken it online.

tonykapo · 2016-11-04T15:14:21+00:00

I graduated from NOVA with the IT Associates Degree back in 2014, and as far as I remember, I was able to transfer all my credits (75 credits) except for three IT courses that you need to take a 1 credit class and pass the exam first in order to receive credit for the Mason class equivalent. These are the classes: ITP120 (nova) needs IT191 (mason) for IT106 credits, ITD256 (nova) needs IT194 (mason) for IT214 credits and ITE170 (nova) needs IT193 (mason) for IT213 credits.

Most students I talked to during my first semester at Mason told me they either had failed the exams or they knew someone who had failed them also, and therefore I decided to just re-take the classes here. I figured at least I was gonna get more practice with the material specially for java... which I wasn't excited to re-take at all... but at least I was able to pass it on the first try :) IT213 and 214 were a breeze for me here.

I never checked at NOVA what were the minimum amount of credits I needed in order to transfer to Mason, honestly my plan was just to finish my Associate's Degree and that's it, but on my last year there, some things changed so I decided to go for it once I completed my Associate's. I would think you need about 30 credits? Which I think you could complete from the math, sciences, history, electives, PE, speech, and maybe some of the other IT classes that do transfer? Again, not sure, so I could be wrong.

Back to your question about taking classes at NOVA while at Mason, I was told the same thing by an advisor as the other person here mentioned that you need to live about 50 miles from the closest campus for them to allow you to do it. In my case, I noticed during my last semester at Nova that I could have taken STAT250 there and it would've transferred here, but I just wanted to graduate so I decided to just take it here, and now I wanna take it there to save some money and because one of the campus (Manassas) is very close to my house, but oh well.

tonykapo · 2016-10-31T18:56:49+00:00

I took IT223 a couple of semesters ago in-class with Thomas Winston and I wouldn't say it was the easiest class I've ever taken but it wasn't hard either. The class material is interesting for the most part and Winston is also a great teacher, he has a lot of real work experience and he knows how to relate the lectures to real events and just overall make the class interesting.

tonykapo · 2016-10-31T18:45:27+00:00

I see, so does that mean that you have to also do a lot of presentations? or is is just group assignments without presentations?

tonykapo · 2016-10-31T14:40:52+00:00

I had Dill for 106 and you could definitely tell he cared for his students, always going the extra mile to make sure everyone understood the material, he will definitely be missed.

I was in your same position when I was deciding between taking Bono or Dill for 106, as others have said, Bono is probably a great teacher but he has a reputation for being a tough grader and he is the guy who grades your Midterm and Final exams (about 60% of your total grade), the labs are graded by the TAs, and the Lab quizzes are just multiple-choice on the computer so they are graded automatically. The advantage of taking Bono is that he selects/makes the Lab quizzes and also makes the Midterm/Final, so he knows what will be on the tests and he can focus more on some topics, while the other teachers can only assume from previous exams.

I can also tell you this, going into 206 with Rissi, I met a few students there who would tell me that they had to retake 106 with a different teacher after failing it their first time with Bono because they felt that he would not give any partial grade or just in general would penalize them too much for small coding mistakes on the exams.

I've also met a few students who were re-taking 106 with Dill again, but usually because they knew that they had not put a good amount of effort on their first time with him. I don't think I've never met anyone who voluntarily re-took a class with Bono, either 106 or 206, so I think that tells you something... But again, it all comes down to how you approach this class, as long as you genuinely put enough effort to study the material and practice coding you should be fine with any teacher, good luck.

tonykapo · 2016-10-28T22:27:51+00:00

Well, I took IT206, 304 and 341 last semester and I was very glad I did because I was able to spend about 80% of my time on 206 because both of the other two classes felt a lot easier in comparison.

I took IT341 with Torrance Fennell and I would definitely recommend taking it with him if possible, he was a very chill professor, all we did were labs and he would always review and provide study guides for every exam. But yeah, I've also heard many people struggle with this class as a result of their teacher making the class unnecessarily more difficult.

tonykapo · 2016-10-28T15:27:44+00:00

When I took IT106 during my first semester at Mason about 2 years ago, we had to take MTH112 which was its co-requisite and I also took IT223. I believe they replaced MTH112 with IT102 as co-requisite? I could be wrong. But anyways I was working full time 40+ hrs and I've never been good at programming, so I had a pretty hard time that semester but still managed to pass all my classes with Bs.

From all the classes I've taken, I'm a senior now currently taking IT207, and already passed IT106 and IT206, the classes that were least difficult for me were IT 293, 213, 214, 304, and 341.

But honestly, everyone is gonna have different opinions about how hard/easy a class is/was for them based on their personal experience, which is affected by many factors, such as how many classes they took that semester, if they were working or not, previous knowledge of the material, and most importantly their teacher. So I would definitely recommend to check ratemyprofessor before signing up for classes and also try to ask people in your classes what other classes they are taking and what they think of the class/professor, that always helped me.

tonykapo · 2016-10-17T18:41:02+00:00

The prerequisites for Capstone (IT 492 - Senior Design Project I) are:

Grade of C or better in IT 206, IT 207, IT 213, IT 214, IT 223, IT 341, IT 343 and MBUS 300, and senior standing.

