<p>For sciences and government, what do you /feel/ like the average class size is? For intro, advanced?</p>
<p>bump-bump...</p>
<p>I don't exactly understand what you mean by government courses (I'd assume Politics classes, since we don't have an official government program/department), but I am more familiar with the sciences anyway, so I can comment about that.</p>
<p>Intro Biology classes are capped at 30, but can sometimes be less than that (my Bio41M class had 21 students). Almost every advanced biology course is capped at 20 students, but often there could be a few as 2 or 3 students, but it seems like for next semester most the classes have around 8 or 9 people.</p>
<p>Physics caps their introductory courses at 36 students. The advanced courses tend to have only a handful of students (mostly taken by just the Physics and Astronomy majors/minors), so most of them have less than 10 students in each class.</p>
<p>Intro to Chemistry has just under 50 people in it, but there is an accelerated chemistry course you can take with about 25 students. Organic Chemistry has about 100, and Biochemistry about 50 students (The introductory chemistry course sizes have changed from year to year, but I am basing these off next semester). The larger courses all have lab periods that are split into about 20 or 25 students each (Biochemistry with about 15 students each), every single one being taught and run by a professor (not a TA). Advanced courses in chemistry will have anywhere from 1-20 students, with a median of around 10 students.</p>
<p>If you want to know about Geology, Environmental Analysis, or something else not mentioned, I can try to figure that out for you.</p>
<p>If you're wondering about how small they feel, basically every professor I've taken a science class with at Pomona (as a pre-med student) has known my name pretty early on in the course. I've felt comfortable asking questions in the classes with 30 students or less, and the professor will likely notice if you're absent.</p>
<p>Environmental Analysis I would like to know about. And yes, I meant Political Science rather than Government. </p>
<p>Do you feel like what you learn in the class is much different with 10 people than with 20-30, out of curiosity?</p>
<p>Environmental Anaylsis is sort of odd because it is a interdisciplinary program, so there are a lot of courses that qualify to go toward the major. The introduction to environmental studies class is capped at 35 students. The more advanced classes seem to have an average of around 20 students.</p>
<p>Classes with fewer students tend to be structured differently. They usually have more of a seminar-style than a lecture-style. For smaller science classes, you may be expected to present a paper to the class, or everyone may read the same articles and discuss it as a group with the teacher. Science classes with 20 or more students will probably be more lecture-oriented, so you basically learn what the Professor decides to lecture on. Smaller classes could make you learn more because there are fewer people in the class and you could stand out if you haven't done the reading and don't participate, so I guess it's harder to slack off and you're more accountable (especially if you have to present papers rather than sit in a class listening to a lecture). Depending on your major though, you could get away with taking larger classes if you wanted to avoid that.</p>
<p>Naw, not wanting to avoid that at all. I like classes where everyone is engaged. Just comparing two schools which have slightly different average class sizes (14 vs. 17) and trying to figure out at what point it might actually make a difference.</p>
<p>Most politics classes will be in the 20's, especially the intro level/popular classes. However, most of the advanced classes will be in the mid-teens.</p>