<p>Hello, I am a current student at a CC and was wondering if anyone has taken the CalTech placement exam and could tell me what areas I need to study in more. I know it's a lot of theoretical and deriving but I would like to know what specific areas of physics that they focus on and what specific areas of math they focus on.</p>
<p>It would help if you could explain more about the physics side. Bump Bump</p>
<p>Why do you want to place out of an intro class?? Caltech physics is not like any other physics classes you’ll ever take ANYWHERE. They are highly theoretical and certainly not what you’d consider entry level or introductory. Some students do place out of these classes, but then end up having to re-learn a lot of the material for the next sequence. You do NOT get credit for placing out of these classes, just switched to a different level.</p>
<p>Placing out of these courses also puts you out of sync with many of your classmates and housemates, which makes finding a compatible study group harder. Caltech courses, especially the earlier ones, are designed to be worked on collaboratively.</p>
<p>Well I don’t go to any study groups because I have already passed all of the physics and math possible. I study independently and wouldn’t be out of sync when I don’t have the course to take anyways. I just wanted someone to give an example of what to expect for the math and physics test.</p>
<p>For anyone who takes the test just make sure you know all your Newtonian physics in terms of symbols. Ex: if I shoot a cannon ball with x amount of weight what does angle Theta required to hit the target that is L length away. </p>
<p>You shouldn’t consider Caltech bigbd because you don’t seem to fit Caltech. Students there study collaboratively. That doesn’t seem to fit you.</p>
<p>Aunt bea, bigbd22 is talking about the physics placement exam which prefrosh take in the summer every year along with a series of other placement tests. Collaboration is not allowed on these exams since their purpose is to gauge each student’s individual starting points to place them in appropriate classes. In general, exams are non-collab (though study sessions and most sets are).</p>
<p>Thanks @chewydog, but isn’t this guy a transfer student? He’s attending a CC so did he get into Caltech and needs to take the placement exam?</p>
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<p>^That was written a year back while his original post was from 2013. My only concern is that this statement may be a slight infraction upon the Honor Code since students shouldn’t be cramming for the test (it doesn’t hep them in the long run).</p>
<p>got it!</p>