<p>Hi so I'll be a freshman this fall and would like to know if such a workload is doable / a good idea: </p>
<p>CS 61A,70
EE 42,43
Math 53,54</p>
<p>I'll be wanting to obtain a GPA of 3.5+ for the semester. Yup so open to encouragements/discouragements/general comments :D Thanks all!</p>
<p>That’s a hard schedule. I don’t know your ability / work ethic, however, but for the average CS student just take CS61A Math 53 and then either 2 breadth/R&C courses or 1 more technical + 1 breadth/R&C for your first semester</p>
<p>take CS70 your second semester. you can take ee42/43 any time</p>
<p>You must really like math, since you have three math courses (CS 70 is like a math course). 
If you really really like math, note that Math H54 is available (honors version of Math 54).</p>
<p>Most students average four courses per semester, although courses with labs (in addition to lecture/discussion), lots of computer programming, or large term projects (which can include humanities and social studies courses) can be more work than math courses. Good students can probably handle up to six non-lab/programming/project courses per semester, and top students possibly even more.</p>
<p>However, your schedule looks like the equivalent of seven courses’ worth of work, counting CS 61A as two because of the programming.</p>
<p>Note that Math 53 and EE 43 are not actually required for the CS major. For the CS major, CS 61A is the most critical one in terms of starting off the prerequisites.</p>
<p>Have alternate courses (e.g. breadth requirement courses) in mind in case the ones you want are full when you register.</p>
<p>Like I tell everyone, take the minimum units your first semester if you can. 13 units. I remember a ton of people telling me the same before my freshman year and I am SO glad I didn’t take more than that.</p>
<p>Haha yes I enjoy doing math, however insane that may sound. I intend to double major in CS and applied math so if I take CS 70, Math 53 and 54 I could declare a major in applied math by the end of fall and be able to start taking upper division courses come spring. Because I took A Level Mathematics which involved a good deal of differential equations, probability and vectors and I also did a year long research project on cryptography in which I had to write a program for the RSA algorithm, taking these 3 courses together probably won’t be as daunting for me since I have some of the bases covered.</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus I am under the impression that the Honors version is a lot more work and is catered more for the mathematics olympiad students. I’m definitely not in that league of math geniuses and since I’m looking at a heavy workload already I don’t think I shall dig my grave any deeper :P</p>
<p>I am debating whether to take EE42/43 in fall or spring. After reading the course description, 61A does have a tonne of programming projects x-x. How does the workload of EE42 compare? I actually took a semester-long university module on semiconductors in my last year of hs (A Level H3 subject) so I want to get EE42 over asap while I can still rely a bit on what I still remember from that module. Regarding EE43, there has to be a reason why the department highly recommends taking the two concurrently right? At least to me, highly recommend = just do it.</p>
<p>@bbb360 Overloading in the first semester is definitely a legitimate concern. The main purpose of me attending Freshman Edge is to get used to the college environment in preparation for a hectic fall. Because of financial issues, I only have 3 years to graduate so unfortunately I don’t have the luxury of taking it slow and steady 
One of my FE courses is philos 12a intro to logic so that will also help me with cs 70 (I think)</p>
<p>And I cannot thank you guys enough for your quick replies! Some of you are the ones who are always helping me out in all my question threads and I appreciate it very much ^^</p>
<p>@Lucidwolfe: There are plenty of people who overload their first semester and pull it off successfully, but even so, six courses (and six technicals at that) is pretty intense. Do you place out of R&C? If not, I’d recommend four technicals + R&C to a max of 20 units. If you do, I’d still recommend four technicals + a breadth course (one of L&S’s annoying 7-course breadth). Drop the technicals that you don’t absolutely need this semester to declare. Once you’ve adjusted to college life, you can start going over 20 units the next few semesters :)</p>
