Physics?

College Majors Science Majors
1

<p>Hello! I'll be a freshman at a top Liberal Arts college this fall, and was wondering about the rigor of physics courses. I took AP Calc in high school and got a 5 on the AP, and got an A (our school doesn't give out scores of A+ or A-, simply As) in honors Physics junior year, but it used trigonometry and pre-calculus instead of calculus. I didn't have time in my schedule senior year for AP Physics, but my Honors Physics teacher recommended me for it.</p>

<p>Phew. Okay, what I'm trying to ask is whether I would be able to successfully pursue physics. I REALLY love it, but everywhere I look online, I see people say that it is incredibly time-consuming and difficult. If I got a 5 on AP Calculus and did extremely well in Honors Physics, are those at all good indicators as to how well I will do in college physics?</p>

<p>Thanks for any advice :)</p>

2

<p>Yes, those are good indicators. Take the intro physics course and see how it goes.</p>

3

<p>Ah thank you! I’m taking the Introduction to Mechanics course in the fall, as well as Multivariable Calculus, so I’ll see how it goes!</p>

<p>Any other opinions?</p>

4

<p>I took no calculus in high school and we didn’t have AP physics… I’m starting my junior year of my physics degree and have managed to do quite well. It’s all about work ethic in my opinion.</p>

5

<p>They’re definitely good indicators. However, calculus based physics doesn’t really require algebra based physics in order to be successful. Algebra based physics is very simplified in comparison. Many physics majors start calculus based physics without ever having taken an algebra based physics course and do just fine.</p>

6

<p>Math is necessary but not sufficient for physics. Having done well in intro physics is a good indicator though, even though most introductory physics classes (even the calc-based ones) are largely plug-n-chug type classes where the problems they give you are pretty simple and involve picking the right formula and plugging in numbers, maybe solving for a variable, IOW not much real problem solving.</p>

<p>The better you understand physics <em>concepts</em> and the better you understand how to solve word problems (create an equation or system of equations from a given description of a problem) and the better you are at algebra and abstract thinking the better.</p>

7

<p>Cool! Thanks a ton!</p>

8

<p>What’s time-consuming and difficult are the upper-division physics courses IMO. Then again, I might be a bit biased since I had graduate-level courses (even though they’re officially undergraduate courses at my college, they would be graduate-level in the US) from junior year onward.</p>

9

<p>I would also suggest you read this, titled “So you want to be a physicist”
<a href=“So You Want To Be A Physicist”>So You Want To Be A Physicist;
Please delete this post if I am not aloud to link pages.</p>