Hello everyone, I am an incoming freshman for the EECS class of 2020 at UC Berkeley. I am very excited to learn about many new things in my time at Berkeley. I have some questions for those of you who have taken classes here. I want to take the following four classes in my freshman year and was wondering if it will be too much for me:
- CS 61A
- EE 16A
- Math H54
- CS 70
I have read some books on all of these courses and am relatively comfortable with a decent amount of course material. I also have prior experience with programming and advanced mathematics and physics due to my participation in competitions such as Olympiads, Science Bowl, Physics Bowl, UIL (for those who know what that is) and the sort. What do you guys think? I would like a decent amount of time for research and some free time, too (maybe 15 hours per week of both research and free time combined). I realize I may be biting off more than I can chew, but only you guys can tell me that for sure. Thank you in advance!
That’s a bit of a tough schedule.
Most EECS students take CS 70 during their second, third, or fourth semester. I’m assuming you have credit for Physics 7A, since you participated in all sorts of science competitions, but you still might consider taking a general science courses in fall (maybe 7B) and waiting until spring for CS 70. You’ll have to take 7B eventually, after all.
Especially if you want to do research, I might consider dropping down to three tech courses, for two reasons. First, you will find Berkeley a lot harder than high school, and may just need to pace yourself in general. But even if you find it easy: there’s really no need to take a ton of courses. Most people I know who got amazing GPAs in EECS took fairly normal courseloads, and just spent a lot of time on each course.
Also, note that no one (neither grad schools not employers, that is) really cares if you take honors math courses - it’s purely for your own enjoyment. So only take H54 over regular 54 if you really enjoy proof-based math, and are okay with the extra work. You can always take Math 110 later if you don’t find regular 54 stimulating enough.
My recommendation is to enroll in four techs, and strongly consider dropping one course before the deadline (about five weeks after the start of classes, except for physics courses). Note that it can be hard to switch from an honors math course to the regular version, because 53 / 54 often have weekly quizzes. So if you’re totally sure that you want to do the honors version, I’d consider going to a discussion for the non-honors version and taking the quizzes so you can switch if necessary.
I think @the77 missed a part in the original post:
Those four classes in a year is not hard.
@Pentaprism I mean first semester my bad XP
@Thej77 I do have credit for Physics 7A from Physics C Mechanics. I like your suggestion and have been taking it into consideration. I think I will perhaps switch to Math H53 (because I do love proofs) and Physics H7B. I took these courses in high school, so I think that I should be able to manage them a little better in college.
In that case, it’s doable, but not easy, especially if you want to maintain high GPA. It’s the first semester, you’ll need to get acquainted with the environment.
My D took CS70 in her first semester, but only because before being admitted to UCB, she’d taken college level math up to partial differential equations and complex analysis. CoE didn’t give her any credits for the college level math & physics (technicality issue). But she petitioned to take upper division math (128A, 128B, 172) & physics (137A) to fulfill the requirements.
You may want to check your knowledge of material of courses you are skipping by trying the old final exams:
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/courses/