<p>After hearing countless stories of Berkeley’s notorious grade deflation in engineering majors, I am curious to know how practical it is to maintain an A- average for all four years of undergrad.</p>
<p>Also, can any current engineering students tell me the average number of hours primarily devoted to studying?</p>
<p>Very very tough in BME. You are competing with premeds in BME, as well as the smartest engineers (BME, EECS, engineering undeclared are the hardest majors to get into). </p>
<p>However, the research opportunities at BME are excellent. So graduate school prospects are terrific at Berkeley.</p>
<p>hmm… i’ve heard that upper-div bioe classes are actually inflated because its such a small major… actually, if you check courserank.com you will see that the average grade for upper-div bio-e classes are around B+/A- range. it’s only the lower divs that will be competitive.</p>
The weeder classes-- first two years of Cal, will be what makes quite a large number change to CS or MCB or IB-related majors. After that it’s much more smooth sailing. Bioe is difficult because they probably require one of the highest number of weeder classes until you can take major-specific ones.
It’s definitely doable - I have EECS friends approaching the second semester of their sophomore years with 4.0’s and no signs of slowing down. BioE courses have high grade distributions, it’s the lower division weeder requirements that you’ll have to worry about. If you do well in those, it should be relatively easy to maintain an A- average for your undergrad