Are the courses hard?

Ph0enix · 04-05-2006, 07:58 PM

I realize that the difficulty of each course depends on the teacher and the level. But in general, how hard is it to get As freshman year?

Does Notre Dame have grade inflation like many of the ivys do or any grade deflation?

nemo2001 · 04-05-2006, 08:15 PM

Well to answer your first question. I'll be honest I did less work Freshman year then I ever did in High School. I did respectable first semester (over 3.0), made Dean's List 2nd semester. T

hat having been said my HS experience may have been an anomoly. Participation in athletics was mandatory all three trimesters, so while the normal day ended at 3:00 PM, then Varsity athletics would run from about 3:20 until 5:15 PM, then driving home in rush hour traffic meant I got home around 6:00 PM most days with 3-4 hours of hw to do each night after I showered and ate dinner.

Freshman year I did 17 hours first semester, 18 hours the 2nd. Even with two lab science courses I had so much free time. If you can't get your hw done, you need to learn time management big time.

red06 · 04-07-2006, 06:02 PM

thats good to hear. i was a little concerned when my friend told me about the super hard science courses (bio) are they really that hard?

irish68178 · 04-07-2006, 06:28 PM

I think a lot depends on how you work. I did like college a lot better than high school because I hate busy work and college has a lot less busy work. However, you have to motivate yourself because no one will hold your hand and, if you are like me, your whole grade may be determined by four tests. While this is not true for all classes, for my major (psych) it has been very different than high school. In high school there were homework assignments, and quizzes, and tests and your grade was all broken up accordingly, so you could use the homework to help boost your grade. For me at least it is different, I have four tests and that is it, the average of those tests is what I get. It is a lot more pressure and a different type of studying but if you can motivate yourself it isn't too bad to adapt to. Every major is different, however, with how they do this but i would guess the sciences are like psych in that the grading is mainly tests.

red06 · 04-07-2006, 08:47 PM

hmm do you know how the philosophy/english/humanities courses are graded? are they graded on papers as well, b/c that would make sense. or are the grades divided between tests and papers?

irish68178 · 04-07-2006, 08:53 PM

My experience has been a split between tests and papers.

nemo2001 · 04-08-2006, 12:00 AM

as an English major (even though I started out Biochem, and have taken classes over in Mendoza because I had slots to do so....) I can tell you that for English it depends on the class. The "Traditions" classes - Brit Lit 1, Brit Lit 2, Amer. Lit 1, Amer Lit 2 all had midterm, final, quizzes and papers. Class participation also counted in those classes. In some of the upper electives the grade has been based solely on papers though. Often this means the "final" is a 10-20 page paer, but that's not so bad. I've also had classes where the final was an oral board with the prof - really the best in my opinion, it doesn't allow you to BS.

red06 · 04-08-2006, 03:33 AM

ive heard that business students start their weekends the earliest (wednesday) and most others start their weekends on thursday and friday. is that true? also, ive heard that as long as you arent a pre-med/science, architecture or engineering major, you will not have an impossible time.

AceRockolla · 04-08-2006, 03:40 AM

How about the Biology program. Is it any good, is it really hard, intense, etc? anything...

red06 · 04-08-2006, 03:41 AM

from my friend "impossible, hard, studying alot, still didnt do well, everyone did mediocre/poor, grade will be curved insanely, its all good, im going to go party now" lol

nemo2001 · 04-08-2006, 01:52 PM

My first response in reading your last post red06 is to say your friend has to be one of the slightly lazy, "college is all about having fun and meeting people" types.

Honestly, though I know some Bio students who have a hard time, some who get straight A's. Not every course curves though honestly. When I did Orgo you had four 100 pt exams over the course of the semester and a 200 pt final. Thus your grade was going to be x/600. In order to pass the class you had to get at least 300 out of 600 pts. If you were lower the prof said: "to bad, you will get an F." Honestly though, he failed between 5-10 students that semester. You know what though he probably gave out 15-20 A's.

The Bio program seems to be fairly strong overall. I mean its the college of Science. It's not going to be a walk in the park. Expect to spend a good amount of time reading, doing hw, studying or working on labs...

I never found any Science class that hard. You just have to stay on top of the work and do the reading when it is assigned, not all in the 2 nights before a test.