I have been dedicated to majoring in Mechanical Engineering for a few months. I have a 3.87 GPA at my community college, last semester I took pre-calc, chemistry and 3 other classes equaling up to 18 credits for the semester, and got a 4.0. Since I was able to handle a heavy course-load and still get all A’s last semester, I thought that taking Calc 1 in the summer would be easy. Man was I wrong.
I have only been in Calc for a week and I’m already thinking about changing majors. It’s not that I can’t learn and understand the material, it’s just the amount of time that is needed to be put in. I used to study for around 3-6 hours a day last semester to get all A’s, but I was studying things that are interesting to read about such as Chemistry and History. It’s hard to force myself to study from my Calc book because I can’t stand reading about numbers and equations for hours on end.
I’m seriously thinking about changing majors to a less technical degree such as Business. It’s not that I don’t think I could get a degree in Engineering, in fact, I know I could get it if I put the time in, it’s just that I’m not sure if I want to be killing myself studying math for the next 5 years. I really didn’t realize how boring math was to me until taking this class.
What do you all think I should do? I have 7 days left to drop without penalty, and I have a test on Thursday that I will have to study all week for. I’m really considering dropping the class and at least giving myself the summer to think about what I really want to do.
If you’re bored with Math, you can’t be an Engineer. Calc 1 is just the start, there’s Muti-variable calculus, differential Equation, Linear Algebra, Eng’g Statistics and Probability, Numerical Method. etc. Not to mention that you need take Physics and Mechanics, then after that you got into your major classes where most of them are Math based.
It depends on the school, but often a business degree will require a base level of math, which means often calculus is involved. William and Mary for instance requires basic math, accounting, and finance courses as part of its “business core.” You should check with each school but you’re right that after that it is much less technical than engineering which is one of the most math-numbers intensive majors out there
Since a summer session is usually about half as long as a regular semester, the course you are taking in the summer is covering material at twice the speed of those in regular semesters.
Business majors often need to take calculus, though at a less advanced level than engineering majors.
Yes, you might retake the class in the fall and see if you like it better then. It won’t be a waste of time or money because calc 1 can be useful for a business degree. Instead of spending all your time reading your calc book, you might try to find useful websites or youtube videos that show different ways of explaining the same topics.
My school’s summer classes are 10 weeks long as opposed to the standard 15 week long classes in the spring and fall semesters, so yeah the information is kinda packed together, but it is the only class that I take. I can’t imagine taking calc along with other hard engineering classes
Maybe I’m just overwhelmed…I’m thinking about just dropping the class and taking the summer off to figure everything out
If you are just feeling burned out over math, then I think taking the summer off would be a smart move. If math has always been a problem for you (from a motivation point of view), then taking the summer off probably won’t fix anything.
I think I am sorta feeling burned out, but I also feel like taking the summer off would be really boring because I have nothing else to do other than chill with my friends. I’ve been trying to get a job for months but it’s really hard to find one where I live
I slept on the idea of dropping out of engineering, and I think I’m going to stick with it (for now lol). Still not sure if I want to take the summer off though, it would kinda mess up my schedule and force me to take another hard math class next summer, or extend my time in college by another semester (I’m already behind)
If you are not enjoying the math, then you should switch majors. Math is the language of engineering and you will be taking math classes for your entire undergraduate career. If you don’t like it now, you won’t like it later. Pick a major that is more interesting to you.
@anvera yeah I wasn’t enjoying it at first, but the more I study, it the more I enjoy it. I think I was just overwhelmed by the amount of work my teacher gives us (10 pages of problems for homework every day)
First of, engineering is not all math. You can do a lot of engineering with only simple math or get into the highly analytical side where you do a lot of real intense math. Math is a tool and just like any other tool, when you’re using it you aren’t really concentrating on the math only part but how to solve all aspects of the problem.
you guys that are saying just go business are forgetting that even business majors have to take an applied calculus class or 2. which is going to encompess the same material as a traditional calc class minus the calculus related to trigonometric functions because a business major isn’t going to learning vector analysis.
Derivative tests are very important in the analytic side of business for obtaining max efficiency, just like in engineering.
calculus is like the most important computational tool you’ll ever learn, hence why it is applied in so many fields and in other fields within math.
you’re also going to have to take statistic classes (remember statistic is applied math) that revolve around the central limit theorem.
@ImUrHuckleBerry Yeah, I actually looked into this after I made this post. After realizing that I would need Calculus for pretty much every other major I’m interested in, I decided to just stick with engineering and stick with the summer class.
I was honestly just overwhelmed and a little bit discouraged by the intensity of this class, I’m doing fine now. It’s actually really easy now.
My problem was that my pre-calc professor last semester skipped half of the material we needed, so when I went into Calc 1 it was extremely difficult. I decided that I needed to make up for the information I was missing, and studied for literally like 2 days straight. Everything is good now, like I said, Calc is actually really easy lol I just needed to build up my foundation.