r/Vanderbilt • u/No_Recording5639 • 7d ago
First Semester Credit Hours 17 --> 14?
Econ major looking to graduate a semester early with 18 credits. I am not sure which additional majors or minors I'll be adding.
I'm currently taking:
- MATH 1200 (took calc AB in high school and did well)
- CORE 1010 (nice professor!)
- ECON 1010
- MUSL 1650 - history of rock music
- CHIN 2201 - have a bit of Chinese knowledge
- Vanderbilt Visions
Advisor recommended I drop MUSL 1650, but I'm not sure if it'll be offered in the future. Would love to hear what you all think.
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u/SecretDevilsAdvocate 7d ago
math/core/econ are all easy classes. doubt chinese will be too hard if you know it and music doesn’t sound hard either. you’ll be fine lmao
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u/No_Recording5639 7d ago
That’s what I’m thinking too. My hardest classes will probably be econ and chinese.
What makes you say econ is easy?
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u/Icy-Skin3248 7d ago
because Econ 1010 is an easy intro class, especially for ppl who plan to major in Econ
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u/SecretDevilsAdvocate 7d ago
econ 1010 is an intro class + i took it and it was incredibly easy (i’m not an econ major anymore tho). i remember one of the midterms i faded all the classes + studied an hour and got a 95 or 100 lmao
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u/Frodolas 7d ago
I recommend challenging yourself, contrary to the advice of the other people on this subreddit. You'll never know what you're capable of if you don't challenge yourself. Others will always try to get you to aim for mediocrity but that's not how you got to Vanderbilt and it's also not how you'll continue to succeed in life.
It would be one thing if you were taking a maxed out STEM courseload of all the highest courses you tested into, such as orgo + linear algebra + biology, or something. But none of these courses are individually very challenging. Plenty of people take 17 hours their first semester and are totally fine. Why immediately believe you're incapable of doing the same, just because a few people on the subreddit (who majored in HOD btw, a joke of a major) tell you so?
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u/No_Recording5639 7d ago
Interesting. My main reason for considering dropping a class is my pre-major advisor. He strongly suggests that I drop history of rock music because taking 17 credit hours in my first semester seems difficult.
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u/Frodolas 7d ago
Advisors do the same thing. They will always tell you to aim lower. You have to understand people's incentives. If you take 17 hours and fail after the advisor tells you it's fine, who will you come back and blame? Who will the university blame for your being on academic probation? Exactly, the advisor.
Versus if you take 14 hours and end up feeling like it was easy, you might not even end up realizing you could've taken more, and the university certainly doesn't care you weren't able to graduate early (they have no incentive to want you to graduate early).
Everything in life is about incentives. When you ask people for advice, you should always understand their incentives first, or you can be very easily misled. Yes, that includes me. (My incentive is it disappoints me when I see Vandy students constantly being underachievers, compared to our supposed "peer" schools like ivies where students strive to be the best).
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u/Thetrufflehunter Peabody | HOD | '24 7d ago
I highly recommend taking a low course load your first semester of college to get used to your new life. You can always make them up later.
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u/srs_house A&S 2011 7d ago
Is Gunderman still teaching History of Rock? It's not a hard class, but it's probably not quite as easy as most people think. Back in the day she could be a little nit-picky (answers that were right one year were wrong the next) and had some surprise attendance polls.
That said, it's offered every semester afaik.
Agreed with trufflehunter - don't overload your first semester. It's a big transition already, a lot will depend on how you can manage self-directed studying plus developing a new social network, and trying to knock an extra class out early won't make much difference in the grand scheme of things.
Also, take lots of classes in different subjects. The lib arts requirements are a great excuse to learn outside your planned major, take advantage of that.
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u/No_Recording5639 7d ago
Robert W. Fry is teaching it now.
As per everything else, sounds good! I just want to make sure I can graduate a semester early if I take fewer credit hours this semester.
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u/fly_around_mars 7d ago
I would drop music. Even if you have a lot of easy classes, the tedious work ends up adding up. First semester freshman year is a bad time to have all the tedium on your plate before figuring out what clubs you want to join, if you want to work, finding research, friends, etc.
History of rock music sounds like an easy class that lots of people take for reqs so I wouldn't anticipate it not being offered, and if it isn't it shouldn't be too hard to find a class that fulfills that role.
If you have to take this many credits to graduate early, then your schedule is fine. But if you don't, I would rather take 17-18 credits second semester of freshman year than first semester.
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u/KroneckerAlpha 7d ago
If you think you can handle it, I’d take it. Doesn’t look like too much. Maybe go talk to the professor first? I only went to Vandy for grad school, so my undergrad experience will be different.
Where I went, my advisor suggested I tone down my schedule a bit. This included suggesting I start intro German instead of where I tested in. Because of the schools own policy, once I started intro German, I had to take the language courses in progression. After four semesters, we were only starting to broach my base German from before I started. That advisor also said calc 1 would be too much, but I pushed back on that hard cause I was already great at algebra and calc.
So go for it, or talk to the professor at least