Ok, so on Stanford's secondary they want you to put down how many units our pre-med courses were... and I have no idea what a "unit" is. Could anyone help me out... please? 
Thanks
Thanks -
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my undergrad used units instead of credits. everyone just had to take four classes per semester (4 units), which translated to 4 credits each for other (e.g. grad school) purposes. what sucked was that i could be in class 22 hours/week and it was considered the same as someone who was in class 12 hours/week because we were all taking 4 units. i'm guessing stanford means credits, but i would ask them to be sure.
Not exactly, it sounds like different schools use different credit/unit systems. I think the "standard", if there could be such a thing, is that a regular lecture/lab class (like all the premed requirements) that meets 3-4 hours a week is 4 units per semester/quarter. So if a school tells you you need 8 semester units of something, they just mean you need to take a year. I hope I'm not stating the obvious but I think there was a little confusion.
hey, mine too! i didn't think any other schools had it like this. unfortunately, all of my courses translated to 3.5 credits each -- even those science classes with 3 hours of class and 4+ hrs of lab/week. i think i got screwed... oh well! i'm hoping schools won't care that i actually only have 7 credits for 2 semesters of science courses. i'm guessing not.
- Thread Starter
- #9
Well... according to Lola and leila that's not always true... but thanks anyway.
I'm just going to call.... I'll post what they say.
Relatively Prime,
Did you call Stanford? What did they say about units? My problem is, I went to a school that had semester credits, but for the summers I went to schools with quarter credits. Do I have to convert everything to semester credits like AMCAS did? From reading the instructions, Stanford didn't say to convert anything one way or the other. But that's so misleading. I wish they were like EVMS, which tells you to put either 'Q' or 'S' behind the credits...
Thanks.
Did you call Stanford? What did they say about units? My problem is, I went to a school that had semester credits, but for the summers I went to schools with quarter credits. Do I have to convert everything to semester credits like AMCAS did? From reading the instructions, Stanford didn't say to convert anything one way or the other. But that's so misleading. I wish they were like EVMS, which tells you to put either 'Q' or 'S' behind the credits...
Thanks.
At Yale, ever class (except labs and languages) was considered to be 1 credit. However, for med school purposes, we were told to just multiply our Yale credits by 3 (1 YC = 3 credits at most schools). For some of my secondaries, I wrote them a little note about this.
Schools need to standardize this and stop messing with calling one class a single unit. ugh
Anyways, in the usual semester/quarter unitary system, a standard quarter has 12-16 units and a standard semester has 12-15 units. Each lecture class is 3 units in a semester system and 4 units in a quarter system. These numbers are based vaguely on the number of lecture hours per class per week, with a slight adjustment for the difference in length between a quarter and a semester. Now labs very rarely count for their full hourly time commitment in hours. I've often seen lab courses counting for (in terms of units) 1/3 the hours spent in lab per week.
Anyways, in the usual semester/quarter unitary system, a standard quarter has 12-16 units and a standard semester has 12-15 units. Each lecture class is 3 units in a semester system and 4 units in a quarter system. These numbers are based vaguely on the number of lecture hours per class per week, with a slight adjustment for the difference in length between a quarter and a semester. Now labs very rarely count for their full hourly time commitment in hours. I've often seen lab courses counting for (in terms of units) 1/3 the hours spent in lab per week.
Everyone in here has something different to say...
Anyways, the way I understand it..some schools call each class a "unit." For example...if my school were on the semester system, and I took a bio, math, ochem, and history class...that's 3 BCPM units (1 bio, 1 chem, and 1 math) and 1 "other unit." If I were to take 2 bio classes second semster along w/ orgy and painting, that'd be 3 more BCPM (2 bio, 1 chem) units and 1 more "other unit." So, at the end of the year, I'd have 5 science units, 1 math, 1 history, and 1 art for a total of 8 "units."
Anyways, the way I understand it..some schools call each class a "unit." For example...if my school were on the semester system, and I took a bio, math, ochem, and history class...that's 3 BCPM units (1 bio, 1 chem, and 1 math) and 1 "other unit." If I were to take 2 bio classes second semster along w/ orgy and painting, that'd be 3 more BCPM (2 bio, 1 chem) units and 1 more "other unit." So, at the end of the year, I'd have 5 science units, 1 math, 1 history, and 1 art for a total of 8 "units."
- Thread Starter
- #16
I made a whole thread about this... but oh well... I'll type it again here.
I called stanford and they said that if you are at a regular spring/fall 2 semester school this is how you convert to units....
Say your one semester course is Y credits, then...
class's units = (Y x 2)/3
That's what the lady said... it's because Stanford uses a "quarter system" that has 3 semesters.... yeah I know, that doesn't sound right, but that's what they call it.
I called stanford and they said that if you are at a regular spring/fall 2 semester school this is how you convert to units....
Say your one semester course is Y credits, then...
class's units = (Y x 2)/3
That's what the lady said... it's because Stanford uses a "quarter system" that has 3 semesters.... yeah I know, that doesn't sound right, but that's what they call it.