and how many credits would you recommend in the very first semester as a freshman?
It varies slightly by school and major. For a freshman non-STEM major I’d say 15-16 credits is good for the first semester (and of probably going to be the average load for the next 7 semesters). For a freshman STEM major I’d say 17-18 credits.
Somewhere in the 14-16 range is what most people recommend.
Academically my first semester I took 17.5 credits (STEM major) but one course was an audit so I only was graded on 14. It was a difficult course load, especially balancing it with my extracurriculars (additional 5.25 credits of music ensembles/lessons and 2 more ensembles not for credit). I wouldn’t recommend going above 17 unless you’re used to an extremely busy and intense schedule.
Usually your college will have a curriculum which will indicate how many you should take at that college for that major…but it is usually 15-16.
Typically, you will need 120-128 credits to graduate. This means that to graduate in 8 semesters, you need to average 15-16 credits per semester.
Courses with labs, art studio, music performance, or large term projects can be higher workloads than other courses of the same number of credits.
It varies. But it depends on your major, whether or not you plan to work or not while in school, etc.