

CS 161 – Computer Security – Syllabus and important notes [pdf] - joshAg
http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~tygar/161/161.2013.08.29.syllabus.pdf
I thought this was a joke, but apparently it isn&#x27;t.<p>Summary:
Late to a class? You get an F and need to leave.<p>Late to section? You get an F and leave. By the way, four sections have been dropped. If you have a schedule conflict, report it by September 2nd, or get an F and need to leave.<p>Unanticipated absence due to family emergency or medical reasons? Full documentation must be submitted on the same day, or get an F.<p>Religious absence? Submit it by September 2nd, or get an F.<p>Cell phone beeps? Get an F and need to leave.<p>Use any non-medical electronic device at all? Get an F and need to leave.<p>Don&#x27;t have a book yet? Pay $50 and also pay out the nose extra to get it overnighted; there&#x27;s an exam on Monday. Oh, and the second textbook hasn&#x27;t been published yet. Too poor? Too bad.<p>Requesting a re-grade? <i>All</i> of your exams will be re-graded.<p>Need to use the bathroom during a quiz? No.<p>Need to use the bathroom during an exam? Your test will be taken from you and photographed, and you will be escorted to the restroom.<p>Suspect someone is looking at your exam sheet? Stand up and report it immediately during the exam or get an F.
======
jackmaney
Required attendance for college courses is bullshit.

I believed that as an undergraduate. I believed that when I became a TA during
my last semester as an undergraduate. I believed that throughout graduate
school (where I TAed and taught several classes on my own). I believed that in
my years as an Assistant Professor (before leaving for industry...long-ish
story). And I most certainly believe it now.

Oh, sure, attendance is important. I always encouraged students to attend my
courses. But college students are adults, and we should treat them as such.
You know what? If you're hungover, or sick, or just walked away from a car
crash, or exhausted, or in any other state where attending class isn't the
best use of your time, then by all means, don't. You're an adult now. You can
make choices and take the consequences of those choices.

And yes, I'll admit that I've had one or two students who skipped most of the
lectures and did an excellent job on the quizzes, exams, and final (however,
in my experience, students who _could_ get away with that generally don't).

These issues aside, though, I didn't go to college for nine years to be a
glorified hall monitor.

~~~
zhte415
I did maths in Imperial College several years ago. They had a simple way of
assuring attendance: no text books. Everything was recorded by hand in the
lecture (before the age of digital cameras). Not one course I took had a
textbook. As a largely self taught book based nerd that didn't like
authoritarian structure, I took myself to a university that was somewhat more
sane.

------
saidajigumi
Sigh. Because 90s-boom-startup mentality is a really great pedagogical tool on
motivated, previously tightly selected students. Or human beings in general.
NOT.

Also, this bit: "Grading will be _highly competitive_." Meaning: "I could have
used powerful team collaboration tools in this classroom, but instead I've
pitted these students against each other." Meaning: "I don't actually
understand evaluation of performance, I just like bludgeoning people over whom
I have power." Meaning: "I was hazed with this kind of crap as a student, I
think it put a few hairs on my chest, and so I return the abuse unto you."

Listen up, instructor: Berkeley probably has some excellent instructor
training resources. You've missed the past half-century, esp. the past
fifteen-or-so years, of vast improvements in educational methods. Maybe your
security chops are great, but your syllabus says something radically different
about your teaching skills.

~~~
Ar-Curunir
lol. I highly doubt that that he was thinking that. You're spouting a lot of
nonsense in that post.

The consensus here at Berkeley is that this is simply a ploy to get students
to drop the class because there isn't enough space for everybody.

~~~
derleth
> The consensus here at Berkeley is that this is simply a ploy to get students
> to drop the class because there isn't enough space for everybody.

Rinky-dink (non-Berzerkely) universities do this by setting configuration
options in the registration software such that only a certain number of people
can register each semester. If you get in a bit late and have a
transcendentally good reason to need that course that semester, the professor
is allowed to sign a small form which overrides the software and lets you in
anyway.

In short, unless UC-Berkeley's software is stuck in 1968 just like its
politics, the reason you gave is highly unlikely.

