auditing classes

<p>Do people do this? it seems like you could just do this for interesting classes you don’t want to do any work for</p>

<p>[General</a> Info. - Office of Registrar](<a href=“http://registrar1.princeton.edu/general/geninfo.cfm#Auditing]General”>http://registrar1.princeton.edu/general/geninfo.cfm#Auditing)</p>

<p>People tend to PDF interesting classes that they don’t want to do a lot of work for. This means that as long as you get a C or better, it shows up on your transcript as a pass. Ds and Fs show up like they would normally.</p>

<p>I’ve audited classes. I also go to the many many public and/or departmental lectures that happen on campus every day.</p>

<p>If you came to Princeton to learn, and don’t care to be judged on it, then by all means.</p>

<p>It’s super fun and interesting (and you learn from top notch people too) as long as the instructor is interesting. But if he or she is not, you can just stop going and it won’t adversely affect you, even if it’s the last week of class!</p>

<p>aren’t you only allowed like 1 pdf per semester and 4 total thru 4 years though? it seems like any courses on top of that you’d have to audit to be able to attend and not do work</p>

<p>Newest Newb how did you get into princeton?</p>

<p>By capitalizing the names of proper nouns like Princeton, while simultaneously not capitalizing common nouns like newest newb.</p>

<p>That and getting a 4800 combined SAT.</p>

<p>But you go to Hopkins, so why do you care?</p>

<p>^Sir (or ma’am), that was uncalled for.
And yes, I do realize that I’m ending my sentence with a preposition. But hopefully you’ll find it in yourself to forgive my gaffe. Not everyone is as talented as you are when it comes to grammar.</p>

<p>Somehow I think your priorities are skewed.</p>

<p>Someone chose to hijack a thread in order to directly attack me, an innocent and helpful poster in this thread who was posting on topic in response to the original question, and you think <em>I’m</em> taking uncalled for actions?</p>

<p>Please don’t come to Princeton. Go to one of the other (apparently 6) other schools in your name.</p>

<p>I hardly think they were attacking you. I certainly didn’t pick up any hostile undertones to dylandlima’s post. Regardless, I’m sorry I butted in- my fault.</p>

<p>@newsest newb I wasn’t utilizing proper rules of grammar, and If you’d read a bit more carefully it says, “Eventually Hopkins.” I’m still a sophomore in high school, but I’m extremely set on going to Hopkins.</p>

<p>And if I do recall, the SAT only goes up to 2400.</p>

<p>Yeah. I got a 2400 and then 3x800. That’s what “combined” meant.</p>

<p>Seriously why did you come to a perfectly good thread just to make trouble? You’re being sophomoric.</p>

<p>lol thanks for the help newb. is it common for people to audit classes? it seems very appealing, there are so many interesting classes and so few semesters</p>

<p>thing is, you don’t have to sign up for anything to sit in for a lecture. most people don’t bother signing up as auditors since it’s not required or beneficial. you can if you want to, so that you can access the course materials online, for example.</p>

<p>right that makes sense. so people do just randomly drop in on classes? like you could unofficially take some art history class just by showing up every lecture but never signing up for anything?</p>

<p>I love newest newb. Just saying.</p>

<p>Will getting a job or grad school hold it against you for a “pass” on your transcript? Is it like choosing to take an honors class instead of an AP (which affects your admission)</p>

<p>Also do really really smart people do this often? It might appear as a lazy way to get through a class but actually you might be the opposite and doing more than expected. Know what I mean?</p>

<p>Well obviously there’s a big difference (that is immediately obvious upon looking at one’s transcript) between taking 3 graded classes + 1 PDF and taking 5 graded classes + 1 PDF or taking 6 graded classes + 2 audits. Or whatever.</p>

<p>Basically, PDF and Audit are for classes that you want to take for fun and/or (for PDF) are forced to take for distribution requirements. You should never PDF a class that’s important for your intended area of study or department or future career. And why you would even consider Auditing such a course is far beyond me.</p>

<p>And thanks, Chairman. I do indeed hope to earn your love so that I may not be purged.</p>

<p>Also, with regards to the other aspects of auditing courses. It’s general etiquette if you’re going to sit in on the class without enrolling (even through audit) to at least ask the Professor’s permission. But for large lecture classes nobody will care at all, even if you don’t ask. Many large intro courses have a decent number of retired people from the community who just want to learn. And Princeton is really nice about these sorts of things.</p>

<p>Also, if you officially audit a course, you can have it on your transcript as audit credit. This doesn’t have any actual usage, but it’s nice as far as official record-keeping goes.</p>

<p>No intention of making trouble here, seems like you went about making trouble quite nicely for going off when I didn’t capitalize Princeton.</p>

<p>Newest newb, thanks for the info on auditing. Sorry for my ignorance, but what’s the difference between PDF and auditing?</p>

<p>When you PDF a class, you’re taking the class - you turn in the homework, take the tests, go to precept if there is one. Your professor submits your grade in the class, just like (s)he would for any other student. But as long as your grade is a C or better, it just goes onto your transcript as a pass. It counts towards the number of classes you need to graduate and can be used to fulfill distribution requirements (i.e. a math/science person might PDF a humanities class that they’re using for a requirement because they don’t want to put a lot of work into it / aren’t very good at or hate writing papers). If you audit a class, you generally just sit in on the lectures (although if you’re officially auditing a class you might do a little bit of the work) and it doesn’t count towards graduation or anything.
I know a lot of people who at the start of the semester sit in on an extra class, but a lot of times by the end of the semester they just have too much work for their real classes and so stop going.</p>