<p>I would like to come as fully prepared to Tech as possible. I know that Tech presents one of the most rigorous college curriculums in the nation if not in the world, so I want to be fully prepared to tackle it. I'm curious of your opinions if you would not mind sharing. </p>
<p>Should I buy the textbooks beforehand, read through them and do the problems to get background knowledge on what to expect?</p>
<p>Should I completely neglect doing any work? This one's out of the question, but I'd like to hear your opinions.</p>
<p>Any other tips? Please share your first year experience. </p>
<p>Do something you find personally enriching. I don't think a summer self-studying is really going to make a huge difference the first quarter or two since you'll be graded pass/fail anyway.</p>
<p>But third quarter and onward aren't based on pass/fail. Past Techers, share your experience. What did you do over the summer before attending Tech?</p>
<p>Let's see, over the summer before i came to Caltech, i got a copy of Apostol, and started preparing for the Ma1a. After the first week of classes, I realized it was a complete waste of time. </p>
<p>So, my advice would be, take your time and relax as much a you can over the summer. Go visit things, go to Bahamas - I don't know. But don't waste your time trying to prepare for the curriculum. Most likely, it won't help you, and you'll have plenty of opportunities to work you behind off in the next 4 years, trust me :)</p>
<p>And as for grades, you should take advantage of the first two terms on pass/fail to develop work ethic that will allow you to survive later on.</p>
<p>The best preparation for Caltech is to.... not prepare. Seriously. You have 2 terms of pass-fail, which you use to acclimate to the academic intensity. You need to adjust to taking on a term with no prior preparation, because that's what it's going to be like on grades.</p>
<p>My summer year before Tech, I worked as a temp doing data entry and some database stuff for a company that manages and orders for college bookstores. I also hung out with my friends a lot, played a lot of volleyball, and played a lot of video games. I went on a week long worktrip with my church youth group fixing up houses for low income families. I also went on a weekend road trip with several friends to Cedar Point, which was probably the single most fun experience of my life.</p>
<p>It's a summer with no obligations, other than making a little money. Enjoy it.</p>
<p>I totally agree with everyone here, and want to emphasize that if you're graded pass/fail for a duration, you should come in ready to really test the waters there. Think about it -- if you develop lots of energy over summer, you're much better prepared to do a good test run.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Should I buy the textbooks beforehand, read through them and do the problems to get background knowledge on what to expect?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>NO! That's a great way to burn out. When you get here, you're going to be working all the time. Why start over the summer? You'll just get sick of it faster and end up bitter and overworked. Seriously, this could possibly be your last free summer. Enjoy it. You've got the rest of your life to work all summer.</p>
<p>Thanks for the opinions all! They were really helpful. I'm definitely going to enjoy my summer having fun. Forget the books! </p>
<p>I was afraid my skills would get rusty, but seeing that the placement exams come early during summer, I won't have everything forgotten when I take them. </p>
<p>I just hope I'll be able to snap back into action once school starts because I'll probably forget > 50% of what I learned if I don't review at all.</p>
<p>@fizix2 and @Dauntless9 --> I've made up my mind thanks to you guys. =) I'm planning to work full time over the summer at a lab and go on a family vacation trip sometime in between. My research mentor is confident that we'll get a paper published this summer. Hopefully, this will facilitate my ability to get research opportunities at Tech. </p>
<p>@Hriundeli --> It's surprising that your preparation of Math 1a amounted to nothing... Was it because you never got that far, the hw assigned required thinking and the book only presented the basics, or the profs already went beyond everything you prepared over the summer during the first week? I'm just really curious. That's all.</p>
<p>@IMSAgeek --> How many hours of sleep do you get on average? By busy, do you mean stressed out busy because it's hard to keep up or because there's so much work to do in a short amount of time (a quarter/term is SO short and you're expected to take classes that normally take 3-4x as long in high school) or both? Do you do homework constantly from the time you wake up, through your meals, to the time you go to bed? </p>
<p>Are exams doable? I know there's a collaboration policy, but it doesn't seem very ethical or fair to allow students this advantage for take home exams unless there is a part of the honor policy that I missed. Are there ever in class exams since most but not all exams are take home.</p>
<p>Thanks for the help once more, you guys! Keep me updated!</p>
<p>Whatever bit I learned over the Summer was almost completely forgotten over Frosh Camp and Rotation, and whatever remained - well, it was all pretty much covered within first two weeks. Besides, since I hadn't had any exposure to proofs before coming here, the textbook problems that I did over the Summer were done with not enough rigor, so my first Ma1a problem set was....pretty horrible as you might imagine :) </p>
<p>But I survived, and so will you :)
You have to understand that here, it is impossible to learn just from your books; you need to learn from your professors and from your peers, as well, in order to get full advantage of what Caltech has to offer.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Whether or not exams are doable depends on the person, depends on the class, and depends on the professor that is currently teaching that class. There are tests that average ~95% and there are tests that average ~35%</p>
<p>You are not allowed to collaborate on exams, and professors usually trust us to follow the instructions on the test, such as open or closed book, open or closed notes, whether you are allowed to use calculators or not - that sort of stuff. </p>
<p>I've heard that there are indeed in-class exams (not quizes), but I've never encountered one.</p>
<p>I had one in-class exam, but due to Caltech's rules he wasn't allowed to proctor it. The TA would distribute the test at the start, drop in halfway and ask if there's any questions, and then show up at the end to collect them. The final was the more traditional take-home style, though.</p>
<p>My son didnt prep last summer, but he did spend quite a bit of time taking the placment exams. He did review some of the materials before taking the tests, and then later studied to test out of Math1abc.</p>
<p>I don't think you need any academic preparation over the summer. You have two terms of pass/fail to remedy any deficiencies. I think you should either find something exciting and non-academic that you actually enjoy doing, or just spend the summer relaxing, hanging out with friends and having fun. There's a lot to be said for taking some time to do nothing. Also, what would you hope to gain by memorizing proofs? Caltech wants you to be able to write proofs as a way of training you to think, not because there's some canon of proofs that everyone needs to be able to reproduce by rote.</p>
<p>seriously, don't memorize proofs, if you really want to prepare for math 1a take a hard math class over the summer to train your ability to think (abstract algebra helped me a lot, even though i didn't end up finishing the class)</p>
<p>Well said. I will listen, and more importantly, I will not fear any challenge that may come my way at Tech. I really look forward to meeting you guys, who will not have graduated, at Tech this fall semester. You seem like really interesting people.</p>
<p>If you are planning to go to grad school, this is one of your last summers before you will be worked hardcore. Enjoy it. </p>
<p>Seriously. I cannot stress this enough. This summer and summer of freshman year are the two summers that you have to yourself. If you want to do labwork, that's great. But keep in mind that sophmore summer onward, if you want to be serious about grad school at Tech- usually involves getting serious in a lab.</p>