@User2987456 See above response for the pros of being in honors college. Virtus has all the bells and whistles of support for engineering students. While things could be different now, it is true that your son will likely have to choose between honors and virtus because of the residential component/commitment. Your son has to decide what is more interesting/important to him.
My son (several years back) had the same decision about scholars v virtus. He chose scholars for a few reasons, but the primary reason was location of the dorm. Cambridge community is the closest to the engineering buildings, and he wanted to sleep in as much as possible, haha. However, he moved to South Campus Commons as a sophomore, which is the largest distance he could go, and it did not hinder his success as a student. In classic engineering style, he saw a problem and figured out a solution: he got a bike on campus to buy himself that extra time in bed. He also chose scholars for the same reason he didn’t choose a tech school - he wanted to meet a diverse group of people, not just engineers.
As for virtus, you should know that the engineering curriculum is very intense. Even students that attend “very competitive” high schools are challenged by the rigor of engineering courses at the college level. Virtus is specifically designed to support the needs of engineering students to ensure they succeed and therefore stay in the major. It has all the bells and whistles (tutoring specifically for engineering classes right in your dorm, block scheduling with peers for ease of study groups, career counseling, etc). It’s a very successful program.
Of course, students not in Virtus have access to tutors, career counseling, etc, but they have to make a little more effort to get it because it’s not available in their dorms.
So, there are pros and cons for both, and the decision really depends on each student.