A minimum of 12 semester credits is required for a student to remain in a full-time enrollment status. The representative plan shown in Table 2, however, requires more than that at each enrollment. Such a load may not be appropriate for everyone. Fortunately, there are alternatives.

Many factors determine not only what courses are needed, but also how many of them to take each semester. There is an obvious trade off between semester course load and anticipated grade point. It would indeed be an exceptional person who could earn with equal ease a semester average of a 4.0 were he/she enrolled in either 12 or 21 credits. It's not hard to predict that as credit load increases, semester grade point average is likely to decrease for the same investment of time and effort. The most conservative strategy is to enroll in no more than 12 credits of course work each semester. No doubt this would extend the undergraduate program beyond four years. Many people, however, find this a successful plan. There's a lot to be said for the view that when someone finishes an undergraduate degree, few people are likely to ask how long it took, unless, of course the program is unreasonably extended. Many people, however, are very likely to ask how good was the academic performance during the program. People on admissions committees for medical, dental, graduate and other postgraduate programs are certain to ask about the quality of the academic effort, but be less concerned with its duration, especially for someone completing successfully such a difficult and diversified major as in the Department of Physiology.

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