CMU requires 360 units to graduate, or an average of 45 units per semester. This means the following:
- 3 CMU units = 1 semester hour at colleges that require 120 semester hours to graduate (average of 15 per semester).
- 1 CMU unit of semester course = 1 hour of work per week (nominally), based on 1 semester hour = 3 hours of work per week (nominally). So a typical semester course load of 45 units should nominally mean 45 hours of work per week.
Now, if a typical course load means substantially more than 45 hours of work per week, every week, even for students with good time management and not taking a schedule with all high workload courses*, that suggests that CMU is generally underrating the workload in assigning credit unit values.
*High workload courses would be those with labs, computer programming assignments, art studio, music performance, or large term projects.