<p>Hi,
I'm an incoming freshman majoring in undecided engineering.
I took IB HL Physics and IB HL Math in high school.
I think I did pretty well in these classes... got straight A's all two years
Perfect scores on physics IA's and decent scores on math IA's.
and got a 6 in Physics and a 5 in Math (I was expecting a 6 in math though...)
so I've gotten credits for the first year engineering physics and calculus classes.
My concern is that if I decide to skip fist year physics and calc classes, I would miss out on some stuff and not develop a firm math&physics foundation... </p>
<p>Would it be better to just take those classes instead of taking harder classes which I may not be ready for and risking my GPA??
Honestly, although my scores are telling me that I did fairly well on the subjects, I'm not feeling too confident about my mathematical/physics skills and knowledge...
Please help!!</p>
<p>You need to check the calculus syllabus for the classes you are skipping and compare them to the calculus you took. My daughter found that the calc 2 for science and engineering almost totally skipped series and instead did some multivariable calc instead.</p>
<p>The tricky part with physics is that ou get credit for calculus-based physics. I’m not sure what your HL physics class was like, but in mine calculus wasn’t a requirement, and it wasn’t really calculus-based. I have heard, though, that even in the calculus-based physics class at NU you don’t really use a lot of calc. Have you talked to an advisor
From my experience with calculus, I took SL calc but took the AP test, then took a Calculus an Analytic Geometry class at my local university my senio year. I took Calc 3 with no problems at NU.
I would talk to your advisor, and also see if they can put you in contact with someone who was in a similar situation before.
From my experience with IB, though, I came into college really well prepared and found my first year to be much easier than IB!</p>