[PTGregD]

Commerce 2MA3 is an extension of the skills you learned in Commerce 1E03 and is taught by the same professor, Rita Cossa.

PROF:

As I just mentioned, the professor for this class is Rita Cossa. Chances are, you either love her or hate her largely depending on your performance in Commerce 1E03. The fact of the matter is that she is an amazing professor, and a lot of people don't appreciate that because they don't put in any work in the class thus resulting in a poor grade, and then they blame it on the professor. The reason she is so good as a professor is that she spells out everything that she wants in her reports. As long as you follow EXACTLY what she tells you to do, you will come out with an amazing mark. Unfortunately, many students choose to disregard her warnings and criticism, which results in a very poor mark for them. She is very approachable and will help guide you in order for you to solve your problems.

LECTURES:

There are three lectures a week; a departure from the two lectures and a tutorial you are used to from Commerce 1E03. The lectures follow the same format however; she uses powerpoint slides with blanks that you need to attend class in order to fill them out. Lectures are usually pretty fast paced; but ultimately your main goal is to just fill in all the blanks because you can always review the material later, but you only have one chance at the blanks (unless of course you borrow your friend's slides later).

BREAKDOWN OF MARKS:

This course consisted of two midterms, two reports, and an exam. The breakdown was that the two midterms were each worth 20%, the two reports were each worth 15%, and the exam was worth 30%.

The two reports are done in groups of five generally. You need to pick a company as your focus for the reports (For reference I picked McDonald's). The topic of the first report is narrower and is mainly includes talking about the company's field (For me this was talking about Restaurants and talking about competitors etc.) and not so much about the company itself. The second report focuses exclusively on the company.

There also tends to be about a 2% bonus given in the class.

HOW TO SUCCEED:

This course is not an easy one to do well in by any stretch of the imagination. Although I mentioned that if you follow the professor's guidelines you will come out with a great mark, there are a few pitfalls.

Firstly, the two reports are both group projects where you work with the same group for both. They are also worth 30% of your mark which is quite substantial. Unfortunately, when working in groups, you will usually find that some people don't want to put in an effort, and unlike other classes where people love putting things together the night before, these reports are impossible to assemble in one night (If you want anything near a reasonable mark that is). You need an enormous amount of time to research, format, and then REVIEW. When the professor tells you to spend 20 hours to review your report, she is actually serious. There is a penalty for each spelling/gramatical/formating error. This starts at -1 (Reports are out of 100), and can range all the way up to -10 for improper citations. As you can see, you quickly end up losing a lot of marks for lack of reviewing your work.

Luckily, the midterms and the exam are easier in comparision. Most of the questions are derived either from the blanks in her slides or from the Istudy online component of the textbook. This means that as long as you study the blanks from the slides as well as do the practice problems online, you will be in good shape to perform very well on the tests in the course.

We had Dr. Capretta for 1E03 this past year. Does it mean she will be teaching 2ma3 as well?

Originally Posted by tiger

We had Dr. Capretta for 1E03 this past year. Does it mean she will be teaching 2ma3 as well?

I wouldn't assume something like that. It hasn't been announced what professor would be teaching this class yet. If you give Dr. Capretta a call then you can ask her.

I had capretta last year for this course so she may be teaching it again.

warning...that would not be a good thing

capretta was awful! i don't think she had a clue as to what she was doing; she didn't really know the material, so she couldn't really teach it to us!

and when we were writing up our reports, we asked if our interpretation of the question was okay (in which she replied yes) and nearly failed us when she actually marked it, saying she never said such thing >:(!

I had this in first semester with Cossa (she came back) and honestly i enjoyed the course. I liked how Cossa knew what she was talking about and how enthusiastic she was. I actually stayed awake in her class compared to my other classes like OB and stats. :/

Just do really really wel on the midterms and final exams and you will be able to get a 10 in this course. Even if you do badly on the group reports. I got a 56% and 74% on the reports and still managed to get a 10. I know people who did worse on me fore both reports but still managed to pull off a 10 in the course.

Of course that doesnt mean just bomb the reports anyways, still put in the effort because it is still needed to get at least a mediocre mark in the course. I cannot stress enough how important formatting is!!! For the first report, my group pretty much got perfect in terms of research and analysis but we failed the formatting which brought us down to a 54. We could have gotten a mark in the 80s if it wasnt for formatting.

In my opinion this course is the WORST I've ever done in my two years.

Personally Cossa is my least favorite teacher and the weirdest I've ever had(I just do not like the way she behaves)!!! Yes, even before Emad(I seriously had doubts when he came to 1E03 to introduce the accounting designation......)!!! !! I just don't wanna see her!!! But had to go to classes for the sake of those notes.....

However the midterms and finals were really easy, considering if you try to memorize the textbook(as suggested at the start of the course by the professor herself). But I think that is mostly because soooooooooooooooooooo oooooooo many people fail the reports, so she had to make tests easy to even out the marks. And yeah..... I failed those reports -.- actually I passed the second one

cossa is bruuuuuuuuuuuutal

cossa is an awesome prof.. i went to all her classes 1E03 .. and i managed to get an 11 even tho we got 51 on the report but that class only had one report
looking forward to 2MA3

Just wondering if we get to choose our own groups or if they are assigned to us?

Mid-terms are fairly easy and you can easily score 80+ on them. The reports will be a pain and you have to follow every single guideline to do well. It is very easy to lose marks on the report.

How is the course if you haven't taken 1E03? or a non-commerce student?

Not bad at all! I didn't take 1E03 just made sure you read the textbook! saved my butt.

How are there reports if there are not tutorials?