I was at the Business I session today where Lori Hill informed us that she'd never take 5 required courses all together.

Why is that so?

And how many would be a decent number of required courses to pack together?

I had to rearrange my schedule entirely and I'm presently looking at:

Chem 1A03
Bio 1M03
Psych 1X03
Econ 1B03
Stats 1L03

if I don't get into Math 1A03. And if I do, I'll drop Econ for it.

That means 2nd semester is:

Chem 1AA3
Comm 1E03
Econ 1BB3
Comp Sci 1BA3
Math 1M03

Does this balance of electives and required courses really matter? and if so, could somebody elaborate on why?


The vibe I got from today's session was that people were taking electives for an easy break...in a sense...to "rest" between their required courses. I've always been in Science courses and I don't know much about this because it's been a fairly intensive schedule in itself so I'm used to that but university is all about changes and I'd appreciate any feedback on the subject.


I made this a different thread because maybe some other people were wondering about this balance and what a good way to look at it would be.

Originally Posted by goodnews.inc

I was at the Business I session today where Lori Hill informed us that she'd never take 5 required courses all together.

Why is that so?

And how many would be a decent number of required courses to pack together?

I had to rearrange my schedule entirely and I'm presently looking at:

Chem 1A03
Bio 1M03
Psych 1X03
Econ 1B03
Stats 1L03

if I don't get into Math 1A03. And if I do, I'll drop Econ for it.

That means 2nd semester is:

Chem 1AA3
Comm 1E03
Econ 1BB3
Comp Sci 1BA3
Math 1M03

Does this balance of electives and required courses really matter? and if so, could somebody elaborate on why?


The vibe I got from today's session was that people were taking electives for an easy break...in a sense...to "rest" between their required courses. I've always been in Science courses and I don't know much about this because it's been a fairly intensive schedule in itself so I'm used to that but university is all about changes and I'd appreciate any feedback on the subject.


I made this a different thread because maybe some other people were wondering about this balance and what a good way to look at it would be.

Soo um why are you taking both 1A03 and 1M03 at the same time? I'm not 100% sure but they are substitutable in ALL of the degree requirements I've ever come across!

Lmfao, no I meant that this is my schedule if I get into 1A03 which is more indepth from what I've heard and seems more like a course I would enjoy.

If I get into 1A03, I'll have to shift things around but I don't know yet so I'm planning as though I don't have the 1A03 option

Originally Posted by goodnews.inc

Lmfao, no I meant that this is my schedule if I get into 1A03 which is more indepth from what I've heard and seems more like a course I would enjoy.

If I get into 1A03, I'll have to shift things around but I don't know yet so I'm planning as though I don't have the 1A03 option

Wait did I just hear Math and "enjoy" in the same sentence, from a GIRL?! hahahahah where exactly did the sun rise from today I wonder. But then again you are brown
I'm used to just about 99.9% of people on Insiders and my Facebook Socsci group saying they HATE math. But yeah 1A03 is an indepth course as far as theory goes, but 1M03 isn't bad either. A C- in 1M03 gets you a credit for 1A03!

Originally Posted by goodnews.inc

I was at the Business I session today where Lori Hill informed us that she'd never take 5 required courses all together.

Why is that so?

And how many would be a decent number of required courses to pack together?

I had to rearrange my schedule entirely and I'm presently looking at:

Chem 1A03
Bio 1M03
Psych 1X03
Econ 1B03
Stats 1L03

if I don't get into Math 1A03. And if I do, I'll drop Econ for it.

That means 2nd semester is:

Chem 1AA3
Comm 1E03
Econ 1BB3
Comp Sci 1BA3
Math 1M03

Does this balance of electives and required courses really matter? and if so, could somebody elaborate on why?


The vibe I got from today's session was that people were taking electives for an easy break...in a sense...to "rest" between their required courses. I've always been in Science courses and I don't know much about this because it's been a fairly intensive schedule in itself so I'm used to that but university is all about changes and I'd appreciate any feedback on the subject.


I made this a different thread because maybe some other people were wondering about this balance and what a good way to look at it would be.

Like you said, I think it's because it can get intense to have all required courses. Electives should be material that you like, however you may not like required courses. That's basically all I think.

