This is my first post in Mathematics but I'm not new to these forums. I use stakoverflow as I'm in software as a professional. This is going to be long post - not to mention a lot of what may seem a lot of blah-blah so I hope you can sort it out and get to the bottom of what I'm projecting.
I took a short cut from junior college and signed up with a regional private university to earn my BS in CIS. Back in the day it was a good choice as classes were at night and I was going to be done in less than two years. Supportin a family of four - this was a good choice. Draw backs? Yes - Only one semester of Calculus and no Physics (Calculus based to be precise).
After twelve years of writing web bases code I decided to get a masters degree because I'm, as far as the pay scale goes. maxing out and expenses are increasing. Not to mention the hunger for more/different is stirring.
I've applied and was accepted at local state university. I mean they looked at my transcripts I would imagine some bright minds scrutinized them, and decided I have the prerequisites to continue in the master’s program. Which btw, is in IA. All of the classes I'm required to take, including all the electives have prerequisites that I really haven't met. The department said that it is at my discretion to decide if I can be successful in this program. The classes I am talking about are Calculus II and III, Differential Equations, and Discrete Math. I’m sure somewhere calculus based Physics will be required as well.
My first class is a Computer Architecture where some of the calculation so far included formulas with complex fractions so basically algebra - and I was struggling with these. Which makes me wonder how much more difficult this is going to get. There is cryptography class that has Calculus II for prerequisite as well.
So with this as a prelude to my question here is my dilemma. I've always operated on the bases of all or nothing, so I'm thinking I'll have to reenroll in at least in Pre-Calc and work my way up to Diff Equation, including Statistics (which I never took either). That's six classes at about 2K per class and two years of my time.
Is there an option for this? Or, if someone has a related experience how did it worked out for you? I mean back in the day I didn't want to take all these courses but now I think they're fascinating and for a longest time I've considered learning calculus physics, I mean just for fun.
So what I'm I do to? I need some kind of super refresher so that I can confidently continue in Calc II and III, and so forth. What is covered in Calc II and III that isn't covered in Calc I and how is Physics depended on Calc, and perhaps my cryptography class dependent on this?
And I apologies for posting this here even though it's no purely mathematical issue, and on the other hand it relates totally.
Thanks for listening...
Risho.