Received my housing assignment to Mosher. Can anyone who knows that dorm tell me the good and the bad about it? Am an engineering major so I'm wondering if there is as much contact with study groups in that hall as what I first heard.
Does the AC work okay?
AC can be hit or miss sometimes, but overall no problem.
The hall has a lot of study lounges which is good.
It isn't a bad place to live freshman year. Met some good friends there. However, I never participated in the learning community stuff. It exist like they say, but I just never felt it to be necessary. There is a room that has tutors almost every day from 6-10 pm which is cool, but my experience with that was all of twice in the whole year.
Mosher is great. I lived there and met a lot of friends. I didn't use the study groups, but my friends I met were my study groups. Since their engineers, they are taking the same classes and it's really nice knocking on someone door and getting help. Meet you suit mates right away and introduce yourself, less awkward and it's good to be friends with them. AC worked great, crank it up during the summer, no utilities bills!
Only instructors listed on my schedule are Bassichis (physics) and Young for elective.
Did you have either of them? Also, signed up for the cluster (FCEN) for Eng.111, Math 151, and Physics 218. Did anyone do the cluster? If so, would you recommend it?
aggie Engineer and Chaos: Thanks for the info. Yes, like Carolein, my adviser suggested the cluster too for the first semester. Did either of you do that or know anyone who did?
I did not cluster and know nothing about it. Bassichis is the most notorious of the 218 professors. You will either like or hate his style, most people hate it.
Kind of unclear about that 3rd slot on the parking request..... I just put as my 3rd the Night Privileges ($88), but a friend from up there said I should put something else, like West?
a Night Privilege would not be a good idea for somoeone living on campus, it is Night's only - it is useful for off campus students who ride the bus - like my daughter who was an architecture major - but needed to come to campus often after 5 to work on projects.
Only instructors listed on my schedule are Bassichis (physics) and Young for elective.
Did you have either of them? Also, signed up for the cluster (FCEN) for Eng.111, Math 151, and Physics 218. Did anyone do the cluster? If so, would you recommend it?
I had Bassichis for Physics 218. It's not easy. I got a B in the class and almost had an A. He's kind of scary. He gives quizes and tells you if you can't do it, then drop the course. Most of the class can't do it, so just stay in. The book he wrote (Don't Panic) is actually good. His in class lecture was useless, but if you do the examples (all of them) you will do fine. Read the book, do the examples and you're good.
I also did a cluster and it was a good decision. Met a lot of people there and it was nice having people in all your classes you knew. Good choice.
Yes, Chaos, friends from UT said instead of cluster, they just call it first-year interest group. They were required to have weekly meetings, but with the cluster, did you just informally get together with a few fellow class members as needed.
Take Physics 218 and multiply the difficulty of the concepts times 10 and you will have Physics 208. But I'm talking about the concepts not the problems. The problems are just as easy as in 218 if you undertand your concepts. The problem is 90% of people will fail to even attempt to try and grasp the concepts and instead they go straight into the problem sets (or not work a problem at all if their prof didn't assign anything). If you take that path, expect to get to the test and be asking yourself how you were supposed to have known how to do this. But I have confidence nobody here will do that. If I could give any advice for 208, I would say two things:
1. READ THE BOOK. And when I say this I mean really read and take your own notes. Lecture notes are almost always useless. I didn't attend a class (not recommended but doable), and if you follow my plan you can definitely survive on your own.
2. Do more problems than required of you. If your prof doesn't assign any problems, do all of the problems available in your book anyways which is most likely Don't Panic. Rework them before the exams without notes. If you have a prof that teaches out of University Physics Texbook, do all the assigned problems, make sure you have 100% understanding, then rework them again without any notes before the exams.
This is how I got an A in 208. 218 was easy and required less time, but the same method would work here too.
Also with 208, you really do need a good understanding of Calculus II material at the least, if not Calculus III. If you are able to work with integrals of all kinds (trig substitution, by parts, etc) then you will be at an advantage. If you are learning this material concurrently, then don't worry because that's what I did, and I survived just fine.
Thanks, Aggie Engineer & Chaos. Did you take AP Physics C in high school? On another thread, I noticed someone said to claim credit for 218 if you have at least a 3 on Mechanics part of the AP Physics. However, I assumed that since a 3 is minimal score accepted, that advisers would discourage it and say just to go ahead and take Physics 218 without using the 3. My score on Mechanics was a 3, so I wasn't planning on claiming it and just going to go on and take 218 in the fall and (hopefully) 208 in the Spring.
I didn't take the E & M portion of AP test even though we covered in Physics C.
I didn't take AP Physics in high school, which was a mistake. People who took AP physics in high school succeeded much easier than I did. I had to do a lot more work than they did. I would not recommend taking credit for 218. It's a course that instructs you not only on basics for future courses (Statics, Mechanics of Materials) but it also shows you the level classes are at.
