To trust--or not to trust--the Advisor?

D is freshman A&S. Advisor is English lit, D is neuroscience. Advisor gives advice contrary to the advice of what D’s new classmates have been advised. Are the advisors trained? Why would advice be different? Why does Vandy assign an English
Lit. prof for neuroscience? Can she trust her advisor like I’ve told her to do? Or should she seek a second opinion?

The advisers are completely useless. Ok, maybe a blanket statement, but I’ve heard nothing but bad from all my friends.

My adviser told me that I needed AP/IB credit to enroll in BSCI 110a. Which is just blatantly wrong. I wish they would just admit that they don’t know something instead of making something up.

The purpose of the adviser is to make sure students are on track for graduation – meeting major and liberal arts core requirements in a timely fashion. Ideally, they’re also well read in academic policies and such. When it comes to picking between courses, gauging course difficulty, etc. they’ tend to be pretty out-of-touch. They have no way of knowing that stuff.

Students are assigned an adviser in their major once they declare the major, This can’t happen until sophomore year. Until then, they just get a genetic adviser to provide, well, generic advise.

Feel free to seek a second opinion here!

They’re eh… They can help you plan out a schedule or suggest some courses but in terms of schedule balancing and what not they’re not that helpful

Your best bet is to ask upperclassmen or some of the people here. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend asking other freshmen either because they’re freshmen and have 0 experience with the classes here (some may be reliable if they talked to older kids/took some classes here in HS but it’s hard to tell who has done this).

Ah. Well, she’s neuroscience, and advisor told her not to take general chemistry and biology at the same time. So she only enrolled in chem. Now she’s hearing (from fellow freshman), that she HAS to take both as a freshman. She’s only taking 4 classes, but with chem as a weed out class, I thought it made sense to stay focused on staying afloat. I suppose she could take it in summer, we live here locally, although that would be very pricey.

My son is a neuroscience major. He took gen chem as a freshmen and biology and organic chemistry as a sophomore. That schedule gave him absolutely no problem, allowing him plenty of time to prepare for the MCAT and even to have a double major plus a minor. I wouldn’t listen to those freshmen. They’re not exactly speaking with any level of experience.

Thank you! I thought as much.

Talk with older students who can give you the real scoop on professors at your school. Knowing to avoid professor X and why is very helpful. My D chose to take a prof who was described as really hard, but it was in her major and she also spoke with enough students to realize this prof would make sure she understood the material. And, in a non-major gen ed required course, she waited another year to be able to fit in a history course with a prof who taught one specifically for non-history majors. D said he was a great prof who keep his lectures very interesting, but didn’t think all students should love history like he did.

But sometimes there are professors with huge egos who like to make things hard for no reason at all. Some profs ramble and tell good stories in class but never teach the material. Some profs will want to indoctrinate you, others want you to examine every side of an issue. It is good to make an effort to search out the best profs.

Also, balancing the classes each semester to protect the GPA is important. Always take enough easy A classes to balance out those really tough courses.

There are teachers that make the class hard for good reasons and teach well and there are others who are hard for the wrong reasons, often because of lackluster teaching (perhaps because they ramble on about non-content/concept related things such as their career) or because their difficulty promotes the wrong type of learning. Like an ultra-detail oriented instructor isn’t helping students by asking questions so specific to the point of irrelevance as opposed to training problem solving/critical thinking skills. So there is challenging in a good way and challenging in a bad way. Even “easy A’s” (I usually encompass medium level classes in this) can still be challenging in their own way but are just more likely to gaurantee a certain grade if you simply turn in all the assignments and study the couple of days (or day) before exams and quizzes. Usually “good” hard classes take independence and ongoing study and prep well before assessments

Although you don’t have to take bio and chem together, I would actually recommend it in certain cases (ie if you know you can keep your schedule together and depending on the ecs you plan on doing). It kinda does suck, but you’ll be glad you don’t have to take orgo and bio together (allowing you to take a course like physics with orgo, which apparently is much easier than bio although the physics teachers suck from what I hear)

If you want to rush or do some ec that takes up a lot of time like varsity sports, I would not recommend that combo. although it is doable, it might be a little overwhelming or your GPA may suffer.