Honestly, last year I had 2 chem, 2physics, 2math, 2 bio, psych and english. Technically all my courses were "required" since I need all of them for optometry school. I didn't find it to hard, but I might be the odd one that didn't.

If you drop 1B03 though you lose the ability to pursue 2H03 and 2G03 etc in second year for econ and hence get a Minor. Also I think 1B03 and 1BB3 are requirments for a number of Commerce courses as well!

I'm sleepy lmfao so I'm not being clear; I'd drop it that semester and just move it to 2nd semester I'll respond to the rest when I'm done SOLAR cause I have to budget my energy That's a future accountant talking. (Possibly. Perhaps. Maybe.)

Hey,

It just depends on what you like to take. I'll use myself as an example. I am in honours economics and political science. In my first year, since social science is so open, I took the 2 required econ and full year poli-sci and then had 6 electives. In my second year I took 5 econ and 5 poli-sci and in 3rd year I took 5 poli-sci, 3 econ and a finance and now in my 4th year I am taking 2 econ, 3 poli-sci and 3 electives.

So it just depends what you like and what you want to do. As long as you complete all the requirements in your degree audit it doesn't really matter. Some people like to balance electives with required courses while others are interested in their course so they take a lot of the required courses all together.

Hope that helps

You can easily handle that course load, assuming math and science actually interest you (which it would appear that they do).

A balance between easy courses and hard courses is more important than a balance of electives and required courses. With your electives, your required courses might actually end up easier!

I will warn you that most people consider chemistry to be one of the hardest subjects though, and is pretty difficult for an elective. And like you stated, people like to use electives as an easy credit.

But if you can handle it, you will earn major bragging rights.

It depends on what kind of worker you are. I work very well under stress as it motivates me to actually study ... I've done worst in semesters with "easy" courses than in semesters where I've found the courses challenging.

Wait did I just hear Math and "enjoy" in the same sentence, from a GIRL?! hahahahah where exactly did the sun rise from today I wonder. But then again you are brown

I enjoy math too. =p

Originally Posted by jesus

I enjoy math too. =p

I used to enjoy math (I'm a boy by the way). Once in university I got completely deterred though. I don't know if it was the material or the fact that the teacher I got for Math 1A03 had an accent and didn't explain thing well and the teacher I had in Math 1AA3 also had an accent (but I could understand this one), talked about rabbits and made mistakes every class.

Originally Posted by jhan523

I used to enjoy math (I'm a boy by the way). Once in university I got completely deterred though. I don't know if it was the material or the fact that the teacher I got for Math 1A03 had an accent and didn't explain thing well and the teacher I had in Math 1AA3 also had an accent (but I could understand this one), talked about rabbits and made mistakes every class.

I'm the opposite. I hated math in high school, loved the material in university though. I didn't actually go to many math classes for 1A03 or 1AA3, I try not to let the profs deter me too much.

Originally Posted by jesus

I'm the opposite. I hated math in high school, loved the material in university though. I didn't actually go to many math classes for 1A03 or 1AA3, I try not to let the profs deter me too much.

Yeah, I had such an amazing prof in highschool for all 4 years. I think going into the course, I somewhat compared my teacher to the profs. You'd think professors would be better than highschool teachers. Especially since you start paying for professors.

sometimes you can't balance required and electives.

example: Hon. physics astrophysics (2nd year) 8 required (assuming astro 1f03 and math 1b03 complete) and 2 electives (one of which is usually physics 2g03 which is required by end of year 3).

it is not about easy or hard. It is about if you enjoy it. If you love to do science courses then by all means take all science courses. it might be harder but you'll enjoy it much better.

I was also considering dropping Psych altogether and replacing it with Comp Sci, a course which runs later into the afternoon and into the early evening.

This would allow me to take Anthro which is toted as an easier course in Term 2.

But I decided against it because with Psychology I know I'll be interested in the material and required to put in a good amount of effort but I've noticed that no matter how easy the course is, when I enjoy it I put in the effort anyway and I think it'd be wrong for me to get into any course with the impression that I would "coast" because that simply doesn't happen at this level

I'd like to see if there's some way to put the lectures onto an iPod. I think that'd be marvellous and you could listen to it on the bus ride and type up the notes or write htem out by hand on a laptop and you'd really be using your commuting time immensely effectively.