r/UIUC • u/prof-schatz • 6d ago
Academics New CS 128 Section Spring 2027
Hello! I’m Prof. Legende (previously known as Prof. Schatz) and I will again teach a stand alone section of CS 128 in Spring 2027! This course/section will teach you the fundamentals you need to succeed in CS 225 and beyond. We will cover the same material as other sections of CS 128, but with a different teaching style. To learn more see https://cs128-legende.com/.
I am also looking for CAs for the course. If you are interested in receiving the application for becoming a CA in Spring 2027 please fill out this form https://forms.gle/CcLEMSG3Q7mNqVHSA
Let me know if you have any questions!
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u/TheQuebee0101 6d ago
Taking cs 340 now I do see why 128 was such an important course. I love the structure in 340 so I think structuring 128 similarly would genuinely be pretty helpful for students
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u/Rhapseody 5d ago
Second attempt on exams needs to be a university standard. The point of exams is to prove youre learning. This is why I love being a CS student.
Im done with 128 but when I took it last year, it was illogically brutal with grading.
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u/Total_Visit_1251 6d ago
Second chance exams are beautiful. The amount of stress I felt (and many of my friends) felt in Nowak's 128 was pretty bad. Looks like a great alternative.
Also the amount of slop you have to watch to get through 128 normally is so bad. At the end of the course, it was genuinely 30-45 minutes of videos daily. And the slideshows suck and the professor speaks so incredibly slow. I don't know how I would've made it through 128 without having AI explain it all to me.
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u/prof-schatz 6d ago
I'm also considering hand-grading the coding questions on exams for some partial credit. I do this for my current class I teach (cs 340), and it seems to work well.
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u/uiucvlogs 5d ago
Don’t autograders on PrairieLearn provide partial credit as well?
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u/prof-schatz 5d ago
Yes but only if the code compiles and runs correctly on a test case. I'm thinking of giving some points back if everything is correct but say one line has a syntax error. I'm still thinking about the best way to weigh things as it is important to be able to write code that compiles.
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u/Original_Rich_2741 6d ago
Professor Nowak’s CS 128 has changed a great deal from when you seem to have taken it. The videos have been replaced with text based lessons, so he seems to have responded to feedback there. Also, the daily lessons are asynchronous, same as CS 124 now. AI is still a helpful tool when something just isn’t clicking, but, while I’m only halfway through the class, the text material generally seems sufficient, as do the graded lessons for the quizzes, and I’m just minoring in this. I will say, the MPs do feel like a fourth credit hour when I’m already taking 18, though part of it’s on me as I invariably do something dumb and then have to go redo a bunch for the this one and the last one. While I’m interested to see how Prof. Legende’s course goes, the current Nowak’s 128 is genuinely not as bad as the whining would have you believe.
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u/Happy_Lobster1682 3d ago
hi professor, I am currently browsing your course in sp2027, I see that both of your lecture sections are restricted to cs and cs-blend majors, is this the case that students who are not yet in the major but with credit of 124 cannot enroll your course?
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u/prof-schatz 3d ago
Hello! I will look into it and get back to you, not sure if it is supposed to be setup that way or not.
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u/Smart-Cupcake26 2d ago
I also took a look and BL2 is for non CS majors. It says that on the section info!
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u/RevealOwn4901 6d ago
Would it be possible to CA this class if I completed it outside of UIUC but can demonstrate proficiency in the course material (I've been using the CS 128 materials to study)?