<p>I have the lovely situation of having a rough schedule this spring.... I'm looking for some advice in whether I should stick w/ 18 credits or drop down to 14. I'm a music major wanting to go to grad school for music but am first-year and have the sticky situation of NEEDING to take TWO 300-level courses in music. (long-story)</p>
<p>So the current list of courses for spring:</p>
<p>345 electro-acoustic music
300 tonal counterpoint
101 intro to political thinking
220 high intermediate french
and piano lessons (pass/fail)</p>
<p>Any advice? or past experiences that would help?</p>
<p>If it were me, I’d be open to taking all 18 credits and wait until add/drop period when you’ve had the chance to sit in on the classes, look at the syllabus for each, and get a reasonable idea of what the workload will be. 300-level doesn’t always mean lots of work (though it does in many cases) just as 100-level doesn’t always mean easy (CSC 112 loses many of its students in the first week - or it did when I took it! We went from 20+ to 6 overnight).</p>
<p>Also, as a first-year you have that handy free drop (unless you’ve used it already) so if it gets to be a month or so in and you definitely are over your head, you can drop one of those classes and it will be as if you never enrolled in it in the first place.</p>
<p>This is always a tough question, and maybe not one that you can answer in advance? You may need to wait and see the syllabi (or you can ask for them from the profs now, some of them have it in advance and will email it to you) and see if it seems really overwhelming. Not every 300 level course is equally difficult, neither is every 200 level course, and sometimes 100 level courses can be more of a pain than any of them. Another thing to think about is that you can always start out taking all of the classes, and then drop one later on in the semester if you feel overwhelmed. Just don’t lose track of when the add/drop deadline is. </p>
<p>I don’t know what 300 level music courses are like, but you have to take them apparently, so let’s put those aside. High intermediate French was a course I took at Smith and I didn’t find it exceptionally challenging. There’s quite a bit of day-to-day workbook work, but you don’t have to to turn that in so if you fall behind or don’t get it all done now and again due to the weight of other things, it won’t kill you. I think that was the class where we read the crazy novel about the french woman who was obssessed with Sylvester Stallone…</p>
<p>Of everything you have on your schedule, if you want to drop something, I recommend dropping intro to political thinking. It’s not the most interesting gov class you could take, it’s intended for people who missed out on Gov 100 for some reason and Gov 100 is a major weeder course for first-year gov wannabes. It’s good if you need a basic understanding of the major schools of thought and the basic historical development of Western political theory (which you do if you want to be a Gov Major), but it’s not useful for much else.</p>
<p>Fwiw, I agree that that Gov 101 is probably the most expendable/replaceable class on your schedule. </p>
<p>The worst thing I recall from D about Fr 220 was reading the romance novel centered on someone like Sylvester Stallone.</p>
<p>For a ball-buster Gov class, American Political Thought (Gov 264) with Pat Coby qualified. One of the two hardest courses D had in four years. Of course, she took it as a first-year, one of only three in the class, which didn’t help.</p>
<p>Also fwiw, unless the 300-level courses are hyper onerous, I think 18 is doable. But do keep your finger on the add/drop trigger…no need to be a hero.</p>
<p>Yes! French 220 WAS the Stallone class!! That book was mad crazy. But I’m guessing that maybe you need to keep the French because you want to study abroad and that’s also why you need to take the 300 level music classes now?</p>
<p>My D has taken 17-, 18-, and even a couple of 19-credit semesters, but her hands-down toughest semester has been her lone 16 credit semester, proving that you just can’t tell the workload until you show up for class. </p>
<p>To me, your planned course load looks manageable, as long as you’re not struggling this semester. The music performance class is the one that puts you over the basic 16-credits, and chances are, you would be practicing the piano anyway, making this course and its credits, more or less, a gimmee.</p>
<p>I agree with MWFN. How did the first semester go? You are the only one who can decide what workload you can manage. D took 23 credits last fall (to which she added orchestra and wind ensemble )and did fantastically. The following semester, she was down to 18 and did less well due to active procrastination. She has also struggled more with some 100 classes in her major than in the 300 ones.</p>
<p>Plus, a P/NP course gives you an enormous break. I imagine it would be tough to fail a performance course unless you failed to show up for your lessons.</p>
<p>My first semester has been going well. My FYS is my killer (prof doesn’t believe that freshman and most sophomores should get "A"s…) Nevertheless, I should still have a high gpa.</p>
<p>Performance-wise, I’m just worried about having to do a whole(?) concert to pass…That’s the requirement to pass piano. Other than that I have to agree about piano lessons, MWFN.</p>
<p>For some of my prospective graduate schools in music, they require profecciceny in German and fluency in French or Italian so that’s why I want to keep w/ French. </p>
<p>The music department is changing and I need to grab these 300 courses (I have recieved many e-mails about the manner and have spoken with professors). 300 level music theory courses are going to be hard to come-by and, looking to be focusing on the music theory and composition aspect of music, I need to take them or I have to transfer. I love Smith and the classes are wonderful; I can’t imagine being in another college…</p>