<p>Here is the Math department’s description of its [honors</a> courses](<a href=“http://math.berkeley.edu/courses_honors.html]honors”>http://math.berkeley.edu/courses_honors.html).</p>
<p>For CS 61A, have you looked at the [course</a> home page](<a href=“http://inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61a/sp11/]course”>CS 61A Home Page), which has webcast lectures and textbooks to look at? You can install MIT Scheme on your computer to do the exercises. It will likely be significantly more time consuming than the math courses.</p>
<p>Regarding workload of EE 42/43 – if EE 43 requires lab homework (writing up lab reports), it could be significantly more work than its 1 unit implies. Find out if this is the case. EE 42 should be like any other lecture / discussion course (i.e. like a math course) in terms of work.</p>
<p>Are you sure you want Philosophy 12A in Freshman Edge? While it may fulfill the [Philosophy</a> and Values](<a href=“http://ls-advise.berkeley.edu/requirement/breadth7/pv.html]Philosophy”>http://ls-advise.berkeley.edu/requirement/breadth7/pv.html) requirement, note that there are Math courses (in logic) that also fulfill it, so you may want to choose a course that fulfills some other [breadth</a> requirement](<a href=“http://ls-advise.berkeley.edu/requirement/7breadth.html]breadth”>http://ls-advise.berkeley.edu/requirement/7breadth.html) that neither Math nor Computer Science could fulfill, since you are trying to complete your double major in three years and probably do not have a lot of free space in your schedule. Here is the [Philosophy</a> 12A course home page](<a href=“Paolo Mancosu - Phil 12A”>Paolo Mancosu - Phil 12A).</p>
<p>I researched a little on EE43 and it seems not many people actually take it. Maybe I’ll skip it as well since its content doesn’t seem that relevant to me. After some consideration, I suppose this workload would be more suitable:</p>
<p>CS 61A,70
Math 53,54
1 breadth course</p>
<p>Has anyone tried taking Japanese 188 for the arts & literature breadth? I think I’m gonna stick with philos 12a for Freshman Edge since it’ll be a hassle to change course and those math logic courses seem to be gpa killers. None of the other FE courses interest me much, being in session D restricts my choices.</p>
<p>I definitely don’t recommend doing Math 53+54+55/CS70 all at the same time. While you may enjoy doing math, being forced to do it constantly does get annoying at times. 53, 54, 55/70, and 61A is pretty intensive by itself and I know several people with similar schedules who started out their school year with a bad GPA.</p>
<p>And while you may or may not succeed in that schedule, why risk it? Don’t you have some GEs to take care of? Why not just mix a few in with your technical courses? It seems odd to have extremely hard schedules one semester and then extremely easy schedules (full of GEs) another.</p>
<p>Back in high school my issue was of an entirely opposite nature, I couldn’t get enough of Mathematics. My core subjects then were physics, chemistry, math and economics and I’ve always found math hw to be the easiest and quickest completed out of the 4. I thought that having the majority of my courses being math-based would actually help me since I’ll be in the “math mode” line of thinking almost all the time. From my experience, taking lessons from a breadth of different subjects throughout the week is actually distractive as I need to shift gears constantly.</p>
<p>But yes, there is a delicate balance between workload and GPA involved and I am leaning towards the latter. One thing I’ll do is start reading up on the CS61A course page and watch some of its lectures in the summer. If I find the content manageable I’ll go ahead with my plan, otherwise I’ll gladly do some rescheduling. </p>
<p>A question about telebears here, assuming that I’m going ahead with taking CS61A,70,Math53,54, which are the courses that fill up the fastest? (ie. those that I need to phase I)</p>
<p>Math 53 + Math 54 + CS 70 + CS 61A + breadth is probably about six course equivalents worth of work (counting CS 61A as two because of programming – but note that if your breadth has a lab or big term project, that may count as two as well, which would make it about seven course equivalents worth of work). Since math is your favorite subject, you probably should not worry about taking mostly math courses (some people who really like math find humanities and social studies courses more difficult – the opposite of most people).</p>
