This is a basic graduate course in abstract algebra, and should help you to
pass the Algebra Qualifying Exam. The course is structured to fit this
goal. For obvious reasons, participation both in the lecture and the
discussion is strongly recommended.
GRADING: The final grade in the course will be calculated from
your scores in homeworks, midterm and final, with the following weights:
Homeworks 30%, Midterm 20%, Final 50%. There is a strong emphasis on the
final; each of the three final exams (Fall, Winter and Spring) should be
understood as a small version of the Qualifying Exam, so this should give you
some additional practice.
HOMEWORKS: There will be 6-8 homework assignments, the number
depending on the progress in the class. Each assignment will contain 15-20
problems. Five of these will be chosen from each assignment set and
graded. (Those five will only be announced after the homeworks are turned in.)
Again, it is strongly recommended that you work on all problems in each
assignment set, as this practice will be helpful for Qualifying Exam.
I will be posting homework problems after each lecture, so that you can start
working on topic we discussed in the lecture right away. However, the
assignment sheet may be incomplete; in this case I will explicitly say this on
the assignment sheet. Once the assignment sheet is complete, it may contain
problems on topics from several lectures, and I will again explicitly say this
on the assignment sheet. Turn in each assignment on the due date, with
preferably all problems on the complete assignment addressed. If a problem we
choose for grading is not addressed on your assignment, you will receive 0
points for that problem.
Additionally, with each homework assignment I will also give a list of
problems from the book which are not supposed to be turned in, but which I
strongly recommend to work through. Many of them are closely related to the
problems on the homework assignment sheet, and may help you toward solutions
of those problems.
EXAM DATES: Final: Tuesday, December 11, 2018
Midterm: Tuesday, November 6, 2018
You should make sure already now that you are able to take the exams on
the specified dates, as there will be no make-up exams. Exceptions will be
granted only in the case of a fully documented personal emergency