~~~
sqrt
The issue is that they weren't expecting there to be so few TAs, and as such
the system allowed many more students to enroll than they ended up being able
to support. (Granted, the registration system here is pretty old, but it's not
as horrible as you describe.)

~~~
jychang
It's literally emulating phone lines that dial in. Telebears is a massive
piece of shit.

Source: Current Berkeley student.

~~~
darth_aardvark
Telebears is certainly shit, but it's not to blame for this particular fuckup.

------
dougtygar
Hi, this is Doug Tygar here -- I'm in the instructor of the course in
question. I appreciate all the comments -- but for various reasons, this
course had a breakdown in finding TAs: so we have 170 students and only space
for about 60-90 students. I'm sorry to say that the same problem is occurring
in a number of other upper division (e.g., junior-senior) level classes this
semester in computer science at Berkeley -- although for various reasons, CS
161 is taking it on the nose.

I really wish we had sufficient resources to teach the class properly.

~~~
xvedejas
At my university (Caltech), professors are not allowed to give proctored
exams. Most quizzes, midterms, and finals are take-home. I'm curious why you
think such strict oversight is needed when it's possible for things to work
with no oversight at all? Wouldn't that be easier for you and the few TAs you
have available?

~~~
dougtygar
Hi xvedejas -- I so wish we had adequate resources so we could consider better
formats for the course. I completely agree with you that this is not the
optimal format.

------
brianpgordon
> You may not use any electronic device during class, including computers,
> tablet computers, cell phones, cameras, recording devices, calculator, or
> any device that emits noise (such as a beeping watch). Anyone who breaks
> this rule will fail the course and be asked to leave.

I think that at a certain point a professor's strictness just becomes an
embarrassment to the department. This professor should be censured for this
policy.

~~~
nknighthb
It's also a legal liability. He's just banned devices relied on by disabled
students. His "alternative exam" will also not meet the requirements of many
disabilities.

~~~
8ig8
> Personal medical devices (particularly hearing aids) are allowed, however.

That's the next paragraph in that section of the syllabus. So I guess he's
covered.

Aside: Odd that hearing aids are emphasized here.

~~~
nknighthb
The necessary accommodations for my disability (explicitly recognized in
paperwork from the college I started to go to, in case I ran into an
instructor who decided they were a priest of the Church of the Luddite) do not
include anything that meets any common definition, legal or otherwise, of
"medical device".

One might, under a broad definition, call them "assistive devices", but
somehow I doubt this professor is going to recognize a common laptop or a tape
recorder, among other things, as such, and he's going to embarrass, humiliate,
and just generally make life difficult for any disabled student who attempts
to argue with him.

------
k3n
Is there any oversight at universities to how much extra-curricular time is to
be expected? When I was in school I didn't know of any oversight, but perhaps
it was behind-the-scenes...

> [...] you can expect to spend 20-25 hours each week on the class.

IMO you should be getting 20-25 credits then. Why even bother with assigning
credits to classes, if it's not at all a realistic reflection of the actual
effort required? It makes the credits seem 100% arbitrary.

~~~
cdwhite
So I was always told that (as beambot points out) the number of credits was
based on lecture time, and moreover that you should expect to spend 2-3 times
as much time outside of lectures as you did inside. So your generic 3-credit
course (nominally three hours of lecture, actually more like 2 1/2) would
require something like 9-12 hours total: 3 in lecture, 6-9 at home.

Now in my experience, this was much more accurate for humanities than for
math/science classes, where the amount of time the class took depended
strongly on one's ability and preparation. I remember in particular one math
professor whose problems were tricky: if you had the right insight, the proof
was usually very simple, but if you didn't have that insight, you'd struggle
and struggle. (And then there were the classes for which I was way under-
prepared, and on which I spent way more than 25 hours.)

Add on to that the fact the time spent in lecture (on which the number of
credits depends) doesn't necessarily track the difficulty of the material, and
you have a recipe for wide variation in the amount of time one spends for a
certain amount of credits. (Labs are notorious for taking way more time than
the number of credits.)

