<p>I’m wondering how ‘startling’ the transition will be for an incoming freshman. I had a 4.0 GPA in HS with 7 APs, but I’m now taking 16 credits in UW this upcoming fall, with two being honors classes. Should I have my guard up, or will it be a fairly easy transition?</p>
<p>HChem, HEnglish, Intro to Honors, psych 101.</p>
<p>I had a 4.0 in high school and I practically breezed through. I thought I could do the same in college and got only a 3.3 or something GPA my first quarter. It’s a completely different level of academics and you need to treat it as such.</p>
<p>The bottom line is, don’t be over confident. You’ve demonstrated that you’re a very capable individual with a 4.0 and 7APs and may think college might be a breeze. Maybe for you, it WILL be a breeze. It really depends on what you’re used to and how you manage your time.</p>
<p>HEnglish and Psych 101 should be pretty simple as long as you show up to class, do homework, and don’t slack. Intro to Honors is honestly more busy work than anything else (at least it was 2 years ago). Don’t spend way too much time on this seminar since I believe it’s a pass fail seminar.</p>
<p>HChem is the class you should be worried about. Definitely keep on top of things, make some study friends, show up to class, and talk to the prof if you ever are confused. This is one of the Honors classes that is considered a “GPA killer”. Don’t let that scare you, but also be prepared for a fast paced, in depth class.</p>
<p>Back to the “it depends on your high school experience!” thing, there are plenty of students with 4.0s who put their guard down. There are also some students who couldn’t get above a 3.8 (unweighted) at their high school because it was just so rigorous, the courses were curved, etc. A friend of mine went to a very academically rigorous high school from the Seattle area, came to UW with a 3.8, and is now graduating after going through the Honors Chem, Honors Physics, Honors Math, etc series and going off to medical school with a 4.0 (+research+volunteer work). He felt like UW was way too easy. Sounds crazy, but it goes to show how people have different backgrounds and the “is it going to be an easy transition?” question is pretty different for each person.</p>
<p>Expect to go from above average to average among your peers… HS classes are nothing like uni classes, even if you took a bunch of APs…</p>
<p>ilikeUW : That’s mostly true, but again it really depends on your high school.</p>
<p>I admit speedsolver does have a very good point regarding how prepared you will be based on your prior schooling. I took one class with a CS major, and this guy came from a private boarding school high-school. He practically breezed through his classes at the UW. One the other hand, I went to an average to above-average public high school and I was in the same aforementioned position that many of my peers also found themselves in.</p>
<p>I think it also depends on what subject(s) you are passionate about. I excelled in some classes I loved while not doing so well in courses that I wasn’t excited about taking, like English courses. I did “well” in them in high school because the grading is less strict then, even in AP and Honors courses.</p>
<p>Don’t take Intro to Fisheries (or something random) that you think will get you an easy 4.0 if you don’t think you’re going to put work into it.</p>
<p>Let’s not forget maturity level. College is a completely different environment then high school. Even if you got a perfect GPA in high school, you could struggle if you aren’t ready to join the level of maturity college requires. (Don’t confuse obtaining a high gpa = maturity, because it does not.)</p>
<p>I think everyone’s advice so far has been spot on. To paraphrase what ilikeuw says…you go from being a big fish in a little pond to a little fish in a big pond. Also, as master kuni implied, most people see somewhat of a drop from their hs grade (I am the opposite, but that’s another story.) Additionally, as speedsolver said…don’t be overconfident. Also (as she said) subjects your passionate about make a HUGE difference. I have fallen trap to taking a class that I thought would be “easy” but I had little interest in. It was more of a struggle to get an A then classes I do like.</p>