https://www.econ.berkeley.edu/undergrad/prospective/transfer-students says that prospective economics majors must take a statistics course with a calculus prerequisite, such as:
STAT 20 or 21: general introduction; 21 has more emphasis on business applications
STAT C8 and 88 (in the same semester for transfer students): emphasis on data science
STAT 131A: emphasis on applications to life science
STAT 134 or 140: probability course for statistics majors; also recommended for those who want to do PhD study in economics as suggested in https://www.econ.berkeley.edu/undergrad/current/preparing-for-grad-school ; 140 has more emphasis on data science and has C8 as a prerequisite
IND ENG 172: probability and risk analysis for engineering; prerequisite “solid knowledge of calculus, including multiple variable integration … programming experience in Matlab or Python”
http://guide.berkeley.edu/courses/stat/ has course descriptions for STAT courses.
If you are concerned about meeting the GPA minimum, see http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/university-california-berkeley/2071932-grade-distributions-in-prerequisite-courses-for-gpa-based-goals.html (reply #2 particularly) for grade distribution information on the various courses, though mathematical strength of students in each course may vary.
recommended math course semester 1?
Intended CS student L&S
AP Calc AB score of 5 (in 11th grade)
Don’t have standardized test scores for IB Math HL test and AP Calc BC test yet.
@ucbalumnus in your opinion is it better to repeat Calc classes even if I qualify for AP credits (5 BC)( took AP stats in senior year because MVC was not offered at my school) before taking MATH 53 & 54? I am in EECS and feel that it may be worth spending extra time repeating these classes at college level than depending on what was covered in a public high school where the focus was on preparing us for the AP exams.
No, unless you try the old Math 1A and 1B final exams and are lost on them (but read the math department’s note about self-studying the Math 1B introductory differential equations material if it was not included in your calculus courses). Why waste time and tuition retaking courses that you already know, when you could use the schedule space for additional electives now or later?
Note that UCB EECS required Math 53 but not 54. Some of the content of Math 54 is now in EE 16A and 16B, so the former Math 54 requirement has been replaced by a technical elective: https://eecs.berkeley.edu/resources/undergrads/eecs/degree-reqs/other-reqs .
@ucbalumnus Thank you! it makes sense.
How Important is in depth knowledge of UNIX or Linux for a freshman? will it be a disadvantage not know it?
Probably of minor help in your first CS course, but not critical.
@ucbalumnus I know this is not the freshman math question, but it is related. So now my son is working through both 11th grade and 12th grade courses, and this puts him on track to get the HS diploma. Meanwhile, I went though his existing credits from HS, from Community College, and from the local University. He seems to have 41 credits from his AP courses, separate credits for MATH 1A, 1B, already recognized equivalency (with prof.'s signature) for MATH 53 and MATH 54, recognized (but no form signed yet) equivalency for STAT 134, we are working on equivalency of one of his courses to IEOR’s INGENG 160, and this leaves two more upper division math content courses that do not have equivalency at Berkeley. He also has, from his CC, a credit that Berkeley, per their website, recognize as one half of their Reading and Composition requirement. We went through all requirements, and it seems that all of them (University requirements, Campus requirements, College requirements, Major course requirements, and nit and Residence requirements) can be satisfied with 15 more courses. Doable in two years. My questions to you, since you know Berkeley so well, are these:
- Do you think Berkeley will go along and let him graduate (the boy needs to get to Ph.D. program and finally start doing research he loves instead of satisfying one more “history-language” requirement), or they will try to coerce him into taking more courses in the status of Bachelor?
- For him to graduate in two years, he has to take specific courses now, starting with MATH 55 and MATH 110 (you yourself, said so before, and Undergraduate Adviser in Math department said the same). But these courses are getting filled quickly, and he, still officially freshman, cannot register till July 18… How does this work? I think he might be not the only one who needs advanced courses in his first semester. How do these kids, who need these courses, get to theses courses, if all places are taken? yes, I know about wait lists… But. I suspect he has a “block” in the “system” because he is listed as a freshman. The “System” will not allow him to even attempt to register for MATH 55 or MATH 110. The credits from APs did not get through yet. Heck, the last set of AP scores will be available on July 9th! We did sent his transcripts from CC and the local University. But how should we know when all these things are “in the system”? It is logical to assume that he can get credits for his MATH 53 and 54 “into the system” when both transcripts AND the forms signed by professors regarding the equivalency are “in the system”. How do we make sure all this happens quickly, so that he can try to register for MATH 55 and MATH 110 or 110H?
- The “System” promised to give him (and every other incoming freshman) an “adviser” on May 30th. He still doesn’t have one. Who should he talk to?
I appreciate your help, as always…
- As long as he meets the degree requirements (120 units, specific course requirements), he can graduate. However, it may not necessarily be advantageous to graduate in four semesters if he could use the additional semesters to take additional electives (e.g. advanced math and courses in related subjects) and do more research as an undergraduate. Also, math PhD programs typically want their students to have a reading knowledge of French, German, and/or Russian, so if his high school foreign language is not one of these, he may want to take some courses in one or more of those. For the history breadth requirement, there is a history of math course (Math 160) that he may be interested in. Note: for the 120 units, remember that duplicate courses are only counted once. For example, credit is not given for both AP calculus BC and college courses equivalent to Math 1A and 1B.
