2.9
Quality3.9
Difficulty30%
Would Retake120
Reviews30%
Would Retake
120
Reviews
Rating DistributionOfficial
5
33
4
13
3
22
2
19
1
33
What Students Say
“She has insanely hard tests that most people fail and have nothing to do with the quizzes or class work imo”
MATH1A - 4.0 rating“I hate this professor, bloody hell, she has a lot of homework, and those questions are very complicated”
MATH1A - 1.0 ratingClass Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
44%
Textbook Required
70%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
B
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.81 avg changeRatings by Course
MATH1ABC
5.0
(1)MATH491C
5.0
(1)MATH49
5.0
(1)MATHA
5.0
(1)MATH40A
5.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
MATHS105
5.0
MATHS1B
5.0
MATH230
5.0
MATH49
5.0
MATH2B
5.0
Reviews (120)
i'll help out Ms. Lam even though i never do well in her class. she is truly a good teacher, very clear and attentive to the class. her tests are little tastes of hell though. good overall but i suppose she assumes everyone loves math the way she does.
Tough class, but concepts are explained clearly and she is helpful with answering questions during her office hour.
Very Hard...she cannot really explain the material at all. Her tests are a killer and the final is not even worth taking bc it brings your grade down atleast one letter grade...
No Comments
a nice instrutor. Willing to help student no matter it's her office hour or not. Do and understand her suggested homework and you can at least get a B+. Want to get an A? Finish all the T/F questions and check the answer with her. :)
Very nice teacher, very helpful, very clear. Would taker her again in a heartbeat. I love Ms. Lam!!
She is a really nice person, very kind and loves Math. But her tests are way TOO HARD!!!! In the midterms you have tons of questions and the final is impossible even though she gives an extra hour.
LAM is an awesome person! I thought she was fun to be around and I loved her attitude. I bombed the class. HMWK everyday and if you don't keep up with it, struggle city. Like a cute pixie she is. Take her if you have the time, otherwise, YOU WILL DIE!!!
If you are not a very good person at math, then stay as far away from Ms. Lam as possible. The exams are murder, especially the final! She seems nice on the outside, but trully she is evil! She enjoys upper math classes better and hates math 101.
Stay as far as you can from her!!!Be happy!!! Don't waste your time trying to pass her class. The exams are way to hard and the final tastes like hell... Even if you work hard, you are not going to pass nay Calculus class with her. Look for another teache
I thought she was very clear and spent a lot of time going over problems the students needed help on. Her tests are a little hard, but they're only hard if you don't study and don't do the homework! DO THE HOMEWORK and you're good!
I encorage having a studygroup with any of her classes because sometimes she doesn't leaves out important points. But she is a helpful teacher and very encoraging. Content and book was diffiuclt for me.
She is a nice teacher, she will teach you until you understand, even 4 to 5 hours. Very good teacher and learn a lot. Thank you her so much, I like Maths a lot mostly because of her.
I have a learning disability and she was very patient and helpful. She is one in a million, that actually care and want her students to understand and pass. I think the people who don't like her are in school because of mommy and daddy and just want to fail.
Phuong is very nice and I am sure she is great with the lower-level classes, but in Discrete Math she is sort of a joke. She can't explain the concepts, so she makes the tests really easy. So take her for a pretty easy time at a TOUGH class, but don't expect to learn as much as those students who take it from a good instructor. Maybe she's just new
C'mon guys. Lam is a great teacher. Only lazy students who doesn't study but want an A would give her bad ratings. Very helpful, if you do the homework and ask her for help if your stuck on any problem, then As her class is no biggy. SHE IS VERY HELPFUL. GREAT TEACHER!!
No Comments
This was my first Math class in about six years and she made it SO easy. Phoung is the best teacher I know. I only wish I could take her for every class here on out. PS: I have a Learning Disability so finding a teacher who can relate to that is hard, but Phoung is amazing.
Maths 105 is too hard although I have learn how to calculate 1+1=2 and 3+3-3=3 in the other countries~ but his class is still too hard for me~
quick quick drop the class class!!!!! she is a hard hard hard teacher!! only gave out 2 A in a whole class
Very very friendly and helpful. You should work hard to get A, but she's always ready to help you out. Highly recommended
Good teacher
She's a good teacher but tends to go off on tangents occasionally, thus wasting precious minutes of class time. Spends too much time on the easier parts of class and fails to give alot of in depth information on the harder parts of Calculus. Tests are much harder then her quizes and practice exams, so beware! Overall though, I think it was good.
