Official Schedule Help

<p>Zjodak: isn’t E7 generally a harder class than E10?</p>

<p>@soepic
I don’t know why you would take Chem 4A, but if you want a challenge or really enjoy quantum chemistry, thermodynamics and labs then its fine. It doesn’t really help with BioE though (otherwise it’d be in the curriculum). Similarly, why not BioE 10? E10 is essentially an overview of the engineering types (civil, industrial, mechanical…, not bio or EECS) split into modules. Otherwise your schedule looks ok, but not easy. Don’t underestimate Math 1B. History R1B should be fine but check ratemyprofessor.com and look up the professor.</p>

<p>@anyway
Are you premed? If you are then you should be retaking Math 16A and R1A. Otherwise, just skip the math courses altogether and R/C depending what you get on AP Lang. You can’t pass out of R1B with AP Lang (you can with AP Lit). PH 14 is easy as is Soc 3AC in most cases, but look up the professor (see above). Anyway, your schedule is manageable for your first semester. The average courseload is actually 16 and the minimum is 13. The reason you would take 13 is if you need time to get used to your surroundings.</p>

<p>@skze
You don’t need Chem 1A to take Physics 7A. If you get a 5 on the AP test, you should skip the class since you don’t really need it for EECS anyway. But I’m not EECS so you might want to get a 2nd opinion. R1A isn’t generally considered an easy course. Taking a humanities might be better if that is your goal. However, philosophy classes tend to be difficult because they require you to think differently. It’s just one of the harder humanities. If you’re interested in it, then by all means take it, but otherwise taking a history or sociology course might be easier.</p>

<p>@eyeheartphysics
Yes, because E7 requires programming.</p>

<p>THanks for the info!
I am not planning to do premed…
so are you suggesting that i just dont take any math classes at all??</p>

<p>Thanks for the help. This is what my schedule is looking like right now based off what some other things I’ve looked into.</p>

<p>Chem
CS 61A
Math 1B
Humanities- I am still very torn on whether I should take the class that seems to interest me or take the easy way out and boost my GPA for grad school. In addition, can you comment on the merit of seminars in my first semester? With the above schedule, would it be wise to replace a class, such as humanities, and replace it with a seminar? What are some good seminar classes I can take as an EECS major?</p>

<p>@anyway?
There is no reason for you to take any additional math classes. The stuff that you need to know you have already learned in Calc BC (differentiation and integration, mostly)</p>

<p>@skze
You have to take 2 lower division humanities and 2 upper division for engineering so maybe take an easy one this semester and wait till next semester to take Phil 25A. I don’t feel that seminars are worth the time that you put into them. Unless you are interested in the subject matter, I don’t recommend taking a seminar. But you may want to look at the seminars offered to see if any of them peak your interest.</p>

<p>what do u think are my chances of getting into german r5a if i am 5th on the waitlist?
i really want to take the class, hopefully the department might be accommodating and just let more people in.</p>

<p>zjodak- are you referring to political science 3? If so, it wouldn’t work for QR since I can only meet QR with a course within the department of mathematics, statistics, and computer science. If you know of an easier course within those three departments, let me know.</p>

<p>sushirave - German r5a is hugely popular due to its reputation as the easiest and highest grading RC class. Few who got into that are going to drop. The general rule that 10% of the class size drop isn’t applicable to the very hottest classes. If someone gets in, they stay in. Even if it followed the rule, roughly two openings would happen, not five. Since it is hugely popular, the department is always faced with the truth that more classes would allow more students. They don’t swell the class, especially since there are RC openings in other departments. They have a budget to handle such and such a percentage of the RC load for Cal and they do it, but they are not likely to take precious resources and apply more to RCs.</p>

<p>^^ I took NAS R1A, which may not be as popular, but was easy and not that many people dropped out of the class and their was quite a bit people on the waitlist. After 2 weeks the GSI asked how many people were on the waitlist and had been coming to class everyday. About 6 people rose their hands, she wrote down their names, and manually put them in the class.</p>

<p>When you go to Berkeley’s Online Schedule of Classes and you want to pick two for your fall semester. Say, Biology IA and Chinese for Native Speakers. How do you know if they don’t overlap? </p>

<p>I also noticed a waitlist and capacity. Will there be some sort of rush to get into popular classes? Sorry for the idiot questions.</p>

