<p>I attended orientation a month ago and registered for my classes with an academic advisor in the engineering department, and I thought everything went pretty smoothly, I signed up for all the classes the advisor told me to. Just now, I again browsed through the web registration and course catalogue, and noticed something: for Math 126, there was a note that said "Engineering majors should not register for sections XXXXX and YYYYY"...I am an electrical engineering major, and it just so happened I am registered for one of the sections listed. The web program did not allow me to reschedule into another Math 126, because it said I needed departamental authorization...</p>
<p>So my question is, is there any reason why engineering majors should not register for those certain sections? Is it anything I should be concerned about and get changed? I am pretty happy with my schedule at status quo, but I also don't want any conflicts.</p>
<p>Any help/advice would be appreciated, thanks.</p>
<p>I don't know what the "engineering majors should not register" thing means, because that's new for this semester. When I took the math classes, it was the exact opposite, where some math classes are marked "engineering majors only".</p>
<p>"departmental authorization" for all math classes that are required for engineering majors should come from the school of engineering student affairs office in RTH 110; I suppose the math department can grant them as well, but it's easier to ask engineering.</p>
<p>I would think it wouldn't hurt to ask, you can email one of the school of engineering advisors (you can find their emails at viterbi.usc.edu) or your department advisor (Jaime, I guess?) If your schedule allows, I would register for the engineering-allowed sections, but I don't think it's a big deal.</p>
<p>I noticed the same thing a few days ago! I was registered for an "engineers should not register" section of MATH 125. My advisor didn't say anything about this when I registered at orientation, so I was surprised to see this notation in the class catalog. I didn't want to show up the first day and have the professor tell the engineers they had to leave because they were in the wrong section.</p>
<p>In my situation, I decided I would rather be in the math section for the engineers, since I'm an engineer, right? So I went online and dropped my old math class. I tried to register for the engineering section, but it would not let me complete the process because I needed D (departmental) clearance.</p>
<p>I sent an e-mail to Julie Phaneuf (<a href="mailto:phaneuf@usc.edu">phaneuf@usc.edu</a>), and within a couple days she responded that D clearance was granted. So I went back to the online registration and this time the process worked and it let me finish and confirm the changes.</p>
<p>This does not answer your question about whether or not engineers can take those "do not register" sections, but I wanted to let you know how one person handled it.</p>
<p>Because of this, I needed to change my GE too, but not a big deal. I'd rather be in engineering math if that is where I'm supposed to be.</p>
<p>It is very cool how you can change this stuff online....</p>
<p>i'm signed up for one of those sections in math 126 as well. that was the only way my schedule would work, and my advisor said it didn't matter. i'm not sure why they're labeled like that...</p>
<p>On a related note, what calculator is recommended for freshman undeclared engineers? Right now, S has the simple TI graphing calculator he used in calculus & physics. Is that sufficient or will he need one with more capability? Recommendations would be helpful. He is thinking of leaving his younger sister his old calculator for HS & buying a new one in LA. Recommendations on calculator model would be appreciated.</p>
<p>I'd bet that a calculus class geared towards engineers would be more theory based while one that's not for engineers would be more problem solving. But, in the end, it won't make a difference because you get credit for it if you pass.</p>
<p>To answer the original question, according to my engineering advisor you can ignore the "not for engineers" description of the Math-126 sections. Those two sections are the exact same as every other Math-126 section, and plenty of engineers are in them. I ended up switching out of the "not for engineers" section due to a better schedule (no 8:00 classes!) with a different section, but it is perfectly alright if you stay.</p>
<p>I don't think there's any real content difference between engineering and non-engineering sections.</p>
<p>As for calculators, I think a TI graphing calculator would be sufficient. I have a TI-86 and it works fine for everything I've ever needed to do here.</p>