How packed are/were your freshman classes?

swifty27
Tue, 18 Dec 2007 22:12:55 +0000

I completely agree with bandislife. UCD students don’t get shortchanged at all as long as you utilize all of the great resources that there are on campus. Yes, it might take a little extra effort to seek these things out, but it’s worth it and they are fantastic resources.

For me, personally, it was a little bit of an adjustment to the size of the intro classes, but it has all worked out fine. The thing about college classes (especially on the quarter system) is that they are fast and there is a lot of information to learn. Your grade is often based on a few papers, a midterm, and the final. The tests are weighted very heavily. There is pretty much none of the busy work that is so ample in high school, which for me has been wonderful.

I’ve found that the best trick to making good grades (at least for me) is as simple as going to EVERY class, no matter how boring or how much I don’t like the prof, taking thorough notes, and doing all of the reading on time. As long as I do that, I’ve found that come time for tests, I don’t need to cram, just review. (Of course, my majors are in the humanities, so I can’t really speak so much for the sciences :)) Also, if the size of the lecture seems daunting, just sit close to the front and you won’t even notice all the people behind you (and it’s less tempting to fall asleep).

And really, as bandislife mentioned, once you complete the intro classes, the size of classes shrinks dramatically and there is much more interaction with professors. For example, I’m taking a creative writing course next quarter with only 16 people in it. I know that many upper division seminars are very small (~20 or so).

So, to sum up, I don’t think that students at schools the size of UCD are at any disadvantage, they simply have to work a bit harder and put in a bit more effort for the same opportunities that those at small LACs get. And that effort can really pay off in the end because UCD offers an incredible number of internships and research opportunities, and, if you can get one of them, they are really amazing opportunities that you might not get at other places.