Would My AP credit fulfill my G.E. electives?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Santa Barbara
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<p>My major will be chem. E for UCSB. I am a prospective freshmen and if I am lucky to get accepted, would my AP credits for biology (3), world history (3), us history (4), chemistry (3), literature (3) fulfill most of my general education electives? Even if past my freshman year at the school? Also, I'm taking AP art history, language, and calculus this year. Which ones should I focus on and which scores should I try to obtain for each of the AP tests?</p>

<p>Curriculum:
<a href="http://www.chemengr.ucsb.edu/undergraduate/curriculum.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.chemengr.ucsb.edu/undergraduate/curriculum.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>be sure to reference the requirements for your year of matriculation since it changes every year: <a href=“http://engineering.ucsb.edu/current_undergraduates/pdf/GEAR-11-12.pdf[/url]”>http://engineering.ucsb.edu/current_undergraduates/pdf/GEAR-11-12.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>though, it won’t vary much for GEs</p>

<p>APUSH would fulfill a univ. requirement of American History
and that’s about it i think</p>

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<p>:(, so the rest of my five AP’s aren’t worth anything then. Do you know of the best GEs to take for my major? Or does it not count?</p>

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<p>APs are good for admission, it shows you are taking challenging classes.
and I may be wrong about other GEs they fulfill, APUSH is just off the top of my head.</p>

<p>not sure what you mean by ‘best GEs to take for your major?’…GEs are college (College of Engr.) and university requirements</p>

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<p>Well, I have to pick some classes from D,E,F, and G courses right? And there’s like 50 of them for each section.</p>

<p>Also, I’m starting to regret having taken so many AP classes. There was major grade deflation in some of my classes which I could’ve avoided.</p>

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<p>OK, LET’S LOOK AT WHAT YOUR AP’S DID FOR YO (College of Engineering) GENERAL ED::</p>

<ol>
<li>Refer to page 7 in this [url=<a href=“http://engineering.ucsb.edu/current_...GEAR-11-12.pdf]PDF[/url”>http://engineering.ucsb.edu/current_...GEAR-11-12.pdf]PDF[/url</a>] to see what gen ed classes your AP’s fullfill. (Link aforementioned by Keltix.)</li>
</ol>

<hr>

<p>Dummy version (I have too much free time at the moment):</p>

<p>You said you passed the following AP tests:
[ul][<em>]Bio (3)
[</em>]Chem (3)
[<em>]World History (3)
[</em>]US History (4)
[li]Lit (3)[/li][/ul]</p>

<p>Let’s look at what those tests did for yo general ed:
[ul][<em>]Your 3 in AP Lit fulfills the UC Entry level Writing Requirement & spares you from having to take Writing 1.
[</em>]You’re taking AP (English) Language this year, right? Aim for a goddamn 5. Get a 5? You’ve just completely finished your Writing requirements even before you set foot on UCSB & knocked off two gen ed classes.
[<em>]Your 4 in APUSH fulfills the American History and Institutions Requirement. Meaning: Exempt from taking an American History class for GE, and you knocked off one class in Area D.
[</em>]Your AP Bio & AP Chem tests does nothing for your GE (Fulfilling Area C ONLY applies to Letters & Science kids.) Sorry.
[li]Your AP World History does nothing for your gen ed. Sorry.[/ul] </p>[/li]
<p>By passing Lit and US History, you’ve already completed 1 of 8 GE classes and spared yourself from from the UC Entry Level Writing Exam. </p>

<hr>

<p>

</p>

<p>Aim for these scores:
[ul][<em>]AP Art History: minimum score 3 (knocks off one more gen ed class.)
[</em>]AP English Language: If a 3: Does absolutely nothing. If a 4: knocks off Writ 2. If a 5: knocks of Writ 2 and Writ 50, thus completing your entire Writing requirement for UCSB.
[li]----->Ideally, aim for a 5 in AP Lang.[/li][li]Calculus: (Is it Calculus AB or BC?) Students at College of Engineering have no Area C (math, science) general ed to fulfill, so passing calculus does nothing for your GE’s. [/ul]</p>[/li]
<p>If you so desire to complete as many GE requirements (for college of engineering) as you can possibly do before going to UCSB, these would be a rough priority list you should follow: </p>

<ol>
<li>AP Language (score 4/5 or bust.) </li>
<li>Art History (you only need a 3)</li>
<li>Calc (last priority, but the Calc concepts itself will lay the foundation to your journey in the scientific field.) </li>
</ol>

