<p>Why make life harder by skipping out of intro courses and taking harder classes? If you don't intend to graduate early or double major, why do it? Do grad schools care?</p>
<p>are you talking about freshmen year, or college just in general?</p>
<p>yeah he's talking about freshman year. I want to know too. And why would you do it if you are double majoring? What are the positives about it?</p>
<p>I don't know if grad schools care, can't help there. But my youngest is skipping out of everything he can (and did in K-12 as well) for these reasons: 1. loves to be challenged in school 2. wants to get core classes out of the way so he can take classes he's interested in 3. wants to double major and do it in a reasonable amount of time 4. wants to travel abroad for school for a semester and still get done with school in a reasonable amount of time 5. by skipping where possible he hopes to have free hours as a senior to concentrate on interests 6. by taking advanced/honors classes hopes to learn a lot and the honors distinction on the diploma is a plus.</p>
<p>If you are content to simply "get your degree" and want to have a more free time than others in college, then challenging yourself or doubling up is not in the cards for you. But if you thrive and challenge and enjoy pushing yourself, higher level classes can help with that. You have to decide what type of college lifestyle will be right for you.</p>
<p>Rbase07: Some double major to make more money in a field once graduated others do it for "fun" or because they have a strong interest in more than just one area.</p>
<p>The only difference that I saw between the advanced courses at my university were that they went deeper into material (thus forcing them to move at a quicker pace) than the regular courses did and filled up a lot slower (thus causing some people to get pigeon-holed into it when the other sections filled up). </p>
<p>As far as graduate schools go, I don't think having/not having the advanced courses on your transcript will make a significant difference with being accepted. If you can spend the time you'll save developing your contacts within the department (for references later on) and beefing up your extracurriculars, I would think you'd be better off NOT taking advanced classes. Then again, I think it also depends on the programs you're applying to.</p>
<p>Although I'm just an undergrad, I've heard that for grad school the courses you take are almost or more important than your GPA (probably similar to the high school graduate applying to colleges --> do they want someone who makes B's in APs or just aced the most standard courses?).</p>
<p>I would guess that it would greatly depend on the program that you're coming out of (engineering vs. business vs. LAS etc.) and which you're trying to get into, ya know? For me, the courses that had advanced/honors sections available were at the freshman/sophomore levels with only a few that were applicable to my major. For me, coming from a school that doesn't have one of the top programs and trying to get into a grad program that does, I ended up relying a lot more on my reference letters, personal statement, and EC's than I did on my transcript/GPA.</p>
<p>what about...dare I say it...to learn more</p>
<p>i<em>wanna</em>be_Brown says "what about...dare I say it...to learn more" and I say EXACTLY! :)</p>
<p>Another good thing about having the GE requirements out of the way at a lot of schools through AP, etc. is that you will be able to pick and choose interesting courses outside your major and take them pass/fail even if you dont want to do a double major. Basically, it give you a lot of flexibility and allows you to almost design your own core curriculum without jeopardizing your GPA if you for some reason get in a time crunch and have to favor your major coursework over the extras. Some schools also apparently make their GE core courses unreasonably demanding as a way of taking back scholarship money and separating the wheat from the chaff, so its good to have them out of the way. At a lot of schools, the GE courses are also taught by grad students or bored professors who'd rather be doing something else and it gets you out of having to deal with them - not to mention the 300+ seat auditoriums in which such courses tend to be taught.</p>
<p>most non-GE courses, then, are in much smaller numbers? dare I say under 100?</p>
<p>Advanced courses are a much more interesting than the general requirements, even if they are harder. Taking advanced courses earlier will free up time in your schedule for even more advanced classes... even graduate-level classes, if your school allows. Taking more advanced classes can have a lot of ripple effects which would positively affect a graduate school applications, such as meeting a professor in a small upper-level class whose lab you end up working in, or something along those lines.</p>
<p>I vote for skipping out of anything you feel comfortable skipping out of (ie don't AP out of intro biology if you're going to be a biology major and crammed for the AP exam and remember nothing).</p>
<p>Umm...Money</p>