<p>Damn this course catalog announcement thingy is exciting. </p>
<p>I was wondering how common it is to take 5 courses in a semester–will this be too much work? </p>
<p>Also, about S/NC, how common is that? Like 1 per semester, or are there people who just go all out and take like 3/4 S/NC? Would that be a good idea? </p>
<p>And how do I narrow down these hundreds of courses to 4 or 5?!?!?!?! Ahhhhh I don’t know what to take! Will it actually be this hard when I have advisors and stuff?</p>
<p>Your advisor will help as much as you want them to, but take advantage of Brown and find those things for yourself. Check out
<a href="http://mocha.cs.brown.edu%5B/url%5D">http://mocha.cs.brown.edu</a>
It's a student made version of the official online course catologue, <a href="http://boca.brown.edu%5B/url%5D">http://boca.brown.edu</a></p>
<p>Check out the Critical Review to see how your classes rank and what peopel think about them.</p>
<p>I know peopel who took five, most of them ended up dropping one but really it depends on how balanced your schedule is and what you consider too much work. 5 courses is definitely possible, if chosen properly. And SNC that's your call. I wish I had hte balls to take everything SNC, I'd learn a lot more.</p>
<p>I'd try taking at least one class S/NC, just to see how you react. A lot of my friends have different opinions about it. Some advisers are great, some you can't even get in touch with. Luck of the draw, unless you sign up for a cap class with a great adviser (Pucci!).</p>
<p>how well an S/NC class works for you depends on your reasoning for taking it S/NC. I took a Latin class spring semester S/NC, since I didn't want to put A level work into it like I did in the fall. Because I took the class S/NC to allow myself to do less work, I ended up doing no work, and the class put a lot of stress on me at the end as I had to make sure I passed.</p>
<p>As I've said many other times on the board, DON'T take 5 classes your first semester freshman year.</p>
<p>And I know narrowing it down seems hard now, but once you get here and start shopping courses, things will become clearer to you.</p>
<p>It's probably not a good idea for 99% of people to actually take five classes the first semester, you don't know enough about hte work lod to properly balance it etc. Unless you want to work a lot and are driven to work 10 hours a day, which is fine, people are like that, in that case, five classes may be what you need so oyu arent bored. I dont know many people who want that and I know people like that who still can't pull the As in all four classes because it's still hard to do.</p>
<p>Even if you "want to work a lot and are driven to work 10 hours a day," I'd encourage you to wait until at least second semester freshman year. During your first semester, you'll be spending a lot of time figuring out what activities you want to do (and how much time they take) and making new friends, etc. Everyone at Brown works hard, but if you are the kid who NEVER goes out or NEVER has time for a 3 am crazy conversation with random people about nothing in particular, then you might be cheating yourself out of the full college experience, even if you're having a great academic experience.</p>
<p>I agree... just bring up that there certainly is a segment of Brown that doesn't experience life or college the way they should and miss out on the 3am conversations and interaction that makes it worthwhile.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the advice.</p>
<p>Are 4 classes even that much work? I come from a Jewish high school where we had a double curriculum (English & Hebrew), and my day went from 8:00 to about 5:00, so I basically had more work and less time to do it. </p>
<p>Considering that 4 classes x 140-160 minutes a week is only about 10 hours of actual class per week (whereas I'm used to about 4 times that amount), how much work can there be? And even if there is a lot, it seems like there would soooo much time to do it. Is it mostly reading?</p>
<p>It's not that the classes are a lot ot handle, it's that the work load outside of course makes up for the fact that you spend less time there, maybe not if i had straight 8-5 it would have made up for it, but it certainly did make up for 730-230.</p>
<p>First of all, lots of classes have an extra discussion section (1 hour/week) or lab (1 hour a week or usually more), so most people taking 4 classes spend more than 10 hours a week in class.</p>
<p>You probably worked really hard in your high school classes, but college is just another level of workload. For example, the history class I took last semester regularly assigned 100 - 500 pages of reading a week. I'm a pretty fast reader, but 100 pages of your favorite novel goes by a lot faster than 100 pages of primary documents from the Mexican Revolution or 100 pages of historiographical arguments. With that regular reading, combined with 2 papers (8 pages), a midterm, and a take-home final, it ended up being quite a lot of work.</p>
<p>The other thing is that, even though it seems like there's so much time to do your work, you'll be doing a lot more things outside of class. In high school, an organization you were in might have met once a week for an hour... and there are definitely those types of organizations here, but you are also likely to get involved in things which will take up huge amounts of time if you let them.</p>
<p>Ilovebrown has it covered.</p>
<p>I know all the overachievers are thinking, "four classes! that's it! that's nothing!" i was exactly the same way. but i would def agree with anyone who says not to take 4 classes first semester. </p>
<p>now i took five classes (one S/NC) 2nd semester and the workload was actually fine. just don't do it 1st sem. those of you worried about doubling up on science courses in one semester, don't worry. EVERYONE and I mean EVERYONE who is a science major always doubles up on science courses. it's pretty much inevitable and not a big deal at all.</p>
<p>for those of you who've taken those classes that only meet once a week in a longer hour range....does this mean you've gotten ridiculous amounts of reading in order to satisfy the quota for the next time you meet? I know it definitely will vary just depending on the class/prof you take...but on the whole, I'm wondering whether it's better to take those classes that meet several times a week, just to have a better paced workload. does that make sense? i just might be rambling...</p>
<p>That's basically right, fooka. Classes like that can be nice though, if you can spread out the work on your own - they make for very good discussions. I personally try to strike a balance between courses of varying formats...</p>
<p>I have taken a long class meeting once a week like that, and it can be very rough if your professor isn't understanding of how long 2.5 hrs is for class. My teacher, luckily, was, and took a 10minute break in the middle of class (mostly so she can smoke). It was a great class in that each week was interesting, it was small and discussion based, etc. THere was a lot more reading for that class than most others, I'd say, but not any more actually assigned work.</p>
<p>Bottomline is, I wouldn't do two in a semester, I think that'd be really rough first to have to sit through that twice, even if it's the most interesting class ever, can be hard, and secondly beacuse that'd require some MONSTER time management skills, but after my first experience I am signed up for another class liek that so I do think it's not a terrible thing.</p>
<p>I took one class (UC0170 with Simmons, it's fantastic) that was in that seminar format, and every week the professor would have a 10-minute break in the middle and would bring cookies and cider. So yeah, with the right professor it can be really fantastic!</p>
<p>thanks for the advice. cookies and cider? how adorable~ I'll definetly take one of those classes and push myself to (at least attempt to) learn how NOT to procrastinate a week's worth of work.</p>
<p>I did two of those classes my first semester. Once was small and discussion-based with a prof who didn't know how to organize a lecture or lead a discussion... so it was a little painful... but the 12 of us kind of bonded over it, so it was fun. The other was a lecture of about 170, but the prof was really funny and the material was interesting, plus she took a break, so it wasn't bad (take PY55 with Carskadon -- it's a fantastic class). That class was in the Hunter auditorium right next to Faunce, so during break I would often go and check my mail and then get a chocolate brownie or couisant (sp???) at the Blue Room. Yummy!</p>
<p>i've heard good/fun things about swedish 10</p>
<p>um you mean croissant?</p>