Way too fast in the important and hard chapter, and slow in easy things. The sylabus is very clear, ZERO flexibility, no matter what or how nothing is even heard, so go ALWAYS to class, do ALL your HW and dont's even ask for help with your grade. Class started with 40, by mid-quarter only 15 left, by the 2 exam, only 12. final is 40% and very hard
Very difficult. She goes too fast with the harder sections where she packed two sections in one day. While the easy sections take the whole class meeting. You really have to go to the math center everyday to understand her. I wouldn't recommend her, take Stanley instead.
Took calc 1b. She didn't really move through the material at a good pace, she spent too long on some sections, not long enough on others (and entirely too long answering student questions, thats what office hours are for). Quizzes easy, test questions were a mix of easier and harder questions. I'd recommend one of the more experienced teachers...
Second worst teacher i've had in my life, tests are killer, material is already difficult. She gets answers wrong so often you stop trusting what she says...very very very strict
foothill students never take her please! she is quite easy in fall&winter, but she turn her exam papers into extra difficult one,she betray all her students who believe that she was an easy grader!her teaching method is completly rubblish, use a whole lesson to teach a simple rule,she doesnt have attitude to be a teacher even a tutor,bad instructor
i dont know what everyone is talking about here. phoung lam is a pretty easy teacher. rite now i have mudge for 1b and she is a lot harder. take lam easy a...maybe she changed her ways from the previous reviewers?
she is very cute, and her class was really intersting! I hated math before i met her, yet now I love math! its because of her class. she gave us many quizes and these are very helpful to keep studying. I am lazy yet she made me active!
very hard teacher, she doesnt know how to teach, she uses survial guide, many quizes, she teaches easy problem in class, but the exams are all difficult ones, she doesnt know how to explain the questions often, always pospone the distribution date of exam papers<--she said she was sick...who believe, these are all her, please consider!
I first saw her ranking in ratemyprofessor and chose to take her class. People said she is easy. But what i found is that she is so difficult. The hw quiz are from the book (which is accpetable).But the 3exams are so hard! if you wanna get an easy A or B.. don't take her! think twice before taking! good luck!
Don't take her!! better take Mudge or Stanley..She is just a TUTOR before being a teacher. I bet why she can teach Math here..She doesn't know how to teach though she is nice and willing to teach. My God !! She'd better learn how to teach before teaching
she is nice, but doesn't know how to teach. Her midterms and exams are extremely difficult. If you want to get good grades, never take her. She always teaches easy stuff in class but exams are very difficult.
Exams are very hard. Very easy in class, but exams turn out to be all incorrect! Makes a lot of mistakes in class! But when you do a tiny mistake on the exam, 0 points!!! Don't take, else you have to memorize the whole book, since she uses problmes for the exams from it.!
Even though I failed this class I would still take her as my teacher any day. Tests are hard but HW quizes are easy. Great teacher and she's so patient to sit down and teach people.
She made it too hard to get through anything. Once you thought you were done she would throw another worksheet at you just for fun. She is very annoying as well. Her class was my least favorite.
Great teacher! She makes an early morning class worth coming to. I am not a good math student and she got me through the course with a B+. She was very helpful outside of class.
She's very nice but her class is not easy. Has tests and Quizzes every class, and they count quite alot in the final grade. If you do all your hws you'll be fine(but usually you won't, and you'll suffer). Her class is kinda boring...she just simply follow the survival guide to teach. If you decide to take her class, make sure to keep up your hw!
She is really helpful. Quizzes and tests are easy, but the final exam is VERY HARD!!I got A- before the final, but after that, I got a B, which is really disappointed me.
She was a good math teacher. I found the material and her explanations very clear although she assigns way to much homework.
I was not very good at math before I took her class, but, after taking her class, I soon became a math tutor! She is very approachable and made clear to me what I was having trouble with. I definitely recommend her as a math teacher.
