Homework isn't overwhelming, and two of them are dropped at the end of the quarter. Prof. Nam gives short lectures that typically have a couple of example problems to help explain his points. The tests weren't that bad since we had 24 hours to complete them, but he wasn't very lenient on giving partial credit. Great personality and always had a positive attitude.
Edit: his final was very very difficult. Made no sense.

Nam is a super nice teacher and teaches in a straightforward manner. His homework assignments are easy and he drops the lowest two which is nice. His midterms are fair, though a single mistake will drop you a whole letter grade. The downside to this class was the final, where the majority of problems were not even remotely close to what we had been practicing or what was in the textbook. Nam is a decent teacher but unless you want a brutal grade-lowering final, I recommend looking elsewhere, unfortunately.

The two midterms were fair and most people did well. The final? Absolutely no words. I’m convinced half of the questions weren’t even for this class. I sat there for hours mindlessly staring at the screen because the final fried every single brain cell I had left.
Nam is a nice guy. Idk. I can’t really say more because, like I said, every single brain cell was slowly fried up over the 10+ hour period I took that final.

Overall, this class wasn't bad. Professor Nam is a fairly good lecturer and always seeks to answer his student's questions. However, I don't think he provides good enough examples for concepts; rather, the examples he gives in class are pretty elementary and doesn't prepare us for more difficult questions. The textbook is pretty shitty too in my opinion.

The midterms were easy but the final was very very hard. I wouldn't count on the midterms for his class to be easy in the future as it seems he made the final extra hard to offset the good grades we got from the midterms. Also, he didn't curve grades in the end despite very low scores on the final.

Make sure to try to get 100% on every homework as that category is a large part of your grade and every point counts!

Course Breakdown:
Homework - 30%
Midterm 1 - 20%
Midterm 2 - 20%
Final - 30%

Exam Medians:
Midterm 1 - 96%
Midterm 2 - 95%
Final - 66%

Professor Nam is the cutest- the positive attitude he brought to lecture every Mon Wed and Fri would always make me smile and lift my mood. Seeing his smiling face would always make me smile- you can just tell he loves the subject and is so passionate about teaching it. He is extremely mindful to answer any clarifying questions, but make sure to ask your questions or he will assume you understand and move onto the next concept. I loved how he structured his lectures- first he would introduce the concept, next he would show you the application in 1-2 practice problems. Each day was only about 2-3 new concepts, and the homework would be exactly like the practice problem he did in class. The first midterm was just like his practice problems from lecture. The second midterm was just a little harder than the first midterm. However, he does warn during class that he can make problems very very difficult, and this is what he did for the final. I spent close to 13 hours on the final (24 hour, open notes exam). Super nice Professor, super caring and kind, always smiling. But just be warned that he can make things very very difficult.

Note that this is a review during COVID-19

Grading Scheme: homework 30%, two midterms worth 20% each, final 30%

After taking Math 31B with a professor who gave very heavy homework loads and time-consuming exams, this class initially felt like a breath of fresh air (though let me be clear that I still got an A in 31B). Professor Nam was very kind, his lectures were very clear, and he always took time to answer as many questions from the chat as he could. Lectures never ran over time. Homework was not overwhelming, just some textbook questions from each lesson to ensure we understood all the main concepts. The lowest 2 homework scores are also dropped.

The first midterm was not particularly challenging. It was reflective of problems we had seen in lectures and homework as he’d said it would be. The second midterm was slightly trickier, and unlike the first midterm, the harder questions were weighted more heavily than the easier ones. Partial credit was also very strict, and some students who asked for regrade requests on certain harshly graded problems were denied. I think he said at one point that scores on the first midterm were "too high" which was why the second midterm was harder. I don't know if that's because the math department mandates certain score distributions or if it came from Professor Nam's own personal assessment of the score distribution, but I don't know that having scores that were "too high" should've been a concern; if students are performing well on the exams, shouldn’t it reflect that the professor is doing their job well? It did still feel like a relatively fair exam though, as the questions were generally reflective of class material including the slightly trickier ones. You just had to be more vigilant and precise with the tricky questions.

