<p>Hey guys,</p>
<p>So i am a transfer student at uc berkeley and it is my first semester this year, but i am screwing up my grades already. I had a decent gpa going in but this semester i am getting all B's and a C- at discrete math. Should i continue to switch into a math major?</p>
<p>Anyone?</p>
<p>What would be your alternative major?</p>
<p>The classes are difficult and you need a grasp of basic concepts. Go to the tutors and find out how to study effectively in 10-week courses.
What major would you change to?</p>
<p>Your previous posts indicate that you are a pre-med who may major in MCB, IB, and/or math. Is that still current?</p>
<p>B and C- grades will not be good for your medical school admission chances.</p>
<p>My alternative major would be MCB. i know the classes are hard and i didnt practice effective study skills. Ucbalumnus yes i know i am quite worried that i am ruining my chances of getting accepted. I am still considering mcb, but like my previous posts i am worried about getting a job in the interim to help out with family. I guess thats not really an excuse but that worry along with bad study habits caused my bad grades this semester. Is there still hope for me to go to med school?</p>
<p>It depends how you failed.
If you think you can do a lot better, then I’d say give yourself another chance.
If you think this was the fair effort you can give within your ability, then yeah, it’s a good time to change the major.</p>
<p>Well, I would certainly sit down with an academic advisor on this one. Discrete is Berkeley’s “weedout” class that they use to calibrate their math majors.</p>
<p>For pre-med, conventional wisdom is to take a major that is not super-competitive. Consider that there are 8 ivy league schools (plus MIT plus Stanford plus U Chicago, etc.) in America, there is Cambridge and Oxford, and schools in France, Canada, and China; all of which have excellent graduate math programs. Of all of these schools in the world, Berkeley graduate program is rated #3 in the world in Math. You had better believe that reputation attracts students who could choose to go anywhere to study math- even at the Undergraduate level, since there is really no undergraduate ranking system for specific departments.</p>
<p>I guess I am saying that even if you are really, really good; the Berkeley program has a lot of really good students in it whom you are competing with for the ‘A’.</p>
<p>You really should stay with math and bring up your study skills, if that is what you love. If your goal is higher grades, you need to really assess the cost/benefit to putting in the work.</p>
<p>UpMagic and ItsJustSchool, thank you for your advice! </p>
<p>UpMagic, I actually came in the class late. I came in the third week of class and, ever since then, I’ve always felt behind. Personally I thought the material could get abstract at times, but overall the material was introductory. It came from concepts I already knew. I tutored Statistics at my community college so I have a background understanding when they discussed some concepts from statistics there. it’s just that I think I have poor time management skills so i almost never make the time to read chapter ahead and, especially, do all the homework. I also studied the class mostly my reading over the chapter and doing the chapter examples, but I did not put a lot of emphasis on the homework.</p>
<p>Basically, I treated the class like a bio/orgo class and assumed that is how I would get an A. The final really blew me away which it shouldn’t have.</p>
<p>ItsJustSchool, thanks for your helpful advice! I definitely gotta talk to my advisors about this issue when I come back from break. There are a lot of students in my classes that are really smart I believe, but I do love math. But trading my short-term interests for my long-term goal of becoming a doctor may be something I’ll have to reassess completely.</p>
<p>Okay, so you have some idea what were the problems, that’s important.</p>
<p>I never doubt the intellectuality of transfer students because obviously everyone has done a lot of good things like tutoring statistics to successfully apply and transfer to Berkeley.</p>
<p>If you think you can greatly improve on ‘time management skills’ and make whatever adjustments that need to be made, then I won’t quite give up on it.</p>
<p>Taking a class that’s within your interest and passion is pretty important too.</p>