Foundation Science at UEA - Your experience and feedback please

http://www.uea.ac.uk/sci/teaching/hbooks/Science+with+Foundation+Year+Undergraduate+Student+Handbook+

Hopefully the above link works.

You all take Chemistry, Physics and Biology together. For maths you are divided into 4 groups, depending on your results on a test taken in freshers week. To proceed to some courses, you will need to be in the top group. The handbook will show this.

It is a very enjoyable year.

think everyone on this foundation, regardless of what course you wanna do afterwards, are all together. so we all do this 1st year of foundation science then go onto different courses afterwards. there aren't separate foundation courses for each subject, it's just one big science foundation course.

I did the computing science foundation year, but the maths modules are taught with all foundation science students. I can honestly say that it was the best maths teaching I have ever had. The lecturer I had for both maths modules I did was so funny and enthusiastic. And it really makes a difference as I got a D at A Level, but 82% and 85% in my maths modules at UEA, with some of the content in the second maths module being further maths which I would have never previously even considered learning.

Thanks for your input mate.

I haven't done any maths for five years, will I be alright or should I start looking over stuff now? I've actually started getting my friend who did economics to start going over all the basic maths i've forgotten.

There are a number of mathematics modules at varying difficulty levels on the foundation course, though to be fair even OB91+OB92 the harder two started off really slow.

Here are the syllabuses from last year to give you an idea of what they cover.
https://www.uea.ac.uk/polopoly_fs/1.173474!0B9110.pdf
https://www.uea.ac.uk/polopoly_fs/1.173477!0B9211.pdf

Yeah I did OB91 and OB92. You can literally start with any level of maths (I think the first part of the first lecture was literally on adding and subtracting) but it progresses REALLY fast onto some further maths stuff towards the end of OB92. So if you've not done maths for a while you need to do a fair bit of work outside of lectures. But there is so much help provided. As long as you put in the effort, your maths will be of a really good standard when you finish. I got so much out of it.

i have a B in biology A-level - any way i could not take biology modules but get more help in the chem side of things? or is that not possible? Or alternatively could i get through to pharmacy via hiding my poor maths skills and avoiding modules that have lots of maths in them?

Nice one, do you know the mathematics module requirement to follow onto the MPharm course?

You realise Pharmacy has dedicated maths modules on the course itself? Hiding any troubles will not help you in the long run, and being good at maths is actually a pretty important thing for a pharmacist!

i have a B in biology A-level - any way i could not take biology modules but get more help in the chem side of things? or is that not possible? Or alternatively could i get through to pharmacy via hiding my poor maths skills and avoiding modules that have lots of maths in them?

After Christmas, you have to drop one of the 4 sciences.

A tip: do not take the course too lightly. You will have exams in December. And you can be chucked out if you fail.

If you go to all the problem classes and the lab sessions you will be fine though.

This is assuming that the foundation year has not changed a lot since I did it 3 years ago.