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As a geology major I needed crystallography and mineralology. Memorizing the chemical composition of over 100 minerals, and measurements of the crystal geometry. This class killed me, I dropped it and the program of geology. That was the hardest course I've ever "attempted" to take.
I second the Abstract Algebra class. I never got past page 3 in the textbook, and I was the only person to ever ask a question in class. I was about to drop when I found out that I had the top grade in the class--a 62. I stuck it out and got a B. Next most difficult was Foundations of Mathematics, a course in set theory. I didn't have any trouble with it, but others in my class were flunking it for the third time. I would have loved to take more upper level math classes, but they weren't available before I graduated.
I was careful with my choices of science classes, so I didn't have anything especially difficult. There was a statistics course everyone working toward a teaching certificate had to take. Everyone struggled with that. But the hardest for me was the 3rd trimester in a required literature series that was part of a foreign language major. I'm not a literature person. I've never understood what literature was about. The third trimester was all about the literary movements of the 19th and 20th Centuries. I never had any clue what the course was about. I have no idea how I managed to get through it. I had to take it twice, and that didn't help. The 2nd time, I got a lot of help with the term paper, and that's what helped me complete the course.
I really don't understand why a literature series would be required for a foreign language major. The department had a number of linguistics courses that could have been offered as an alternative choice of concentration, but they weren't. They were only electives. I would have cleaned up in linguistics classes. Literature is an unfathomable foreign language to me.
My most challenging class of all was plain ol' English 101, and it was exclusively because of my instructor. She was your prototypical man-hater, and effectively turned our class into Feminist Literature. That, on its own, didn't cause the problems.
The inherent problem that I have with liberal arts in general is that many of them are subjective. There is not a "correct" answer; there is only what is interpreted as correct by whoever is doing the grading. In this particular instructor's case, anything that wasn't complete shock and outrage at how the female characters were treated in the work, resulted in a failing grade.
Woe was he who read, "The Handmaid's Tale" and attempted to do something silly like draw parallels between the dystopian world presented in the book and our modern world, or to try and recognize symbolism within the material presented in the book and how that might have been derived from historical events. No, your job was to express disgust at how dehumanized the women were in the book, lest you fail.
I actually failed that course twice until I got a different instructor the third time. I was more stubborn than intelligent at that age.
For a while, I thought my Astronomy 102 (kinda like astrophysics) was the hardest class. It was at the time since I was 17 but it helped me get used to college course load. Then my 4000/5000 level GIS class was the hardest because I am not a computer person what so ever, so computer mapping was not enjoyable. Now this semester (only 1 more year!) my graduate level geomorphology class is my hardest, as shown by my 54% on the last test. Part of it is my doing as I have no geology knowledge and got a C on the pre-req class.
Two classes come to mind. Digital signals and then Real time processing. Got an A in the latter and learned a ton
The signals class I got a C with a 45 as my final grade. Prof was a tool and learned nothing in his class.
I second the Abstract Algebra class. I never got past page 3 in the textbook, and I was the only person to ever ask a question in class. I was about to drop when I found out that I had the top grade in the class--a 62. I stuck it out and got a B. Next most difficult was Foundations of Mathematics, a course in set theory. I didn't have any trouble with it, but others in my class were flunking it for the third time. I would have loved to take more upper level math classes, but they weren't available before I graduated.
Don't feel bad outside proofing a few things it's the hardest math in existence.. It trumps anything in electrical, computer, mechanical, and chemical engineering and a lot of lesser schools don't even attempt to teach it. Algebraic topology and number theory probably come next followed by DE and linear algebra.
My hardest: Differential Topology. I realized nobody cares if you know math without a degree and using it for engineering requires a lot of time and capital. I use it for financial analysis now. Mostly just calculus though.
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