course load

<p>Can anybody tell me what a typical course load is (including during the winter semester)? How many classes, or semester hours is typical? Do students stay pretty busy with the General Education requirements the first two years, or do you have time for other courses right from the beginning?</p>

<p>3 courses in the fall, 2 in the winter, 3 in the spring. Everyone takes the same amount. There are General Ed requirments, but you typically want to take those courses. They are the essence of our liberal arts experience; they are not something to be avoided.</p>

<p>To add my opinion, many students may "save" their GEDs for later years so they can balance some of the easy GED intro classes with harder classes. I am saving my Health and Exercise Science class for a term I know I am going to have some hard classes, so it will hopefully balance out.</p>

<p>Thanks for your answers. That helps a bit.</p>

<p>There appear to be between 14 and 19 general ed classes (depending upon how many math classes, and how many language courses needed for proficiency). With 8 courses per year, that means a full two years' worth of core courses. My D is currently comparing two schools (Furman is one), both of which have an extensive core requirement. The issue is not "avoiding" them. She wants to double major, and she is trying to figure out whether one school has an advantage over the other - in terms of needing a 5th year to finish, or having room in her schedule to take some classes just because she is interested in them, that don't satisfy either major, nor the core - This is something she'd really like to do. </p>

<p>She would like to major in music and something to do with languages - perhaps a self-designed linguistics major. She would like to study several different languages. Her music will satisfy the fine arts requirement, and she'll get the language proficiency probably several times over. Will her AP Lit and Comp satisfy the English courses? Will AP calc BC do anything for her?</p>

<p>The AP's will help her with some of those distribution requirements. My son came to Furman just 1 course shy of sophomore status because of AP's and had to take just one Spanish class to complete his language requirement (incoming freshmen take a placement test to assess what level they're at).
For info on AP credit, go to <a href="http://www.furman.edu/advising/ch3place.htm#tab%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.furman.edu/advising/ch3place.htm#tab&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>