And then you get into how some classes are more efficient than others in terms
of how much learning you get for the amount of time you spend, and _this_
doesn't match up with the number of credits either...

~~~
k3n
Yes, I know how they're derived...I had both 4h lectures + 0h labs and 3h
lectures + 1h labs, and that's a good example of how arbitrary it really is.
Even for subjects as closely aligned as biology, chemistry, and physics,
there's a disconnect.

My point is that the hour/credit system is disingenuous to the point of being
counter-productive, and is one of the areas of the educational system that I
think we need to revisit if we're ever to progress passed the same old system
that our parents (and for some, grandparents) used. It was a good start on
objectifying quality and quantity of education, but it hasn't evolved really
and we've learned a lot about learning in that time span.

I understand that classes are challenging, but they should be so on their own
merits -- not because of laborious exercises. I'm not saying "no homework" or
anything, but just don't require it. A lazy student will always find a way to
fail, the gifted will pass, and the driven will do what's required (homework,
attendance, etc.) to pass. At least that's my take on it.

------
sk5t
I don't see the point of most of these policies other than to make people
very, very anxious. Being late to section once or twice would seem to have no
reasonable relationship to a student's understanding of the material, yet here
it results in an instant F. I wonder if the instructor suffers from a
personality disorder.

~~~
acadien
He actually has a pretty darn good rating on ratemyprof (yes I hate that site
too). Anyways I suspect its his method of weeding out the students that are
less passionate about the topic. As it says in the syllabus the class is
overly full, and there aren't enough TAs to support it. I'm not defending his
methodology, but I understand his motivation (preference to motivated students
first).

------
khwang
I graduated from UC Berkeley a year ago, and I remember CS161 being known as
one of the easier technical upper divs at Berkeley. Although I never took the
course myself, these rules seem like quite a departure from the norm.

I wonder if perhaps the professor is trying to scare people into dropping the
class?

~~~
Scaevolus
Looks like budget problems mean they can't support everyone:

"There are currently about 170 students. However, given the current TA
staffing, we can only support 75-90 students in the class. Because this class
is so challenging, I expect that about 2/3rds of currently enrolled students
will drop the course. Those who remain will need to commit to being on-time
for every class and discussion section, and willing to devote substantial
effort to reading and understanding highly technical material (and being
examined on it during every single class section)."

~~~
pkill17
Not a budget issue; they just couldn't staff enough TA's (not enough students
expressed interest in becoming a TA).

~~~
legutierr
Well, with this kind of attitude from the prof, I can see why.

~~~
sqrt
This attitude likely resulted from the lack of TAs rather than the other way
around...

------
ben1040
Escorting people to the john during an exam? This is a plain old college
course, not the California bar exam.

Based on this I wouldn't be surprised if the TA who is assigned "bathroom
escort duty" also would be instructed to check the toilet paper roll for crib
notes prior to allowing the student to relieve themselves.

------
pkill17
For those unfamiliar with our curriculum: CS161 is given as a "choose-two of
these required courses" choice in order to complete the CS major. Many
students are enrolled out of necessity.

~~~
sqrt
This is false; you are confusing 161 with 162.

~~~
pkill17
You may be the confused one: "Breadth courses choose two from the following"
[http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/csugrad/](http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/csugrad/)

I didn't say it was required, but it's in the "choose-two" allotment of
breadths.

------
marincounty
I had a friend who went to Berkeley 20 years ago. He told me his professor was
teaching 300 students via a video monitor. Any, real instruction was taught
through TA's. Plus, he said the professors didn't care about teaching; it was
all about their research. Yea, I know they need to publish, but it just didn't
seem fair to the students? There's a lot of students who drop out of that
university, and never set foot in a college again.

~~~
k3n
One of the top reasons I gave up on "college" \-- I'm paying for an education,
so it'd be nice to be taught by, y'know, an _educator_. Someone who wants to
teach, who enjoys their craft so much that they're excited just to talk about
it... I had a few professors like that, and even though that was decades ago,
I can still recall their names and mannerisms, if that tells you what kind of
impact they had. They even made me enjoy classes that I loathed taking, simply
because they were excited to teach it. However, as I progressed, I had fewer
professors and more TA's "teaching" classes.

