<p>How many hours of study each day are required to maintain such a GPA at a bear school?</p>
<p>Ask Ankur Luthra. He double majored in EECS and business administration at Haas earning a 4.0 and 16 A+'s. ;)</p>
<p>Based on your post history you seem like a ■■■■■, but I’ll answer anyways just in case others are interested.</p>
<p>It depends on the person as well as the classes you choose to take. A 4.0 is only marginally better to employers (and maybe to medical school? idk) than a 3.8/3.9 but is 10x harder to achieve because a 4.0 requires you to not slip up on any of your tests.</p>
<p>No, it is not an insurmountable task. But it is extremely hard and requires tons and tons of studying (maybe 10 hours a day I’m not kidding). I have friends who studied 8-9 hours a day in EECS and ended up with 3.7s </p>
<p>I doubt a 4.0 would be that much more impressive to employers than a 3.9/8 though. </p>
<p>Though for MCB it’s a different story. Depends on whether or not you want to go to Med school or not. Then a 4.0 would look better than a 3.9/8 but it is still extremely hard to achieve at Cal.</p>
<p>10 hours?! That is insane…</p>
<p><a href=“http://coe.berkeley.edu/engnews/spring03/16S/ankur.html[/url]”>http://coe.berkeley.edu/engnews/spring03/16S/ankur.html</a></p>
<p>"Ankur is currently working for Microsoft until he leaves for Oxford University in the fall. After his Rhodes studies he will go to Harvard, which he deferred for now.</p>
<p>Ankur is unsure what he’ll do after Harvard, but if he keeps up his momentum, he is likely to give Bill Gates a good run for his money. "</p>
<p>^ On his Linked In page, he’s currently working for a private equity firm in the SF Bay Area.</p>
<p>Ouch, sold out for the money</p>
<p>People like that sometimes make me wonder why I’m at Berkeley (or a top-tier school in general). I would be completely fine working in some small office in the middle of nowhere and having a small family.</p>
<p>Don’t shoot me, but I feel like someone with a 4.0 has to be a little bit crazy.</p>
<p>To each their own I guess!</p>
<p>Assuming you are reasonably “smart” and diligent it’s definitely possible to maintain a 4.0 with ~4 hours of studying per day (including weekends) in EECS . That is assuming you are not taking a very difficult course load. I.e. no more than 2 (at most 3) technical courses per semester. And none of the more work-intensive courses at the same time.</p>
<p>However, like someone else before mentioned, the bigger problem for most people will be not slipping up on any tests. I have had classes where I’ve done very well, but made a couple of stupid mistakes on the tests (such as calculation mistakes or answers that were too general, even though I knew the correct answers) and thus ended up with an A- due to the competitive curve. </p>
<p>And I agree, a 4.0 in EECS won’t open many more opportunities than a 3.8/3.9. For MCB that might be different.</p>
<p>I knew someone who graduated Berkeley in EECS with a 4.0 (with more A+ grades than A grades). I don’t think he studied 10 hours per day either.</p>
<p>lol I agree kevrus. I think they also might’ve grown up in a home with at least one parents being a work-a-holic and encouraged their kids to do very well.</p>
<p>I am a bio major and have never taken any EECS classes, but I would think that getting a 4.0 in MCB is significantly easier than doing the same in EECS. You only have to take ~6 upper division classes within the MCB major since it is just for a BA. If you are doing the CDB emphasis it is even easier because 2 of those classes don’t even have to be in the MCB department. In contrast, I imagine there are many more requirements for EECS. With MCB, it is pretty easy to space out all of your “hard” classes and just take 1-2 science classes per semester. If you are only taking 13-14 units total and carefully picking your classes, it is very possible to get that 4.0 as long as you don’t fall behind.</p>
<p>
I’ve never taken an MCB class but what you’re saying sounds very similar to EECS. EECS majors only need 6-7 upper divison classes and 5 lower divison EE/CS classes, all of which can be spread out pretty nicely with ~13 units per semester.</p>
<p>Wow really? That is very surprising. I thought you all were taking something like 15 upper div EECS classes. Well then, I stand corrected.</p>
<p>Nope, EECS kids actually only have 20 required units of upper div work in the EECS department.</p>
<p>It’s actually very doable to graduate in 3 years in EECS if you have AP credit like Calc BC, Physics and Chem.</p>
<p>chem’s not required for eecs though</p>
<p>It’s not but you need to take a math/science technical elective and Chem 1A fulfills that (AP Chem is even better because you get 5.4 units instead of 4)</p>