Academic advising is a sketchy job for any teacher advising someone age 18. Because Vandy is really a midsized research university, you will have to work hard as an upperclassmen to get intimate faculty support and you probably need to learn to manage well on very businesslike and courteous interactions with teachers assigned to advise you. You are really not in a liberal arts college and the system does take constant work to understand all. Our son’s advisor seemed to be very good about “let me get back to you on that” answers and she would go above her station to get a solid answer or actually call a department head to be “sure”. Basically, advise your sons and daughters that understanding ALL the criteria for ALL things is on their shoulders. Advise them to cultivate a courteous relationship with even the most ineffectual academic advisor. You never know when they will step up for your student so do not underestimate their good will even if you suspect you better figure out answers yourself from multiple resources. example: both of our sons at Duke and at Vandy flubbed one course and their course grades by second month were not looking redeemable. This happens to a lot of previously perfectionistic high school students! There are no extra grades for subjective things like class participation and completed assignments anymore. If you leave town for full weekends and do not study a certain number of hours each day (one son) or you rush three frats and do not get up daily to eat breakfast and to treat your courses like a paid job (another son) Or you get mono (both sons) you will do badly on a quiz or test. Your son or daughter must go first to their academic advisor and then to their academic Dean to dig themselves out of these holes and to make alternative plans (dropping a course, repeating a course, going to summer school, etc). There are so many things to learn that befriending anyone a year ahead is ideal plus getting to know people in majors you may or may not declare is smart. One of my sons didn’t get Phi Beta Kappa eligibility due to Vanderbilt’s standards on foreign language for this designation. (he didn’t care but we were a tiny bit taken aback —after the fact that he skipped that). Even selecting your foreign study for 3rd year begins now by asking upperclassmen specifics re the things you won’t see on glossy brochures or websites…and by paying attention to what you hear. Remember that all students have the option of graduating with honors in their chosen major, and that is another set of criteria to study. When the entire school is basically an honors college, you must build your own resume out of multitudes of permutations. One of the pluses of Vandy is the range of ways to use the institution but it does take fortitude.

Recognize early on that while going abroad to study for a semester or a year can be a great thing, it limits the time left to fit in all your course requirements. Not all courses are taught every semester, and some have pre-requisite courses also. So it takes some tinkering around with a full 4 year plan to make sure you have thought of everything needed to graduate on time while studying abroad.

Having had 2 daughters who are/were neuroscience majors I would STRONGLY encourage your daughter to NOT take BIO and CHEM at the same time right out of the gate. The courses are extremely difficult and they are weed out courses for a reason. There was a mass exodus of pre-med after the first semester. Both my girl chose to take Orgo over a summer to help lighten the load. My girls’ general opinion (and their friends as well), is if you are good at memorizing tons and tons of information, then orgo and biochem are not too bad. Physics is not too horrible either. But Gen Chem and Bio… grueling.

Orgo should not be about memorization (you should only be aware of a few concepts and then be able to figure out other ones and solve challenging problems that are very unlike the ones before. Ideally ochem is taught based upon a few core principles and the few cases that demonstrate them. Should be about logic and visualizing more so than memorization)…if it was, they didn’t actually have quality teachers (same can be said about biochem, but it is the tradition of biochem to be taught as a rather rote course almost everywhere). I am now hoping they took it at a different school. And while general biology is quite hard at Vanderbilt, general chemistry is actually very standard. The problem is: is a student ready to seriously work or will adjusting to college be super tough?

The usual difference between college and HS sciences (AP or non) is that the section sizes are very large in comparison and even if the exams and assessments are not that difficult (say, in comparison to the AP or honors course taken) for the college course, there is the fact that you must be more independent with study (teachers will not constantly push students to study and there are often little graded assignments in the lecture component other than exams or quizzes) time and it is much easier to get distracted by social and EC life since classes don’t span say…7 hours a day like they did in HS. If one is very disciplined and you are used to the format that requires more independence from HS (as in a few tests and not much HW in HS and a relatively hands off instructor), then a student can likely take both. However, I personally think that, if pre-health, doing that likely has the unsaid pre-requisite of having at least exposure to the AP/IB version of both or solid honors classes RECENTLY as many others who double up have backgrounds where they may have even received credit for it and are taking for the experience/knowledge.

