I’m a soon to be first year for eng, and I’m not sure what engineering strain I want to do anymore. I’ve been thinking of switching to engsci(I know that it’s going to be tough – by the way, what’s the typical average I need after first year to be successful?), but I’m afraid of doing horribly in physics – I’ve had absolutely awful physics teachers for all of high school. how screwed am I if I manage to transfer? does the first year curriculum allow me to explore(most of) every strain?
also, pertaining to physics – what’s the general consensus of physics in the first year of eng? do the classes have a high failing rate? is it generally considered one of the hardest courses?
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hey there,
congrats on your eng admission! it’s understandable that you’re unsure what you want to go into at this point– and you’ve certainly got some time left. plenty of eng students go in not really knowing what strain they’re interested in.
as far as i know (and maybe you know this too), transferring into engsci is harder than transferring out of engsci. according to the university, you can only do so after first year, whereas you could transfer out of engsci right now. the website only specifies that you’ll need a ‘superior academic record,’ which i suspect is vague on purpose — they don’t know what kind of transfer room there will be year to year, and what your competition will look like.
in terms of how screwed you are if you manage to transfer, this blog post compared first year engsci to ‘drinking out of a fire hose.’
so, assuming you decide to go ahead with the transfer, you’d be going into second year engsci without having had the same intensive foundation as your peers. you can check out all the first-year engineering curricula here, which might give you a more accurate (and concise) look into first year than i can offer. the idea of first year, though, is that you do get a feel for each strain so you know what you wanna pick later on. with that said, i dunno how good of a job track one is gonna do regarding engsci strains.
the post is actually pretty illuminating regarding the differences between engsci and track one, so i’d suggest giving it a look.
what i’ve heard about physics is that there is some overlap with high school and AP physics. i’d suggest you check out forums and see what others say, as well as take a look at the course descriptions. this is track one’s first year physics req, and engsci’s is phy180, which i can’t find any working pages on. it’d probably benefit you to have a solid high school foundation for things like kinematics, but if you’re worried about it and enough of a keener, you can definitely pre-study to prep yourself.
anyway, since none of this info comes from firsthand experience, i’d recommend you hit up the engineering registrar and speak to them as well. they might be able to advise you on what your gpa will need to look like to transfer into engsci, as well as what first year physics is really like.
best of luck!
be Boundless,
aska