Questions about Registration, AP Credit etc

Colleges and Universities A-Z Duke University
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Hello everyone, I will be enrolling at Duke Trinity in the fall and am currently going through the class registration process, and a few questions popped up. It is a long list, so please bear with me!

For bookbagging, there is an “open” status and “waitlist” status. Does that dictate the actual order of students when classes officially open for registration? I am on a couple of these “waitlist” status classes and I am not sure what that means for my hopes of getting into that particular course.

As I have learned, most freshmen take around 4 classes per semester at Duke. Some people have said to register more, up to 6 classes, because during the first week of classes you can observe classes and decide to add/drop certain ones depending on your fit. Is this advisable, and should I reflect this on my bookbagging and later on, registration?

Students at other schools have said that sufficient AP credit can bump your enrollment status from a freshman to a “sophomore”, which grants upperclassmen priority when registering for classes. Is this true at Duke, and how many AP credits is that line to be unofficially recognized as a sophomore?

I have heard there are placement tests offered from multiple departments, but so far I can only confirm that Math has a proficiency test. Is there other departments, like Chemistry or Physics, that also offer this? Also, I have taken college level Spanish for 3 years in high school but could not take the AP Spanish tests, is there still a way to be placed higher in my foreign language studies?

An addition to the note above ^^, I am planning to take the Math proficiency exam in August that will place me out of 122L and into multivariable/linear algebra material. Do any of y’all know the difficulty of the exam, like compared to the AP exam, and what materials I should review in preparation for that exam?

I have looked at other threads discussing about how some colleges display the numeric AP score that you have received in addition to the credit that was satisfied with that score on the transcript. I am curious if Duke does this practice, and if some AP scores are not great may possibly affect grad school admissions or such?

When consulting the AP credit chart, I have seen some classes, i.e AP US, World History and AP Comp and Lang be referred to “any course.” Do these credits satisfy any part of the General Education curriculum (QS, CCI, EI, CZ, etc.), or are they counted as elective credit building towards the 34 total credits to graduate?

Thank you all so much for your time! I can’t wait to start freshman year at Duke and to embrace all that it offers!

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  1. Open status courses mean that the course currently has seats that are open. Once registration officially opens, you should be able to register for those courses. Waitlisted courses are those that are already full. However, since many students add/drop courses until the first two weeks of the semester, there is a waitlist which the system automatically enrolls those waitlisted students to the course immediately if it opens up. If you are on a waitlist, it should say a number next to a yellow triangle, which shows your spot on the waitlist.
  2. You can only register up to 4.5 credits for the time being. Once the semester officially begins, you may be able to register for up to 5.5 credits, but this is not advisable since you want to keep a balanced life in Duke. The normal course load at Duke is 4 courses. In order to take 6 courses, you would need to get special permission from your Dean.
  3. You need 34 credits to graduate, and you are only granted two credits via AP scores. Thus, if you have more than two AP scores, only two of them may be used for credit. However, you will be able to place out of many introductory courses using those AP scores and may be eligible to take advanced courses. Take a look here: https://trinity.duke.edu/undergraduate/academic-policies/AP-credit-by-department
  4. I believe the chemistry and physics department do not have placement tests. You can only place out of those introductory courses if you have AP/IB credit. The math department does have some guidelines for placement exams, as you mentioned. Also, for your Spanish placement, you can just register for the Spanish course that you think will fit you and always switch classes between different levels once the semester starts until the end of add/drop period. I suggest you take a look at the Duke Spanish placement guidelines online.
  5. The parameter for that placement exam should be mostly AP Calculus BC.
  6. Duke does not do that on your transcript. If granted credit, the equivalent Duke credit will be listed without your AP scores.
  7. They do not count towards anything. You will not be given credit, advanced placement, etc. Those AP scores can essentially be disregarded now.
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@doublepenguin Thank you so much for your help! The registration process makes more sense to me now. Just a quick note, how would you think a first year schedule consisting of the following would work:

  1. Economics 101, Lecture 3x, Discussion
  2. Calculus 122L, Lecture 3x, Lab
  3. Math 89S: Game Theory, Lecture 2x
  4. Chemistry 110L, Lecture 2x, Discussion, Lab

I am undecided between pre-med and pre-business (economics major), so this seems like an approach into trying out both. I heard the Math Seminar isn’t a hard course at all, so hopefully that can balance out my schedule. Thanks again!

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It seems like a well balanced list of courses. However, as a reminder, lower level courses such as MATH 122L and CHEM110L can be quite demanding since they are intended to weed out people. They are going to be a big lecture class with a pretty firm curve as a grading scale. I suggest you start clearing away your language requirement and take a language course this semester.

Do not worry about clearing requirements for your potential majors right away. Try using your first-year as a way to explore areas and just take interesting courses! You’ll find that they will fulfill some of your general requirements and major requirements anyway.

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@doublepenguin Yes, that is a good point. From what I have heard Duke Math is very demanding, so I will probably defer that to later in my undergrad studies. The foreign language part is also a good option, but right now as I’m seeing all of the courses that are running this semester are full, so I might try and take something like Psychology or Sociology, as I’ve heard those are quite interesting. Thanks for your insight!