<p>Hi, </p>
<p>I have heard from some people that Chicago does not allow students to take more than 4 classes per quarter. Is this true? Is there any way around it? It seems like this would be very restrictive for those, like me, who are planning multiple majors.</p>
<p>Remember, there are three quarters in a normal academic year, vs. two semesters elsewhere. Four courses per quarter is the equivalent of six courses per semester – and that’s a hell of a load. The 10-week schedule can be very intense, not so much at the beginning, but from week 4 on it sort of builds to a crescendo. I don’t think there are many students at Chicago who are desperate to take more than four courses in a quarter. (I think you can, but you have to pay extra.)</p>
<p>Multiple majors: Lots of people do it. Non-science majors seem to have 10-13 required courses in addition to the Core. That’s basically a year of work (spread over 3+). Science majors are more demanding, but have lots of overlap in their requirements. Many majors offer the option to write a senior thesis (“B.A.”) for honors, but few require one.</p>
<p>But: multiple majors is not necessarily a great thing. Students here on CC seem hung up on it for no really good reason. They seem to believe that having a double major makes one look more attractive to employers or graduate schools, but I don’t think there’s any evidence of that. If your main major does not have a lot of job-market appeal, by all means take enough courses in an area that leads to employment so that your resume/transcript can show the interest and skill, but there’s no need to complete a second major. Instead, you should go deeper into your first major – that’s what majors are for, making sure you have the experience of depth in a particular area – or take true electives and expand your mind.</p>
<p>I am by no means an expert on this, but here’s how I often look at it:
Your typical humanities course is three credits per hour, while your science and math can be 4 and even 5 credit hours. However, if you’re going to be taking a class, it will usually be at least a 3 credit hour class (at universities that run on the semester schedule).
So, to simplify things, let’s assume that you’re taking 4 classes at UChi that would be 3 credit hour classes (a bad assumption, but it won’t exaggerate the numbers at the end). At UChi, that would be 12 credit hours for three quarters, or 36 credit hours in the year. That would be the same as taking two semesters at 18 credit hours. Now, I know students that have taken more than 18 credit hours in one semester (I have taken 20 in one semester, myself), however, many institutions also make students pay extra for taking a larger amount of classes (the one that I’m thinking of now limits students at 17 credit hours/semester).
Furthermore, this takes the idea of 4 and 5 credit hour classes out of the situation, which would have you taking more than the 18/semester average.</p>
<p>
No way. 3 quarters of 4 courses per quarter is the same as two semesters of 4 courses per quarter. </p>
<p>Some people claim that UofC tries to cram a semester’s worth of material into a quarter, but there is no real evidence to support this claim.</p>
<p>I do agree though, that majors are way over played. An employer cares about what you can do. Having majored in something is one way to show some knowledge, but there are many other ways, such as having a resume that says “took three courses in modern paleontological methodology” would probably qualify you as well as being a paleo major for digging rocks somewhere.</p>
<p>Indeed. I have a hard time believing that UChicago is actually half again as intensive as semester colleges like, say, Harvard. 5 courses at a time is standard at semester schools - why is it too much at Chicago?</p>
<p>Also, I don’t entirely disagree with you about the majors, and I’m not sure that I actually will get multiple ones. But I have at least one area of interest that I would like to pursue to an extent that I’m not sure is possible given the 4 course restriction, the Core, and the number of courses I would like to take in my primary major.</p>
<p>I think there are HS students who haven’t found a challenge or depth of study in school and feel that double major in college may fill that hole. 3 or 4 carefully chosen courses in any particular quarter at Chicago can keep a student very busy and be enough to satisfy.
Experience it and believe.</p>
<p>From what I’ve read you can take 3 courses in 6 quarters and still graduate in 4 years. Financially, doesn’t sound like a good idea since you get a lot less “college” for the same amount of money. And yes, if you take 5 classes in a quarter tuition is more.</p>
<p>Eisenstein – it’s not “half again as intensive”, but it may well be 20% more intensive. That’s approximately the number of additional courses one expects to take - 12/year vs. 10. If you took 5/quarter, it would be 15 vs. 10, and maybe that WOULD be half again as intensive . . . and twice as unpleasant.</p>
<p>Students should answer this. My sense is that four courses winds up being plenty. After all, they have to leave some time for Chicago’s world-famous party scene! Or maybe they’re just a bunch of slackers who like wearing t-shirts about how tough their college is.</p>
<p>(That said, I’m sure lots of students could handle 5 courses, but they would have to give up other, valuable things they do for that. I wouldn’t think it was a good idea.)</p>
<p>By “half again as intensive”, I meant that Chicago should not claim that they cover the same amount of material in a 10 week quarter class that other colleges do in a 15 week semester class. It’s simply not realistic to think that Chicago students learn that much faster than those at Harvard or MIT. </p>
<p>Incidentally, does anyone know if the increased tuition of a 5 class courseload is covered by a College Honor scholarship, or does that only pay for the standard tuition?</p>
<p>One thing to remember, Chicago does not calculate hours per course. One gets 1 credit, no matter how many hours the course meets. S1 has had courses that met 3 hours per week, 5 hours per week, and 8 hours per week, all earn 1 credit. One course even required attending a local martial arts Do Jo for a couple of hours per week.</p>
<p>I don’t think Chicago claims that they cover more material in a shorter amount of time. What I have seen is professors who are used to teaching a course on a semester system folding it over and deleting some material for a quarter system.</p>
<p>The semester/quarter debate could go on and on ad infinitum. I know of students who audit more than 4 classes, and certainly most people are not going to stop you from showing up to classes you’re not registered for. Is each class really more intense? I think that varies prof to prof, school to school, class to class.</p>
<p>My contribution to the ad infiniturm: My impression is that four courses is quite enough and that 4 x 3 = 12 courses/ year is more work than a lot of campuses with 4 (or even 5) x 2 = 8 (or 10). At Dartmouth where there is also a quarter system, 3 courses per term is the standard load. </p>
<p>I’m not sure what the “college honor scholarship” is, but the university’s merit scholarships are for a dollar amount, so they would not cover added courses.</p>
<p>When I attended college in the dark ages, my school was on the quarter system. Three courses was the standard – each academic class was five hours’ credit. Had to get an advisor’s approval for four courses, and they did not sign off on those lightly.</p>
<p>Eisensteinprime, depending on your major, you may be able to pursue that second interest via the allied requirements for your major. I know that for math, there are seven courses one must take in other areas of the Physical Sciences Division as part of the math major. S is using those seven classes to go deep in his other, narrow interest rather than a second major and instead of a minor. (No minor classes can apply to the major, which is why he didn’t go that route.) This way he can take the classes in this other subject area that he wants rather than meeting departmental requirements.</p>
<p>I hadn’t heard that Chicago profs “lightened” the load due to the quarter system. ;)</p>