Ms Lam seems to use a similar pattern of teaching every day that is either hit or miss. If, during the first few days of class, you find that the teaching style doesn't fit your learning style, I recommend you drop the course. Tests are harder than expected but quizzes are almost fair. Use caution, she includes previously unmentioned problems.
she is one of thoes teachers that stictly teach for the money. Every class is the same pattern and unless you live for calculus you wont get much out of her lectures. You have to teach yourself most of the material. O and the final is impossible!!!Their are better teachers so i dont recomend her for calculus.
Great teacher. I took Math 1B in summer and was easy as she had prepared me so well. Recommend you take her class if you want to be successful in math.
poor teacher. took points off exam although answer was correct. Her explanation was you graph is incorrect, and if you had given an incorrect solution with ref to your wrong graph, I would have given you full marks. She cannot do maths as simple as 25*25, her comment was "it's not 625, right?"
I had to put a lot of time and effort into this class this past quarter. Ms. Lam is a really nice teacher with great energy. Her tests are based entirely off of the web assign hw and textbook hw. Although she doesn't require doing hw, do it!! She definitely graded fairly and gave good partial credit, but overall the class was hard. 7.4/10 overall
Don't take her if you still wants to keep you GPA. Exam is extremely hard which involve 50% of proves and 20% of true/false questions. Those question are not even appeared on the text book. STAY AWAY FROM HER!!!!
She made Math2B really difficult, because more than half of the questions on the midterms and the finals were not from the book. She gives you about 20 hw problems on each section of the book, but none of them can help you answering her questions on the exams. Those questions are "proof questions" which even the book doesn't have any to practice.
She's just a GPA killer. She can blow your gpa by her nonsense midterms and finals. the high percentage of the questions are not even similar to any exercises of the book. I do NOT recommend her!!
That's absolutely a bad choice for your MATH 2B, if you want to learn and pass the class with a good grade. She makes the subject extremely difficult and awful. She's not standard on her midterm exams and final. Overall, I'm not happy with selecting her as my teacher of 2b class.
She was amazingly difficult on the midterms and final exams. The exams were not from the concept that she had talked in the class. Moreover, all the assigned homework problems from the book didn't help to prepare for her exams. I would not recommend her.
I believe that the exams were nonsense. She had a high expectations, which means that she wanted you to know the concepts that she didn't talked about or practiced in the class. Now, I can see why she's a gpa killer, after taking her class. Not recommended at all!!
She's such a bad choice for 2B, she gives us so many hw problems and during the midterm none of them help. if we don't write the answers according to her answer sheet its automatically 50% off. Her lectures and exams not match at all why do people like her teach such high level math? If it is your last quarter & you are taking 2B stay away from her
Received the lowest grade in this class in my 2 years at foothill. I took phys 4A-4D, every math series, chem series, IGETC, etc. Her class isn't hard in the sense that the materials are hard, it's that her grading method is ridiculous on the exams. Slightest errors will equal 0 partial credit. Recommended you avoid to save your GPA.
She is a great person but not so good teacher. She gives a lot of homework and the test are EXTREMELY hard! some stuff you dont even learn it and it's on the hw. and she NEVER NEVER NEVER lets you out on time. but she is super nice and willing to help out those who need it.
I want to like her, but her grading on her tests make NO sense. She will mark you down on tests for EXTREMELY minor things.. Beware of that. Otherwise she is very enthusiastic, wants her students to do will and covers material very well. She usually stays after class for people who want/need help and will you can get a one on one with her.
She is very hard and a hard grader. This is the lowest grade I have received ever! Her exams are not really what she teaches and does leave a lot of homework, but she is a great instructor and very patient when you don't understand a concept. She is very approachable and available everyday for help. Over all, her class was hard,but I learned a lot.
She is nice but she is not helpful. Kind of confusing has time to help but does not explain well. I mdo not recommend this class
Very kind. Has a lot of office hours. Patiently explains problems until you understand.
She is better at other things than a teacher, maybe she is better as a tutor or a leader. IF you take her class be ready for the not good. But if you want tough then she is the right person for you.
She's really nice and willing to help. Her explanation is crystal-clear, and she always do the calculation step-by-step. Homework and quiz per week. Quizzes are actually easy, but they're conceptual so you gotta pay extra attention to the details. She gives fair, considerate points. Definitely recommended!
