My student has been accepted to several engineering programs (and still waiting to hear from a few more) and is curious about the difference between attending a semester vs a trimester school for engineering. When he was looking at the suggested curriculum for two schools (Mines/Cal Poly), the total credits needed per trimester/semester was very similar (16/17). As one example, Calc I, II, III were 4 credits at each school and took place during one trimester or semester. This was similar for Chem/Physics. Most major classes seemed to be 3 credits and labs were 1 credit. The biggest difference was in general ed/elective credits which were worth 3 at the semester school and 4 at the trimester school (this seemed counter-intuitive to me). His older sister is EE/CS at Rice and generally takes 17-18 credits/semester, which is the equivalent of 5 classes (this is in part because she always takes a humanities class on top of her engineering requirements because she enjoys learning something new/different).
So based on his research and talking with his sister, he asked me if that meant that at a trimester school he’d be taking 4-5 classes, which he believes would also be the case at a semester school, and if that meant he’d be learning the same amount in a shorter time period AND taking more classes overall. I had no idea (I am not an engineer/got a business degree at a trimester school before going to law school with semesters), so told him I would ask in this forum as there are likely people who do know!
Appreciate any helpful information re semester vs trimester (for engineering). Also happy to hear input re Mines and Cal Poly as he thinks he has ruled out the other schools he’s been admitted to (UCD, UW, CU Boulder, OSU, UVM, WPI). He is still waiting on trimester schools (UCSD/UCI) and semester schools (Lehigh/Bucknell).
I went to UCSB (quarter) undergrad and Berkeley (semester) for grad school. I was a Bio Sci major so had a lot of STEM classes with labs. Personally, I strongly preferred the quarter system.
Are you sure these are trimester schools? Or are they on the quarter system?
My engineering major went to a college on quarters. The important thing to remember is quarters are 10-11 weeks long….so shorter than semesters. Students really need to keep up with the work. Things just happen faster…like mid terms and finals.
So…keep up with class and homework. Get a tutor quickly if needed. Don’t miss any classes. But then I would say that applies to semesters too. Quarters just are shorter. Less time to make up for any slip ups.
Cal Poly SLO and the UC’s mentioned are on Quarter system. 3 quarters during the normal school year: Fall, Winter, Spring and a full Quarter during the summer.
My son went to a quarter school (Cal Poly) and I went to a semester school. The way terms break, quarters make way more sense to me. That said, Poly is bowing to the pressure of the rest of the CSUs and UCs and will switch to semesters in a few years.
Understood - I know that often trimester/quarters are used interchangeably since there’s a summer session with both, but thought that trimester was the more common language as that seems to be the case here in NorCal
An academic year typically has 30 weeks of instruction, divided into two 15-week semesters or three 10-week quarters (a summer session is typically an 8-week half-semester or fourth 10-week quarter). In the usual credit system, 1 semester credit = 1.5 quarter credit. So a student who takes a year of full 15-credit loads at a quarter system school will earn 45 quarter credits, while a student who takes a year of full 15-credit loads at a semester system school will earn 30 semester credits, which is the same amount of credit.
At many colleges, the same content in a year-long sequence (e.g. general chemistry) is just divided differently, i.e. into two 15-week chunks or three 10-week chunks, with the same amount of material covered and same workload per week.
However, a one-semester course may be compressed into one higher-credit quarter course, or two lower-credit quarter courses. For example, a 4-semester-credit course may become a 6-quarter-credit course or two 3-quarter-credit courses.
