<p>"(3 units in 3 weeks)"</p>
<p>Holy crap man! What class was that? I'm going to take a couple of those such as history, gov, and speech. I specially want to get rid of speech.</p>
<p>i don't look at ratemyprofessor.com because i eat everything they throw at me.</p>
<p>i got lucky this time though, i got all good professors without looking at the web.</p>
<p>Jubei:</p>
<p>The upper division class in winter intersession was on ethics in business although we spent a lot of time on ancient philosophy and logic which made the course harder for me. I read the whole textbook before the class started and took notes while reading which made the experience barely tolerable.</p>
<p>As far as using the three week intersession, it's a great way to get some nasty classes out of the way quickly and bag three semester units. Shop your three week class carefully or it could become hell on earth, especially with a full time job.</p>
<p>Well, I'm just just taking speech so I think i'll be okay. Maybe some history type classes afterwards.</p>
<p>i work 35-40 weekly...taking 18 credits....maintaining a 4.0 but its at a community college so i dunno if that's necessarily saying much</p>
<p>This will be my exact situation this incoming semester as I enter as a freshman… Do you have any pointers oon how to survive college by going about it exactly as you did?</p>
<p>I work anywhere from 35-40 hrs/week. Taking 21 units this fall at a Cali community college with a 3.74 gpa I’ve completed 62 units.</p>
<p>For mere mortals, I think as long as you’re able to focus without distraction on school work when you’re not at work - meaning no tv, no video games, no crying babies, etc. - then you can expect, on average, to spend 3 hours per credit hour per week, including time spent in class. You have to be realistic in what is sustainable though. Sure spending 80 hours a week between class and school is doable for a week or two, but how about for a 16 week semester? </p>
<p>Lets say you capped your “work” week at 55 hours:
35 hours of that is for a wage earning job, 20 is for school work.
According to my metric, you should be able to take 6.67 credits without too much stress.</p>
<p>Now of course there is variance in all this, which is why I said “on average.” Some people are quick at math and can chew through Calculus problem sets easily. Others are slow readers/writers and may take extra time to get through an research based English course. There are, of course, some easy courses, like my History of Jazz class, 3 credit hours, lecture totaled 2.5 hours week, but I only spent on average 45 minutes per week reading for that class… and that was overkill. But they get balanced out by heavy weeks in classes like Organic Chemistry.</p>
<p>Forming the weekly plan of attack:
Look at a calendar (I like Google calendar) and block off your requirements (lectures/labs, work, <em>also time it takes to commute/transition</em>, chores, etc.) and then figure out how many hours you need to block off for sitting in a library or other quiet place to get schoolwork done. Most importantly, none of this works if you don’t get enough sleep (trust me it will all come crashing down).</p>
<p>In the end, only you know what kind of student you are, you may need 3+ hours per credit regardless of course type, you may find you only need 1.5 hours, but you’ll have a pretty good idea after one semester if you’re serious about it.</p>
<p>I personally set my cap at 60 hours per week, 15 working, 45 for school (15 credit hours) as a Materials/Aerospace Engineering double major. It has worked out well so far (4.0).</p>
<p>There was a guy I knew my last year of CC. I knew he was obviously a bright guy, but I found out that he was married and he worked 40 hours a week. He went to work for an automotive company after high school without any plans to attend college. When the economy tanked, he started off slow at my CC (about the time I did) and then started taking 15-16 units per semester. He maintained a 4.0 throughout, even with our toughest math teacher. I was very impressed with him because he worked. I think he ended up going to UC Berkeley instead of Stanford.</p>
<p>What he basically did was work all week and do very little homework (if he could avoid it). During the weekend all he did as homework. It definitely made me realize I lacked discipline 'cause he could just sit there for hours doing it all. I usually end up procrastinating one way or another.</p>
<p>Another girl I knew worked as well, but I wouldn’t say she was of the same caliber. She knew her stuff though because every time she had work to do she did it immediately.</p>
<p>I personally kick myself for not being as motivated as they were.</p>
<p>I currently work 40 hours/wk and am taking 9 units, but will plan to take 18 units come Fall.</p>
<p>I plan to cut my hours to ~30 and plan to do how CalDud’s friend did with cramming all my homework into the weekend. So it’s work 6 or 7 am - 1 or 2 pm M-F, then school from 3 or 4 pm - 9 pm M-Th. I plan to use F-Su to catch up on HW and stuff, but well see. I agree that it’s not that hard when you look at it on a week-by-week basis, but over a 12 week quarter sounds a bit tough. I view it as the fact that I know I’ve done tougher in life (mentally and physically) and I can at least try to pull that off.</p>
<p>I’m married, but luckily no children, and I only play games or watch TV at a minimal recreational level, so I have the least bit of distractions.</p>
<p>I think studies should come first, but if it get to be too much with work and school at the same time and you need the money, then you can try to drop one class at a time until you find a good balance for your time.</p>
<p>I’m currently taking a summer 4 unit math class and it’s pretty brutal. This coming fall, I will be taking 15 units + 3 more if I can add this class ( I’m number 5 on the waitlist, so I’m confident I’ll get it). I don’t have a job and live off fasfa so I’m confident I’ll be able to pull at least a 3.5. The thing I’m scared of is not getting fasfa because it still hasn’t gone through… If i don’t get fasfa, I’m screwed. I might have to take out a couple thousand dollar loan. Money absolutely cannot get in the way of me transferring next Fall. I’m too close to fall back on my unit count…</p>
<p>Last semester I worked 20 hours a week, took 15 credits: calculus, C++ 2, oceanography, intro to physics, physics lab, and also ran my wrestling club once a week. Got 5 A’s.</p>
<p>The downsides to this is that I had no life, didn’t see my friends for 4 months basically, and some nights only got 2 hours of sleep. but you gotta do what you gotta do : /</p>