See title. Everywhere else has their engineers taking 5 courses per term...and I could definitely do without my elective hogging up all my exam studying time. What's the deal?

Engineering is popular everywhere. they want to weed out the noobs in first year.

Also, iirc you're not taking 6 courses per term. You're taking 11 courses in total this year. Just some are assigned more credits. Eg. the Math and programming course are not 3 unit courses.

Just to point out, you are attending more hours of lecture or labs, but it's not that much larger of a workload compared to others.

Well one of them lasts for two terms, so effectively its 6 courses per term.

I suppose I should be thankful that we don't have Calculus and Linear Algebra as separate courses, but then I think I'd prefer it that way...makes studying for math a lot easier.

Originally Posted by wintermelon

Nope, I counted. It's 12 courses in total.

Math 1, Math 2, Physics 1, Physics 2, Chemistry, MATLS, ENG 1C04, 1P03, 1P03 again, 1D04, plus two electives.

1P03 is one year-long course.

Dammit, nano'd

Originally Posted by FireDragoonX

Engineering is popular everywhere. they want to weed out the noobs in first year.

Also, iirc you're not taking 6 courses per term. You're taking 11 courses in total this year. Just some are assigned more credits. Eg. the Math and programming course are not 3 unit courses.

Just to point out, you are attending more hours of lecture or labs, but it's not that much larger of a workload compared to others.

We would have also accepted "Because engineers are just that awesome" as an answer

I'm not comparing the engineering faculty to all the other ones though. I'm comparing ours to every other schools, and every other school seems to not give their engineers pointless electives to take. And those that do still only have 5 courses per term!

I'm sure someone will correct me somewhere...this is just what I have observed over the past few months.

Well IMO elective keep you well rounded (as society/mgmt will do too!)

I dont think theyre a bad thing either. in my first year i relied on my 8 and 10 from my electives to bring up my average!

Originally Posted by wintermelon

give their engineers pointless electives to take.

I'm going to stop you right here with this one. Electives are not pointless, rather than keeping your head down and plowing through the technical materials, electives give you a chance to actually think and learn about other things.

Just because an elective slot is in one year, it doesn't mean you have to fill it then. Take it at your leisure (i.e. spring/summer term) if you feel you have too many courses to handle.

Originally Posted by wintermelon

I'm not comparing the engineering faculty to all the other ones though. I'm comparing ours to every other schools, and every other school seems to not give their engineers pointless electives to take. And those that do still only have 5 courses per term!

I'm sure someone will correct me somewhere...this is just what I have observed over the past few months.

Pointless Electives?
I'd say pointless Physics, Materials, Chemistry and Engineering Design. Atleast electives boost our marks.

I'm pretty sure I won't be majoring in Mechanical,Electrical ,Chemical,Civil, Engineering Physics and Materials at the very same time. Those subjects are a waste of time. I'd rather study more subjects from the major I want to be in then study dumb shit from the majors I have least interest in.

None of the courses are useless. We all knew Mac had a general first year when coming here, so you really should expect to learn a little about EVERYTHING! Geez. If you didn't want to do a general first year, perhaps you should've picked a different school.

Besides, it's not like your chosen discipline in the future will be completely isolated from other disciplines. Doing software? You'll need to know what'll be using whatever you program, like planes or whatnot. Civil? You'll need to know the materials being used. As well, you'll be working with engineers from all different sorts of disciplines. Taking these courses now gives you a basic understanding of what those other engineers will be talking about.

I'd also like to point out that having an "artsie" elective is required by law somewhere (or something of the sort to become an accredited program) to make engineers well-rounded individuals. So other schools do indeed require their engineers to take electives unrelated to their discipline. It's also why we have to take 1PO3 - it's mandatory under some law. Engineering is highly regulated, so all schools essentially teach the same things.

We all knew what to expect coming into Mac for engineering, so I don't think anyone has the right to complain about taking courses unrelated to one's future major, or more courses than some other school.

Originally Posted by aj-maxx

Pointless Electives?
I'd say pointless Physics, Materials, Chemistry and Engineering Design. Atleast electives boost our marks.

I'm pretty sure I won't be majoring in Mechanical,Electrical ,Chemical,Civil, Engineering Physics and Materials at the very same time.

You may be one of the few that already know what major you want to pursue. Some people don't and giving the first years a taste of what they can expect from approximately each department helps them decide. I myself got into Biochem & Environmental Eng with Comp Sci at Western but then transferred over to McMaster (for a variety of reasons including) to go into Comp.

Also, you're calling those courses pointless? Physics comes in handy in any type of engineering you will do (both Newtonian and electrical). Materials, well now you (at least) know why materials break. Chemistry, at the very least you learn to think outside of the box, look at problems in a round about way. Engineering design? That's what we do! We take ideas, we design, we implement, we test, and repeat.

First year courses are not so much designed to teach students new things, rather to level the playing field. Make sure everyone is at the same level (more or less) after first year.

Now my point is,
I already know what major I want to do. Let's assume Software. Why would I use physics, chem or for that matter want to learn design(By this I mean 1C03 and not 1P03). Why should I be paired with the herd of dumb sheep who've got no idea what to do in engineering. I'm sure pretty much 80% of the people know what they want to do. I mean I might as well fail physics and be denied software. PHYSICS...a subject I won't use denies me to a Major. Inspite of have a 12 in the Programming course.

Ahh well I guess they should just, Make chem/physics/1C03/materials electives where you have to pick any two out of the four or something like that. That would be amazing and SMART!(The Main attribute Mac's engineering faculty program lacks).

P.S. I would've well chosen any school I would've wanted. The only thing that got me to Mac was...
A. Game Designing.
B. EA Canada.

Also do not assume that I am failing any courses.

Software engineering should not be part of the engineering faculty. It's not exactly engineering in the same sense as all the other disciplines are, I don't think. I agree with aj that software is the only engineering discipline here that does not have much relevance to a lot of the first year courses compared to all the other disciplines.

Thanks for the info Iman, I did not know there were such kinds of regulations, though it actually makes lots of sense why there would be and I'm surprised I did not consider that earlier. Stupid thread is stupid :(. BUT, do you know any other engineers besides ourselves that are taking six courses per term? :(