Is My First Quarter Schedule at Western Washington University Balanced?

[Lucretius]

I was just thinking: I will be learning this stuff really fast! I will be going through all of single-variable calculus in less than a full academic year! Is it recommended to go into multivariable calculus right afterwards, or linear algebra?

 

[mathwonk]

linear algebra is a prereq for advanced calc done right, but some advanced calc courses include linear aklg.

 

[Lucretius]

Looking at my course guide (I'm already getting ahead of myself, trying to plan out my first year) it says that I can take a Linear Algebra and Differential Equations I course, but then in the guide it says Multivariable calculus is recommended. Maybe I should wait before looking any further into this?

 

[mathwonk]

talk to the profs there, they are usually petty helpful and know the ropes there better than i do.

but the sooner you get linear algebra the beter. and multilinear calc. thise are the two most important math subjects, bar none. and lin alg comes first.

 

[Lucretius]

Man, it's going to be a long wait, this month and a half before school. I'm already prepped to go! As soon as I can, I am going to declare my major. Looking into the very distant future, it's a shame that WWU has no graduate program for physics, but one for mathematics. Guess I'll have to find another school for that —*but I'm getting ahead of myself.

 

[jbusc]

linear algebra is a prereq for advanced calc done right, but some advanced calc courses include linear aklg.

I say this all the time and people always give me strange looks. I'm glad that I'm not the only one who thinks that.

When I took multivariable calc most of the people in the class hadn't taken linear algebra yet, I however had done an advanced linear algebra course, and I thought everything was pretty straightforward. All that you are doing is calculus on vectors essentially.

 

[Lucretius]

I got a response from a professor there:

They said that while Linear Algebra and Multivariable Calculus are related, and it often seems natural to take Linear Algebra before Multivariable Calculus, that Linear Algebra is a more abstract topic, and the first quarter of multivariable calculus is designed so as not to rely heavily on Linear Algebra. His recommendation is to take a quarter of Multivariable Calculus (at least) before attempting Linear Algebra.