<p>I've been looking on the tamu website document for the required courses for freshman biomedical engineering majors. I'll be coming in as a freshman with a good amount of AP credits, but it still looks a little overwhelming. Any tips for freshman engineers regarding course planning? </p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>It is not as overwhelming as it may seem. Just listen to advisors at NSC. They will not advise you to take every course listed especially if you come in with AP Credit. You will take your physics, math, and engineering courses, and maybe biology? for biomed. My word of advice is there’s only one way to get used to the academics here and that is to face the challenge head on and don’t look back.</p>
<p>Have you looked at which AP credits can be directly applied to a requirement on your degree plan? If not, you should. Take your total credit hours required by your degree plan, subtract from it your total hours you can apply with your AP/dual/transfer credit, and then divide that total by 8 semesters. This will give you a good idea of an average amount of credit hours you need to take per semester without summer classes. Keep in mind that many of your upper level classes are prereqs for others, so you can’t simply pick your own degree plan, but you can play with when you take certain classes.</p>
<p>If you need help finding out which AP credits directly apply, email/call a counselor in the biomed engineering department. As far as taking classes your freshman year, don’t schedule any more than 15 hours per semester.</p>
<p>And also, if you have AP’s regarding your major (bio, calc phys etc) I would highly consider not taking those credits if you don’t even have a five on them. Others (like history english whatever) that aren’t, take all that you can get.</p>
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<p>I disagree, with the exception possibly being Calculus. Take the credits you can, and get them behind you. Even if you are spotty on classes like AP Physics, it really won’t effect you that much. Calculus is really the only course that you need a solid foundation on.</p>
<p>A lot of advisors will highly disagree with you gstein; If you get a 3 on AP chem and you intended major is ChemE, it might be best to retake it 1. to learn the material better for a good foundation 2. to learn how to deal with a relatively familiar course while getting used to college 3. so you don’t have to jump in an upper-level course straight away and get dominated.</p>
<p>The advisors are trying to make students make conservative decisions when it comes to education. I for one listened to their advice, and it has been rewarding yet I now realize that it really wouldn’t have been that bad to skip some of these classes. For calculus, if you get a 5 go to calculus 2, otherwise take calculus 1. For Physics, I would actually agree with Gstein on this one. In all honesty, these physics courses are way to fast for anyone to really retain the material in its entirety. I get a feeling that future engineering classes will not require you to constantly pull out this information. Also, it is really not that hard to refamiliarize yourself with things if they do. For chemistry, take the credit even if you get a 4. It is another class where you might need to remember a few things, but it will be easy to pick back up in a hurry. Chemistry was the one science I took credit for since I got a 5 and I do not regret it one bit.</p>
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<p>Correct, they would disagree with me. Heck, I would have disagreed with me when I was a senior in H.S./freshman in college. But they are going by statistical averages, playing it safe, and yes to some point they may also recommend it because not taking AP credit helps the university financially.</p>
<p>Although I didn’t elaborate on my point, it is my opinion that many of these freshman/sophomore classes are best to complete and get behind you. Most of the knowledge you gain in these classes will either:</p>
<p>1.) Be mostly lost in the dozens of other classes you take
2.) Not be used much
3.) Be elaborated in much more detail and be explained better to you in a later class
4.) A combination of any of the above</p>
<p>Because of this tendency, as well as the overwhelming amount of credit hours and physical time commitment that your engineering degree plan calls for, get them done with in any manner you can (take that AP credit). I did so for AP Physics C Mechanics with only a 3 on the test, and I am currently quite proficient in mechanics. I recommend this action for any class except Calculus, which not understanding the material in will be detrimental to your other calculus classes (not including DiffEq or any type of advanced engineering math).</p>