For engineering you need calculus. For art, history, English literature, foreign languages, you do not. For business administration you need business math. A high school college prep kid can take 2 years of algebra and 1 year of geometry and 1 year of business math and be completed ready to do college non-engineering. How much calculus does a chemistry or biology or botany major need? Calculus is for engineering.
I had 3 semesters of Calc, majored in biochem and microbiology. When I got my first job in business I fell in love with that and never looked back. I don’t recall using Calc in anything but knowing what it could be used for was useful. When I finally reached senior management I could go ask our engineering department to run some numbers for me. They could generate information that was useful to management even if they didn’t all completely understand how we generated it. More people need to understand what you can do with Calc than actually know how to do calculus if that makes any sense. I never liked calculus class but I loved the concept of what all you could do with it. How, when, and where do we teach that? I don’t know, but I’m satisfied that engineers know it and they are a useful asset just like the rest of your fellow employees, everybody has a part.
Chemistry needs the same as engineers. Biology/botany less so.
>>How much calculus does a chemistry or biology or botany major need? Calculus is for engineering
For chemistry, you’ll need ODEs (which require calculus) for reaction kinetics, same for biology and botony when modeling population changes. Business finance will require calculus for Black-Scholes, for example, and stochastic calculus for profit expectations.
Calculus is not just for engineering. It’s a way of thinking about the world as state and changes to state.
I was a chemistry major. I took three semesters of it. Try doing any kind of quantum mechanics without calculus- can’t be done. Thermodynamics also in almost entirely relationships derived using calculus. Pretty hard to study reaction kinetics as well without understanding differential equations.
Calculus is not just for engineering. It has its uses in most sciences and even in economics - things like marginal costs and sensitivities to changes in demand, interest rates, etc., all are derivatives.
IMHO that is debatable.
But even if true consider this:
Nothing makes it from dream, concept or prototype into physical reality available to the masses without engineering at some stage.
A chemist may discover a new polymer but it doesn't become a useful success on a large scale if production is limited to hand crafting small batches.
The solution to put it into mass production?
Engineering.
And the transportation vehicle or system to deliver it to users?
Engineered, of course
Canned foods, lotions, medicines, plant seeds, gasoline, pure water, plant food, cars, air travel, prepared foods at grocery stores and restaurants,
computers, appliances, movies, professional sports, newspapers, etc., etc.
All are widely available only through engineering somewhere in the process.
Dumbing down math is just plain dumb!
...and physics.