Ask a Student - Academics

Sly Si · 03-31-2009, 02:23 PM

With decisions about to come out, some of you will undoubtedly have some questions for us current students pretty soon. Feel free to ask any academic questions you have here, and we'll answer them as best we can. For questions related to other aspects of student life, there's another thread.

Senior0991 · 04-01-2009, 06:56 PM

How hard are classes? Are there people who are admitted and give a lot of effort but still don't do well? I'm asking because I know I am not as qualified as the majority of other admits and I am a bit worried that I won't be able to handle the material, especially outside the science and math realm.

shayonsaleh · 04-01-2009, 07:08 PM

How are introductory foreign language classes? Are they very hard? I've been taking Spanish in high school, but I kind of want to try a different foreign language.

gregh313 · 04-01-2009, 07:17 PM

Does grade inflation (outside of the math/science/engineering realm) exist at Stanford? Does grade deflation exist? How bad are the curves?

dpattzlover · 04-01-2009, 08:00 PM

Can undergrads double major?

Sly Si · 04-01-2009, 09:08 PM

Senior0991: Are you sure you're not as qualified as other admits? I think you underestimate yourself. You'll do fine.

shayonsaleh: I don't know about difficulty, but they are a lot of work. You'll have class every day and homework every day.

gregh313: As a math student, I can't help you much. My English-major friends have told me that English classes are extremely easy to get A's in, but that's about all I know.

dpattzlover: Yes, but some double majors are (logistically) harder to do than others. What did you have in mind?

superwizard · 04-02-2009, 06:33 AM

gragh313: yes there definitely is grade inflation even in the techie classes. I would guess that the average grade of a class is usually ~ a B+ or an A- and only a few Cs are given out in most (not all just most) classes.

dpattzlover · 04-02-2009, 08:47 AM

I'm not totally sure yet, but I was thinking of combing something related to health services (perhaps pre-med) with international relations, but I don't know if those are too unrelated to combine..... is it easier to minor in something that's a bit more random like that?

Sly Si · 04-02-2009, 11:18 AM

You can combine premed with anything. In fact, "pre-med" is not a major at Stanford. You major in something else (Human Biology is popular) while satisfying all premed requirements.

dpattzlover · 04-02-2009, 12:32 PM

^^Yeah, I think I knew that. What if you are in the school of engineering? Is it easy to major in the college of arts and science as well? I heard it's kind of difficult to do, but I'm not sure.

superwizard · 04-02-2009, 07:16 PM

Being Premed and engineering is definitely not easy. I know quite a few ChemEs who are also premed so it is doable but its definitely not as easy as majoring in say humbio or bio and being premed.

dpattzlover · 04-02-2009, 07:29 PM

What if you choose a major as BME .... can you have a major or minor in the CAS?

neuschwanstein · 04-04-2009, 06:29 PM

Is it possible to major in human bio (premed) and art history? Should I just try to minor in art history instead?

cominghome · 04-04-2009, 08:51 PM

neuschwanstein: yes it's possible, but talk to your advisor about this first when you come to stanford. try out double majoring, and see if you can handle it. i think the deadline to declare majors is end of sophomore year/beginning of junior year. freshman year and sophomore year is experimentation time!

Sly Si · 04-06-2009, 07:14 PM

dpattz: Don't worry about which major is in which college. It doesn't matter at all. Most of us will never even notice that there exist multiple "colleges".