<p>I know people have asked this before, but I wanted advice on a possible schedule for next year (freshman).</p>
<p>Letters & Science R44: Western Civilization (Long) (5 units)
Astronomy C10: Intro to General Astronomy (Filippenko) (4 units)
Mathematics 1A: Calculus (Borcherds) (4 units)
Philosophy 12A: Intro to Logic (Fitelson) (4 units)</p>
<p>I originally wanted to do the first three classes and a seminar, but I couldn't attend CalSo and all the seminars I'm interested in are pretty much full. Any advice is appreciated, thanks.</p>
<p>thats 17 units. i would suggest taking 3 classes out of those 4, because none of those classes are really "easy" (are any classes at berkeley really "easy"?). But if you feel your up to long nights of studying/papers and/or your incredibly bright and talented in philosophy, writing, or mathematics, heck go for it. I'm not going to discourage you, just let you know that most people who reply to this are gonna say 17 units are too much for a freshman.</p>
<p>I agree with above, most students go easy freshman year/first semester, and then proceed to load up from there (going from 14/15/16 units up to 17/18/19).</p>
<p>First-semester freshman should always take a lighter course load, no doubt. The explanations have all been said: new academic environment, meeting new people, college experience, acquainted with school, different grading systems, etc. But you simply don't want one stroke of courage determine the fate of your academic career; choosing an ambitious courseload, even if it's only 17 units, is admirable but not advisable. In my case, I had 4, 4 & 5 unit courses (13)- this is the minimum course load for L&S. On top of that, I took the 5 unit course pass/no pass. Thus, I only had 8 gradable units for the semester, so if anything strange happens (it's college, remember), whatever mistakes I make during first semester will only minimally affect my overall GPA come graduation time. It's always difficult to gauge where one stands at Berkeley. There are so many intelligent, talented, and lucky (there's always room for lucky people, too =T) students that it makes high school honors classes seem like a joke. As an incoming student, one has probably never been immersed in such an atmosphere and things might seem to come at you like bricks. Wait one semester, see how things flow, and proceed from there- with your GPA intact.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice...I thought 17 units would be too much. I'm just going to eliminate Astro C10, then add a 1 unit seminar. I'd like to take Astro C10 eventually, I hear Filippenko's a great teacher (and it fufills my physical science requirement).</p>
<p>You will be working fairly hard in some of these classes. You will have plenty of problem sets and much reading. You might just be fine with this schedule, it's possible that you will find it overwhelming. If you feel overwhelmed after a week or up to five weeks in, drop one of the four unit classes, or maybe take physics for future presidents (3 units and similar to astro 10) instead of astro 10. Perhaps keep a class or two other than these in your vision so that you might take it if it feels easier or you enjoy it more than one of these. You'll see how it is and then decide from there. </p>
<p>BlueElmo, yes.</p>
<p>I'll probably be in logic and western civ with you.</p>
<p>BlueElmo, that's a good point raised. In a semester, there are 16 weeks and you can drop a course by the fifth week. However, one must consider what that entails. Dropping courses have been mentioned on these boards in the same breath as shopping around for courses and over-enrolling; the latter two are good policies to follow, but the former should only be used as a last resort. Shopping around means going around to different courses during the first week to see which courses you might potentially like, while over-enrolling means enrolling in additional classes with the intent on dropping one. One should not set their schedule with an openness to the possibility of dropping a course; proper planning is intended to prevent one from such a scenario (having to drop a course). Keep in mind that if you take, say, four courses for the first few weeks of school, you'd have to do homework for each class, not knowing which one to drop. Also, the first weeks of class are not good indicators for success in a given course. Your grade will be largely determined by what you accomplish in weeks 6-16, not weeks 1-5. Courses tend to start off easy, then progressively become more difficult as the material is no longer introductory, basic concepts. What exacerbates this situation is exactly how BlueElmo writes "find it becomes too much for you," because if you've reached this point, it's already too late. You don't want to have suffered grade-wise until you make a decision as to how many units you'll eventually take for the remainder of a semester: that's letting your schedule control you, as opposed to it being the other way around.</p>
<p>What's the deadline for changing a course from letter-graded to pass/not pass? I think it's about a week after the deadline to change from pass/not pass to letter grade, which is about a week or two after the add/drop deadline, right?</p>
<p>If you want to change from pass/no pass to letter grade, it's the fifth week of school as well. If you want to change from a letter grade to pass/no pass, it's the tenth week of school (so you have five additional weeks after the drop class deadline). Of course, all of this does not apply to the College of Chemistry or the College of Engineering (which have their own set of registration deadlines) and certain courses regardless of college are designated as EDD, or with an Early Drop Deadline.</p>
<p>If you want to drop out of these courses, you have to do so by the end of the second week of instruction. I don't believe they have different grade changing policies, though; I haven't heard of that.</p>
<p>Western civ has a lot of reading. That's supposed to be its primary difficulty. A decent amount of papers, lots to remember, and tons of reading. Logic is logic. Some people are just bad at logic for whatever reason. Few people really find out till they take a logic class. I havne't heard of anyone who started off poorly, tried extremeley hard, and produced poor results. Most people are fair at logic, and some are simply great at it. Anyone will have to work at it, and every couple weeks there are usually hours long practice sets, but it depends on how the prof sets it up. The prof is supposed to be pretty good this coming semester, and the profs (2) of western civ good but to some people boring.</p>
<p>Heh...astro10...take it with a grain of salt. I feel bad about saying anything negative about the course b/c EVERYONE raves about it. Filippenko is indeed a great guy and energetic lecturer, but just keep in mind, if you're really a science-oriented person, you're just not and Astro10 isn't going to be a cakewalk by any means. And while I do acknowledge the fact that he's a good lecturer, I also have to admit that I fell asleep in lecture quite often and I regret not taking Physics for Presidents instead.</p>