OT-UMich classes
I'm currently a junior in high school and am looking to dual-enroll in calculus III. I'm looking at places like the local community colleges like Schoolcraft and Washtenaw, but I realized I forgot about the most obvious choice of all: Michigan.
Could anyone break down how the cost of classes go? They say that the cost per credit hour is $661 and I'm not sure what that means. And also, how well would math credits transfer into UMich from places like Schoolcraft and Washtenaw (Recently legislation that guaranteed transfer credits between Michigan colleges expired, and in the future I'd actually like to go to Michigan)?
Don't worry about admission because for dual enrollment it is different than actually being admitted into the school.
EDIT: In addition, if anyone could give me tips on what teachers to get or avoid that would be nice.
lol pretty funny
First of all, talk to the advising and admissions offices. They'll be very willing to answer any questions you may have.
Secondly, Calc III at Michigan is really shockingly difficult. I've seen many future engineers struggle with the material and the workload. Don't let that surprise you. Places like Washtenaw will be considerably easier. (In high school, I took Calc III at UM-Dearborn - it was a cakewalk compared to the Ann Arbor class).
Take a look at the exams for last semester's Calc II class to see the material you'll be expected to know. Much more difficult than the AP exam:
http://www.math.lsa.umich.edu/courses/116/index.html
Everything you should know about transfer credit:
http://www.lsa.umich.edu/students/academicsrequirements/academicpolicie…
Read this page about the math different math sequences:
http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_results.aspx?termArray=f_14_2010&cgtype=…
Doing well in calc 3 really hinges on you being able to work in 3D more than anything else. Do that and it's easy. If you can't do that, you're going to have a bad time. IME that's what hung people up in the class.
Thought Calc III and Diff Eq weren't so bad, but Calc II was awful. But it was in grad school when I took a true PDE course when I finally said "screw this, this is stupid, I can solve all this BS numerically on a computer". That class was a bitch.
Here's my view on PDEs.
Solutions no longer exists. I don't mean like the solutions are equations, no, the answer is like a set of symbols and groups and ifs and ors and scribbles that some non-engineer (read: math prof) tells you that they mean something, but I'm still not really convinced. You get about 15 steps in and you're approaching the finish line, but it's not really the finish line, it's just going to be your finish line, unless you remember that trig identity you used once in high school. Let's say you get by that and manage to approach a second finish line. That's not the finish line either. Because there is some approach or technique that was described in the "text" - and advanced math text books are probably the worst thing ever at explaining how to do math - that you were supposed to read and understand and be able to apply to your exam. If after that you manage to see how you can transform your sum into an integral and change your skwiggally drawing that is some mathematician's variant of a lower-case Xi into some Mathematician's variant of an Arabic symbol *dot product* the letter F (which comes out of left field), then you can get the final answer which is a bunch of symbols and groups and ifs and ors and scribbles that some non-engineer (read: math prof) tells you that they mean something.
Doing this at michigan is really really dumb. Do it at a community college and save all the money. No one gives a damn about where you took calc 3 in high school.
the only but here is: if he's looking to get into somewhere really competitive (MIT, Stanford) then it might look good if an A, A- or B+ score at UM in Calc III show up in the app.
Holy crap you predicted what I would think before I thought it. Come to think of it, yeah, I had a friend that took Calc 3 at UMich and ended up going to Northwestern. I mean, NU is no Stanford but it's still pretty cool.
EDIT: Bad way to word that, more like you considered something that I hadn't before and might be a big factor...
If it's true for grad school, I highly doubt undergrad admissions committees will give a crap WHERE you did your calc 3. It's impressive enough that you did it, and at a "college" level. Do it at community college where it's significantly easier and collect that 4.0.
Also you're spending the summer between junior to senior year in hs by taking a single calc class...
Honestly, that will not sound "impressive" to a college admissions office. Go do something interesting and unique. This is your chance to take a risk and try something different. Who cares if you get a few more credits upfront...
That's just my two cents.
It's going to be during the school year. No worries, I'll be doing something "different" for those admissions people during the summer.