2 and 3. Other posters should be more familiar with recent scheduling procedures. https://registrar.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/pdf/UCB_StudentEnrollmentCalendar_2018-19_V5.pdf does say that continuing students do phase 1 enrollment from 4/16 to 6/15, while new undergraduates do phase 1 enrollment starting 7/16. It looks like Math 55, 110, and H110 have seats reserved for those with enrollment permission; you may want to ask the math department how one gets enrollment permission.
@ucbalumnus Thank you!
1a. Sure, he can take extra course. But we are going to be paying $30,000 for each semester he is an undergrad… And I am 55, and every thousand of those $30k per semester has to be borrowed.
1b. He already took many additional courses, he is so tired of not doing actual research… He can take extra courses when he is in PhD. program, and do research… No?
1c. We speak Russian at home. I bet you he knows Russian better than many who took courses. He has a working knowledge of the language. Also, one of the Math camps he was in during one of the summers (two years ago, I think), he spend in Germany, in the camp where Math was taught in Russian(!!!). (This off-thing happened because Russian emigrants math professors living in Germany collected Russian-speaking kids of Russian immigrants form all over). His language in HS was Latin. He won USA-wide competitions two years in a row. And he jumped from Latin 2 to Latin 4, skipping 3. (I know, not much math is written in Latin…)
1d. Yes, I know about the double counting of the units. I counted his MATH 1a and 2b only once, in the credits for the major, but not in the credits from AP tests (he took 13 different AP tests). Yes, we looked at MATH 160, he is considering it for the breadth requirement for History. Also, there is MATH C103 ‘Introduction to Mathematical Economics’ - to satisfy “Social and Behavioral Sciences” and either MATH 125A ‘Mathematical Logic’ or MATH 135 ‘Introduction to the Theory of Sets’ to satisfy “Philosophy and Values”.
Thank you for #2 and #3!
1b. He can do research as an undergraduate as well. Note that PhD program admissions these days look for that.
1d. Note that the L&S 7 course breadth does not allow more than two of the courses to be from the same department. So at most two of MATH 160, C103, and 125A or 135 can be used for the L&S 7 course breadth. See https://ls.berkeley.edu/seven-course-breadth-requirement .
@ucbalumnus Thank you!
1a. Yes, he will do research as undergrad. He already has a paper, needs to submit it though. He did research from age 14, presented it at MAA conference in November, 2017, now struggling trying to catch his local University Adviser to finish it up and submit for publication.
1b. This is a great catch! thank you! I had this bug in my algorithm… 
We will keep it in mind when making the schedule.
Now - off to figuring out what to do with the registration restrictions… Thanks again! let me repeat. I am so glad that you are there, giving advice. Your points happened to be right on the spot, time and again! The people at the advising place for the L&S College, and some other people do not have it straight sometimes. You - do.
@ucbalumnus
Oh, Boy, isn’t it fun to watch how classes fill up as the time goes by, during the sign up period! Specifically I am looking at MATH 185.
http://classes.berkeley.edu/search/class/185?f%5B0%5D=im_field_term_name%3A789&f%5B1%5D=im_field_subject_area%3A6&retain-filters=1
The picture is intriguing. All sessions are full except for plenty of seats in the session led by a Russian visiting Professor. And it is not like this session opened up late! It was available from the start, I remember seeing this filling-up months ago (or so it seems). Do kids have a problem with Russian vising professors? Accent? Manner of teaching? Toughness? I do not believe that the skew in statistics of open seats for different sessions can be explained by random occurrence.
I am specifically interested in MATH 185 because my son almost got it counted by Prof. Vera Serganova, from his previously taken University courses. She said “I think most of our 185 (complex analysis class) is covered in the course of xxx, but some topics are not.” So I am trying to figure out whether to recommend my son to take this course as the fifth course in his Fall 2018 schedule, since he probably will have a relatively easy time with it. (And the accent is not a problem, since he speaks fluent Russian and recognizes funny English constructs that Russian native speakers create when speaking English. He is being raised in a Russian speaking household with parents-scientists, who speak funny accented English). If he goes for this course (MATH 185) however, his load will be 21 units, and he has to go fish for permission, since the limit of 20.5 will be exceeded. Is it worth it? Will they give it to him? He is still listed as a freshman because his incoming college and AP units are slow to be processed by the System. His other courses are MATH 55, MATH H110, LATIN 101 and CLASSIC R44. (He knows absolute majority of material in 55, and probably almost half in 110, he has national gold medal in Latin, and aced Latin Virgil as AP test, so he is not expecting trouble from the first three courses, but you never know!)
He can certainly try to add it, and be prepared to drop it (or something else) before the drop deadline if the total workload is too high.