She has insanely hard tests that most people fail and have nothing to do with the quizzes or class work imo. I did A LOT of self studying to get a gist of what may be on the test but only one or two questions ever were. I read the book, did all back of the book problems, and went over old quizzes/hw plus KhanAcademy but Idk where she gets the tests
She is sweet and extremely helpful if you have questions, however her lectures do not prepare you for any of her exams. She said she "leaves things out on purpose" instead of lecturing on it. Which makes her lectures pointless to be honest, we go over worksheets mostly and be ready to learn everything on your own conceptually. Exams are tough.
Nice teacher and explain concepts well. However, don't let class material fool you. The exam is more challenged. Final is easylier than midterm.
I can't gauge how easy this class is since I already knew the material. Forces you to buy textbook to do online homework. friendly and helpful
She is nice and caring, but when it comes to her quizzes and tests they are hardly related to what she teaches. The first exam was about 30-40% of what we studied in class and for homework and the other 60% was kinda like wtf where did this come from.
I hate this professor, bloody hell, she has a lot of homework, and those questions are very complicated. What's more, the countless quizzes.
Poor explanations and the majority of class wasted with simple questions. HW was 75% if late. The final was around 3 times the length of both midterms, and at the end, around 90% of the class were still working on it. I can't believe this teacher has spent her entire life teaching, but overloaded the final like that. Now I'll have to retake...
The quizzes weren't necessarily that hard and she gave good partial credit on quizzes. Midterms were the same way. The worst part is she never posted grades throughout the term and only posted them a week after the final. The final was long enough that the 3 hours to take it wasn't enough and most people didn't finish. If you can, find someoneelse
Lam is a kind and energetic teacher. However, I found that I really struggled with her teaching style. It's seems as time is spent on rather unimportant details versus the larger concept. Sections are gone through quickly (quarter system), but the style of teaching lacks the solidification of the concept. It didnt work for me, but may for others.
Her lecture is all conceptual with really hard homework assignments. Her tests are insanely hard, and are completely different than what is done in class. She is nice tho, and willing to work with students.
I've taken Lam for the last two quarters. Put in 15hours a week studying for the exams. Got 100% on the homework and above B+ grades on quizzes. Then 50% on the exams. Nothing relates to the exams. I would recommend just not taking her and wait for other teachers to open up. She is oblivious to the disconnect between her exams and teaching style.
I am not bad at math. But, this professor is horrible at teaching the concepts. What she teaches is very minimal and her tests are about stuff that we never touched upon or learned. Her homework assignments are incredibly difficult and long and don't really help to study for the tests at all. The quizzes don't prepare you for the test.
My advice to you is not to take this teacher. She will exam you on the most difficult material from the textbook; all of which she has not gone over in class and expects you to learn on your own in the STEM center. It not her fault that there isn't enough time in class to go over much, but given the circumstance the exams should be less difficult.
You will not get an A in this class unless maybe you have already taken calculus in the past. I did 100% of the homework in the class and even got 2 tutors to help me make sure i was learning the proper methods but i still got a B in the class. This was largely due to the fact that the final exam was much more difficult than the course work.
I was scared to take her bc of RMP, but the reality is Lam is a great teacher who does not deserve the BS. People are just lazy. Her tests were not too hard, you have to actually study. I saw that what most call doing the HW is just clicking through the wrong answers until you get the right one because she gives unlimited tries. Thats a u problem
Professor Lam is a very good maths teacher,I'm taking her for Online Spring class. She is definitely a lecturer that i would take it again. She is so caring and she shows the topic steps by steps and makes sure every student understands. Sometimes the quizzes and exams are hard if and only if you dont do the homework and don't focus in the class.
Professor Lam really puts in the extra mile to make sure you know the basics and concepts. Make sure to do homework and you do need to study for her tests and quizzes which all come from lectures and homework. She provides feedback and gives extra credit points. She made Calculus enjoyable and fun. I took this class online in the Spring.
I feel bad, as Prof. Lam is so sweet and really cares, but my GOD, I learned nothing. The quizzes and exams are 100x harder than anything she lectures on, and I never felt prepared. I thought it was just me, but when I got to 1B I realized I'm not actually bad at math; she just isn't the best at teaching.
