Transfer success for failing frosh -- BicoastalMamma, this info is for you

Colleges & Universities Harvey Mudd College
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<p>Thought I would post this because it seems applicable to the kind of academic situation BicoastalMamma has described. Maybe some seasoned Mudders could respond if they know anyone who went through the program.</p>

<p>HMC has a “Program of Transfer Studies” designed for students who, facing academic trouble, will be leaving HMC. This program allows a student to take one final semester without having to take the core – for the express purpose of building his GPA in order to transfer out.</p>

<p>So here’s the scenario. You get into Mudd. You work your buns off through first semester and find that you just can’t handle it. Extreme exhaustion, multiple failed courses, yada yada. It’s just too much. You think your academic life is over and you figure you’re doomed because surely no college will take you after the Core has had its way with you in second semester.</p>

<p>But wait! You can petition the Scholarly Standing Committee for admission to the Program of Transfer Studies. Your first semester was Pass/Fail – you have no GPA. Your second semester will consist of courses that <em>don’t</em> chew you up and spit you out. You can make good grades in those courses and end the year with a nice, normal GPA that should be just fine for freshman transfer status at many colleges.</p>

<p>Here’s information about the [Scholarly</a> Standing Committee](<a href=“http://www.hmc.edu/about/administrativeoffices/registrar1/ssc.html]Scholarly”>http://www.hmc.edu/about/administrativeoffices/registrar1/ssc.html), including a link to the Petition form and deadlines for submitting the petition.</p>

<p>And here’s a paragraph describing the [Program</a> of Transfer Studies](<a href=“http://www.hmc.edu/academicsclinicresearch/catalogue1/catalogue08091/regulations.html#transfer]Program”>http://www.hmc.edu/academicsclinicresearch/catalogue1/catalogue08091/regulations.html#transfer).</p>

<p>This is what I found while reading the [Student</a> Handbook](<a href=“http://www.hmc.edu/about/administrativeoffices/dos1/studenthandbook.html]Student”>http://www.hmc.edu/about/administrativeoffices/dos1/studenthandbook.html) and related links online. Please note that I’m not Muddstaff, I’m just a frosh mom, so don’t take what I say as representing the College. The person you would want to contact for more information is probably Associate Dean for [Academic</a> Affairs](<a href=“http://www.hmc.edu/about/administrativeoffices/academicaffairs.html]Academic”>http://www.hmc.edu/about/administrativeoffices/academicaffairs.html) Mary Cardenas, who oversees the Program of Transfer Studies and serves on the Scholarly Standing Committee.</p>

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<p>I think if you have any "F"s on your transcript, you still have a horrible GPA and an admissions person at a 4 year college will throw you in the reject pile, unless they have personal knowledge that you can work like a dog and still fail an engineering core. </p>

<p>Maybe, the model should be hard classes that are manageable by smart hardworking students, rather than chew you up and spit you out. Now, it is not such a surprise to me why there is a shortage of engineering graduates in this country. HMC is not the only engineer school with the chew them up model; many are worse from what my engineering friends tell me now. Too bad, they did not tell me 6 months ago.</p>

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<p>“Maybe, the model should be hard classes that are manageable by smart hardworking students, rather than chew you up and spit you out. Now, it is not such a surprise to me why there is a shortage of engineering graduates in this country. HMC is not the only engineer school with the chew them up model; many are worse from what my engineering friends tell me now. Too bad, they did not tell me 6 months ago.”</p>

<p>Well, engineering is one of the few professions where if we don’t do our job correctly, people die… sometimes in large numbers. I surely don’t want to drive on bridges or fly in airplanes designed by people that just skated through school. That’s why I’ll never fly in a 787 :P</p>

<p>In four years, you go from oblivious HS graduate to someone who is expected to make tough decisions that can give or take life away. That is a lot of power and responsibility that must be acquired through rigorous study.</p>

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<p>

I think we need a “bang head on wall” avatar on this site.</p>

<p>In the first semester, if your son fails a class with a course number below 50 (that’s all of his courses unless he placed out of something), he does not receive a grade of F in that class. He receives a grade of NC – No Credit – and it has no impact on his GPA. You might not see a difference between F and NC, but college Admissions officers do. If he applies as a freshman transfer student to, say, a state flagship, I really doubt they’ll reject him on the basis of “No Credit” grades in, say, Linear Algebra and Quantum Mechanics (not typical freshman-year courses at most flagships afaik). They’ll look at the actual grades he receives in his second semester. And if he were to take the Transfer Studies option for a “terminal” second semester, he’d be able to spend that semester making higher grades in courses that are not as difficult as the Core courses he’s taking now. Those second-semester courses would be the only grades computed into his GPA.</p>