<hr>

<p>You think you passed Chem, Bio, and Calc in vain? YOU ARE WRONG. </p>

<p>All AP’s you passed counts as units towards your graduation. </p>

<p>You passed Chem, Bio, Lit, APUSH, and World History? That’s 40 units you’ve earned yourself. (I think that means you come into UCSB as a sophomore.) </p>

<p>You pass Language (please aim for 4/5), Art History, and Calc (AB)? That’s 60 units you’ve earned yourself, meaning you enter UCSB as a junior! (I think.) </p>

<p>Benefits of junior level standing (should you achieve it) are:
[ul][<em>]Bragging rights.
[</em>]Ability to take classes upper-division-only classes.
[<em>]Earlier passtime for you when choosing classes for next quarter<a href=“Not%20lying.%20With%20class%20space%20dwindling,%20it%20helps%20to%20be%20able%20to%20have%20your%20first%20pick%20of%20classes%20earlier%20than%20half%20the%20school.%20.%20.”>/u</a>
[</em>]More bragging rights.
[li]And yada-yada-yada. . . [/ul]</p>[/li]
<hr>

<p>But really, you shouldn’t be worrying about GE’s now. Worry about passing your AP’s first; your advisor at orientation (should you be admitted) will go over this GE bs. </p>

<p>If anyone finds a mistake in my post, please correct it.</p>

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<p>Thank you so much hairy lemon for your insightful post!</p>

<p>Also, I’m required to take Math 3A and Math 3B right? Shouldn’t my AP credit from AP calc. BC fulfill those two if I do pass the test?</p>

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<p>i got a 5 on the Calc AB and they let me petition for skipping math 3a and 3b in the ME department a couple of years ago. now im trying to get this transferred since i switched to EE; lets see how it goes</p>

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<p>

</p>

<p>I missed that part. oops. </p>

<p>It should fulfill those requirements. Per keltix’s post:

should you get a 5 in Calc BC, you should be able to successfully petition to skip Math 3a & 3b. </p>

<hr>

<p>Imo, shift your priorities for AP testing to: </p>

<ol>
<li>Calc BC (get a head start in your major & avoid the big lecture class sizes of 3a/b.)</li>
<li>Language (Writ 2/50 are fairly easy GE’s should you fail on your bid to earn a 5.)</li>
<li>Art History (only need to score a 3 yo.)</li>
</ol>

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<p>I think in order to be a junior you need 90 units.</p>

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<p>it doesn’t matter what score you get as long as you get above a 3. Shoot for a 5 on English AP because then you get out of all writing requirement. You have less general ed than the letters of arts and sciences, but you will probably have to take art and literature electives which most people do not fulfill in hs.</p>

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<p>It does matter what score you get…</p>

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<p>Generally, how big are the writ 2/50 and calc. 1/2 classes?</p>

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<p>writ 1/2/50 are not big (25 students) but they are hugely impacted. there are dozens offered and they fill up super fast. crashing is near impossible.</p>

<p>i’m not sure about the math 3a/3b classes’ difficulty but i would prefer to take a year class in HS to learn it right, rather than try to squeeze it into 10 weeks. they are usually comprised of 100-300 students, depending on the quarter.</p>

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<p>What do students do when they can’t take a required class like writing? Do they take it in another quarter?</p>

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<p>

</p>

<p>Yea. They take it another quarter. </p>

<p>Six quarters has passed for me, and I have yet to fulfill my Writ 2 requirement. </p>

<p>EFF</p>

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<p>I don’t know how much math you need for Chem E, but I passed Calc AB/BC with 5s and let me tell you, Math 3C sucks ass. It didn’t do me any good personally to get ahead in math and my roommate is a mechanical engineering major and took 3A last quarter so passing calc does you no good unless you love matrices and vector spaces.</p>

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<p>I hate to bring up an old thread, but approximately how much money would I save by passing all my AP tests?</p>

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<p>Tuition per year is $12,508 (set by the state). For every year, you take about 16 x 3 = 48 units. So, per unit, the cost is around $261 ($260.583333…). Each class is about four units, so multiply that by four and you get $1044 per class (does that sound right?).
Well… $87 to pass a test vs. $1,044 to pass a class… I’d say it’s worth it.</p>

<p>For some reason, the $$$ per class seems too high. Please correct me if my calculations are wrong.</p>

<p>EDIT: But I have a predicament as well. I took (and passed) AP Calculus BC my junior year, and have virtually forgotten a good lot of it (I don’t remember specifics). Should I retake Math 3A and 3B (or just 3B) or should I jump into the waters and skip it?</p>

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<p>you can’t retake 3a or 3b. the university won’t let you. If you passed the bc test, you are mandated to go into Math 3C.</p>