Lam is my favorite math prof I've ever taken. It was clear from day 1 that she genuinely cares about student success. I struggled in the course, but that was a matter of circumstances & she did everything she could to help and be accomodating. Lectures sometimes long but I found them clear, detailed, and helpful. Super helpful in office hrs too.
Solid teacher, genuinely cares about her students learning the material and succeeding. She also puts in the effort to give thorough feedback on assignments, which I appreciated. Others have commented that her tests are hard, but I found them to be reasonable and fair... I would definitely take another course with her given the chance!
She is probably the best math teacher I have ever had. Math is my hardest subject and she made me feel like I'm good at math. She was also very understanding while I was going through a tough time with family. She is super nice and funny and I really didn't mind going to her class. Forsure recommend!
She sucks. She doesn't grade jack and the homework is too much, and I'm smart so trust me.
Would not take again
Honestly No just no.
I actually had taken her for math 48B, and she was so nice and caring. She was very accessible outside of class and would make sure you clearly understood the material. I don't really know her teaching style for calc, but she was the best in pre-calc.
The homework is worth 25% of your grade. And is graded on thoroughness. No matter how boring it may be do all of it. And check the answers with the back of the book.
I had finished calculus (through multi variable) but needed 1A at Foothill. Problem came with homework she said to try and turn in on time so I didshe didnt grade any I mean any homework until the last week. She went through a took points off everywhere. Because it was so late no one had a chance to make the corrections she wanted.
Just no. I have always been a math person but this changed me. She did not grade anything until the last week of school. When grades started rolling in she became "very busy therefore unable to answer questions on an individual level" essentially didn't let students learn from mistakes because we never knew they existed.
I was struggling to keep up, had to spend 3-4 hours on hw, very fast-paced honestly not even worth it, I tried watching Kahn academy videos to teach myself. If you have the time to teach yourself the materials go for it and take the class but I wouldn't
A really large amount of HW. This is probably the most HW in my life. Expect about 10 HW per week. And it will not be evaluated until the very end of the quarter. She is a good person herself, understands personal convenience, and has no deadlines for homework. But she's just a professor who gives too much homework and has too much work to do.
She seems nice but is clearly too busy to be teaching. I took her for two quarters (math 1A and math 1B) and both times, I got similar experiences. She assigns so much homework, which she does not grade until the end of the quarter. Tests every two weeks and the questions are pretty tough. Seems that all tests have a C average so it's not just me.
Lam does a horrible job at making class easy. She will review your homework one week after school is finished. Creates exams one day ahead of the day you take them meaning no proof reading. No thought in learning the material if you aren't graded constantly. Grading shows your work throughout the quarter and what you need done. Worst Foothill Prof
I needed this class b/c I was late to registration and only could do online. She assigned hw that was never graded. she should've made clear in the beginning Had a 5 weekly quiz and 4 exam. Grades were based on the exams/quizzes which I did poorly bc the lectures didn't have enough info to understand the concept. no help or feedback. don't take!
Signed up for an online asynchronous class and the professor wanted us to come in person for the final and wouldn't let me switch the date due to pre-planned travel. I was anticipating that I would be able to do the final on vacation but now I have to drop and it's too late to find a new professor.
she gets paid to assign homework, wow.
Definitely a hard class, she tries her best to help you but it's mostly just study for this and that with textbooks, and the tests are extra hard, as well as an IN PERSON final exam for the online class. Would not recommend taking her class if you have any other option, do it.
get ready to do everything by yourself. she tries her best but she shouldn't be a teacher. she cannot teach math at all. you have to study by your own and if you ask something, she can not help you at all and sometimes she couldn't answer you because she doesn't know anything about the answer and how you find the questions answer.
I could literally say so many bad things.THE FINAL IS IN PERSON despite the class being online, absolutely no exceptions. She's so nit-picky & takes off excessive points unnecessarily and unreasonably. Really disorganized teaching style, her canvas is super hard to navigate, the cherry on top is she takes forever to grade. DO NOT TAKE HER CLASS.
