Lior Silberman's advising page

This page is for students who require my services as a department undergraudate advisor. Students interested in research supervision should instead visit my students page.

General comments

• I am currently the transfer credit advisor. I also informally make suggestions to honours students, but this is not a formal advising role.
• Please keep a record of all correspondence, in case there is a later dispute about any promises made to you.

Transfer credit requests

Types of requests

Courses you have taken or are considering taking at another institution can be recognized at UBC in one of several ways. Depending on the circumstances, you may request:

• Specific credit for a UBC MATH course, if both the material and level of a course you have taken match to to a course we offer. You will be treated exactly as if you had taken the course at UBC.
• Generic credit if the course you have taken are is at an appropriate level but don't correspond to any specific course here. We will enter a line such as "MATH 1st(3)" or "MATH 3rd(6)" in your records, and you will be treated exactly as if you had taken mathematics courses of the specified year and number of credits. Generic credits help satisfy degree requirements and course pre-requisites denominated in credits (e.g. total credits for graduation, or a pre-requisite of "at least 12 MATH credits 300-level and above").
• Course exemption from a specified course, if you have essentially learned the material of a course at the appropriate level. You will be treated as if you had taken the MATH course for degree requirement and graduation purposes, but the exemption will not affect credit counts. Exemptions are appropriate when courses don't correspond precisely but it nevertheless does not make sense for you to retake the course here, and can be combined with generic credit. Second-degree and graduate students may only receive exemptions, not Specific or Generic credit.
• Exemption from a degree requirement, if you have taken courses in a another subject that have not led to exemption or specific credit from a non-MATH course that is required for the mathematics B.Sc. or B.A.. A request for a graduation exemption is appropriate only in the extraordinary situation where your prior studies provide you with the expected background in the non-mathematics subject (most often CPSC) despite the other department not granting you transfer credits, and accordinly requires significant justification beyond a claim that the material of the courses matches (such claims are properly considered by the transfer credit advisor at the other department).
• Manual registration is a course exemption (see above), as applied to a visiting student, a second-degree student, or a graduate student. Exemptions for such students cannot be entered in the student systems and their registration is handled manually by department staff based on determinations made by me.

Before writing about a transfer credit question, please consult the UBC Transfer Credit Tool and check whether there is already a decision about the equivalence. It's ok to ask for reconsideration: courses change over time, both at UBC and at other institutions, but generally there should be reason for us to change a past decision. In addition, the BC Transfer Guide website contains further information concerning courses you might take at institutions within the provience:

1. For university level courses which transfer to UBC credit, check the Course Search Tool.
2. For high-school level courses which satisfy admission requirements or the calculus pre-requisites (especially BC PREC 12), visit the page on Adult Basic Education. Once there open the most recent "ABE Articulation Guide" and find the table called "MATHEMATICS TRANSFER GUIDE", usually around page 38. Courses listed in the final column ("Provincial") are accepted by UBC as equivalent to BC PREC 12.

Who should I contact about my mathematics transfer credits?

1. If you are a visiting student, a second-degree student, or a graduate student you must contact me directly. See the email instructions below, and note that if you are asking for an exemption that is already shown on the UBC Transfer Credit Tool you don't need to provide any further information about the course except that fact.
2. If you are asking about credits you obtained before admission to UBC (but not in one of the categories above), you must contact your Enrollment Services Advisor. They will write to me on your behalf.
3. If you are in the faculties of Applied Science, or Land and Food Systems, please contact the advising office of your faculty. The advisors will contact me on your behalf.
4. In all other cases (including if you are from the Faculty of Science), you may write to me directly. See the email instructions below.

Email instructions

Transfer Credits: [student id] [student name]

1. Your current/intended faculty and programme, including whether you are a first-degree student, a second-degree student, a graduate student, etc.
2. The institution(s) where the courses were taken, and a copy of your transcript(s) (informal transcript / screen printout are fine).
3. For each course you want me to consider, as much as possible of the following information:
   1. The course name and number.
   2. The UBC Transfer Credit Tool record of the course, and whether you are asking for reconsideration of that.
   3. The form of transfer credit requested including corresponding UBC course numbers, if applicable (see types of requests above).
   4. The total number of classroom lecture hours in the course.
   5. A detailed syllabus and the textbooks used, if any
   6. Sample course materials (exams, midterms, homeworks, course notes) allowing me to judge the level of the course.
   I cannot consider courses without sufficient information. I can read English, Hebrew, and some European langauges but all other materials must be translated to English.
4. The names and contact details of any other advisors and advising offices you have contacted about this matter and their responses to you.

It may take me some time to respond: I work on these requests in batches.

Notes on specific courses and requests

• We are fairly permissive about credit for differential calculus (note that MATH 100/102/104 are equivalent courses, so it does not matter which of those numbers is used for your credit/exemption).
• Credit for intergral calculus (MATH 101/103/105) is only given for courses which include the topic of sequences and series.
• Credit for matrix/linear algebra (MATH 221/152) is only given for courses which include the topic of eigenvalues and eigenvectors.
• The courses MATH 320 and MATH 322 are the keystones of the honours programme; specific credit for those courses based on courses taken elsewhere is rare and requires a showing that the other course is taught at a substantially higher level than the corresponding course at UBC.
• UBC-Okanagan's calculus sequence for management and business (UBCO MATH 116/142) is not equivalent to the UBC calculus sequence. UBC-O students who are considering transferring to UBC must take UBCO MATH 100/101.

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Clarification: the writings on these pages are generally my own creations (to which I own the copyright), and are made available for traditional academic reuse. If you wish to republish substantial portions (including in "derivative works") please ask me for permission. The material is expressly excluded from the terms of UBC Policy 81.