Credit weight of courses

[msh]

Hi everyone,
This question has been asked before but if anyone can post a rather straightforward answer to it I would really appreciate it!

Can you use a course from UoG that weighs 1.0 credit to count for both of the 0.5 biology courses? Or do you have to choose two 0.5 courses only, as the form is set?

Thanks!

[dreizehn]

As straightforward as I can be as to whether one can "...use a course...that weighs 1.0 credit to count for both of the 0.5 [credit] biology courses?" is:

In my estimation, YES...probably.

I have no official "in" and, unfortunately, this is not overtly set out on the OVC admissions pages. I based my judgment off the following:

• There's no overt statement it's not allowed, so I'm assuming it is allowed.
  
  
• The course requirements are listed as credit weights required (e.g., "Biochemistry = 0.5 credit"), not a specified number of courses, so I assume it should be fine so long as the credit weight is met.
  
  
• Two previous posts on here indicate the approved use of a single full-year course (1.0 credit) to completely fulfill a 1.0 credit requirement:
  • The most recent post (January 14, 2013) by "JA" from UofT (currently the last post in the thread): fvc.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=admissions&thread=6440&page=1#11619
    • Used "ANA300Y1 (full year course) I chose this to fulfill 1 credit of the 1.5 biology prerequisite requirements..." (emphasis mine)
      
      
    • The only humanities/social sciences course listed as submitted is "Humanities: HUM199Y1 (full year course)." (emphasis mine) Hence, I assume this single, full-year course alone was used to fulfill the entire humanities/social sciences 1.0 credit requirement.
      
    
    
    
  • The only other post I could find that is directly relevant and useful was a far older one from 2005 by "08 qimmiq" (the last post in the thread): fvc.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=courses&thread=162&page=1#804
    • "...used a full year research course as 2 of my 3 bio pre-reqs." Hence, a single, full-year course was used to fulfill 1.0 credits of the requirement.

Now, as said above, this is simply my own conclusion. For a truly definitive answer, you would have to contact Ms. Lundmark (which may take quite some time at this point in the year, as she is likely to be quite busy with admissions work).

As for entering this into the BIF form: personally, I'd just enter the info for the full-year course into both of the spaces it's being used for (i.e., the only thing that would be different would be the "Year/Sem" box).

Were you to do this and they took issue with it, I'm pretty sure they would simply contact you (e-mail) to let you know the course is not acceptable alone to fulfill an entire 1.0 credit requirement. You could then simply respond to indicate another course to use in addition (i.e., I assume you have at least one (0.5 credit) additional biological sciences course you could use were it to come to that). During my application they took issue with one of the courses I submitted and this is what happened, and I have heard similar things from a few other people, so I assume it would be the same approach if there was an issue here.

[msh]

Thanks for your reply! You didn't have to go through the whole board haha! My 1 credit course is actually just a 1 semester course, but I think it is my best choice. However, like you said if they don't accept it I have other ones I can use.
Thanks again!

[Krista]

Hi,

I just zipped off an email to Deanna Lundmark, and she said it was fine to use a 1.0 credit course.
Dear Krista,

Yes, you can use it as both. If the course runs the full year, ensure that both semesters the course was taken meet OVC rules. If so, enter it in both BioSci spaces.

Mine was also just a 1 semester course, so I guess I will enter it as two 0.5 credit courses?

Just thought I would share what she said so everyone knows for sure!

[lowenger]

I don't think you can submit 1.5 credits for two .5 courses.

[dreizehn]

Feb 14, 2013 17:37:31 GMT -5 agb said:

I have a question similar to this one...

I just got my course assessment back, and I had a humanities that was not approved (I originally submitted two 0.5 credit courses). But now my question is: can I submit one 1.0 credit and one 0.5 credit course to fulfill the 1.0 credit humanities requirement? If not, I would just use the one 1.0 credit, but I actually have a higher average if I use both and the 1.0 just counts for 0.5 credit.

Has anyone tried this for the biology or humanities prereq's?


Thanks!!

Don't you just love the whole course approval process for external students? I know I did... (seriously: yes, I get it is a necessary evil as part of the process of making sure everyone's on a level playing field...but that doesn't make it any more enjoyable hahaha)

Anyways, to actually answer your question (which I'm assuming you probably already resolved by now considering the date): only the admission's office (i.e., Deanna Lundmark) can give a truly definitive answer to your question, as these types of questions have many variables unique to each student (e.g., academic history, specifics about the courses in question, etc.). (sorry it's basically just a redirect of your question, but it seems that's kind of the way it is with a lot of course approval questions due to their unique nature)