Want a teacher that take weeks to grade and doesn't care about what goes on in your life. Don't even make the mistake and take her
final in person for an online class and she has office hours from 7-8pm. Also, everything she puts on the test is barely covered in the textbook. Yea, thats right. Everything you do is on a textbook she barely knows anything about. She likes to make you think about the question if you ask her, but please, she is not a great teacher/ don't take her
Quizzes, tests, homework are all busy work
A lot of hard work but very cool professor.
She cares a lot about getting you to the "ah-ha" through struggle, tho she does provide help if that doesn't work out. This does mean a bit of reading but leads to good understanding Sets up at least in person classes to form mini study groups rather then long lectures. She is kind, helpful and engaged. Great teacher.
I really liked Prof. Lam and didn't have any trouble with the class. Her lectures were well-presented and she was a very reasonable and supportive teacher. I've taken math classes with 4 different professors so far at Foothill, and she has been my favorite.
Professor Lam turned out to be very friendly and helpful. Her course checkpoints are incredibly beneficial, and she was patient in addressing any questions, even re-explaining concepts I missed due to being late. If you choose this course, you can fully grasp the course under her guidance.
She did not teach at all. She just made the whole class read the textbook the whole period and gave a lot of homework. I took this class in person with the intention of the teacher actually teaching. If it was just reading the textbook to learn, I would just take an asynchronous class.
She's the most ridiculous math instructor you could ever have. She can't even draw the simplest R^3 graph correctly, only teaches the most basic concepts during lectures and takes forever to grade homework. Even though the class is fully in-person, you'll still need to spend a lot of time reading the textbook and teaching yourself. Drop it rn.
I don't recommend her class to anyone.
Grading 45% final exam, rest on regular checkpts, book activities, and reading/concept quizzes. You get multiple tries on quizzes and checkpts and extra time for activities. Professor really cares about students, and responds quickly to issues/email. Must read and do the exercises in the book (not graded) to do well and don't fall behind.
Don't take class! It's online however the final exam is a proctored in person test. For distance learns you need to find a proctor at your school or testing center. Testing centers do charge a fee. Very inconvenient! Made an error with grading weight and claimed it would drop grade which indeed did.
The class grading is without midterms but final exam heavy (although the final was similar to what you'd see on weekly checkpoints). You get multiple tries and personal feedback on weekly checkpoints/quizzes. In class it's more group work focused on doing textbook activities instead of just lectures.
This instructor doesn't teach anything and relies on you to teach yourself, but she's quite accessible with daily office hours. Her personality sometimes made it difficult to go through. Class design is fine but needs a lot of revision for it to work for the interest of student.
Professor Lam is very caring, nice, and wants to help you succeed in her class. She teaches for ~20 min, then lets us do group "activities" homework problems for collaboration. Her class is good if you can self-learn and put in just a little bit of time outside class. Final is harder, but if you know the concepts of the material, you'll be fine.
Prof. Lam's class was a mixed experience. While the lectures were well-presented, the grading and feedback could be inconsistent. Using Unstuckstudy alongside the textbook helped me better understand the concepts.
I do not recommend taking this professor. I got stuck with this class because it was my only option. She is a very harsh grader and her "feedback" that she leaves on the assignments are very rude and not helpful. Coming from a student who is good at math, devoted, studies hard, and gives their best effort- this teacher looks past all of that.
Just assume you're self-studying. Don't use her videos. Read + understand the textbook examples & you'll be fine. Grading is heavily weighted by tests, final = 45%. Final exam avg low bc of cheating during checkpoints but as long as you understand the activities, final is easy and has extra credit. Daily office hours.
I think Phuong is great! She's a very positive lady and is always willing to help everyone. If she notices you struggling she will absolutely address it and help you if you're receptive. You do have to put in the work and speak up when you get stuck.
Passive aggressive.
Class Info
Online Classes
100%
Attendance Mandatory
44%
Textbook Required
70%
Grade Predictor
Your expected effort level
Predicted Grade
B
Grade Distribution
Common Tags
Rating Trend
Declining
-0.81 avg changeRatings by Course
MATH1ABC
5.0
(1)MATH491C
5.0
(1)MATH49
5.0
(1)MATHA
5.0
(1)MATH40A
5.0
(1)Difficulty by Course
MATHS105
5.0
MATHS1B
5.0
MATH230
5.0
MATH49
5.0
MATH2B
5.0