Advice for freshmen on choosing classes

Colleges and Universities A-Z Harvard University
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<p>A family friend asked for some advice on how to choose classes as a very undecided freshman. I thought I'd post it here, in case it's helpful to others:</p>

<p>#1. Your concentration isn't that important at Harvard, so don't stress to much.
In the end, your concentration is just half (or fewer!) of your classes (and maybe a thesis). I've definitely benefited more since graduation from my Gen Ed and electives (and far more from my extracurriculars, like The Crimson). </p>

<p>#2. Your concentration doesn't dictate your job/career/life
I think one of the biggest benefits of going to Harvard (vs. a big state school) is that your major doesn't dictate your career -- you really can be an English major who heads to wall street, or a Econ concentrator who becomes a doctor. </p>

<p>#3. Try to balance your schedule as much as possible
This is good advice for all four years, but especially important in your freshman year as you try to figure out what you're good at. Taking a "lopsided" schedule (i.e. all paper-based classes) can be a surefire way to make yourself insane. Some "axes" to think about balancing along:
*Problem sets vs. papers
Small seminars vs. big lectures
Lots of work vs. lighter workload
Gen Ed vs. concentration vs. elective
Intro classes vs. more upper level<a href="Especially%20in%20the%20humanities/social%20sciences%20don't%20be%20afraid%20to%20dive%20into%20a%20class%20that's%20not%20the%20intro%20level!%20%20They're%20often%20less%20challenging,%20at%20least%20in%20terms%20of%20grades,%20than%20the%20intro%20class%20and%20will%20give%20you%20a%20much%20better%20idea%20of%20what%20it's%20like%20to%20be%20a%20concentrator">/i</a></p>

<p>#4. Take a freshman seminar.
You only get one shot to take one (or two!). They're often fascinating, a great way to meet a professor early on, and generally really light in terms of workload.</p>

<p>#5. Shop till you drop
I would create giant shopping lists (based somewhat on the Q, but mostly just by flipping through the course of instruction) and try to see something like 10-12 classes for the first couple days of shopping period. Sometimes a 5 minute drop in is all you need to know that a certain professor (or even, a certain concentration) just isn't right for you. Talk to your friends about what they've checked out + seems good, & share your notes. You'll probably end up wanting to take more classes than you can actually manage - but that's a good way to start building your plan for soph/junior/senior years.</p>

<p>Last but not least, let me put in a personal pitch for CS 50 - the best class I took at Harvard. The prof (Malan) is great, the work is tough - but incredibly rewarding, and you learn an incredibly useful skill. It's certainly a big time commitment (10-15 hour weekly problem sets), but there's a ton of support available if you're finding it tough.</p>

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<p>Thank you for drafting this; freshmen are very receptive to advice at this point.</p>

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<p>I feel these instructions do not apply to science concentrators. D managed to test out of foreign language for her freshman year and despite managing to remove those two required courses from her schedule she only had one completely elective class her whole year. D entered her freshman year wanting to decide between the life science concentrations and psychology - had to take SLS 20, LS1a, LS1b, Math 1a, Math 1b, PS1, Expos 20, one elective (Took “Digging the Glyphs” which had a Q score that should have made it “easy” but professor saw score and decided to “change the curriculum”. It was not “easy”.) She is now planning on Neurobiology with a Mind, Brain, and Behavior track.</p>

<h1>1 Fine but depending upon your interests you may want to get thinking faster than other frosh. Looking at departmental requirements, it looks to me like the science and engineering concentrators need to figure this out earlier.</h1>

<h1>2 Could be but I get the impression that if one wants to do science research like my daughter you will need the undergrad science research for your grad school applications.</h1>

<h1>3 D would have loved to have been able to follow those instructions her freshman year and is trying to apply those type of techniques this coming semester - Organic Chemistry, Neurobiology of behavior, Institutional Violence and Public Spectacle: The Case of the Roman Games, and The Business and Politics of Health.</h1>

<h1>4 Might have been able to take one as her only elective but did not want to because they are only P/F. Maybe she made a mistake missing out on this.</h1>

<h1>5 That’s great if you have a lot of choices in the classes you need to take.</h1>

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<p>Second mifune— thank you so much for posting this :]</p>

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<p>I deeply regret my “to” in #1!</p>

<p>Smoda raises a good point that if you want to get a PhD, your concentration does matter, quite a bit. This wasn’t anything I ever considered (and I think it’s a very small % of students that go on to doctoral work) - but it is certainly something to keep in mind, if that’s a path you want to take.</p>

<p>For certain concentrations (notably hard sciences, but also econ + math), it is rather critical to take the foundational courses early on, because prerequisites are much more strict here than in history/psych/etc.</p>

<p>Regarding smoda’s daughter’s schedule - I would have begged/pleaded/insisted that she add more balance freshman year, if I were her PAF/proctor/advisor. Many, many students load up on the premed courseload early on, and it causes much misery (speaking from my own experience here!). I’m glad she seems to be balancing out a bit sophomore year.</p>

<p>I also deeply regret smoda’s disagreement with my point #5 – even if you think that “have” to take a certain schedule, and have no electives, you should still shop! You never know when a random class will catch your eye and cause you to throw your four year plan into the garbage.</p>

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<p>Great advice! I’m a current sophomore and I can personally vouch for a lot of what you said.</p>

<p>Especially:
<a href=“Especially%20in%20the%20humanities/social%20sciences%20don’t%20be%20afraid%20to%20dive%20into%20a%20class%20that’s%20not%20the%20intro%20level!%20They’re%20often%20less%20challenging,%20at%20least%20in%20terms%20of%20grades,%20than%20the%20intro%20class%20and%20will%20give%20you%20a%20much%20better%20idea%20of%20what%20it’s%20like%20to%20be%20a%20concentrator”>quote</a>

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<p>Classes like Gov 20 are great on their own merit (though now that Levitsky is not teaching it, 20 may change) but they are by no means a model for the other 11ish gov classes you would take as a concentrator. I took some staple “freshman classes” like Gov 20 and Lifesci 1b, but my favorite classes were the oddball ones like “Arabic 162: Introduction to the Modern Arab World.”</p>

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<p>Believe me, my daughter would have loved to have had a more balanced schedule but every one of those 7 courses were expected to be completed before her sophomore year. I don’t know what she would have done have she not tested out of foreign language. That would have made for 9 required courses freshman year. Oh, and BTW her advisor has been nonexistent. Since matriculating, she got at most 5 minutes of his time. Neither of us are too concerned she there was not much to discuss.</p>

<p>D’s boyfriend’s schedule is going to be even crazier going forward. He is doing EE but wants the option of medical school and therefore must complete the pre-med requirements in addition to his concentration and gen-ed requirements. He has already laid out a plan for the next 3 years with one gen-ed/semester. He will have one “pure” elective that has no strings on it at all. This semester there will be basically no shopping for him. He went through all the ged ed’s to find any that did not conflict with his required EE/pre-med classes. D had appealed to him to join her in one class that appeared to be “fun”. His reply was that was not how he wanted to spend his one free class.</p>