<p>But from the dozen or so other posts now scattered through many threads on this forum, it sounds like your son isn’t really in danger of failing after all and you’ve been eating yourself up with what my grandmother would call “borrowed trouble.” This Transfer Studies thing is the “nuclear option” – the safety net that should make your worst fears go away, because Mudd does have an exit strategy for students who find they need one. A last-resort option exists, if your son needs it, which it sounds like he doesn’t.</p>

<p>As to what the “model should be,” HMC seems to have a pretty good track record right now – in their shoes, I don’t think I’d be looking to chuck it all and start over. Engineering is probably the toughest course of study out there, for the very reason rocketDA states. </p>

<p>It’s perfectly normal for your son not to have the same grades at Mudd that he had in high school. Few students do. In the 50+ years since Mudd was founded, ten students have graduated with 4.0 GPAs (one of them teaches Math there now :D). Mudders don’t enjoy the grade inflation that students of some other colleges do. But they do get terrific job placement and grad school placement. Must be doing something right.</p>

<p>You know what made the biggest difference for a frosh Mudder my son told me about, who was struggling in multiple classes – what helped this guy was finding out that his folks understood he was going through a huge adjustment, that they weren’t freaked and furious over a string of low (even failing) test grades, but they had confidence in him and his ability to pull it out. He found it a lot easier to focus with the weight of that stress off his shoulders. Went to talk with his profs, found he could understand the material after meeting with them a few times, and is now pulling up in every subject. I think that’s part of the process for most Mudders, really, based on what I’ve heard from faculty/staff, students, parents, and alumni. They learn a way of working and thinking that’s different from what they did in high school, and that takes time. And of course it causes stress in these kids who spent the past four years at the top of the heap as the smartest kids in their classes. For a lot of them, it’s the first time they’ve encountered something they couldn’t grasp on the first try. Maybe not on the next try, either. But what pride and satisfaction they must feel when they finally break through.</p>

<p>Good luck to your son, BcM.</p>

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<p>That’s fascinating - so they even try to take care of the students they’re losing. I wonder if Caltech/MIT etc. have something similar. That was kind of you to look it up.</p>

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<p>

Interesting question. A quick search of Caltech’s Web site didn’t turn up a similar program, but interestingly enough, their ITR/reinstatement process involves a panel with a heavy student presence and a more reflective, possibly more subjective process.
[UASH</a> Handbook for Students](<a href=“http://registrar.caltech.edu/uash/handbook.htm]UASH”>http://registrar.caltech.edu/uash/handbook.htm)
Caltech students sit on their Admissions committee too, if I’m not mistaken. Seems like an interesting approach.</p>

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<p>I found out that students have 5 semesters to complete the core classes, so they can repeat a class or take a summer school class and still graduate.</p>

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<p>Oh yeah, that’s right! I’m glad you mentioned that, BcM. I recall reading a couple other things about that…

  1. If they fail a core class, they have to retake it the following semester.
  2. They can retake a core class twice if need be – so they get a total of three chances to pass it.</p>

<p>That is a relief, given the breadth of the core. Just about every Mudder is bound to find himself in some core class that’s a weak spot for him.</p>

<p>It sounds like you’re breathing easier now? I hope so. :)</p>

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<p>I think it’s actually even lower. Records from the Dean of Faculty tell me that in 2008 graduated the sixth 4.0 ever. I am not sure if there was one in 2009. And I caught a glance at Prof. Yong’s CV and it says he was ranked second in his class - clearly impossible if he had a 4.0.</p>

<p>But I’m just nitpicking, you are right on geek_mom in that it requires a lot of hard work to keep your GPA up here, and almost everyone’s grades slip from high school.</p>

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<p>

Woo… I stand corrected! I’ll have to tell my son that. As to Prof Yong, though, maybe he was second in his graduate class?</p>

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<p>No I think the CV says that he was “only” second at Mudd.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.math.hmc.edu/~dyong/papers/thesis.pdf[/url]”>http://www.math.hmc.edu/~dyong/papers/thesis.pdf&lt;/a&gt; (go to the very last pages, he has attached a copy of his CV to the end of his thesis).</p>

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<p>I’d still maintain that he’s one of the crazy smartest genius students ever at Mudd. He graduated with over 200 credits in only four years. To those who don’t know, a typical semester load at Mudd is 16 credits (5.3 classes), 128 are required to graduate (so 8 semesters of 16). Anything above 18 per semester is an overload, but Yong averaged 25 credits per semester which would put him to over 8 classes each term. Maybe if he had only taken 7.5 classes a term he’d have gotten the 4.0 :-)</p>

<p>Had two classes with him - incredibly brilliant, but also very down to earth, funny and laid-back, and an amazingly clear orator of the subject matter. He’d play random stupid Youtube videos during 5 minute breaks in every class period ;)</p>

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<p>Right you are – I stand corrected. :o</p>

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<p>Bumping this thread because it seems germane to current discussion.</p>