And yes, for some reason at most selective schools, usually it is general chemistry that is a slap in the face and sends many off of the pre-health track. In my opinion, most of such schools are not actually very hard for it, it is just that it is a relatively challenging course to be taught in a pure lecture format in a huge auditorium with a perhaps distant instructor. Quite a bit of research (including a decent one that profiled gen. chem at Stanford and Berkeley) revealed that mainly the teaching style played a huge roll in students’ dissatisfaction (and sometimes the resulting poor performances) with general chemistry. I would say one issue is the content as well. General chemistry at most schools is math based memorization of seemingly disconnected concepts that are not presented in context. This hurts in getting students’ interest up. In addition, if you are at a school where most ochem professors are very biased toward problem solving as opposed to that same sort of memorization/algorithmic problem solving emphasized in gen. chem…it is very common for even those who did well in gen. chem to struggle because they were simply not taught to think about chemistry very deeply and certainly not conceptually/qualitatively. However, the transition may be less abrupt if the ochem sections are indeed more about memorization than anything else (I suppose these would be considered “easy” ochem instructors?).

Idk about this, in my experience, gen chem was way WAY harder than gen bio. I got an A in bio with just reading the powerpoint slides and memorizing them. Got a B in gen chem by trying to do the same thing. The problem with gen chem classes at Vanderbilt is that they are SO detail oriented. That little fun fact in the box at the bottom of the page in the textbook? That’s gonna be on the test.

Gen chem tests also seem to actively try to fail you. For example, on the very first test, we had to name compounds and all that. I learned all the rules, and knew them backward and forward. On the test: name Sb2(SO4)3. I had no idea what Sb was on the period table (antimony). If I knew that name, I could have easily done the problem, but nope, apparently we had to memorize the periodic table (was never told this in lecture). Another example: on a free response problem, we had to convert hectometers to meters to do a problem. Of course, I had no idea what the conversion was. If I did know, I could have done the problem. It’s the little things like that that make gen chem at Vandy so hard. Even if the CONTENT may not be more difficult, the tests sure as hell are.

@derp125 I think I was just saying that that honestly isn’t that bad…those sorts of things are pretty normal, especially among more selective schools. This admittedly makes it maybe harder than an AP chem test (like a midterm given by an AP teacher in HS) because that focuses on more pure plug and chug. Most selective school gen. chem exams are “plug and chug plus” with the “plus” being the slightly annoying things that you just mentioned (things you must do before plugging in the numbers), but I’ve definitely seen worse, but again, even among elites, the “worse” I speak of is uncommon. Something like you describe is the norm. I rarely, for example, see legit application style problems or ones that require unexpected mathematical manipulations, derivations, or concept relationships on gen. chem exams anywhere. The tricks you speak of are often a failed attempt to challenge students (as in I believe they are doing it wrong) and ultimately lower students’ grades and giving the appearance of “rigor”. It’s pretty much why I don’t like how gen. chem is taught and tested at most places. It often borders the annoying stupidity you speak of instead of developing legit problem solving skills.

Here is an example (I have old gen. chem exams on me since I tutor) of what I think of (and what you probably spoke of) that I am not too sure about (as in…I wonder what the point is lol):

“The Clairmont Campus has an outdoor Olympic-size swimming pool with a volume of 5.89x10^5 gallons of water. During one of her workouts in the pool earlier this week Dr. McGill swam 72 lengths of the pool (and designed this test question). Each length is 25 yards. In one length, she exhales into the water 6 times, each expelling approximately 550ml of air. During vigorous exercise, 4.0% by volume of exhaled air is CO2. What mass of CO2 in pounds (lb) does Dr. McGill exhale by the end of her workout?” some unit conversions are given with several of them being irrelevant so as to distract students.

