PHYS 359Statistical Mechanics
- Units
- 0.50
- Faculty
- Science
- Subject
- Physics
When it runs
- F24
- W25
- S25
- F25
- W26
- S26
- F26
- W27
- S27
Ran in 5 of the last 7 terms. Winter 2027: scheduled, 2 lecture sections. Spring 2027: schedule not out yet.
Fundamental postulate of statistical thermodynamics. Entropy. Microcanonical, canonical, and grand canonical ensembles. Fermi-Dirac, Bose-Einstein, and Boltzmann Statistics. Maxwell-Boltzmann velocity distribution. Applications to specific heat of solids, classical and quantum gases, electrons in metals, Planck's law of radiation, and Bose-Einstein condensation.
Prerequisites
- Complete all of the following
- Must have completed at least 1 of the following:
- Complete 1 of the following
- Complete 1 of the following
- Must have completed at least 1 of the following:
- Must have completed the following:
Corequisites
- Completed or concurrently enrolled in:
- AMATH373 - Quantum Theory 1 (0.50)
Antirequisites
None listed.
Leads to
Fall 2026 sections
| Section | Class | Enrolled | Meets |
|---|---|---|---|
| LEC 001 | 7277 | 39 / 60 | Online or by arrangement |
Winter 2027 sections
| Section | Class | Enrolled | Meets |
|---|---|---|---|
| LEC 001 | 6610 | 0 / 100 | MW 10:00–11:20 |
| LEC 701 | 2578 | 83 / 9999 | Online or by arrangement |
| TUT 101 | 6966 | 0 / 100 | Th 16:30–17:20 |
Reviewed on UW Flow
75% liked it35% easy90% useful
From 36 ratings and 10 comments on UW Flow. The most helpful comments, quoted as written, without names. Read them all on UW Flow.
Course was taught perfectly, Alan is amazing at explaining things and the course is set up to help you succeed. There's tons of opportunities for help, eg, office hours tutorials, Piazza and if you take advantage of those you'll really be comfortable with all the content. Very useful course, content was entirely new but I feel like I have intuition on it coming out of the course. Final was a little tough but fair.
Apr 2025 · liked it · 1 found this helpfulOn UW FlowRemove this
Class is fun, makes me want to learn more about stat mech, assignments are fair, Jamison is a good lecturer, truly what can you want more in a course
Aug 2026 · liked itOn UW FlowRemove this
Fair exams and long assignments that are graded brutally. You could get everything right and still get 80 on an assignment. I'd recommend having the assignment weight shifted to the final, not worth your time since he posts solutions anyway so you can study those. Jamison also posts tutorial solutions too which is great for extra practice. You learn about interesting stuff but this course was still kind of annoying to study for.
Apr 2026 · didn’t like itOn UW FlowRemove this
Jamison the goat. Hands down best phys prof out there, made statmech understandable and manageable. Threw us the craziest layup for our midterm.
Nov 2025 · liked itOn UW FlowRemove this
Amazingly taught, however how they grade is what gets you. The content is relatively easy to understand, but if you get 1 small thing wrong on a question, they'll usually give you 0/25 for example. Alan is an amazing prof that teaches really well, and is very willing to help (especially in office hours). Most of the time tutorials go over something on the assignment for that week, so I feel like the course is set up to help build intuition.
Apr 2025 · liked itOn UW FlowRemove this
Discussed on r/uwaterloo
32 posts and comments in 29 threads mention PHYS 359, December 2012 to December 2024. Quoted word for word, newest first; each reply sits under the post and the comment that started its branch. Search r/uwaterloo for newer posts.
Winter 2024
PHYS359 Piazza is asking profound questions about the exam distribution 21 points, 1 comment
Spring 2023
BIOL 239 222 points, 36 comments
u/Giadas233: “I graduated quite a few years ago, this is so nostalgic. Similar thing happened to me once. Don't worry, you'll be fine. https://www.reddit.com/r/uwaterloo/comments/8eqa7m/phys359\one\last\meme/”
Spring 2022
Holy 💀 1,451 points, 465 comments
u/olezarus: “… I had a Quantum Mechanics 2 (PHYS 334) midterm exam and Statistical Mechanics (PHYS 359) midterm 10 minutes apart from each other IN PERSON. These were our first in person exam and we had two extremely hard midterms nearly back to back. …”
u/RainZhao: “Solid take and perspective. Crazy the midterm averages were that low for PHYS 334 and 359 as well. It definitely reflects an issue with the students and study habits.”
Mathematical physics Course blueprint recommendations 3 points, 21 comments
“Hey everyone, I’m going into the mathematical physics program at Waterloo next year and I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations on a sort of blueprint I could follow for courses because …”
u/Yu-Li: “… override request) / PHYS 468 Change coop sequence 4A winter: AMATH 474 PMATH 863 AMATH 475 PHYS 359 One more physics course you like (I would choose from quantum computing/ continuum mechanics/ computational physics) Then do more research coop terms and study terms in the fourth …”
PHYS 359 3 points, 2 comments
u/Remarkable_Leg9657: “How tough is PHYS 359? I have heard from a lot of students that it was a very tough course this time and a lot of people were not able to pass the course. Any advice would be much appreciated.”
Is it true a lot of people failed PHYS 359? 2 points, 1 comment
u/Remarkable_Leg9657: “I have seen quite a few reddit posts, in which a lot of people have stated that they failed PHYS 359? Was the course really hard? Did the prof make the exam really hard? What happened with PHYS 359?”
PHYS 359 Final not curved?? 25 points, 24 comments
u/Veraaa22: “Hi guys, am I the only person who failed PHYS 359 with a really really bad mark that has never happened in my entire life? Also, did he curve up, or if anyone knows the final exam average?”
u/the_garden_waste: “If anyone is still in this position and the prof hasn’t replied. I just emailed the science undergraduate office, your physics advisor, Stefan idziak and the prof for this course in one email …”
u/the_garden_waste: “… PHYS 359 is never offered in the spring either. Emailing them is honestly the best option at the moment. …”
Winter 2022
PHYS 359 VOMITING THREAD 4 points, 3 comments
u/phys359suicide: “Dude wtf??? Why? Question 1 was weird but fair, question 2 was good. Question 3 was fucked and question 4 as well but I remembered it was an assignment question and did some of it. Question 5 was fucked and question 6 was completely screwed. …”
Spring 2021
As alumni that don’t have much to lose for spilling, what’s a piece of dirt you have on the university/ a terrible experience that you can finally share? 180 points, 39 comments
“I’ll start. In 2018, at the height of MeToo, an instructor in the HR department mocked the movement, and joked about men being scared to interact with their female colleagues anymore in fear of being …”
u/Roughly6Owls: “… I took QBL's Statistical Mechanics course (PHYS 359), the only class at UW that I ever dropped. As a teacher he rarely acknowledged the class, instead opting to primarily teach the blackboard via an incomplete/weak summary of the textbook. …”
Fall 2020
Anyone taken CO 487 (applied cryptography) before? 5 points, 8 comments
u/descuit: “… I have the following course (amath 353, phys 359, amath 361, phys 334). Would it be doable to take co 487 with these courses? Is it a course that you spent a lot of time studying for? …”
Manageable Semester? 2 points, 9 comments
u/TytrixFTW: “I just transferred from Honours Phys to Math Phys (BSc) and might end up moving to a BMath later too. Is this upcoming semester manageable? MATH 135 MATH 235 MATH 237 AMATH 251 PHYS 359”
Spring 2020
Now it's our turn 363 points, 7 comments
u/MoistGochu: “Motivation for phys 359”
Check it elsewhere for Fall 2026
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