On Physics 8B (summer)

First, I must apologize for my incredibly late blog posts. It was completely unintentional- I've just been caught up in other things for some time. But now, (hopefully) I'll find enough time to give you updated posts on a regular basis :)

These past few months, I've been focused on one thing: Physics 8B. For quite some time, I was debating whether to take Physics 8B or MCB 102 over the summer. Ultimately I chose to go with physics because I didn't want to have it looming over my head during the semester. Class started mid-August, mondays through thursdays, 4 hours a day- 1.5 hrs lecture and 2 hours lab/discussion. Discussion wasn't mandatory but the GSI's were great and going only helped me in the end. Labs (unlike 8A) were actually graded on your work and not on completion and there were quizzes at the beginning of each lab. You have to do 10 labs ( I think..) and one is dropped. Mastering Physics was assigned twice a week and made up about 17% of your grade while labs made up 8%. Each midterm made up around 24% with your worst midterm making up 12%- the final was around 15% (I hope the math is right..haha). Buehler (who taught physics 8B over the summer) gave 3 midterms/1 final- although the third "midterm" was just the first part of the final so it was given a day before the actual final (45 multiple choice questions). I thought Buehler was a great professor as far as lectures went. He was very clear, gave great lecture notes, and simplified the material so it was easy to understand. However, his simplicity was misleading when it came to taking the exams. Boy, his exams were tough.. The midterms usually consisted of about 5 questions with multiple parts (parts a, b, c, etc.) as well as a few multiple choice questions that corresponded to each short-response question (very conceptual). It would have been fine except that each question incorporated multiple concepts that we learned in class, so I think that screwed me up the most. I would lose track of what I was doing half-way through and completely overthink the problems.. Anyway, it was tough. Would I take physics 8B over the summer again?... Nope.. hahaha and I'm glad I never have to make the choice again. Although I don't think MCB 102 would have been much better.. However, looking back, I feel like I have a good grasp on E&M and I have Buehler to thank for that :) If I could do it all over again, I would choose to go abroad since I won't have the time to go abroad from here on out :(

This semester, my main classes are Bio 1B and MCB 102.. Wish me luck! And good luck to you guys as well! Have a fantastic semester!

-K