Ok and I would hope that you're doing it for "you" too! Trying different things is the only way you're able to see what you like or dislike in my opinion. Also it would be great if you can do something outside of Michigan; there's a whole world out there!
i'd recommend doing honors calc.
people will say things like, honors calc is going to kill you, go to wcc or do regular um calc.
fact is, freshman year of college you will be dumped right into a college level course, and you won't have just one to adjust to. it's also a good chance to see if you're interested in the honors college.
if you can afford it (huge if, obviously it is egregiously expensive and wcc is a perfectly smart alternative at a reasonable price) i'd go with honors calc.
I guess it depends on what your goal is taking the class. I took I to get some college credit, but I don't think I learned as much as if I would have taken them at unich. Scraft was a pretty good intermediate to help get acclimated to college life
Did the credits just end up going to actual major requirements or did they just end up as elective credit?
I don't remember precisely when or how I managed to get it back in the day (mid-90s, in my case), but I am fairly sure that Michigan does actually publish a book of AP Guidelines which I found invaluable in figuring out how all my AP credits could potentially be parceled out, as it were. What they now have online - HERE - describes which test, the minimum score needed and which classes passing that test will allow you to enroll in.
The transfer guidelines were also typically laid out in guide format, as I recall - those are online here now. LINK
I attended Madonna unit because it was close to my home. The classes were well taught and frankly just perfect for my development at that time. They were not easy in comparison to my umich exams and material, but there was substantially less competition and that gave me the chance to acclimate first to the amount of info in a real college science course.
Bottom line community college or small university is the way to go. Don't worry about transferring credits, they won't make you retake these classes either way. And consider Madonna U if you live near Livonia.
Take what you can through WCC, or whatever school can transfer the most classes these days, as they are much cheaper / easier at CC's (exams primary reason) without sacrificing the Michigan experience and education. Not being an expert, but the consesus I got for the basic math / science classes were more "how to study" bootcamp than the learning oppurtunity from you core major's undergrad classes.
Humblebrag
How's your day been?
Eh pretty crappy.
I dual-enrolled my junior and senior years at Schoolcraft (though not in math or science) and had a mostly great experience. Just be prepared to have the full gamut of students--burnouts, retirees, mature moms, going-back-to-school types, overachievers, etc. As far as CC's go, it was great.
Now, reading the thread, have the rules in Michigan changed? When I did it, my school was required by law (IIRC) to pay for any college class they didn't offer, as long as it wasn't gym or theology/religion. I took college-level history classes after I finished the AP cycle, and even a philosophy course, and the district paid for it all. The same was true for my friends who took math classes at Schoolcraft, UM, UM-Dearborn, etc.
If parents_paying & (parents_rich | parents_upper_middleclass)
seats_open = enroll_honors_at_umich();
if !seats_open
enroll_regular_at_umich();
end
else
emu_possible = enroll_honors_at_eastern();
if !emu_possible
no_error = enroll_WCC();
end
end
if !no_error
fuck_it_take_jewelry_making();
end
This is a sports blog so that's why I OT'd it
people associated with Michigan, Ann Arbor or college sports it's on topic as a rule of thumb. Not like it's a big deal, just FYI.
Michigan charges more for the first credit and a flat fee per credit for any subsequent credits below full time status (12 credits)
I'm not sure what status you would fall under but let's just assume LS&A
1st credit = $870
2nd - 4th credit = $510/each
Total = $2,400 + school fees
*The tuition and fees will likely go up as they are for the Fall 2013 term and not Fall 2014
I went to the Ann Arbor Public School system and my friends in high school had their tuition covered for taking Calc III (Math 215/255/285) during their senior year in high school so you may not have to pay anything. I believe one of the other posters mentioned this as well.
One of the advantages/disadvantges between taking Calc III at UMich and other places is that I think the grade you get at UMich is moved to your actual transcript if you decide to come to UMich for your undergraduate degree. If you take the class at a different institution you'll get the credit but not the grade.
Hope this helps
Do Ann Arbor Public School kids who are beyond Calc B/C before senior year have to pay to take math at WCC or U of M? For some reason I thought aaps covered that...but the more I think about it there is no reason for aaps to cover that (as the kids could take stats or business math or some other option at the high school).
Curious.
This might be getting ahead, but figure out what schools you plan on applying to and ask them flat-out if the UM/WCC/SC credits would transfer. You might not hear back from all, but usually a couple will getback to you and you'll have an idea which ones make sense.