See…that is just unnecessary and hardly tests chemistry. I guess it kind of tests problem solving skills but seems like a relatively “cute” but dumb application to me. Why bother testing unit conversions at this level when you could instead test things of true relevance. In addition, by time you are finished reading that, you are likely confused. I’m sure she was proud of herself, but I think it misses the mark and does indeed just screw some folks over. Sometimes they get it right, but rarely, assuming that their goal is to indeed test deeper learning as opposed to merely lowering grades.

Also, keep in mind, when I reference biology, I likely have Singleton stuck in my head, I keep forgetting about the others which actually do not seem that tough and certainly have less problem solving than general chemistry. Either way, what I say about doubling up still stands. I would not do it without at minimum, exposure to AP/IB or strong honors versions (as in strong enough to maybe make it possible for a student to take an AP and score about a 3) of both. A lack of experience and exposure to the content plus those “tricks” that teachers throw is a recipe for disaster if you are taking both.

Did your daughters take the summer classes at Vandy or a hometown school? Wondering from which schools Vandy will allow transfer credits. We are actually in Nashville, but I don’t know if the price of a summer class at Vandy is worth it if she can take it somewhere else using her TN hope summer $$ (CC or public U).

@bernie12 does Vanderbilt follow that math based memorization in gen chem resulting in difficulty in o chem trend?

@swimmom2020 I don’t think any college works. Vanderbilt advises you to check in with them before registering for a summer course to make sure the credit will be accepted.

I have never taken a summer course (someone should confirm because this is based on what I have heard from others), but I don’t believe you get a grade for your summer course, meaning you will get the credits but no grade on your transcript. Not sure how this plays into med school because most med schools want a grade attached to the credits that fulfill their basic requirements (although you could take an upper level course).

You could do something along the lines of taking a course (and not using the credits) and then retaking during the year. A lot of people find the 2nd look helpful.

@Suffer: No, depending on who you take, Vanderbilt in ochem seems mostly about details (memorization of reactions and general concepts taught in lectures) and lesser so problem solving and/or jumping through hurdles to solve the problem. This means that most of the exams I have seen require you to be knowledgeable and alert more so than clever/creative which means that most should have a reasonable chance at success without overextending themselves. You can be tricked or forget a key detail otherwise (this is especially for the “predict the product” class of problems. I’ve seen some slick stuff there. They’ll try to provide with a starting reagent that looks much more complicated than ones you’ve seen to throw you off and ensure that you understand regio-chemistry/selectivity of the reagents it is being treated with). I’ve heard that Sulikowski’s section has more problem solving than the others, but I don’t know what that means…as in to what extent her class is different. I would imagine she would be what I consider the “middle tier” instructors back at my school the way folks describe her. It’s more challenging but not extreme, and problems aren’t seemingly random/over the head of like 1/2-more of the students. She has pretty high averages according to a friend. However, like most of them, usually gives one “bad” (low mean) exam.

@Bernie12 not sure what you mean by “Vanderbilt ochem seems mostly about details,” and what your vision of a problem-solving based Ochem exam looks like.

A fair portion of exams are synthesis, which are definitely “problem solving.” Would argue that mechanisms also require problem solving, particularly when they aren’t exact replicas of mechanisms you’ve seen in lecture. I’d say these two are where students struggle the most. Studying flash cards that are A->B are only so helpful when the problem is A–>?—>?—>?—>?—>G. There are other problem solving questions, like ranking a series of compounds or reactions based on some criteria. Some questions have two reactions in series and leave out multiple pieces of information (eg. provide the intermediate and the second set of reagents that would get you to the end result). Simple memorization will not solve these problems.

The rest of the exams are mostly based in memorization. Ochem in general is difficult because you need to memorize a high volume of information with a high degree of detail. Slight changes in a molecule or reagent system could yield a different product. Sometimes there are multiple possible products and you need to know what’s preferred. Potential products usually look very similar, with a functional group just in a slightly different location or conformation. These are the kind of things that make Ochem difficult everywhere.