<p>Alright, lets say I'm not the best person in math, but these two classes are a requirement for me. One thing I can say though is that when I looked at "ratemyprofessor" for the Stat 220 teacher, it seemed like she was a complete nightmare from hell. I was like "I thought statistics was suppose to be an easy class," from what I heard in high school of my high school statistic class. Though I know calculus is definitely supposed to be harder (especially when I heard about the weekly quizzes during each quiz section). </p>
<p>The statistics class I'm taking is called: Principles of Statistical Reasoning, which mainly helps us gain an understanding of the rationale behind many statistical methods, as well as an appreciation of the use and misuse of statistics.</p>
<p>And Calc... eh, it should be like the AP Calculus classes we've taken in high school (except a bit more difficult). Though I did horrible on the AP test for Calculus... so I can't really say, cause if I had at least gotten a score of 2, I would have gotten credit for it.</p>
<p>So anyway, would this be a good idea? How hard is stat class? I always thought it was just graphing and such, and just algebra. Though just reading this professor's rating for this class... it seems like an absolute nightmare! And my friends are telling me taking two math classes is the worst thing ever (unless you like math and excel at it, which I don't). And most of the other classes I wanted to register for the pre-requisites of me major is mostly full. P.S. I'm studying at the University of Washington as well. </p>
<p>I’d say put one of them off. Unless you need to double up for pre-req reasons, I don’t really see the point of taking both. You admit that math isn’t your strongest point, so putting two maths (which are very different) together probably isn’t the best idea.</p>
<p>As for stats, the difficulty will vary widely between schools. At one school I went to, an introduction to stats class pretty much taught us what buttons to push on the calculator. At a different school, it was a calculus based nightmare. You could try asking friends at your school how difficult the stats class is, but based on the ratings you found for the prof I think you’ve already got your answer.</p>
<p>Can you put a different major pre-req in your schedule instead? Or a GE requirement?</p>
<p>As a math major, here’s some insight that I can give without getting too technical:</p>
<p>The reason why people claim statistics is an easy class in high school is because most major high schools have funding for technology such as TI-83+ graphing calculators. A lot of introductory statistics classes use a textbook by Weiss. Incidentally, the symbols on the TI-83+ match up perfectly with the symbols your book uses (TI-84+ silver edition is highly recommended because the 83+ is missing certain t-distribution functions that make your life easier). Therefore, high school statistics classes are incredibly easy if all you have to do is read the question, decide what test to do (usually it tells you outright), punch in the numbers, and you get the answer with almost no effort on your part.</p>
<p>Many statistics classes in college follow this basic outline. BUT. Occasionally you’ll get the teacher who will not let you use a graphing calculator to blow through the questions. Doing statistics questions by hand is incredibly tedious and error prone, especially if math isn’t your strong suit. Common pitfalls I see when I help other students is that they don’t remember how to apply order of operations or they simply block the information from getting to their brain because of how many numbers you might have to keep track of at once (typically 30 numbers at once). Graphing calculators definitely make your life easier and lets you relax your brain. But again, when you gotta do it by hand because the teacher doesn’t let you use one or you can’t afford a graphing calculator, then that’s when statistics can be a GPA killer.</p>
<p>Calculus is quite a different story in its own respect. 99% of the time, you can’t use a graphing calculator at all and you’re only allowed a scientific calculator at best. This puts all of the math on you, so definitely you’re going to want to remember how to plug in numbers into functions as well as remember how to compute numbers up to a 4th or 5th power. If you have a good teacher, they’ll actually go over relevant material and make clear expectations on what you’ll be tested over. If you don’t have a good teacher, a lot of the burden will be put on you to learn the material by yourself (as in, suppose you have a teacher that only uses lecture to write the theorems up on the board and nothing else. No examples at all. That leaves it up to you to actually apply the theorems by yourself on the homework, and usually homework isn’t even a grade).</p>
<p>It’s not impossible to do both classes at once, but you might want to ask these instructors what resources and technology they’d recommend for the class (especially IF they even allow technology for problem solving).</p>
<p>I consider statistics to be “softer” than calculus but if your statistics professor is a “nightmare from hell” then that’s not going to matter. </p>
<p>Does that professor always teach that statistics course you need? If it’s sometimes taught by a different professor then you may want to put it off. If it’s always offered by that professor then I guess you can go ahead and take it if you can’t get into any other classes for your degree. If there’s another professor that might teach it soon then I’d put it off and see if there’s any course at all that could help you towards your degree. If you can’t find anything but maybe your degree plan has some flexibility with elective credits, you could consider a random elective to help you get to your 120ish hours to graduate. </p>
<p>Yeah, apparently she’s the only stat teacher out there (or at least for this quarter, maybe, but she’s the only professor out there for a stat class right now).</p>
<p>I was thinking of an elective to take, but there’s just so many, and most of them are like full. I’m still new with a bit of this registering thing and catalog since there’s a huge list, and the classes I mainly know are the pre-requisites toward my major. I mean I’m supposed to take some visual learning art performance class, but I have no idea what to take, and whether if I should take it later in the year to “easy” up my course when they get even more difficult. Since right now, I’m taking the “beginning steps.”</p>
<p>No graphing calculator are alowed though (as I looked on their website). I barely knew any friends who took stats in high school though, cause everyone wanted to take Calc instead since it “looks better.” Though from the friends I did know who took Calc, they said it was alright… And yeah, like what cameraphone said, people claimed that “Statistics Class” was easier in high schol.</p>
<p>And there are “written exams” as well… Like short-answers write in stuff.</p>
<p>Some reasons why students may think college introductory statistics is harder than high school AP statistics:</p>
<ol>
<li> The college course is one quarter or one semester, compared to the high school course usually being a year.</li>
<li> The college course may be enrolling weaker-at-math-and-statistics students than the high school course, since the stronger students tend to be the more advanced ones who take the AP courses in high school, while the weaker students are less advanced and do not reach those courses until college.</li>
</ol>
<p>Note that the above are not unique to statistics – many other subject have similar characteristics when comparing the college introductory course to the high school AP course. (In addition, for some courses at some schools, the college course may cover more difficult material than the high school AP course.)</p>
<p>What I meant was maybe you can look at many of the past course schedules (Fall 2014, Spring 2014, Fall 2013, Spring 2013 etc) at your university and search for the stat 220 course and see if the professor who is scheduled to teach this course for Spring 2015 has been the one teaching it in the past. </p>
<p>As for the Visual and Performing Arts, my school has a list of approved courses for that so you should be able to email your advisor and get a list of approved courses for that specific category of your degree plan.</p>