<p>nybeath: You check the times they are offered to see if they overlap or not. For Bio1A I’m seeing the only time offered is MWF 8-9AM. I couldn’t find a class titled Chinese for Native Speakers, but I found Elementary Chinese for Mandarin Speakers and Elementary Chinese for Speakers of Other Dialects that are offered at different times than Bio1A, so if those are your class picks then you should be good but keep the other classes you want to take in mind.</p>

<p>On your second question I would assume there would be a rush, but I’m going to be a freshman, so I haven’t dealt with it yet…</p>

<p>You seem to know what you’re doing, so 15 units wouldn’t be too bad. I think those who advocate 13 units do so because students need to adjust to being away from home and being in a new environment. However, I’m going to say that your schedule is a bit intense. English has a reputation of being difficult at Berkeley so try not to underestimate Eng 45B and C. For your AC, Ethnic Studies/Woman’s Studies should be fine but do you really need to take an Upper Div? Ditto for your history class. Plan out your schedule and see if what you need to take for the next two years and plan accordingly.</p>

<p>Okay, obviously my difficulty gauge is completely off. How many units do most people take their junior year, if they’re not transfers? What % is devoted to upper division courses? The problem is, before I got accepted, I thought that juniors and seniors ONLY took upper division classes, but obviously that’s not the case. For L&S I need to complete 36 upper division units, which would be more than half of the classes I have yet to take at Cal, which is why I aimed for 2 out of my 4 classes to be upper division this first semester. Bad idea? Will I be able to handle three, four upper division classes a semester much easier later on? </p>

<p>As for the American Cultures req, what did/will you all take to fulfill it? Any recommendations?</p>

<p>And thank you so much for the advice! I don’t know . . . I’m not very bright in any other subject, but English has never, ever caused any problems for me, and I’ve already read most of the books on the reading lists, but . . . yeah, that doesn’t mean I’m not very, very frightened of actually attending classes this fall.</p>

<p>Am planning to take 15 units first semester. Biochem major but want to keep options open for fields such as computer science and econ, as well as other sciences. Received 5’s on all AP sciences and both calcs, as well as taken a cc course in multivariable calc, and don’t know what math/sciences to take. Initial thoughts:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Chem 1A (dunno if I should take since I already have taken AP Chem, but heard that this class was a “weeder”)</p></li>
<li><p>Stats 020 (or should I take Math 1B, or should I take Math 53?)</p></li>
<li><p>Chinese 01AX (I only know how to speak but not write/read and am willing to learn more Chinese)</p></li>
<li><p>Some English class (I took the APEL exam last month so that should waive 1/2 of the English requirement but not the other half) - possibly the Rhetoric one</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Is this a good schedule? Difficulty? BTW, I also want to take a physics, Compsci 61A, Econ 001 and Pol Sci 002 later, and I know some of those are difficult - am I balancing/distributing my schedule/workload well? Any recs as for teachers for these classes?</p>

<p>because i am signed up for german r5a and am 5th on the waitlist, is it beneficial for me to still attend all the lectures and discussions and just hope that because of this, the gsi or professor will let me join after 2 weeks like what calbear2012 said?</p>

<p>yes, attend class if you are waitlisted.</p>

<p>Just some general questions:</p>

<p>-Can 1 class satisfy a prereq and a breadth? I know this isn’t allowed for Haas, but I was just wondering if this is allowed for other majors in L&S</p>

<p>-Can 1 class satisfy American Cultures requirement and a breadth?</p>

<p>-How many classes do people normally take during the summer? (I will probably have to take summer classes next summer to have all the prereqs for Haas and my backup majors done) Is 2 too much?</p>

<p>Catalysis,</p>

<p>1) yes
2) yes
3) usually 1-2</p>

<p>bump… can anybody answer my question? (Post 94) I am at calso right now and I am scheduling my classes tomorrow… =(</p>

<p>btw, someone recommended me today to do Chem 4A instead of Chem 1A… and since stats is full and I just realized that chem majors need to take beyond Math 1A/B… I might take Math 53 instead of stats. Is that an incredibly hard schedule? (Again, Post 94 for details)</p>

<p>Hey all, I wasn’t able to attend calso/don’t really understand the system. I understand some of the classes I want to take might be full, but don’t really know how to work with/around that. </p>

<p>So far I’m looking at:
Spanish 1 - 5 units
Intro to Stats - 4 units
General Psychology - 4 units
AC requirement course - 3 units.</p>

<p>Too much or too difficult? If it helps, I already took stats, just forgot it enough not to be comfortable taking the next level. What problems might I run into? Anyway I can improve it?</p>