This all makes sense to me, however, using Calc I, II, and III as one example - at both schools they are 4 credit classes. Presumably roughly the same material is covered in these classes at both schools. So at a quarter school you are learning that material in 10 weeks vs 15 weeks at a semester school. The same for Physics 1 & 2 and Chem 1 & 2. At a quarter school, you could do the entire Calc series in 1 school year whereas at a semester school it would take you 1.5 school years or a school year + summer session. So this is what led my son to ask me whether this is a real difference for engineering students. If you learn the same material, get the same credits, but need to learn the material in a shorter time period (1/3 shorter), then is that “harder” for the student. Originally I would have thought the answer was no because at a quarter school you’d be taking 3-4 classes instead of 4-5, but if you look at the engineering curriculum it looks like students take 4-5 classes regardless of whether they are on a quarter or semester system.
I do appreciate all the general information people have provided but nothing I have read so far (here or elsewhere) really answers my son’s question. Perhaps quarter schools just teach less material in the Calc/Physics/Chem series or perhaps there is less review, repetition, or something else. That is what I was trying to ascertain since my son will have to make a decision between quarters/semesters (as well as many other factors).
CPSLO: calculus 1 through 4 (141, 142, 143, 241) cover single variable and multivariable calculus over 16 quarter credits (= 10+1/3 semester credits) of courses. Note that calculus 3 finishes off the single variable calculus portion (infinite sequences and series) and then introduces multivariable topics, so you can say that it may be slightly accelerated versus some other single variable calculus sequences.
CO Mines: calculus 1 through 3 (111, 112, 213) cover single variable and multivariable calculus over 12 semester credits (= 18 quarter credits) of courses. Note that calculus 2 finishes off the single variable calculus portion (infinite sequences and series) and then introduces multivariable topics, so you can say that it may be slightly accelerated versus some other single variable calculus sequences.
So it looks like both cover single variable calculus is a little less than an academic year and start introducing multivariable calculus at the end of the first year calculus sequence. CO Mines Math 213 spends more time on multivariable calculus than CPSLO Math 241, because the second year course covering that is 15 weeks long instead of 10 weeks long.
Wow, thank you very much - this was very helpful as I didn’t previously understand that the classes did not cover the same material, probably because all of that is over my head! My son is currently in multivariable calculus so not sure where in the sequence he’d start at various schools, but this will definitely help him understand how it is not an apples to oranges comparison between schools. Thank you!
Look up the curriculum path at both and the look up the course descriptions. The names aren’t typically equivalent. At Cal Poly for example, there’s no Diff Eq per se in the ME curriculum. It’s because they combine Diff Eg and Linear into Linear I and II. It can be very confusing, but at the end of they day, most schools cover similar basic material in the same relative amount of time. Two semester courses will be three quarter courses. Where it gets interesting, and beneficial in my eyes, is single courses not in a sequence. You can pack more of them in, or if you don’t like them, spend less weeks on the subject.
From a student point of view, a quarter system commonly means taking more courses, but each one is “smaller”. It probably does not make too much difference in a highly structured major like an engineering major – just follow the template. It does mean registering for courses and taking final exams one extra time per year.
The typical quarter system academic year is offset about five weeks later compared to semester system schools (though there is at least one school where it is not offset, and the winter quarter is split by winter break). If the student has seasonal extracurriculars like varsity athletics, the amount of overlap with quarters or semesters may differ, in how much of the academic year requires more time management for school work alongside the extracurriculars.
If he will bring college credit for single variable and multivariable calculus that is accepted by the college, it is likely that his remaining lower level math courses will be linear algebra and differential equations (check the colleges’ course requirements for his major). By not having to take up to 4 quarters or 3 semesters of lower level math courses, he will gain that much space for free electives eventually. He may want to use the extra early schedule space to start physics and other required sequences earlier, and/or fulfill general education requirements earlier. The extra space that will be freed up later can be used for either additional advanced courses in his major, or electives in other subjects, or both.
If he is in industrial engineering, designing an optimal eight semester or twelve quarter college schedule with consideration of prerequisite sequencing and other constraints can be seen as an optimization problem.
I’ve attended both types of schools. They’re really just different ways of slicing the same pie and I didn’t find one to be better than the other. You learn the same amount whether you go with semester or trimester (which we called quarters.)