Should I withdraw or not?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Berkeley
1

<p>Ok, so I'm taking a summer class at Cal. I'm going to be a junior, and I'm staying another 5 semesters. I'm doubling. Well, I'm taking a class that counts as my last L&S breadth requirement and also as an upper div requirement, but I don't necessarily need it. I just thought I'd get rid of two birds with one stone.</p>

<p>However, I want to go to law school, so GPA matters. I may NOT get an A or A- in this class, and I really do not feel like wasting my time during the summer to do something that will hurt me in the future.</p>

<p>Should I withdraw from the course? THe grade is comprised of 2 examinations, and that's it. The cons I see are that if I withdraw from summer sessions now, a "withdraw by petition, summer 2006" will appear on my transcript (will this effect grad school apps?), and my money will not be refunded. However, if I do not drop, I will put tons of time into a class to get a crappy result that will lower my GPA, which really matters for law school. Additionally, I have not had much of a summer, at all, considering I am working as well.</p>

<p>What should I do?</p>

2

<p>If you get a B+, your GPA won't be much affected. Do the calculation yourself. If you were getting a C, then OK, but if you're only not positive that you're going to get an A, then dropping sounds too drastic.</p>

3

<p>My GPA is around a 3.7. A 3.3 would probably bring it down quite a bit. Any thoughts?</p>

4

<p>No, the "withdrew by petition" looks pretty bad, so I'd advise against it. Just drop your current class, and try to find a session E course that doesn't look too bad (like Stat 100, for example). Take it P/NP if you will, but at least you will have something. And you won't waste all of your money. That's a good GPA, by the way...keep it up and good luck.</p>

5

<p>try your best and get an A! you can do it!</p>

6

<p>Student, why does the "withdrew by petition" look bad? It is summer, right?</p>

<p>Also to be honest, my heart isn't in my studies right now, so I doubt I could get an A. I'm also really tired from working every day.</p>

7

<p>regardless if its summer or not a withdrew by petition does NOT look bad. its the overall GPA that matters most. do you really think an admissions officer would see a "withdrew by petition" and automatically look down upon this candidate. the answer is NO.
One withdrew by petition is okay, but if you have multiple withdrews by petition than it will look bad on your transcript.
if you really think getting atleast a B+ is too difficult than i suggest withdrawing. i have a friend in a similar situation and he withdrew from a course because he knew even getting a B+ was impossible.</p>

8

<p>*-) you might just take it on as a challenge, unless it becomes too physically strenuous</p>

9

<p>I didn't with an idiot Econ professor and somehow scored a very irregular C. Go for it, but learn your lesson.</p>

<p>You just wasted 10k of your parents money for nothing.</p>

<p>Its too dangerous to take Summer classes IMO; its too hard to predict the kind of curriculum professors and grading professors are going to use.</p>

<p>Just get through Berkeley as quickly as possible and score well on your LSAT. Remember also to constantly badger professors for recommendations. Read their papers and go suck up to them in office hours and you should get a good recommendation as long as you get an A in class.</p>

10

<p>How did I waste 10k?</p>

<p>It was only 800 dollars. This is SUMMER, not the semester. </p>

<p>And a C won't exactly help my GPA.</p>

11

<p>For out of state additional fees is still 6k for summer school. Check your telebrears.</p>

12

<p>Boing, in one's undergraduate career, one takes classes from about 36 professors. You only need 2 to 3 faculty recommendations for grad school. Is that really such a hard thing to get?</p>

13

<p>You want a good one, which means you'll likely want to take more than one class with that professor and have some way of he/she directly grading your work.</p>

14

<p>I got a great one from my math 1B lecturer. He didn't grade any homework or exam, but I asked a few good Qs in class and discussed some lecture points a couple of times in his office hrs, which were generally deserted. Then there are many more smaller classes where the prof will grade your work and more class interaction will allow you to shine.</p>

<p>I think you're right about the first part of my statement though, you have to be more assertive in a large class situation. But I would say in my career, there were at least 25 classes where the setting was closer to the latter situation (good level of personal interaction with prof outside of office hours situations.) If you're neither somewhat assrtive nor good, getting great recs is harder to do at Cal vs a small school. I actually wasn't very assertive though, just interested in the material and neither too shy nor too assertive.</p>

15

<p>New update. I am not going to withdraw, but I may take it P/NP.</p>

16

<p>There we go. P/NP for the win...just make sure you have at least four graded classes for each P/NP.</p>

17

<p>I was under the impression that some schools might ask you why you withdrew from a class and I'm not sure that saying "I didn't think I'd get a good grade" would be looked upon very favorably.</p>

18

<p>Well, how about, I'm in a bit of a financial jam, I haven't seen my family for 5 months, I haven't gone home for 5 months, and I hate summer? haha,...but yeah, it's all true.</p>

19

<p>New update. So I decided to take it for a grade, and give it my all, and I pulled a straight A.</p>

<p>Lesson learned kids. Try, try, try. Never quit.</p>

20

<p>congrats NeedAdvice</p>