<p>While a good student can handle that workload or more, doing so in your first semester may be more risky because (a) you may not know how heavy a workload in university courses you can really handle, and (b) you will be adjusting to a new environment.</p>
<p>What you may want to do is sign up for your proposed courses and attend them for the first week. If the workload appears to be too heavy, drop one (probably the breadth or CS 70, since they would not be as immediately critical as prerequisites like CS 61A).</p>
<p>Be prepared with alternate course lists (probably EE 42 and other breadth courses) if you find that some of the courses you want are full when you register. You can look at [Home</a> Page - Online Schedule Of Classes](<a href=“http://schedule.berkeley.edu%5DHome”>http://schedule.berkeley.edu) for the current semester to see how full each course is now.</p>
<p>Lol, definitely going to sign up for an easy breadth to preserve my sanity. Your idea of trying the course load out for a while before deciding is great! I’ll be sure to take that into account 
According to the spring schedule, all 4 of the courses still have some open seats, though I’m not sure if fall will be the same. I am signing up for the CalSO dates 1st-2nd July just for the priority in phase I telebears so hopefully it’ll be worth the $295.</p>
<p>The earliest CalSO is highly highly recommended because of the position it puts you in versus other incoming freshmen. You still have all those current students who will have had their phase I slot already, including non-freshmen who take these courses for breadth, electives and other reasons, so they are not empty even at the first CalSO date, but with telebears you should register the instant your slot opens, which is CalSO for the incoming students.</p>
<p>Approaching your registration / CalSO day, watch the fall semester at [Home</a> Page - Online Schedule Of Classes](<a href=“http://schedule.berkeley.edu%5DHome”>http://schedule.berkeley.edu) . If any of your desired courses are full or close to full, look for other courses with space that you can register for.</p>
<p>In addition to other breadth courses (including reading and composition if needed) and EE 42, consider also treating CS 70 and Math 55 as interchangeable if both the CS and Math departments let you take either as a double major (i.e. if one is full, try registering for the other).</p>
<p>Note that CS 61C will fulfill Physical Science breadth, and optional Math major courses can fulfill Historical Studies (160), Philosophy and Values (125A, 135), and Social and Behavioral Sciences (C103), although no more than two breadths can be in any department. If you are taking Philosophy 12A in the summer, you won’t need another Philosophy and Values course.</p>
<p>But also make sure that you have or will fulfill [American</a> History and Institutions](<a href=“http://registrar.berkeley.edu/?PageID=ahi.html]American”>http://registrar.berkeley.edu/?PageID=ahi.html) and [url=<a href=“http://americancultures.berkeley.edu/]American”>http://americancultures.berkeley.edu/]American</a> Cultures<a href=“the%20courses%20used%20for%20these%20can%20also%20fulfill%20the%20L&S%207%20course%20breadth”>/url</a>.</p>
<p>@rider730 Yup that is the ideal but seeing that I live in Singapore, have not received my I-20 for visa application yet and whose Freshman Edge program starts on July 5th, I think CalSO in early July is my best option :)</p>
<p>by the way, as an international student, you don’t have to fulfill American History & Institutions. You do have to fulfill American Cultures though.</p>
<p>Bad idea if you’re aiming for a 3.5+. Make that a 2.5+, and then you’ll be talking.</p>
<p>The people with 3.5+ tend to have both average to lighter-than-average workloads and good work ethic. Otherwise, the resulting lack of sleep, conflicting deadlines, etc. means that you’ll have trouble keeping up or your health will get the best of you.</p>
<p>If I were you, I’d take: MATH53, EE40, CS61A, and a humanities.</p>
<p>I found out about the irrelevance of AH&I requirement to internationals too late… I’ve already signed up for the US history SAT test this June, but I guess it doesn’t hurt to cram the SAT prep book for history since I have nothing much to do right now x)</p>
<p>You can take another SAT in its place, although SATs in general aren’t very useful here.</p>
<p>Yep, there is no need for any other SAT subject since I have already satisfied the QR requirement with SAT I math. I do curse myself for missing this year’s deadline to take AP Eng. Lit. though, but I suppose taking the German R&C will be cool as well.</p>