Required use of CA community college credits at UCs such as Berkeley?

Colleges & Universities University of California - Berkeley
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If you have community college credits that transfer to UC, are you forced to use them?

Longer story: DS took AP Calc BC as a sophomore and is now a junior. He has also “run out” of science and computer science at his high school. Next year he will apply to various UCs and private colleges (for 2017) with a currently intended major in physics with a minor/dual major in CS. His long-term goal is probably a PhD.

For courses he takes at the community college, he is aware that, in general, UC-transferable credits will transfer to California publics, but that he will take placement tests for privates. He worries that perhaps he shouldn’t take courses critical to his major (like physics and math) at the community college because they will be less rigorous and less proof-based than the equivalent courses at a UC. He asks if maybe he should take courses that interest him through some online source that is not UC-transferable, so that he will have the option to take the more rigorous course at a UC.

What spurred this question is that we recently toured Harvey Mudd, and he attended a Discrete Math course there. He is currently also taking Discrete Math at our local community college. He doesn’t find the CC class particularly challenging or rigorous. The class at Mudd was proof-based and much more interesting than the “get the answer” style at the CC. Mudd and the CC covered the same topic (trees and graphs) this week, so he had a good comparison of the depth of coverage in the two classes.

For the next 3 semesters, he will (waitlists willing) take multivariable, linear algebra, and diffEq through some CA community college (probably online). Those would be transferable to UCs. However, he worries that there would be a similar lack of rigor that would put him at a disadvantage in later classes at a UC, whereas at a private college he would likely repeat those courses at a deeper level.

The same question applies to physics classes. His HS does not offer AP Physics C classes, so he has only taken AP Physics B so far. He could take the physics with calculus classes at the local community college next year, but worries that he might want to retake the full physics sequence for physics majors at, for example, Berkeley, and might be prevented from doing so if he had those CC credits.

He’s fine with transferring his CC courses that don’t particularly apply to his likely majors (biology, world history, and geology). Actually, his AP Calc BC class was a dual-enrollment Calc I and Calc II series taught on the high school campus, so those will also transfer to UCs.

For UC Berkeley reference, our local CC has courses that transfer as Math 1A, 1B, 53, and 54 and Physics 7A, 7B, and 7C.

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If he wants to compare the content and rigor of math and physics courses at Berkeley, he can look at old exams:
https://math.berkeley.edu/courses/archives/exams
https://tbp.berkeley.edu/courses/
Note: the courses prefixed with H are the honors versions of the courses.

It is worth noting that Harvey Mudd and Caltech are outliers in the course rigor department; their regular math and science courses are probably equivalent to the honors courses (if offered) at most other schools, public or private.

Berkeley frosh math majors do sometimes come in with the lower division math courses completed at CC while they were in high school. They then move directly into upper division courses. Since such students, like your son, are top-end students in math, they tend to be quite capable of handling upper division math courses.

For physics, the honors physics sequence is not required for physics majors at Berkeley. More details at http://physics.berkeley.edu/academics/undergraduate-degree/the-major-and-minor-program .

Of course, there are also students who transferred from CCs into the math and physics majors at Berkeley.

What he may want to do is take the courses for credit at CC, but concurrently follow the textbooks for the honors courses at Berkeley or other schools and do additional problems. Then he can be more assured for having a stronger background in the lower division material, while not unnecessarily delaying his progress in his favorite subjects. Starting out ahead in his major can also give him more elective space with which he can take any other courses of interest (in or out of his major).