The final, however, was a completely different story. Based on what he had said in class, I expected the difficulty to be similar to that of the second midterm but the questions had suddenly become much more complex, requiring computations of complexity beyond those which we had experienced in any homework or lecture before. Because of covid, exams were open book, yet for most of the questions, there was not a single textbook example that was similar to the exam question. I felt content with this class before the final and after the final, I was at a loss for words. I know individuals in this class who had to pull an all-nighter to maximize their score, and even then scoring an A was rare. Believe me when I say I studied like hell and was still unprepared for the final, and I'll reiterate that the open book policy barely helped due to the book having no similarly complex examples. That said, he stated that if grades on the final exam turned out too low, he would consider curving the class, see the update for more info.

(Originally at this point I responded to another review that had said the final was fair, but I have since removed that response because it was moreso me letting out my emotions after finals than anything and wasn’t super necessary. However I still believe everything else I said still stands. I’m leaving this note in here as a testament to the emotional state the final left me in, take it as you will)

UPDATE: Some people reported their final grades as being higher than their calculated raw percentage. Personally, this was not the case for me; my final grade matched my percentage exactly (as did many other students’ grades), which was a little disappointing since I was less than a percent away from the next grade (which again was similar to many other students’ situations). So it seems some people may have been curved or rounded while others weren’t, I’m not sure exactly how that worked. That said, I might consider taking a class with him again based on the circumstances (such as the type of math class being taught and who else was teaching the class that quarter). The final was abnormally difficult, but the rest of the class until that point was ok, so it kind of just depends on how much concentrated difficulty you’re willing to deal with at a given time. Overall the class was ok, Nam was ok, it’s just that things took a sharp turn at the very end that many of us didn’t see coming.

EDIT: Someone said the final exam ended up on Chegg?? If so that’s kind of outrageous. This would mean that some students may have gotten the answers from there and those people’s final exam scores might have pulled up the average and screwed the rest of us. This is just a rumor so I’m not going to pursue it any further. It’s just the fact that it might have happened that I find outrageous. However, again, this is a rumor and I’m just addressing it because I like to cover all my bases

TLDR: Very nice guy, lectures are helpful, homework and midterms are very fair, final was wayyyy too hard, would possibly consider taking again depending on the circumstances

Nam is a very easy-going guy. His first two midterms were easy as they were very similar to problems we had encountered in our homework sets. However, the final was RIDICULOUSLY HARD. Only 2/7 problems were similar to homework problems. The other 5 required you to have a full understanding of computational ideas as well as the CONCEPTUAL ideas which I believe were not emphasized enough in class. That was the first exam I've ever failed and Nam said he would curve but he didn't (I think he even curved us down as he made a 93.3 and above an A and didn't let those with a 93 get an A).

If you choose Nam as your professor, make sure you do the homework as it's not only an easy grade (you can check all your answers on Slader), but the first two midterms are nearly identical to the homework problems. TA sessions were also not mandatory, but I do recommend going as I found them extremely helpful!

Totally agree with the previous review. Professor Nam can clearly address the concept, but his examples in lectures are not enough for the exam, especially the final exam. The homework and two midterms are quite easy and fair. But the final was super difficult; the average for the whole class was about 65%, and he didn't curve the final at all, which disappointed me. So make sure you have full scores on all the homework and midterms if you want to have an A. Otherwise, your grade possibly changes from A to A-.

I disagree with a lot of these reviews. Nam is a funny and nice lecturer, sure.
But his grading was unnecessarily hard. Everyone did so well on the first midterm that he decided he wanted to make the next midterm and final extremely difficult to drag grade averages down. His partial credit was ridiculous as you could lose 13% of your grade on that exam for using a method that he didn't directly address was incorrect in class, but the textbook contradicted him. The final was 24 hours, but myself and plenty of others spent over 10 hours on it only to receive a C, which dragged my grade down to an A-.
The people who are saying he's a great professor are either math geniuses or suck-ups. If you are the average Joe Bruin, I do not recommend him.
Edit: He downcurved the grading scale so a 93.3< would be an A-, and he doesn't have the courtesy to respond to our emails after the final.

I really enjoyed Math 32A with Prof Nam. He's very nice and approachable. I also like the structure of his lectures as they're straight to the point so you always know what topic you're on. The homeworks are a good length, they maybe took an hour or two each week and helped me learn the material. The only problem with this class is that the in class examples and midterms were much easier than the final. Although I received an A in all three, the final took me a ridiculous amount of time and was definitely much more difficult than anything we'd seen in class. My best advice is to ask your TA for more challenging problems that go beyond the textbook in order to prepare. Overall, I'd recommend Prof Nam, just make sure to really study for the final!