Should I major in pure mathematics if I want to have an easy time in college?
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Anonymous
Those are related to an obscure field called “computer science.” |
Anonymous
Eh, only the Mayh 101 part. Not the pure math major part. |
Anonymous
This reminds me of a Mar 23 piece in the NYT: "We Talked to 10 Graduates About Their College Regrets" "There were some pretty big holes in my mathematics major." When I was applying to college, there was a news article about the best colleges that were outside the Ivy League. Skidmore was one of the “new Ivies” in the article. I liked Skidmore when I visited. It seemed to be strong academically, and it was a small school, which I thought would be uniformly better than a large school.It wasn’t until I went to graduate school and worked at several universities that I realized Skidmore had left me severely underprepared. I still feel like I’m catching up. There were some pretty big holes in my mathematics major. People I know who studied math at other schools took twice as many courses as I took in mathematics, because I was filling my credits with liberal arts classes. When I was 17, I thought well-roundedness was really attainable only at a small liberal arts school. If I could go back in time, I would have gone to a medium or larger school and tried to make the well-rounded thing happen on my own. So don't major in pure math at Skidmore. |
Anonymous
| It may be a troll, but my DC also really loves math. Double majoring math and CS. DC said they'd love a job where they get to do math all day but not teaching. |
Anonymous
With math you can't go by course name/count at any school big or small. It can be taught at a high level in an intimate setting and poorly at a huge state school. Not surprised about the Skidmore experience as it's not known for math. A school like Reed is similar size and may have more distribution requirements, but produces very good majors--with rigor from day one. On the other hand I know someone who did a PhD at Hopkins, who has said something to the quoted student re undergrad at his large state school in the south. He may have taken more courses, and all the usual titles, but the level of instruction was clearly lower, and there was catch up to do in grad school. Best advice is try to visit, and sit in on HS senior year math class for comparison. |
Anonymous
Not sure what you mean by pure math. I guess it is that part of math that is less applied. It will be more theoretical and more abstract. I studied engineering many years ago at Virginia Tech. I completed 7 years of education including some time as a PhD student. My focus was mainly operations research and traffic/transportation. Various math topics needed include probability theory, birth-death processes, Markov chains, and queuing theory. Then there is deterministic optimization (linear programming, integer programming, 0/1 integer programming, dynamic programming, geometric programming, penalty and barrier methods, and graph location). Then there are probabilistic domains such as inventory control and reliability, maintainability, and availability. When real world probability distributions are introduced, closed form solutions may not be tractable. And in this case, simulation techniques are introduced. That stuff is not easy. I would describe it as a lot of applied mathematics. But an applied mathematician likely deals with more complex and abstract topics than those I listed. And a “pure” mathematician would be dealing with yet more complexity and abstraction. If your mind is wired for that much complexity, then definitely go for it! But I doubt most math majors, of any type of math, enjoy a “much easier time” compared to others. Check out www.siam.org for the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics. Check out their publications to see if that is appealing. |
Anonymous
This. My son is great at math. His major is computational modeling & data analytics + a minor in math. He's at VT and says he hasn't yet had a hard math class but has found some of his general ed classes challenging. OTOH, my daughter hates math and chose a major where she only has to take a couple statistics classes. Having an easier time in college is mostly about choosing a major that aligns with your aptitudes + a school that doesn't have a lot of general ed requirements so you can mostly focus on your aptitudes. |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
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For people who don’t know the term “pure” math, most departments offer multiple math degrees. EG here’s VT:
https://math.vt.edu/content/math_vt_edu/en/undergrad-math/jcr:content/article-image.transform/m-medium/image.jpg It’s common to call the plain Jane traditional math degree “pure.” But when applying to jobs or talking to anyone outside a math department, this is a bad term to use. Instead just say math. |
Anonymous
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I was a math major in college (after loving it in high school.) I did not find the math courses easy. Particularly those beyond Calculus and Linear Algebra.
My GPA for non-math courses was considerably higher than the math courses. (Perhaps I should have majored in something else.) |
Anonymous
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Asian and English second language? Then Yes |