Undergraduate Bulletin

Course Prerequisites

Students should meet the prerequisites to a course before taking the course, and courses enforce prerequisites at the time of registration. Prerequisites indicate through specific coursework the type of knowledge, the level of academic maturity, or the acceptance to a specific program that a student should have achieved before taking a course. Completion of the prerequisites may be in progress at the time the student advance registers for the following semester. The University has the option to de-register, by the end of the first week of classes, any student not meeting the prerequisites to a course. Students who believe they have satisfied the prerequisites to a course through transfer work or through other study or experience should seek permission of the instructor before registering. Permission of the instructor supersedes stated prerequisites. Certain courses may be taken only with the permission of the instructor or of the department; this is listed as a prerequisite to the course.

Advisory prerequisites indicate the type of knowledge a student should have in order to do better in a course than would be expected without that knowledge. Students electing to take a course without satisfying the advisory prerequisite should expect to have to work harder and not do as well as students who have completed the advisory prerequisite.

Course Placement

Stony Brook University does not accept local LOTE Regents scores for credit, placement, or as a means of satisfying general education requirements.  

Foreign language departments at Stony Brook offer language placement exams so that students with a background in a foreign language may place out of the general education foreign language requirement.