<p>I was just wondering how you guys are going to choose/have chosen your classes?</p>
<p>i've been accepted to the engineering school, and is planning on going into chemE. i have lots of required classes, that i will start taking soph year. i was looking at the liberal studies course list, and there are A LOT of options. how do you chose what classes you want to take? i would love to take as many as i want, but that still means narrowing my list down to around 6-8. </p>
<p>The Engineering school has lots of requirements. In fact, about 80% of your courses are to fulfill major or engineering school requirements. This means, on average, 4 out of 5 classes each semester are somewhat predetermined. For example, you’ll be taking a freshman writing seminar for two semesters. If you haven’t placed out of math classes, you’ll need to take calculus or differential equations. Physics, chemistry and computer science courses round out the engineering prerequisites. Have you placed out of most of these with AP tests?</p>
<p>no, i went straight from AB to Multivariable calc in high school, so i don’t have the AP score for the BC exam. however, i’ll be attending the 6-week pre-frosh program at cornell this summer. i think cornell is having me take 3 classes. if that’s the case i’l hoping to knock out chem 2090 and a math course, along with one semester of writing seminar. if not, two is still better than none.</p>
<p>i was looking at the graduation requirements, and it says that i need at least 6 liberal studies courses (chosen by myself). i would love to take more, but if 6 is the most i can fit, i’ll be happy enough. so i was wondering how to pick those 6 courses out of the hundreds available.</p>
<p>Makes perfect sense now. I would approach it from a practical view. Are you interested in any non-engineering subject, such as economics, history or psychology? The most useful sequence, I feel, is to take one “deep dive” into the liberal arts. This means taking an intro course first (likely to be an enormous class size at Cornell), and then follow-up courses in the same subject (class sizes will get smaller as you advance). I did this with both economics (4 courses) and history (3 courses). Now that I’ve had time to reflect on my experience, I think the most useful thing would have been for me to advance further into the economics course catalog, rather than try history as a second branch. That’s because I really did enjoy economics, and the class sizes were ideal as I moved up the ladder. Starting over with history meant going back to huge intro classes (as a prerequisite for many classes) and dealing with TAs (teaching assistants/grad students) and sections (you do know what these are, right?) once again. Good luck at Cornell!</p>
<p>yes that makes sense. so you took a topic that you were interested in, started with an intro course and went up the ladder. were you/are you also in an engineering major?</p>
<p>the thing is i want to try out so many things, and i thought that that was going to be possible. after looking at the engineering school’s graduation requirements, i realized that it’s not possible unless i add an extra year for undergrad. a few subjects i really want to try out is comparative gov., western history (past the civilizations, more like last 100 years), law classes (constitutional law/policy), if possible maybe an intro to a foreign language course. i’m also thinking of maybe minoring in Information Science, Systems, and Technology.</p>
<p>Yes, I was an engineering major. The main problem with engineering is that you really don’t have the opportunity to take many electives outside of the engineering school (and graduate in 4 years) unless you take classes during the summer or load up on classes (6 or more per semester). During my time there, I also wanted to take a foreign language, but that was impossible due to the time requirements (language lab, daily classes, etc.). You’re going to find your plate full if you try to do too much.</p>
<p>But it looks like your pre-Freshman program will give you some breathing room to explore academically early on. After your first year, it would make sense to zero in on a particular subject as your minor or even a double major.</p>
<p>i think it’s just part of my excitement of going to college. i’ll have to narrow down on my electives, especially if i want to pursue a minor. yes, foreign language does seem impossible to me too. i guess this is what the faculty adviser is for. i’ll meet with mine when i get assigned one to discuss about what courses i should take that would benefit me the most. i really appreciate your help, thanks a lot.</p>
<p>just curious, have you finished grad school already?</p>