~~~
derefr
Is there any resource which ranks colleges on their staff's passion+teaching
ability, rather than some combination of fancy equipment and recruiting
students who will do well no matter what?

------
deepblueq
It looks like it has quite a few more students than it should, and he's using
every excuse he can to drop people. This isn't very nice, but I can at least
understand his position. Then I saw this bit:

"If you miss a class or are late to a class or section (without prior approval
from the instructor) you will be considered to have dropped the class _and
will receive a failing grade._ "

It's practically a lottery for bad GPAs.

~~~
fallinghawks
"you will be considered to have dropped the class and will receive a failing
grade."

You can't have both. Can you?

~~~
Bartweiss
This is what through me off most - I assume he means that you'll be dropped
from the class and is just trying to ramp up the fear factor even farther.

------
readme
Reads like every syllabus I've ever seen:

<ridiculous amount> of hours is required. If you don't put in these hours,
don't expect to pass!

It's just a cop-out so the professor can assert it's your fault for not
studying enough if you fail.

In reality, most of the kids who pass will probably study 5 ish hours per week
for that class, if they are lucky and have time.

~~~
genwin
You get to pay out the nose for that treatment too. College is hardly worth it
nowadays, and certainly won't be worth it in another decade when it has again
doubled in cost in today's dollars.

------
Ensorceled
I had an Applied Math Professor like this, "You should be spending 20 hours a
week per credit". We had 6 credits per term so that left 7 hours per day for
eating, sleeping, getting to class and what have you.

~~~
solistice
Having gone through something similar (3-4 hours of sleep daily, irregular
eating), it's not worth it no matter what. Within half a year, I was a bodily
wreck, coming down with regular colds/flus, several eye infections and a
debilitating 2 month diarrhea that left me with a 14.something BMI. Oh, and
the ensuing pandemonium got me expelled from the school, to add insult to
injury.

It's a damn diploma, which doesn't even guarantee you are getting a job,
especially since those 7 hours left mean you don't get to network during that
time. It's totally ridiculous anyone would expect you to sacrifice your health
for that, and I did buy that con for far too long.

Ahh, well, such are things.

~~~
Ensorceled
I must admit these bad things never happened to me because I didn't actually
work the 20 hours per credit :-)

------
antoinec
"If you feel someone is looking at your exam sheet, you should immediately
stand up and report the incident – during the exam" Sounds pretty fun actually

~~~
dsuth
"He's cheating off me!" "No, HE'S cheating off ME!" /slapfight ensues.

We never had anything this ridiculous when I went to University (EE at one of
the better Uni's in Australia), but reading it sure didn't make me miss the
ridiculous hoops you were expected to jump through in the name of 'education'.

Competitive grading is especially ridiculous and not a valid reflection of how
industry actually works. Sounds like some of these professors need to be
turfed out into the real world for a while.

------
jackmaney
Okay, something seems a bit weird.... When I saw that the instructor had a
gmail account listed on the third page of the syllabus, I suspected that maybe
he's an adjunct and wasn't given an @berkeley.edu email address. However, he's
full professor at Berkeley
([http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~tygar/](http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~tygar/))....

~~~
ams6110
I see this with academics more and more, they don't want to deal with the
university IT department and policies, so they just use gmail, google docs,
etc.

~~~
bphogan
Yup.

G+ is a much better community for online and hybrid class than anything the
Blackboard monopoly can muster up.

------
wmf
This almost sounds like an oblique commentary about the diligence necessary to
implement secure systems. One buffer overflow and you fail.

