lsu1993

Then that seals the deal. I'll just do regular my freshman year so I can get my feet on the ground and test the waters then ill jump into honors my sophomore year. Thanks for all the input!

spectrum2

I tried looking this up on the web site but I couldn't find it. If a student is admitted to honors as a freshman do they have to maintain a 3.5 GPA at TAMU? From what I hear that is difficult to do in engineering even without honors classes. Also if a student is admitted into university honors their freshman year from what I am understanding the student isn't required to take any honors classes freshman year but they will still get priority registration. Am I getting this right? From what I understood students can "get their feet on the ground" as Isu suggests and then move on to the honors classes during sophmore year. Please tell me if I've got these things right. Thanks.

cibirochka

Spectrum2,

To take honors classes you have to have a 3.5 GPA. I'm in mechanical engineering, and that hasn't been hard for me to maintain, but I had already completed my math and physics classes when I came. Since you're going to be registering after all the returning students, it's understandable if you don't take honors classes your first semester. However, it is frowned upon to use your priority registration for spring classes without registering for an honors course. I don't know if there are any consequences, but that might be one of the things they're changing.

spectrum2

So if I have this straight, a student probably shouldn't apply to honors if they are not going to take honors classes freshman year. Once they are in TAMU they have to have a 3.5 to take any honors classes. So if a student concludes first semester freshman year or all of freshman year with say a 3.2 they would not be allowed to take any honors classes until they get their GPA up to 3.5, if I'm understanding correctly. At that point are they not in the honors program? I know in some schools where students have to maintaln a GPA for scholarships there is usually a probation period before the scholarship is lost. Is the honors program similar to that? Its a little confusing but it may be that with the changes to the honors program some things are getting figured out along the way. Part of the confusion is, if said honors student is living in the honors dorm and they don't make the 3.5 mark do they have to move out for second semester? My S is taking BC calc and AP physics right now. I don't know how he'll test on these but even if he gets 5's I've heard it is a good idea to take at least Calc 2 in college. I'm not sure how accurate this is but when we attended the info session for engineering they said that the average engineering GPA is a 2.8. Judging by that scale a 3.5 sounds really high with all of the adjustment that happens freshman year. From what I'm hearing it sounds like it might be better to wait and see before taking on the extra pressure of honors. I raise the question because my S is apprehensive about if he will be able to maintain that 3.5. I know he wants to enjoy his college experience so he doesn't want to go in feeling that he needs to study every minute. Any thoughts?

cibirochka

I don't know how it will work now that they're changing it, but in the past some students didn't take any honors classes their freshman year. You could contact someone working in the honors department to ask. Up until now, being in the honors program was very loosely defined, and I suppose that yes, while the GPA was below 3.5 students were out of the program. Once again, I don't know how this will work this coming year. There might have been exceptions to not being allowed to take honors courses while the GPA was lower than 3.5, but not being allowed to take honors courses wasn't an issue. You would just get back into next semester when your GPA was better. I think students were able to stay in honors housing for the second semester even if they did not maintain a 3.5. Taking honors courses also depends on which classes you're taking. Honors Environmental Design, ENDS 101, is considered an easy A class easy A classes . I didn't find the honors engineering 111 and 112 courses I took difficult, and the honors astronomy 109 course I took only differed from the regular fairly easy course by a five page research paper. I haven't taken any honors math or physics classes, but those might be the ones to worry about instead.