<p>A whole concert? Granted, my D only took first year performance, but in the spring recital, she was one of several students. She did not have to sustain an entire concert by herself. Her performance course was graded, however, so clearly there are major differences between the two.</p>
<p>I think you are needlessly apprehensive about 300-level courses. You will be fine.</p>
<p>Composer, sorry to hear about some of the musical theory classes disappearing. Is this related to budget cuts or are there other reasons?</p>
<p>S&P, by any chance did you take 220 in Fall '07?</p>
<p>Grading is funny. D did a lot more work for an A- from Pat Coby than she did for many classes where she got an A. But I suspect it was one of the most significant courses she took in her Gov major…at least it has come up in conversations many times.</p>
<p>LiT, 23 units? Wow. And I thought D was a glutton with a plate piled high with 20 plus orchestra & wind ensemble. In later years she dropped the wind ensemble…one activity too many for her. At the end also switched to P/NP for Ballet, speaking of !@#$%^&! grading.</p>
<p>No, I took 220 in the spring of 06, but they don’t change the reading list for the lower level french classes very often. </p>
<p>Grading can sometimes be highly variable at Smith, that is for sure. And 23 credits? I took 20 once and I literally thought I would die. But I was also involved in a number of different orgs that required a lot of time and travel (not that wind ensemble does not take a lot of time and orchestra does as well) and honestly, I just could not juggle all of those classes and have an off campus job and some semblance of a life. So I made a strict 16 credits plus ESS or other 2 credit course rule with myself and I was a much happier student. </p>
<p>S&P, Ambreen Hai but I believe she passed out Thurston’s grading rubic right after the add/drop period and announced to the whole class about freshman not getting A’s.</p>
<p>TD, there’s only one full-time theory professor and the other is retiring but may be (most likely) teaching part-time next year. The administration’s priority isn’t hiring a new theory/composition professor. The music department wants it to happen but there’s other places that need addressing outside of the music department. Budget cuts as well. They’re closing Josten library and re-working the music major to make it “more accesible” to everyone.</p>
<p>Composer, I think that sucks on two counts: an arbitrary “first-years don’t get A’s” policy and not informing people until after the add/drop period. I’m not for grade-grubbing but something like that should be announced at the first day of class so that if students are conflicted about several courses on their schedule they can make an informed decision</p>
<p>I thought the deal had been cut to keep Josten library open. No? I’m very interested in this apropos of some other proposed budget cuts that I’m having an on-going dialog with various parties about, so please let me know.</p>
<p>What the hell does making the music major “more accessible” mean? It sounds suspiciously like “dumbing down.”</p>
<p>S&P, ah, then you & D missed by a semester. At least in that class.</p>
<p>About the variability of grading…ummm…yeah. I’ve written and deleted a couple of comments a couple of times and I think I’ll just leave it there.</p>
<p>I think the deal was to keep Josten’s open for this year and then re-visit the issue of closing that space and moving the collection to Nielson. I mean frankly, I think that centralizing the collection will mean the things in it get used more, not less. I often found myself searching the catalog in Nielson, finding an item I wanted that was stored in Josten, and then deciding it wasn’t worth tramping down to Mendenhall to get it. I’m not a music major though, and i can understand why it will be hard to lose a dedicated space for the Josten library collection, which is quite an excellent collection. </p>
<p>I wonder if it might be possible to convert some of the not so often used and quite ugly group meeting rooms in Nielson into an attractive suite where at least the gems of the music collection could be displayed and a librarian could be tasked to sit in the suite and help students with their research, something similar to the Rare Book reading room? Seems like it shouldn’t be too difficult to organize or too expensive to fund?</p>
<p>This concerns me greatly, as I was thinking very hard about double majoring, with one major being in Music (Vocal emphasis). I’ve heard that Smith has an excellent Music department and if the major is changing, I’m very curious as to the details.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t get too worked up about, things at Smith tend to move at a slow pace thanks to our many committees, so changing the music major is not something that will happen overnight. </p>
<p>I second the idea of contacting the music department (a really good idea anyway if you’re thinking about majoring in vocal performance) and talking to a music professor when/if you go to Smith to do your Ada interview. </p>
<p>I have no idea what making the major “more accessible” means, but if I had to wager a guess (NOTE: This is PURELY conjecture), I would say that it will have more affect on music theory majors than on performance majors. “More accessible” to me means less of a focus on theory and more of a focus either on performance/conducting/composing and also changing what kinds of music are taught, perhaps expanding the course offerings to give more attention to modern or world music. Of course, I could be totally wrong but that’s what makes sense in my head.</p>