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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]UC Berkeley-
Undergraduate classes with less than 20 students - 52.9%
20-49: 27.7%
50 or more: 19.4%

So over 80% of undergraduate courses at UC Berkeley have less than 50 students. Stanford, Cornell, Michigan, MIT, CMU, USC are also in the 80s. [/quote]

The statistics are misleading, because small classes are not evenly distributed across the various departments. At Berkeley (and probably all UCs), freshmen intro classes and cs /stem classes are huge.
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Let's say a school with 2000 students has 50-50 CS and English majors. And students may only enroll in one class per semester. If this school offers two 500-student CS classes and 50 20-student English classes, the school can claim 50/52 or 96% of their classes have 20 students. Yet 50% of the population will experience the huge 500-student CS classes.[/quote]

Relax, 40-60% of the CS/STEM classes' students are GONE within 5 weeks. Another 20-30% of the remainder will be GONE within another 3 weeks! There will be plenty of empty seats in the lecture hall/classrooms you will be lonely.[/quote]
 
That was exactly my strategy to get into the over subscribed classes in Berkeley. If you are not persistent and just follow the path of least resistence, you won't graduate in 4 years. Typically [i]every[/i] quarter, you won't get 1 or 2 classes needed to follow the recommended "track" for your speciality w/in the major. This inclues upper division (3rd & 4th year) as well as intro classes. The thing to do is show up for lecture anyways... many standing or sitting on the floor. Put your name on the prof's waiting list (the dept's waiting list is useless). As frustrated students leave after 1-2 weeks, you may have a chair to sit. After 2-3 weeks, enough drop to put you at the head of the waiting list, and the professor gives you a spot and informs the dept. It's not strictly following the rules, and you shouldn't have to at such an esteemed institution, but you do that to survive the rat race.[/quote]

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