As for the class itself, I took the engineering track so it was non-honors Calc III for me. Actually thought it was the easiest math class I took at UM, but that was also 11 years ago, so who knows. If you like thinking in 3D, you'll have a blast!
Highly recommend doing the classes at U of M-Dearborn. Much cheaper than Ann Arbor, and the credits transfer over. They're pretty flexible with offering night classes too if I remember right (from about 20 years ago) I did Calc III and Linear Algebra there and only had to take Differential Equations at Ann Arbor to finish up the math requirement for engineering. Added bonus- if you set your sights outside of Ann Arbor for undergraduate, you still have the U of M name on a transcript.
If you attend AAPS you should also get like a 700$ discount or something like that. I took multivariable at EMU in high school (no good times at UM), and the total cost of the class was like 1300 or something but my school covered about half of it
because I wasn't ready for college and got a C and zero credit from Michigan. Then I took Calc 4 summer after freshman year at a community college and got an A and got my college credit. You're better off going to your local community college and dominating the class, then you'll get credit instead of potentially wasting your time (as I did)
A+ at Community College > C at Michigan
in PA, many districts pay for community college courses, if the high school does not offer them.
I guess I'll just say that Calc III just became harder this year. It was pretty easy when I took it my 2nd semester of freshman year. All the exam questions were really straight forward computation for the most part. However, this year a different teacher became the coordinator and exam questions became much more like Calc II and required advanced implementation of the material.
I did this (2003, from Saline), so:
IIRC:
1) For each class at Michigan you take you bail on a class at high school. Which is great. I had TWO classes my senior year and didn't have to show up til like 10. It was amazing.
2) High school has to pay the tuition because they're not instructing you but still getting the funds. Double score.
Bonus: if you take I think it's Math 289 as one of those classes, it's a pretty awesome one credit seminar that meets for an hour a week and teaches a lot of really interesting math tricks. As for 215 vs. 285, 285 is more theory focused with a smaller class size with all the benefits of that. 215 is more just doing problems without as much theory focus (from the student's perspective). 215 is waaaaaaaaaay easier, but you'll learn more with 285. If you're planning on doing a math focus once you actually enroll as an undergrad, do 285.
Also, in my experience, the guest student -> undergrad student with your Mcard is not something that goes smoothly. They never did fix it so I could get in the fucking dorms, which was a pain.
With respect to 2), they don't necessarily cover your full tuition costs. Your high school gets a certain amount of money each year per student (something in the ballpark of $8k), and if you take 25% of your classes at a University instead of at high school, they have to contribute up to 25% of that amount towards your college tuition costs. Usually I think they're able to cover to whole thing, but it's not guaranteed.
I don't think I got a guest student ID when I dual enrolled at Michigan, I just got a regular Mcard that kept working when I started being a student.
The third option is you take Math 295, and jump straight into real math.
Last thing, as a dual enrolled/guest student, you're not allowed to register for classes until the first day of classes. If the class you want to get into is already filled, talk to the professor, explain your situation, and they will usually grant you an override into the class.
Yeah, you get the Mcard, but in my experience they never turned all the stuff on that it was supposed to turn on (meals, dorm access, etc.) when I became an undergrad. Every new thing I had to go to the admin people and it was a PITA.
The last point is a very good piece of advice.
Don't do it at Michigan. I know the allure of taking a class here during high school is exciting, but its not worth it IMO as far as both cost and stress you'll endure. Many of my friends have taken every possible measure to not have to take math here.
I sailed through calc in high school (AB), then pulled a C- in Calc II my first semester. Its just a whole different ball game. Average scores on exams in the low 50%'s were commonplace. In hindsight I could have tried harder, but it still would not have been fun in the slightest and I'd probably still have gotten some form of C. My friend who took honors calc II had a better time with it, but the ones who had it the best were the ones who took it at WCC or Lansing Community College.
I don't mean to rain on your parade, I just don't want your senior year of high school to be a drag, especially since your grade in the class may count if you carry on to enroll as an undergrad.
Calc II is VERY explicitly a weeder course. 116 is designed to absolutely murder anyone who isn't interested in doing a STEM major, basically.