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<p>Because he may be lacking in some skills necessary for success in courses he will need to take to meet general education requirements.</p>
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<p>if he did well in classes, and did well on the AP exams, and is getting credit for the AP lit and/or lang, I dont think that is going to be an issue. If he did poorly on the exams or in class, I would agree. And if he had any difficulty with these aspects at the CC, I may agree. </p>
<p>But without truely identifying a reason to retake a course that he has already done well in by college standards, I find little value in it. Unless he wanted to pad his GPA. Or pad the university’s wallet.</p>
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<p>Perhaps that may be why public universities are often quite generous with credit units for AP credit (although subject credit may not necessarily be granted) compared to private universities. The in-state students at public universities require a subsidy for each course or semester of attendance, so getting students to graduate as quickly as possible is their motivation. Private universities, on the other hand, may not want students to graduate early in order to collect additional tuition.</p>
<p>So he tried and sign up for English 48/49 but it said that he needed to be apart of a learning community? He called them but they didn’t answer and went to voicemail. Same thing goes for the Math 96. If he can’t get these classes, could he pick other classes in the mean time than? I’d really like it if he can get into these classes but he has to go through the “learning community”? first. We don’t know what that is.</p>
<p>vlines–several schools we have looked at won’t give any credit for any DE classes taken at a community college so it just depends if they will allow him into Calc 3 (I’m sure you looked into this but for others).</p>
<p>Back when I was in college, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, if you were not in a math related major, math, accounting, etc. if you had 4 years of high school math you were exempt from any math in college :D.</p>
<p>Our kids are only taking AP tests outside of their majors because most of the schools they are considering don’t give AP credit in their major courses anyway.</p>
<p>We saw the no DE credit rules at some too. Most schools would not give DE credits if the DE class also met the required HS class. So if you are required to take 4 years of English in HS, and senior year you took english DE, no transfer credit for you!! But if you took 4 years of English at your HS, AND an additional english at the CC, THEN you could get transfer credit. Same with Math/ Social Studies, etc. </p>
<p>As UCB pointed out, colleges with those rules were usually private, and we found also the more exclusive schools.</p>
<p>Interesting information, could one assist with the current situation now which what I explained above?
Side note: He’s also looking forward to be a Civil Engineer as it is the basics of all engineering and can get any job, really inspired about this.</p>
<p>A course labelled “College X” isn’t a college-level course. Rather, it’s a course to bring students up to the level they need to be at to take college level courses. So College Algebra is the same as tenth grade math. </p>
<p>I’ve looked at some of those math placement tests. None of them that I’ve seen have trig identities (other than sin squared plus cosine squared, which you need to know cold for any calculus class; if you want to do calculus you need to know your way around a triangle in your sleep.)</p>
<p>It really does depend. I know kids who started with Math 55 at Harvard who did fine. My son had to take a math placement test at Carnegie Mellon - who said we don’t care how you did in AP Calc, if you can’t remember enough to pass our test, you need to be placed appropriately. He did fine (he’d also had a year of Linear Algebra after BC Calc.) It’s really weird though that kids think they’ve had calculus and then get placed in a pre-calc class. It’s hard to imagine that they’d really be that far behind.</p>
<p>It’s funny to hear trig identities aren’t used that much - since it’s just about the only math I’ve used in real life since graduating college. (That and plugging numbers into equations to size beams and the like.)</p>
<p>Could he take Humanities/History II? There’s no Prerequisite but I have a feeling you’re suppose to take Humanities/History I before II… just because it’s in order.</p>
<p>sylvadi, your questions are so specific I think you (or preferably your son) are going to have to talk to the registrar at your college. There’s no way someone on a message board can help you.</p>
<p>OP- Civil engineering is not the basics of all engineering. It is a distinct discipline which shares many of the required courses with all the other engineering subjects- and then has its own specific requirements.</p>
<p>Civil engineers need the same math proficiency as every other engineer. Unless your son can retake the placement test and place out of remedial math, I think you should encourage him to do the remedial math and work his tail off to excel at it. Once he starts the higher level math, physics, structures, fluid mechanics, etc. classes for his major, there will be no time to catch up on the foundations.</p>
<p>I appreciate the 5 pages of assistance. There aren’t any English 48/49 and Math 96 classes to take so he will be taking other classes. If there is an opening before September (deadline) he will take those classes, if not it would be summer or spring.</p>
<p>Unless your son has a really firm foundation on the lower level courses, I would advise him not to start out with a 5 credit Math 96 Course. If he does not do well in the course it can kill his gpa because it is 5 credits.</p>
<p>My D spent the last two yrs of HS at a Ca Community College. If a course comes up as a Learning Community it means that section is reserved for students who are enrolled in a special program. A learning community program is usually reserved for students who are at risk and the CC is making an extra effort to help them have success and be able to transfer to a 4 yr school. Not all sections of a course will be classified as LC.
It is hard to get classes at the CC if you are not hyper vigilant. In my D’s case I had to check the registration several times a day to see if a waitlist spot opened up. They fill up almost immediately and if a student doesn’t put an effort in they will not get their classes.
Remedial classes can count towards your full time student status but they will not transfer to a CSU or UC. Transfer time will most probably be over 2 yrs.</p>
<p>San Diego Mesa has a page about Learning Communities, but it does not have much information:</p>
<p>[Learning</a> Communities - San Diego Mesa College](<a href=“http://www.sdmesa.edu/learning-communities/index.cfm]Learning”>http://www.sdmesa.edu/learning-communities/index.cfm)</p>
<p>Here is a placement test from the Berkeley math department:</p>
<p>[Calculus</a> Diagnostic Placement Exam | Department of Mathematics at University of California Berkeley](<a href=“http://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/placement-exam]Calculus”>http://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/placement-exam)</p>
<p>It is advisory only (placement into math courses is not enforced), and is not behind a pay wall or student login wall, so anyone here can see what kind of high school level math is needed to be ready for freshman calculus (note: Math 32 = remedial precalculus, Math 16A = calculus for social studies and business majors, Math 1A = calculus for math, physical science, engineering, and some economics majors).</p>
<p>There is also an advisory page on AP calculus credit, since people seem to be discussing that here:</p>
<p>[Advanced</a> Placement (AP) Examinations | Department of Mathematics at University of California Berkeley](<a href=“http://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/ap-exams]Advanced”>http://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/ap-exams)</p>
<p>They appear to be confident that students who scored a 5 can go directly to more advanced math courses, but not so confident that students who scored a 3 or 4 can succeed doing that.</p>
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<p>I think you would find that he would do just fine. Alg 2 skills are used in all those classes you mentioned. There may be a topic or two that he doesn’t quite remember (logs, etc), but not enough to mess him up on a placement test.</p>
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<p>I think you are mixing up trig FUNCTIONS (sin, cos, tan - all of which are used a ton, and will be on placement tests) with trig IDENTITIES (eg cos t = sin( pi/2 t) ) which, with the exception of sin^2 + cos^2 = 1, are not used nearly so much and tend to not be on placement tests.</p>
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<p>I agree. The other half of our marriage is a Civil Engineer and uses math daily including coming up with needed formulas at times (based upon knowing the concepts in order to do so).</p>
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<p>Good catch, Creekland. I was having trouble figuring out how the only high school math someone would use would be trig identities. No need for fractions, but a frequent use of double-angle and half-angle formulas? That would be strange.</p>
<p>Indeed, placement tests ought to, and probably do, have trig functions on them. But half-angle formulas? Nah, if you need one of those you can look it up.</p>
<p>Bookmarked.</p>