Has anyone ever heard of a student getting approved to take a transferable course at a local university before starting Penn as a freshman? My son and I were discussing the possibility of his trying to take a class at the local univ. before he started Penn in the fall if he could get approved to do so.
I’m pretty sure that’s permitted (I think you’re even allowed to do that during the summer when you’re a Penn student).
I wonder who my son would contact at Penn to inquire about this. Registrar? Admissions? Advising?
Admissions answered our questions.
Just wondering…what’s the answer?
They basically said the class couldn’t be evaluated for transfer credit until he is registered for the fall and he’s spoken with his advisor. So, in my mind, it’s still worth the risk of not getting credit to go ahead and take a class. They also said as long as this would be the only class he will have taken, he would still be considered a freshman.
My son isn’t sure he wants to take anything, but I think it would take some pressure off of him so he could just take four classes each semester freshman year.
Penn offers internal exams for course credit at the beginning of the semester. My son took a math exam the first week of school and tested out of the course. I think exams are also available for biology and chemistry, maybe others. The paragraph below is copied from the penn website.
“All students are eligible to take the Mathematics Department’s internal exams for credit, which are offered at the beginning of the fall semester. Near the end of the summer, the times and dates of the exams will be posted near the top of the department’s undergraduate web page.
Anyone who has studied calculus should consider taking these exams. The department keeps no record of those who do not pass; thus, students who take the exams and fail have lost nothing. The exams are open to all without charge. More information is available on the Mathematics Department website.”
Oh, thanks for that. I don’t know how much calculus my son will remember, but it’s worth a shot. He took it last spring, so it would be over a year old, but maybe he can brush up this summer.
Some (possibly outdated, since I’m going off of what I remember from starting in 2007) information about transferring course credit:
- AP Courses - not all are accepted; typically a 5 is required in order to get credit, though in some language courses, I believe a 4 can satisfy the language requirement without granting credit toward graduation.
- Other college courses - Courses taken for credit at an accredited institution can qualify for credit toward graduation as long as you get a C or better.
Regarding math, my understanding is:
- If you have no calculus experience, you should take MATH103, which is the equivalent of Calculus AB
- If you have taken Calc AB or an equivalent, regardless of your grade, then you can choose to enroll in MATH104, which is the equivalent of Calculus BC.
- If you have taken Calc BC or an equivalent, then if you get a high enough grade, you will get credit for MATH104; you can also get credit for MATH104 by taking a placement test and testing into MATH114.
- If you decide not to take a placement test and enroll straight into MATH114, then if you get a C or better, you get credit for MATH114 as well as MATH104 (I did this, and naturally I got a C-, which was a real kick in the teeth!).
You’d have to check on it, but I believe the rule is that any course transferred in can be applied toward graduation but NOT toward your major or your GPA; I don’t think any outside courses fulfill the sector/foundational requirements.
Don’t quote me on any of these things… check out the registrar’s website and you can probably find more legit information.
But taking the placement exam won’t give a student credit towards graduation, correct? The biggest issue is the amount of classes needed for the Fine Arts degree. It would be great if my son could take four classes a semester and graduate, but the Fine Arts degree with require four semesters of five classes. At MIT, where my oldest goes, a student can graduate only taking four classes a semester. My oldest was able to transfer in his community college math and Arabic classes, so he actually had several semesters of taking only three classes.
So, the goal here for my son in taking summer classes is to reduce the load during the school year due to his disabilities.
Are all students required to take Math 103 or 104? Even though he took Calc I at the community college and got an A, he says he’s forgotten much of it, so if he can’t get “credit” for passing the exam-that is, can’t get one course of the 36 required to graduate-I’m guessing he won’t take the placement exam.
Hope that makes sense.
@sbjdorlo The placement exam does give credit towards graduation.
@sbjdorlo Have you talked to financial aid to see if they will cover an extra semester or two? Maybe in his case they will work with you since your son has a disability. My son has taken 5 courses a semester and now has terrible sleeping habits. Some days he doesn’t sleep at all, others he sleeps in the middle of the day depending on his workload. I think having your son take 4 a semester is a good plan.
Just make sure the course is from a 4 year university… admissions told my incoming freshman son that his community college courses he took during the summers didn’t transfer since he will be an incoming freshman… they said classes for incoming freshman have to be from a 4 year university not 2 year (community college) to transfer
Definitely. I already tried to get his community college classed done in high school (the ones that went past high school curriculum) transferred, but of course Penn doesn’t take CC credits. So yes, my son would take the classes at the local state university. The cost isn’t cheap, about $300 a unit, but it would be worth it to use the last of his 529 money on the summer classes if he can get credit. At this point, my son says he doesn’t want to take a summer class this summer, so that will mean summers after freshman and sophomore year. That will be easier anyways since he’ll be able to work with an advisor to make sure whatever he takes transfers in.
Most majors in the College are structured such that you only need 32 course units to graduate - 4 per semester. First semester freshmen are generally limited to 4.5 c.u. (4 courses, with the extra 0.5 c.u. allocated for labs for anyone interested in hard science courses) unless they get a specific waiver from their academic advisor. I took 4 c.u. first semester, then five second semester and first semester of sophomore year, and then six second semester of sophomore year… five was a good number for me (6 was way too much), and with those extra courses in hand, I was able to take 4 c.u. both semesters of junior year and first semester of senior year (one of those c.u. was for a pass/fail class and one was for an independent study) and had enough credits to graduate with a major and a minor without needing second semester of senior year.
If your son applied to any of the other three schools, then summer courses are a good idea to lighten the load during the academic year, but keep in mind that unless he is planning to do graduate or professional school after undergrad, it is wise not to consider the summer between junior and senior year open for summer credits since most students who plan to enter the workforce after graduation take internships in their final summer. But the summers after freshman and sophomore years are definitely fair game for some extra courses!
@chrisw, in looking at the required number of courses in the College, it looks like there are 61 majors and only 17 of them require 32 courses to graduate; the rest require more. I know it probably seems silly to be looking for the “easy road out”, but with LDs and health issues, it would be really nice if my son could only take four classes a semester and no more. However, Fine Arts requires 36 courses to graduate, and thus, if he didn’t take summer courses, he’d have to take 5 courses for at least four semesters. Thus, the idea of taking summer classes (at least to me) is really appealing.
I definitely agree with you that summer before senior year would not be a good time to take classes. He may just have to double up in the summer after freshman and sophomore year and take two classes each summer if it can be worked out. Or, he might find out he can handle five classes.
He was considering Cinema, which only requires 33 courses to graduate, but he decided he couldn’t do anything with that degree, so he’s back to thinking Fine Arts since he wants to do game design/animation at this point. That could change.
Huh, I stand corrected! For what it’s worth, I’d say that the more popular majors are the ones with 32-34 c.u. requirements (notable exception is biology). If he is interested in game design/animation, he may want to consider looking into computer science engineering; I know a handful of people went into game design and animation, but they all came through engineering programs (with a lot of fine arts classes). If he is interested in that route, he could look into either dual degree or internal transfer - especially if he is willing to take summer courses, it is not overly onerous to do a dual degree in 4 to 4.5 years. Just a suggestion!