My son is looking for some guidance with regard to upper level ChE classes. He is looking at doing the double major with chemistry and is curious if there are any courses that will sneak up on him? Courses that would be best taken with 15 hours instead of 18. And possibly any, “DON’T take these two classes together!” That kind of thing.
DS is a current ChE and Bio major. Will email him to see if he has any input to this. Cant say how quickly he will get back to me but hopefully within a day or two.
@2015pop - I received a reply from DS.
That’s the kind of thing that differs person-to-person. I would at least suggest putting Physical Chem I into an easier semester and trying to spread the 300 level CHE classes out so there isn’t too much bad math in a single semester. Also TAKE SUMMER LAB DURING THE SUMMER! That’s about all I got.
Hope this helps. If not, feel free to PM me and I will see what I can do to help.
Helps a lot, thanks!
I didn’t do the chem major or minor, so I can’t give any really specific advice. I would say, number one, spread out labs. Ideally he should try to not take two in the same semester. Not only are the reports and long hours in lab difficult, but it can also cause problems if you were counting on taking certain classes during certain semesters, and it turns out that lab times conflict. I agree that it’s a good idea to take summer lab in the summer, which is what I did. The second semester lab sounds especially brutal.
I’m not sure I would say that there is a single most difficult upper level ChE course, though the second semester lab does seem to be a big time sink. Many of the 400-level classes are not bad at all (health & safety, polymers, biochemical engineering…) Hope that helps.
The summer lab is very expensive for OOS students so unless you’re NMF with the extra paid tuition semesters, another alternative is to do the summer abroad for the lab…I think some found it to be cheaper or the same price.
If cost is an issue, then take the “summer lab” during the regular school year.
Another drawback for the summer lab is that it is grueling. My son’s summer lab would start at 8am and continue till 10 pm five days a week. Saturdays was a “half day” and Sundays were spent with write up and preparing for Mondays.
Since the lab is done the summer after junior year, it was also the summer S was applying to med schools. Not being able to work on his app until July made his submission later than he wanted. He had gone to Costa Rica (with the Honors College) in May so he couldn’t work on it then.