Thanks so much for your feedback. Has your son had any internships yet? How easy is it to get one?
@pbleigh. Could you please share why your son dropped UH? I read some old posts that even though the professors are not supposed to grade Honors vs. non-Honors differently, but some do anyways. Have you heard the same thing from your son? Thanks.
@ATTX University Honors has many more requirements to stay in it than Engineering Honors plus your first year you have to live in their dorm; that is the reason my son dropped it. He stayed in Engineering Honors and is still in it. In engineering many of the honors classes are stacked meaning that you are in the same class with non-honors students but you are given a different syllabus that essentially has more work to do if you are an honors student. So it is not that they are grading the tests or homeworks differently for the honors students - it is that the honors students have more work to do for the same grade in essentially the same class. My son has become wary of the stacked honors classes because of this reason.
And FYI once you complete first semester and obtain 3.5, they can take honors classes without being designated honors student. My son does this. University honors would require a major and two minors. Really need to look at the whole picture before deciding. Being in honors for your major, is much better and more recognized.
Thanks for the feedback
@pbleigh and @AggieMomhelp. After reading through many posts and your replies, it seems to me UH may be too much for their freshman life (I’d rather them get a chance to experience college life outside honors halls). I think I’ll suggest them to decline UH if offered, but keep the EH for now … however, the decisions are entirely theirs, so we’ll see.
Can you share some of her experiences at Purdue? Weather, class size, faculty contact, projects, internships? Don’t know anyone who’s attended.
@Jamesmom3 - I just saw your questions. I will private message you!
My son is trying to decide between Purdue and A&M. He’s been admitted to engineering honors. Can you share about class sizes? Also, for freshman year how easy is the registration process?
When we visited he was impressed with the honors presentation but now he’s waffling. Thanks.
@Jamesmom3 I read somewhere on tamu’s website. I believe the class sizes are expected to be 20-25. I’m not sure how that works when they take classes with other kids, eg. general requirements. As being part of eh, one is given priority registration. So I expect open enrollment is open to them first before others can register for classes.
@Jamesmom3. Do you mind sharing why your son changes from being impressed by A&M to become undecided? My sons are also admitted to Purdue and A&M EH … and would like to find out the positives or negatives to make him waffling? Thanks.
@Jamesmom3 @icedmachiato If you look at the course listings for engineering courses the class sizes can be a little distorted. For example for one engineering class you may have one teacher teaching 3-5 different sections of 20 students each. If you look closely the teacher will have a lecture with all of those students at the same time; the 20 student sections come into play for their lab time only and that is taught by TA’s. Another example specifically for honors engineering courses is frequently like this: you will see one teacher assigned to the honors section of a particular engineering course and it will have just a handful on students; but, if you look closely you will see another section taught by the same teacher at the same time that is not honors and has 50-80 students in it. This is what they called a stacked honors class. The honors kids go to the exact same class as the non-honors but have a different syllabus then they do. Once you get to some 300 and 400 level courses class sizes tend to be much smaller anyways but honors classes tend to be of the stacked variety. I think my son has only had 2-3 dedicated honors classes besides research. The honor’s kids do get to pre-register the first day of pre-registration and that is a great perk.
The honor’s kids do get to pre-register the first day of pre-registration and that is a great perk.<<<<<
Yes, this is probably the real value.
@pbleigh Thanks for the info. Even 50-80 is still very good size imo. Sounds similar to where I did my undergrad. I remember we had a hall filled with students for general engineering classes. I would say 200+ kids in there. How is ta’s quality? Most of my ta’s were grad students from oversea and very often communication was an issue. One of the grad students was really good and he actually did the lectures for one series.
@icedmachiato My son says the TA’s are a mixed bag, sometimes you luck out with a good one and sometimes you don’t. The first year math, science classes are extremely large. The honor’s engineering classes for the first year are much smaller then the non-honors and since these are lab based courses, having other honor’s students for lab partners is also a plus.
He’s just wondering if the class sizes are really smaller - and how much contact there is with faculty. It does seem from pbleiegh’s reply that they are smaller than some at Purdue. And he likes the idea of engineering honors vs university honors - we haven’t heard from Purdue yet on honors. He is still leaning towards A&M.
Can you share your thought processes on the two schools? Are you oos?
Thank you@pbleigh@icedmachiao