How hard are these classes?

Engineering Materials
Structural Analysis
Geotechnical Engineering
Fluid Mechanics

I’m planning to take these four next semester was wondering how my overall semester would look like in terms of difficulty and time management.

Here’s some background information about me in case you need to it help you answer. I’m a sophomore taking Environmental Engineering, Dynamics, and Solids. I guess I’m doing alright in my classes. So far, I’ve gotten A’s and B’s in most of my engineering courses. I don’t work part time, but I am heavily involved in an engineering organization as an officer and I plan to run for next year.

Also, please rank these classes from least to most difficult. If you have any questions, let me know!

Thanks!

You should really check with other students at your school. The instructor can make a huge difference in course rigor.

Also, other than Fluid Mechanics and maybe Engineering Materials (which is likely a “Civil Engineering” version of the standard Materials class), the topics covered in each course could vary a lot between schools.

However, with all that said, it looks like a standard mix of classes. Nothing jumps out.

Good Luck!

8.4 units of hardness.

It probably also depends on your preferences / talents. More than 30 years later, I still remember using the class nickname “Fluid Traumatics”. Part of the dislike was a research-y prof that didn’t seem to like teaching. (Who knew we’d be disappointed when class was dismissed after only 20 minutes of lecture?) But I think there were other classmates that liked the subject.

Fluid mechanics is often considered difficult for several reasons (both from the student’s perspective and from the instructor’s).

First, it is a very math-heavy subject. It force students to revisit the entire calculus sequence, especially multivariable, as well as differential equations. Given how many people tend to just skate through math class to get it over with, they also tend to struggle when they are expected to know it again.

Second, it requires a lot of derivation up front before you can do anything useful with it. It doesn’t do much good to start talking about flow through a pipe by just throwing a bunch of equations like Bernoulli up on the board without going through the derivations first. Usually, the whole first quarter or even third of the class ends up being mostly derivations. This causes students to rapidly tune out. It’s a really difficult thing to overcome.