Can the Physics Department Waive the Additional Hour Requirement for My Minor?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the possibility of waiving the additional hour requirement for a physics minor at a university. The focus is on the implications of the current requirements and the personal circumstances of a student who is close to fulfilling the necessary credits but is reluctant to take a specific course due to personal preferences and anxieties.

Discussion Character

  • Debate/contested
  • Conceptual clarification
  • Meta-discussion

Main Points Raised

  • One participant expresses a desire to waive the additional hour requirement for their physics minor, citing personal circumstances and the burden of taking an additional course.
  • Several participants argue against the waiver, stating that the existing requirements for a minor are already low and should not be further reduced.
  • Some participants suggest alternatives, such as directed or independent study, but note that these options may not fulfill the advanced hours requirement.
  • Concerns are raised about the necessity of fulfilling all requirements to maintain the integrity of the minor, with some participants emphasizing that waiving requirements could undermine the accomplishments of others.
  • There is a discussion about the specific course in question, the Advanced Lab Seminar, with differing opinions on its value and the participant's reluctance to take it due to presentation requirements.
  • One participant mentions that the only remaining option is to take a 3-hour course, which they find undesirable.
  • Another participant suggests that confronting the fear of presentations might be beneficial, while others express skepticism about the request for a waiver.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants generally disagree on the reasonableness of waiving the additional hour requirement. While some acknowledge the participant's concerns, the majority argue that the requirements should remain intact and that personal preferences should not dictate policy changes.

Contextual Notes

The discussion highlights the limitations of the current requirements and the personal challenges faced by the participant, including anxiety related to presentations. There is also a mention of specific course options that do not meet the advanced hours requirement, which adds complexity to the situation.

  • #31
How do you know that the lab program is pointless, when you haven't done it. Do you believe that the people running the lab program think it is pointless? Are you really saying that there is nothing to learn?
 
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  • #32
pongo38 said:
How do you know that the lab program is pointless, when you haven't done it. Do you believe that the people running the lab program think it is pointless? Are you really saying that there is nothing to learn?

Yes. I'm saying the advanced lab and seminar are entirely pointless. I don't know why they require it for physics majors in preparation for research!
 
  • #33
Ignoring the part where that doesn't actually answer the question, "how do you know the lab program is pointless"...

The standard pre-med track involves introductory physics. How useful do you suppose that to a practicing doctor? Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), it's not really up to the students to decide what's required or not. If one wants the degree, one has to jump through all the hoops.
 
  • #34
Leveret said:
Ignoring the part where that doesn't actually answer the question, "how do you know the lab program is pointless"...

The standard pre-med track involves introductory physics. How useful do you suppose that to a practicing doctor? Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), it's not really up to the students to decide what's required or not. If one wants the degree, one has to jump through all the hoops.

Hopefully, I was clearly being sarcastic. I don't plan on going into research or doing a thesis. The advanced labs prepare students for that kind of work.

However, I agree it wouldn't be useless for me. I would still learn some practical things that could prove useful in the future.
 
  • #35
Ah, my apologies, then. It's hard to catch that stuff on the web :P
 
  • #36
Leveret said:
Ah, my apologies, then. It's hard to catch that stuff on the web :P

Oh, I agree. I'm now a math major, physics minor. Up until recently, I was a physics major, math minor. Now, I should really focus on learning programming or computational software.

Maybe some of you can advise WRT that.
 
  • #37
Are you asking what computer language you should learn? I'd say go for Java or C/C++. Java would be easier than C or Cpp because Java is multi-platform for one, and you don't have to deal with a lot of the weird quirky things that are in C. FORTRAN may also be useful, engineers and scientists still use it despite better options. Once you learn one language, the others will be a simple matter of learning structure and syntax.

I don't know if you know but usually it's also a good idea to take classes on applied or numerical methods (mathematics course usually) so that it shows you how to do the math side of computational fields (like finance, biology, genetics, physics, etc.).
 
  • #38
hadsed said:
Are you asking what computer language you should learn? I'd say go for Java or C/C++. Java would be easier than C or Cpp because Java is multi-platform for one, and you don't have to deal with a lot of the weird quirky things that are in C. FORTRAN may also be useful, engineers and scientists still use it despite better options. Once you learn one language, the others will be a simple matter of learning structure and syntax.

I don't know if you know but usually it's also a good idea to take classes on applied or numerical methods (mathematics course usually) so that it shows you how to do the math side of computational fields (like finance, biology, genetics, physics, etc.).

There's a Numerical Analysis course offered, but I haven't taken the Fortran prerequisite.

If I go into a computational field, will I have to know programming languages or software packages such as Maple, Mathematica, Matlab, etc.?
 
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  • #39
I think these rigid credit hour requirements are engineered to screw students over. I'm not advocating making a minor "as many credits as you feel like," but a range would be more sensible (20-21 credits.)
 
  • #40
Well, they have given a range, it's 21+ hours.
 
  • #41
Ryker said:
Well, they have given a range, it's 21+ hours.

That's true. But how many people are that ambitious. :-p
 
  • #42
cdotter said:
but a range would be more sensible (20-21 credits.)

I like Ryker's answer. But suppose they made the minimum 20. Now we have another student who wants to get a minor with 19. After they let him through, the next student wants one with 18. Where does it stop?
 
  • #43
cdotter said:
That's true. But how many people are that ambitious. :-p

Me, apparently! I'll have 23 hours! :-p It is a minimum of 21 hours.
 
  • #44
Shackleford said:
There's a Numerical Analysis course offered, but I haven't taken the Fortran prerequisite.

If I go into a computational field, will I have to know programming languages or software packages such as Maple, Mathematica, Matlab, etc.?

It could help to know them already, but you can learn them in your free time. MATLAB is basically like FORTRAN's glittery little niece. It's slower but it's easier, you still write scripts but you have a command line. Plus you have different 'toolboxes' that help you with different things. MATLAB is usually used to do computations that don't need much optimization (like the difference in optimizing would be maybe a couple seconds or minutes, which is not a huge enough difference to warrant the extra effort to optimize). It's very easy to learn once you've learned an actual programming language like FORTRAN, Java or C. Mathematica is usually used just for symbolic operations because it's very nice and neat in that area, but really slow with pure computation.

Anyway, once you learn a real language, you can learn these other things on your own and would probably be a good idea to do so since it'll look good on your CV/resume.
 
  • #45
Shackleford said:
Yes. I'm saying the advanced lab and seminar are entirely pointless. I don't know why they require it for physics majors in preparation for research!

Research is about pursuing the truth. Labs and seminars are just one way to do it. Do you accept that you can have broad educational objectives whose usefulness is not immediately apparent, as well as narrow objectives whose usefulness is clear? Both approaches have validity.
 
  • #46
pongo38 said:
Research is about pursuing the truth. Labs and seminars are just one way to do it. Do you accept that you can have broad educational objectives whose usefulness is not immediately apparent, as well as narrow objectives whose usefulness is clear? Both approaches have validity.

Did you miss the sarcasm memo? :-p
 
  • #47
When I was getting my BA in math my school offered complex analysis once every 3 semesters. To make it worse they had real analysis 1 and 2 as a requist for it. I ended up with a semester where I met every single requirement to graduate except complex analysis, which wasn’t offered until next semester. The worst part was that it was the only courses I needed that semsster also! Meaning I had about a year of school with only one class I needed to take. I ended up taking a few graduate courses and a couple independent studies, which were some of the best courses I ever took. They brought my understanding to a level it would have never been otherwise. Maybe this will be a good opurtinutiy for you also.
 

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