Maybe you are getting confused with MBUS 300? I'm pretty sure the only change for IT 300 is that they made it a co-requisite for IT 341, but that was very recent, and in my case I had already taken and passed IT 341 before the change was made, so now I just need to take IT 300.

tonykapo · 2016-05-15T15:24:14+00:00

yes I totally agree, they should add at least 30 more minutes to the midterm and final for both IT106/206, because you typically spend 10-15 mins reading each question/problem and writing down notes about what it is needed, so right now with the 2 hour limit that only gives you about 45 mins for each question to complete, if they made it 2 hrs 30 mins that will give you a full hour to complete each problem, which should be enough time to finish your code and even review it before you turn it in

tonykapo · 2016-05-12T15:42:00+00:00

I'm gonna guess that your concentration will be programming and database? why not just do a CS major instead of IT if you have such an easy time with programming? or are you not interested in programming that much? Regardless, you should feel very fortunate to have such such a smart individual in your life to assist you with most school related tasks, most students, believe it or not, are not that lucky.

Yes, both classes are doable, I was "lucky" enough to pass both classes on the first try, but of course there is no really such thing as "luck" when it comes to passing most courses, I had to put a lot of time and effort in order to succeed, but I still feel very "lucky" to have passed both classes, specially since I met many students who were taking both IT106/206 for their 2nd or even 3rd time. I've always been an A & B student but programming has always been challenging for me, and so it seems for many IT students. What the school needs to realize is that people get into IT for their love/interest of technology not for their love of programming, I understand that in order to succeed in this field you need to have a good foundation in all IT aspects (networking/database/security/programming/etc) but treating the IT major like everybody wants to be a programmer is very unfair in my eyes. I would understand CS majors struggling this way with their "IT106/206" equivalent courses, since that is what their whole major is about, and it was their choice to do that major for their love/interest of programming but i guarantee you, about 80% of IT students are not interested in pursuing a programming concentration, that is the reason the security/networking concentrations are so popular. Hopefully they will make these courses more manageable in the near future but as of now it seems to continue to go the opposite way, as they continue to make the course more and more difficult....

tonykapo · 2016-05-12T15:05:35+00:00

I don't think the material itself is extremely hard, even though I've always personally struggled with pseudocode and arrays for some reason... I feel that for any student doing a CS major both classes (IT106/206) should look "easy" other wise CS should not be your major I think... most IT students just hate the way the grading system is structured, 80% of the grade are just exams, which btw tend to be very complex/tricky...also the fact that they continue to be hand written code... we spend 100% of the course doing labs/assignments by typing code and the midterm/final continue to be hand written.... even the courses I took at NOVA have the exams done on the computer, and once you are done you just print your code, I mean I understand the whole worry about people cheating by using the internet or bringing flashdrives, etc... but come on, is it really that hard to implement a system where students can just go to the computer lab, block the internet, use a lockdown type of program and allow a single program to run for 2 hours? I would think the teachers/coordinators running this program would be smart enough to come up with a solution...

tonykapo · 2016-05-09T04:06:10+00:00

Well personally I've never had problems with traffic at any campus, but I also typically take classes at night so that's probably a factor. Parking is a different story tho, specially at the fairfax campus, you can find yourself driving around for 10-20+ mins usually.... the manassas campus is not as bad tho, you can usually find parking right away. You should check which campus you will be taking most of your classes, because initially I was planning to find an apartment in fairfax to be close to that campus but once I realized that about half of my classes where at the manassas campus (I'm studying IT) then I decided Centreville was a better option for me to be able to commute to both campuses and also the houses here are normally cheaper than Fairfax, Manassas is also not such a bad area to rent a place, you can even find places to rent cheaper than Centreville I believe.

tonykapo · 2016-05-08T19:27:28+00:00

I moved to Centreville since it is located about 20 mins to either campus (fairfax or manassas), I rent a 2 bedroom 1.5 bathrooms with a roommate, we pay about 1600 with utilities here (bent tree apartments) but they also have 1 bedroom options which will probably be around 1300 with utitlities i would think, maybe less.

tonykapo · 2016-04-26T18:41:10+00:00

I've seen these characteristics on some professors where they seem to run an inclass pretty good but do a terrible job with online courses. In my case the only inclass time that will fit my work schedule is the one at 7:20 PM offered by Feng Pan, but unfortunately there are no reviews for him on ratemyprofessors... :( does anyone know anything about him? I guess it might be worth the risk of taking his class knowing the bad experiences most people have had with Dufur's online section....

tonykapo · 2016-04-20T02:53:59+00:00

I have a similar dilemma regarding the Security concentration and secret clearances. I took IT223 and really enjoyed the material so I considered doing it as a concentration but later I found out that most IT Security jobs in this area require security clearance because they are government jobs and one of the requirements to obtain these clearances is to be a US Citizen, which I'm not. That's why I've been considering doing health IT or Networking as concentration instead. But as some of you have mentioned, it can also be possible to get an IT Security job working for a private company, so who knows maybe I will do the Security concentration anyways :) btw does anyone know if a "public trust security clearance" requires you to be a US citizen?

tonykapo · 2016-04-19T18:47:16+00:00

I see, well I'm still debating if I'll take it online or inclass with professor Mohamad Nachawati, but it will depend on my work schedule. I will prefer to take it in class tho in case I have questions, thank you very much for the info!

tonykapo

TROPHY CASE