1.For pre-med students, will any of the R&C classes count (such as Classics R44 or Italian R5A) towards the 1 year requirement of english for med-schools? Or does it have to be a class offered through the English department like English R1A?
2.If I test out of both the R&C requirements (with a 5 on AP Lit), what other classes besides R&C can I take to fulfill the 1 year requirement of english for medical schools? Or, If I want to be premed, should I choose not to test out of R&C and instead use the R&C classes to fulfill the 1 year requirement?
tldr: In other words, if I pass out of R&C, would it be more beneficial to still take one year of R&C or instead take other english classes like English 45 (which would simultaneously satisfy the Arts and Literature Breadth).
Thank you. I have already read this from the FAQ page, but was hoping for some personal advice. They say taking R&C is the safest bet, but I was wondering if anyone didn’t go this route and if skipping R&C if possible is better. @ucbalumnus
Note that you need not commit now to skipping or retaking R&C course(s). You may want to talk to pre-med advisors about which upper level English, Rhetoric, Comparative Literature, and College Writing courses would be accepted by medical schools for their English composition requirements, then make your decision in a later semester if you are still pre-med by then. Some of these courses could be specifically useful, such as:
College Writing 106 “Intermediate Composition: Argument in the Disciplines”
College Writing 161 “Writing in the Biological Sciences”
Rhetoric 107 “Rhetoric of Scientific Discourse”
Rhetoric 145 “Science, Narrative, and Image”
@ucbalumnus Alright, thank you for your help. I think I will take a history course for breadth requirements this upcoming semester and figure what I’ll do for English next semester or later semesters.
@cottonball18
The premed advisors say that you can take anything in the Rhetoric, English or Comparative Literature departments and it’ll count for med schools.
Personally I tested out of R1 and I hate writing so I plan on re-taking English at community college over the summer or just applying to medical schools that don’t require English.
The benefits of taking R1 is that you are not taking a class, which is curved, filled with actual English majors. R1 you have an advantage that might help with your grade.
@Walter924 ok thanks. So R&C classes aren’t curved like other English classes? And I will probably end up taking English just to be safe for med schools so I will most likely take R&C. If only AP credits counted…
http://www.berkeleytime.com can show grade distributions of various courses, whether formally curved or not.
R&C courses presumably are not formally be curved, but are graded based on the instructor’s opinion of the quality of your writing. Probably upper level writing courses are similar in this respect.
@cottonball18
So curves sometimes aren’t specifically stated, but instructors still like to keep around a B average, A- if you’re lucky. With R1A you’re in a class with freshmen, who are probably not English majors, so your writing has comparatively better quality than if you are taking a class full of English majors who are great writers. If you could have been an English major in another life, you might still do well in a real English class. Berkeley has a lot to do with knowing your strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes, you can’t compete, but other times, if you put enough work into the class, you can do better than you expected. If you think that you can pull it off and that you’d enjoy it, take a class that’s not what you normally take. I got an A- in upper division Theater 125 History of Celebrity my first semester (I’m a Bio/Econ major), but I also straight out pass/no passed Peace and Conflict 100 and Theater in American Culture 25AC because I generally get C- on Berkeley on demand essays. I’ve always known on demand essays where I don’t know the rubric or it’s vague aren’t my strong suit.
@Walter924 yeah, that makes sense. If if I pass out of R&C, I think I will ultimately take R&C rather than English classes for English majors. Just curious, why did you take so many Theater type classes (especially the upper division one freshman year)? Did you also take stem classes first semester? Honestly, double majoring sounds pretty difficult. I’m taking Math 10a and Chem 1a for sure, it’s just my third class I’m not too sure about.
@cottonball18
I like watching plays. I thought an important part of college was taking random classes. They covered important breadths. I’m double majoring so I’m limited in my extra classes. I got confused on the enrollment time since mine was 12:00 and I thought it was a default so I ended up registering at 4:00 after work and all of my classes got filled up so I freaked out for 4 hours but my classes kept disappearing. I gave up and enrolled in what I could but was on a waitlist for both upper division classes. I waited it out and got in. They were a lot of reading but interesting and not too stressful. Math 1B filled up when I was trying to get in, but I looked at it again a few weeks later and there was one open seat, which I took.
First semester: Chem 1A, Chem 1AL, Theater 125 Celebrity (History), PACS 100 (Philosophy), Math 1B.
I wanted to get into Stats 20, or L&S 40C which had something to do with Hollywood. I had a lot of alternate classes but they all filled up too.
Double majoring isn’t bad because all of the classes that I’m taking are in subjects that I’m pretty good at. My PoliSci roommate (thinking about switching majors) takes a lot of random classes to get out of taking Friday classes. I think that’s less effective and riskier. I think one of my friends took Dutch as a grade booster but it turned out it was the class he did the worst in. Plus I have all 3.5 years planned out which gives me a solid semester buffer if I fail any classes or switch majors.
Second semester: Theater 25AC (Arts and Literature, AC), Bio 1B, Physics 8A, Econ 1
Third Semester hopefully: Stat 20, Bio 1A/L, Chem 3A/L, Physics 8B. We’ll see how that goes, but at least no more essays or a whole lot of reading. Some math homework and a lot of memorization.