<p>Why is 12+ credits considered full time in college? And what exactly do a credit mean? How many hours of studying and homework are you suppose to do for each class a week?</p>
<p>However many are necessary for you to complete the requisite tasks and make good grades. This should increase some from the time you spent studying in high school.</p>
<p>One credit hour equals approximately one hour of class a week.</p>
<p>For instance, BU is on a four credit system, which usually means that you have three hours of lecture a week plus an hour of discussion. Most students take four classes here (16 credits), though I think a lot of schools on a three-credit system take five classes (15 credits). </p>
<p>As to how much time you should spend on homework and studying...I don't know. Depends where you go and what you do.</p>
<p>I don't get how 17 credits or hours is considered full time. A full time job is at least 40 hours. And couldn't you take All 17 hours of classes in One Day and still be considered Full Time?</p>
<p>12 hours of class a week doesn't take into account studying and writing papers. Add about another 25-30 hours for that. There's your 40 right there.</p>
<p>Full time student doesn't necessarily imply the same time commitment as holding a full time job. marct's point about all of the time you spend fulfilling out of class requirements is well taken, too. It's possible to schedule all your classes in one day, but I really wouldn't recommend it...it might be nice to have a four day weekend, but you might not like it so much when you have three midterms in one day because all of your classes meet on the same schedule.</p>
<p>So you would need to dedicate 25-30 hours of studying a week or 5-6 hours of studying a day? Thats alot of studying. Do everybody study 6 hours outside of class each day?</p>
<p>I think 6 hours is excessive. However, it depends on the school. I know students at schools like UChicago and MIT that study 6-7 hours a day. I also know students at state schools like Michigan State that study 1-2 hours. Mostly, it just depends on what you are comfortable with and what makes you successful. Studying 6 hours a day may help one student, but another might only need 2 hours, and do just as well.</p>
<p>Its just personal preferences probably. What exactly do studying consist of? Do you do lots of 'homework' like in high school or do you just read the textbook? Do professors give out homework and check it everyday?</p>
<p>No this is college. Professors don't check up on you to make sure you're doing your homework. They really don't give a ****. It's up to you to do it, and to budget your time accordingly. The homework in college is generally reading, and writing papers. You don't have busy work. Just use some common sense when thinking of these questions.</p>
<p>Actually, a lot of my Spanish professors make a regular habit of collecting and sometimes grading homework. I've never taken a math course (thank God for AP Stat) but I imagine some math professors/TAs might collect problem sets, etc. Both my Spanish lit and Russian lit professors this semester gave regular reading quizzes for grades as well.</p>
<p>Some professors also have really stringent attendance policies. Usually this only applies to smaller classes, but I did have an anth professor this past semester who actually passed around a sign in sheet to the 100 person lecture class every day and went back and graded people down who weren't showing up.</p>
<p>In high school, a HUGE part of your grade was homework and attendance. Do the professors collect writing papers and grade them or is the grade 100% based on exams?</p>
<p>In my experience, in most classes, attendance and daily homework combine to represent 10-20% of your final grade (some teachers emphasize participation grades as well), though I did have an Acting teacher who took 1 point off your final average for each time you were tardy and 2 points for each class you missed (you better believe I set two or three different alarms for that in the morning, because that class was all the way across campus!!). Each exam or major paper is usually worth 20-30%.</p>
<p>So exams are worth 80-90% of final grade and homework/attendance are worth 10%? That would make little room for error on exams. Wouldn't failing one exam drop your grade by a Whole Letter ?</p>
<p>Yeah, one really bad test performance or poorly written paper can majorly affect your grade. There are some courses where the balance is different, but what it all boils down to is that there is little room for error when it comes to major assignments in most college courses. One bad midterm won't cause you to fail but it could easily be the difference between an A or a B, a B or a C, etc.</p>
<p>At my CC, the only class that I have spent anywhere near the 'recommended amount of time' studying was chemistry this summer. But one must consider that taking a 6 week dose of a 15 week course can be rough.</p>
<p>I'll be taking 6 classes next semester, but three of them primarily require writing skills and history, which are the skills I am the most efficient at.</p>
<p>It depends what type of class it is, too. Literature and writing classes often have no tests, but have papers instead. A math course is often going to be only tests (although some professors will have quizzes and/or grade homework). In classes that had both papers and tests, each paper was usually worth about 10% of the final grade, attendence/participation would be worth a small percentage (never worth more than one paper), and tests would make up the remaining percentage. And yeah, messing up one test can really mess up a final grade.</p>
<p>And the rule of thumb for studying (for me at least) is for every credit hour you take, expect to spend about two hours a week studying.</p>
<p>it totally depends. one hour of full concentration study is worth more than 8 hours of study where your not really focused.</p>
<p>I've always been fed the bs about studying 3 hours a week per credit hour. I suppose its balances out over a period of time as classes go through peaks and lulls in work capacity.</p>
<p>Is it best to study in between classes or at home? Say you have 4 hours between some classes, would most college students spent those 4 hours studying in the library? Where do most students study?</p>