------
lsjaaa
Hi Prof. Doug Tygar, Good evening, I am a Berkeley student in your cs161
class. I fully understand the situation. I have to say that the current
syllabus is not too bad. Although the quiz part is kinda 'crazy', those
quizzes will certainly force students to read the required reading before
lectures, which is a good thing!!! I am not against this syllabus. However, if
the student is 5 min late and he is unable to take the quiz, that would be
really sad. So, if we can have a policy like having quizzes in the middle of
the lecture and dropping the lowest 2 quizzes, that would solve all the
problems. Again, I do believe that quiz will help students study more and read
the required reading ahead. I am looking forward to a great 161 this semester.
Thanks a lot for all the efforts that you have been taking in to make this
course better.

~~~
dougtygar
lsjaaa -

thanks! You'll hear some very good news on Tuesday morning.

------
ramate
As someone actually attending this class, the primary reason for this syllabus
is to get 2/3 of the class to drop. They couldn't find enough TAs for the
class, and were forced to rework the curriculum, as well as get enough people
to drop to try to alleviate the overcrowding.

------
rickdale
I spent a summer at Berkley coming from as liberal an institution as there is.
The biggest difference that really affected me was the professor stood up
during exams and shouted out every five minutes that five minutes had gone by.
Where I went to school, professors weren't allowed in the room during exams.
Even timed exams. I don't know, but the whole shouting out the time and stuff
really sucked and did not help me learn calculus. It just distracted me and
made me play games with time rather than with equations. Different
environments suit different students.

~~~
ibrahima
As someone who graduated from Berkeley EECS, this is highly atypical.
Something fishy is going on here.

~~~
rickdale
Might be, but I swear to my story. Pretty sure the professor was a grad or phd
student and all he ever liked to do was put hard ass equations on the board
and toot his own horn when he solved it. I had a really hard time relating to
the guy thats for sure.

------
jacalata
Anyone remember that course on game theory? What this course needs is for
every student to turn up ten minutes late to the second class. (First class
would be too hard to organise, I think).

------
dougtygar
Hi everyone -- Doug Tygar (the instructor) here again. I just wanted to
mention that between a number of drops from the class and what looks like some
more resources, I think I will be able to run the course without the draconian
conditions in the original syllabus. So, we'll have an updated syllabus on
Tuesday. Best wishes everyone!

------
anonchemucb
In the Chemistry department, some of the classes taught large discussions.
Perhaps a way of solving the problem while keeping 170 students, you could
just have the TA's teach 2 discussions, maybe in the evening and just have it
be in a large room. It might be impersonal but it keeps everyone without
having to be anal about it.

------
akozlik
I'm pretty sure this was intended to be intense specifically to push students
from taking it. The professor is ensuring that he has enough TAs for students.
By encouraging students to not take the class he's making the class better for
those who decide to stick it out.

------
john_butts
Wouldn't if be easier to lean on two or three grad students to step up? I
genuinely don't know how these things work, but maybe that's why this looks a
little nuclear to me.

------
josephpmay
I am currently applying to college, and reading this is making me think twice
about applying to Berkeley. Is the UC budget crisis really that bad? Are
situations like this common?

~~~
thatswrong0
Current UC Berkeley EECS senior: I would apply to Berkeley but suggest you go
to a better funded smaller school so long as its top ~15 if possible. Me, I
had the choice between Berkeley, Illinois, and Carnegie Mellon. I do wish I
had gone to Carnegie Mellon. The only two things that Berkeley really has
going for it at this point is: it's close to tech companies (so tons of
recruiters) and the degree still has a prestigious ring to it. Classes are
packed even in upper division CS courses; I'm still waitlisted for 3 classes
and have no idea which ones I'll get into. And it's only going to get worse as
more people flock to CS and as the budget tightens.

~~~
sqrt
I'm a CS sophomore at Berkeley, and I actually had the same choice. Sure, it
would have been better to go to CMU based solely on the school, but the
difference in tuition and fees between the two was too great to not go to
Berkeley. (I'm in-state and received little financial aid.)

~~~
thatswrong0
Ooh yeah I forgot about this point. If I were in state I wouldn't mind as
much.

------
aaron695
Obviously a joke of some sort [or a mental breakdown], but lets all jump on
board and take it seriously shall we.

