A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

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TomServo
Posts: 33
Joined: Sun Mar 31, 2013 9:55 pm

A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

Post by TomServo » Tue Aug 06, 2013 1:01 am

I was getting 98-100% on almost every quiz and exam but must have done B-ish on the final. This was a Summer class and is probably from the last batch of grades my transcript will have when I send out apps this Winter. I'm worried because I want to do GR theory. My transcript will look like this:

Community College
Calc sequence all A's
Diffy qs. A
Linear algebra. A
Discrete math. A
Intro physics seq. A

Uni
Classical mech seq. all A's
Vector analysis. A-
Lab methods (error analysis) B+
Honors E & M. B+
Honors quantum. A
Complex analysis. A-


For my CS classes it's all A's and B's.
I'm worried a would-be theorist should have perfect grades, especially in math.

Is the above a bad transcript for UT-Austin, UF, or FAU? Haven't taken stat mech. Or senior labs yet. Have done one Summer of research on a scholarship and just got another scholarship for people in my major.

TakeruK
Posts: 941
Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 3:05 pm

Re: A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

Post by TakeruK » Tue Aug 06, 2013 12:06 pm

I think A- grades are great and you don't have to get straight As to get into grad school. I think that an A- average is a strong GPA for applications.

In addition, I remember that Complex Analysis was not even part of the Physics major at my undergrad, but it was a recommended course for those interested in grad school.

Are you taking any more math courses? I remember my Differential Equations sequence split the ODEs and PDEs into two separate courses. I also remembered taking a statistics/probability theory course and there was a 4th year mathematical methods on how to solve things numerically. At my undergrad, there was also a 2nd year level course that basically taught you how to use CAS software such as Maple and Mathematica. My GR theory friends make extensive use of GRTensor, which is a package for Maple. Maybe you have covered all this in your CS classes though!

Godot
Posts: 12
Joined: Wed Feb 13, 2013 1:09 pm

Re: A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

Post by Godot » Wed Aug 07, 2013 1:30 am

No one will care about one A-.

kangaroo
Posts: 130
Joined: Fri Jan 13, 2012 5:31 am

Re: A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

Post by kangaroo » Sun Aug 25, 2013 3:08 pm

The A- is not worrying, what's WAY more worrying is how you seem to be overly concerned about an A-. You're gonna have LOTS of setbacks doing research in grad school, and you need to learn how to handle them. If you're that paranoid about an A-, you probably need to take a step back and just learn how to chill and take things in your stride.

Catria
Posts: 354
Joined: Fri Oct 26, 2012 4:14 pm

Re: A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

Post by Catria » Tue Sep 17, 2013 11:33 pm

Of course not.

I understand you want to pull out all the stops but keep that attitude for the lab.

bfollinprm
Posts: 1203
Joined: Sat Nov 07, 2009 11:44 am

Re: A- in complex analysis as junior/senior, bad news?

Post by bfollinprm » Wed Sep 18, 2013 1:26 am

Material covered in an undergraduate complex analysis course is pretty ancillary to research in GR.



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