Thread: Do some colleges only require 4 courses per semester?

  1. #1
    CIS and business major
    Join Date
    Aug 2002
    Posts
    287

    Do some colleges only require 4 courses per semester?

    http://www.bu.edu/econ/ugrad/ba/index.html
    http://www.cs.bu.edu/ugradprogram/degreereqs.html#major

    I was looking at some of the majors at Boston University, economics and computer science. I noticed they only require students to take 32 courses to complete their bachelor's degree. Which of course is only 4 classes per semester over 4 years.

    Are a lot of colleges like this?

  2. #2
    'AlHamdulillah
    Join Date
    Feb 2003
    Posts
    790
    well, they might be 4 credit courses, which seems about right if that's the case. if it were 3 credit courses though, there is no way i would believe that a college would let you by with only 12 credits a semester and have you grad. in 4 years.

  3. #3
    Still A Registered User DISGUISED's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Posts
    499
    Isn't 12 credit hours the cutoff for full time student status as far as the federal goverment is concerned? I can't remember, it's been a while since I was in school full time. I never had less that 18 credit hours the entire time I was in school

  4. #4
    Registered User CompiledMonkey's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2002
    Location
    Richmond, VA
    Posts
    438
    You are a full time student if you take 12 credits a semester, yes. But most undergraduate programs require at least 120 credits to graduate.

  5. #5
    & the hat of GPL slaying Thantos's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2001
    Posts
    5,681
    Thats why it takes most people 5 years to complete their undergrad work instead of 4.

    For the next three years I'm taking 12 or 13 units a semister just to complete JC. It would be very hard to add another class every semestier and still maintain some level of sanity.

    Also remember that most classes require approx 2 hours of self study for every hour of lecture (bleh)

  6. #6
    'AlHamdulillah
    Join Date
    Feb 2003
    Posts
    790
    well i ran fine with 16 hours this semester, and im registered for 18 hours this spring semester, and i dont think I will have that much trouble with that(some would argue i am slightly insane anyway, which i would agree with).

  7. #7
    & the hat of GPL slaying Thantos's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2001
    Posts
    5,681
    Are you also trying to work full time EvBladeRunnervE?

  8. #8
    Administrator webmaster's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Posts
    1,012
    At Harvard, students are required to have only 32 semester classes to graduate. On the other hand, the classes are generally the equivalent of 4 credit hours per week, although this varies from class to class. (Many classes meet only 3 hours a week.) But the amount of work is not necessarily proportional to the number of hours a week that a class meets. (Ask any freshman who has taken expository writing, which meets two hours a week, but requires more work than most classes freshmen are taking.) And of course, there are the infamous math 25 and 55, which meet for 3 hours per week but have 20-30 hour a week problem sets. ("Boot camp for math concentrators.")

  9. #9
    Registered User
    Join Date
    May 2003
    Posts
    1,619
    I took 40 courses as an undergrad, but some of them didn't actually count towards my major, and that 40 also takes into account 1 credit lab courses and stuff.
    You ever try a pink golf ball, Wally? Why, the wind shear on a pink ball alone can take the head clean off a 90 pound midget at 300 yards.

  10. #10
    5|-|1+|-|34|) ober's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Posts
    4,429
    It all depends on the school. I took 40 or 42 classes or something like that to graduate (173 credits). You had to take 16 credits to be considered full time at my school. (but I think 12 is the cutoff for most schools). But I was also taking 5 and 6 classes/semester. The most I took in one semester was 21 credits which was 6 classes (3 credits/class) and 3 labs(1 credit/class). However, I only worked part-time as a softball umpire during that time, so I had a lot of time to study.

    Also, since then, the school has gone to all 4-credit classes, so like my last couple semesters were pretty much 20-credit semesters.

Popular pages Recent additions subscribe to a feed

Similar Threads

  1. You've heard of finals week crunch (or maybe not) but how about ...
    By Jeremy G in forum A Brief History of Cprogramming.com
    Replies: 17
    Last Post: 01-18-2005, 06:59 PM
  2. what physics courses
    By EvBladeRunnervE in forum A Brief History of Cprogramming.com
    Replies: 1
    Last Post: 10-22-2003, 12:19 PM
  3. wonderin' bout colleges....
    By jverkoey in forum A Brief History of Cprogramming.com
    Replies: 23
    Last Post: 03-18-2003, 01:40 PM
  4. What is Computer Science like?
    By Shadow12345 in forum A Brief History of Cprogramming.com
    Replies: 13
    Last Post: 09-08-2002, 11:59 AM
  5. Colleges
    By aresashura in forum A Brief History of Cprogramming.com
    Replies: 0
    Last Post: 11-22-2001, 05:46 PM