<p>^ Should I be worried about this? I'm at a local 4 year college right now completing my A.A. in physics and I was looking at the BS program for physics at FIU ( the university I'm planning on transferring to ) and they do not require anything higher than ODE's. Is this a red flag? My goal is either to go off to graduate school to pursue a Ph.D. in physics or math, so I would like to at least get into a decent program.</p>
<p>I don’t think so. ODE is required for a BS. If you are planning to go beyond that, it is up to you to see what additional classes would be helpful. I am sure your physics professors can advise you.</p>
<p>Just to point out…it’s Ordinary Differential Equations. Not original. ;)</p>
<p>This isn’t unusual. Most schools only require physics majors to take up to ODE. Most also require linear algebra. Many of them will have a course, or perhaps a two semester sequence on mathematics for physicists which covers the pertinent areas of a ton of different areas of mathematics as they pertain directly to physics. Many schools require this course for the major, and many others list it as a strongly suggested elective. I’m a physics major, and I can assure you that it would be wise to take such a course. Minoring in math is another good option, especially if you plan to go on to grad school for physics. That said, be aware that a great deal of upper level math is entirely irrelevant to physics. There’s a lot that is quite relevant though too. </p>
<p>lol oops that’s what I meant to put. Sometimes when I’m typing stuff up my brain just goes into autopilot and I’ll write some nonsense. Anyways, thanks for the clarification. I was just alarmed by this because I know higher level physics require a wide variety of math, such as partial differential equations, differential geometry, and even topology in some cases. I’m mostly interested in the theoretical side of physics, so that’s why this kinda caught me off guard. I like doing math, so I’m most likely going to be taking a bunch of courses that really aren’t that useful to physics anyways. I was worried though that this was somehow indicative of how good the school’s program is.</p>
<p>You will get a lot of mathematics in your physics courses and often physics programs have a mathematical methods course that is a requirement. Our program at Illinois Tech, has a requirement of two mathematics electives beyond ODE. This is more than enough to get into a graduate program in physics although many physics majors take extra mathematics courses.</p>
<p>You’re right that a lot of branches of physics require math such as topology, partial differential equations, differential geometry etc., but the parts that are used from each respective topic are kind of limited in scope. Differential geometry is very relevant to General Relativity, but there’s also a ton of stuff in a differential geometry course that is completely irrelevant to doing General Relativity. Ditto for PDE and topology. Probability has a lot of usefulness in physics (particularly in quantum mechanics), but there is also a ton of stuff that you’d learn in a probability course that has nothing to do with what you’d use in physics. </p>
<p>If you like math purely for its own sake, on top of its usefulness in physics, then taking some extra math courses or a math minor is definitely a good thing. Having a deeper understanding of various types of mathematics is a beneficial skill for a physicist. But you shouldn’t feel as though you absolutely HAVE to take all of those courses. A mathematical methods for physicists course/sequence will cover aspects of partial differential equations, topology, differential/non-Euclidean geometries, probability etc. as they directly pertain to physics, and will do so in a more applied sense. They leave out a lot of the pure mathematical theory and rigorous proof writing that would be encountered in the actual math courses. </p>
<p>I love math purely for its own sake, as well as its applicability to physics. So the best option for me was to major in physics with a math minor. I am gearing most of my math courses toward courses that are relevant to physics, but I’m also taking a couple of math courses that are really just pure math courses like abstract algebra and real analysis. </p>