@solostish
I see. Thank you!
@Cayton Out of curiosity, when you say a philos class from x is generally more difficult than a hard philos class from y, do you mean in terms of grading, subject matter, overall rigor, pace, or some combination of all of those?
@Cayton I can’t thank you enough for such a detailed response. I really appreciate you taking the time to convey all of this information to me. I will definitely be contacting you with further questions in the future.
I find it exceptional that you’re maintaining a 3.75 there. I can only hope to match that if I choose UCLA.
@goldencub
UCLA philosophy classes are harder than the hardest CC philosophy classes when it comes to…well everything, generally.
The classes here have about the same amount of reading, but those readings are denser(Though you do get used to it pretty quickly, so don’t worry too much.). A typical class will have about 30-40 pages a week of reading that’s required. The readings are dense and may require you to go through them twice. I think you can avoid having to do that if you read those assignments very, VERY slowly. I’m talking about 10 pages an hour. Don’t be afraid to reread an individual sentence of paragraph; that stuff is meant to be digested slowly.
Subject matter is harder, generally, in the sense that you’ll be covering philosophers in more detail(And more of what they wrote) at the upper-division than at the lower-division. You’d think you’d already know a lot about Plato because you took a CC lower-division ancient philosophy course or two that covered him, but you’d be wrong. It gets so much deeper, lol. Especially, ESPECIALLY in courses that are devoted specifically to a single philosopher. Also, a lot of stuff in the upper-division courses will be familiar to you because you read about it in your CC courses, e.g. Aristotle’s four causes and Plato’s theory of forms. But those lower-div courses are survey courses generally and give you a rough understanding through the readings and lectures of those concepts. In Phil 100A(Ancient Greek Philosophy, upper-division), these concepts are covered once more, but in substantially more detail and you learn other stuff about these familiar concepts that you didn’t know about before.
When it comes to pace, UCLA is just faster because it’s on the quarter system. That’s pretty much it. I don’t know how Berkeley compares with its semester system, so you’ll have to find someone here who knows a thing or two about Berkeley philosophy. I know you want to go there. I’ve heard Berkeley philosophy is pretty damned hard, too. They certainly make up for the slower pace of the semester system.
And when it comes to overall rigor, the papers assigned have higher standards and so do any exams. You gotta go into more detail and it’s expected with papers that you not only show that you know the arguments that given philosophers are making, but you give your own opinion on those issues and defend them with very good arguments(You seriously cannot bull**** this part in your papers. You will regret it). In addition, you’re often expected to list possible counterarguments in your papers that someone could make to your position(And they have to be good counterarguments. Not easy ones that take no effort to refute) and state why they fail to undermine your arguments.
I know this might sound a little intimidating, but your CC classes do prepare you for this stuff if you put effort into them, and I’m sure you do. Again, go to office hours and talk to your professors and TAs.
@Cheolf
No problem, and I know you’ll do well when you get accepted to UCLA(And hopefully decide to go here!). It’s all a matter of effort and hard work.
@Cayton No, that all sounds like good fun. I’m excited to get into upper divs.
I read Plato and Aristotle last semester, so I’m fairly familiar with how dense readings can be (although Plato was fairly easy to read). I’m sure things won’t be too bad as far as that goes. I don’t know if you had the same textbook for your CC Ancient course, but it was Readings in Ancient Greek Philosophy: From Thales to Aristotle, a really outstanding book. We covered much of The Republic, tons of Plato’s dialogues, and a number of Aristotle’s texts (focusing on metaphysics and epistemology - we didn’t cover his Nichomachean Ethics).
It’s good to know that there’s more to it. I’m also glad I’m not the only one who reads philosophy extremely slowly. :))
Thanks again for the help.
@goldencub
No problem.
And the 99 day count begins!
@themightybicycle oh no…
Just a friendly reminder for everyone to complete their TAU (transfer application update; fall grades)
guys, so I took the bilingual competency test instead of taking a foreign language in high school.would that count towards the igetc foreign language requirement?
@hellwasfull I don’t think so because they can’t give x amount of credit for it. My husband had to sign up and challenge the Spanish courses he wanted credit for in order to get the units. He had AP spanish from high school that covered one course, and challenged up to level three. I can’t remember if only one or two are needed to satisfy igetci, but this is a pretty easy route. I would double check with your counselor however.
@sugarbabies3 Hmm, that’s interesting. My community college takes SAT2 scores for igetc.
@JacobfromCA But he was talking about a language competency test, not the SAT2 scores.
@sugarbabies3
Oops, sorry, I mistook what you meant by “I don’t think so because they can’t give x amount of credit for it” as meaning that the community colleges can’t give you credit for tests. But I’m guessing your husband received credits for his foreign language requirement because he had AP scores right?
@JacobfromCA No worries. The AP credit only counted for 3 units worth. And he simply challenged SPA 102 and SPA 103 for theit units worth.
@sugarbabies3 I see. Thanks!
Hi
so i noticed that the transfer update still has that little comment section about academic record. Would it be appropriate if i added my scholarship on there? I got notified about it in december, technically during filing period but at the time i already submitted my app.Do you guys think it would be okay to mention it in there?
@hellwasfull if you have nothing related to your academics that you may want the UCs to be aware of, then go for it. why censor yourself? congrats btw
Another philosophy major here!
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