<p>To summarize the core requirements: You have four classes that you’re required to take freshman year and one sophomore year (3 quarters of IHUM and 2 of PWR), but for all of those you have several choices of what to take. Then beyond that, you need five subject-area requirements, at least one of which (and possibly two or more) you’ll pick up with classes in your major. Then you have to take two more classes (the EC requirements), but those can often double up with subject-area requirements.</p>
<p>So that’s 11 classes in the worst-case scenario, and about 8 in the best case.</p>
<p>Compare this to the average load of 3 or 4 serious classes per quarter (and the occaisional 5-class quarter if you’re masochistic), for a total of 48 to 64 classes total. Honestly, it’ll probably be closer to 64. So that gives you between 12.5% and 20% of your classes are GER’s. It doesn’t feel like that much, though.</p>
<p>I can’t tell you anything about major requirements because it varies a lot between departments. Engineering areas are known for being demanding in terms of number of units/classes required, for example. There’s also a fair bit of difference in how those requirements are distributed. To illustrate that, in physics, the requirement is a list of courses that you must take with one or maybe two electives. By contrast, in math, they really don’t care too much what you take as long as your advisor is satisfied that you’re covering all the different areas of math.</p>