<p>Our son, like many, had a top-notch application profile and chose UIUC for engineering. He transferred 34 credits due to his SAT II/AP scores. He basically started as a sophomore. He had 7 courses in the fall and 5 in the spring and finished up with just under 2.0 GPA. The University dropped him. The Dean will read an appeal, documenting our son’s depression. Our son did not notify the University of his struggles and enjoyed the University in every other respect. Any views on whether the appeal will be looked at favorably?</p>
<p>His GPA is probably what turned them off. Even if you have all AP classes, you must have decent grades-especially for a program as prestigious as UIUC’s Engineering. And though I don’t doubt that your son went through depression, many people use this as an excuse for their grades so it could easily turn Admissions Officers off. Did you explain what exactly triggered his depression?
The fact that he garnered all those credits is quite impressive and shows that your son is very bright, so that could definitely help your situation.</p>
<p>This is a very unfortunate situation and I really hope that the university can be able to readmit your son. Best of luck!</p>
<p>First off let me say I am sorry for your son’s struggle with depression. To be clear, when you say the university dropped him do you mean he was put on probation after first semester and then did not meet the criteria after second semester and was then “dropped” from the university? If so, those are just the rules. I think your son can go to a community college and then re-apply. It happens more than you think. It can turn into a happy ending. He may find that UIUC just was not the place for him and this was the way to find out.</p>
<p>Good luck with your situation.</p>
<p>To be clear, when you say the university dropped him do you mean he was put on probation after first semester and then did not meet the criteria after second semester and was then “dropped” from the university? </p>
<p>Yes, that is what happened. UIUC term is “dropped” and the decision was made based on his GPA being 1.96 [must be 2.00]. It is still a shock. It’s also disheartening that the University will not accept that 7 courses and 5 courses at the sophomore level were too demanding for a freshman. It’s been 10 days and our S has not finished his written appeal. We have talked and emailed with the Dean, so he knows the story. Plan A: get him back at UIUC. Plan B: try to find a school to transfer to at this very late stage of the process. In the meantime, get S to learn to communicate and to ask for help. We’re encouraging him to talk to appropriate adults. It is surprising that the Dean of Coll of Eng says he is completely responsible for the decision to readmit our S.</p>
<p>That’s what happens when one signs up for 7 courses first semester of freshman year.</p>
<p>Hopefully he is readmitted.</p>
<p>Good luck with your son. Next time, try not to overload with classes, as it seems like your son did with 7 then 5 classes</p>
<p>My son just got dropped by UIUC also after his freshman year. He entered College of Engineering with the same exact amount of AP and SAT credits as your son, 34 credits. My son was hoping for an appeal, but was told that he cannot appeal and can only try readmit after away for one year. Do you know the criteria for appeal, not readmit? And who told you that “the Dean of Coll of Eng says he is completely responsible for the decision to readmit our S”? Because we were told that the decision is up to admission office. </p>
<p>Are you interested in emailing in private to discuss the whole issue because we are struggling to figure out what to do also?</p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>“It’s also disheartening that the University will not accept that 7 courses and 5 courses at the sophomore level were too demanding for a freshman.”</p>
<p>The University didn’t sign your son up for that many courses. He did it himself. Usually, an advisor looks at your schedule during the summer you go for orientation. </p>
<p>Anyway, common sense should have prevailed in the class registration process. The summer I registered for classes, my parents told me not to take more than 15 hours (4 classes) because they wanted me to have a manageable course load my first semester on campus.</p>
<p>Does anyone know what is the chance of being readmitted to UIUC College of Eng?</p>
<p>This is an unfortunate situation. Even if students come in with loads of AP credit, they are just 18 years old. My experience as an undergraduate advisor for over 25 years indicates that even the best student can have an adjustment difficulty in the first year. I have long been an advocate of having students start with no more than 4 courses their first semester and then increasing the load as they prove they can handle it.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, there is clearly another problem involved here and that is academic advising. A good academic advising system has an early warning system that helps the advisor keep track of students and identify potential problems before it is too late to do anything about them. A well-timed “Withdrawal” from a single course can salvage teh entire semester by simply reducing the load.</p>
<p>There are a number of students who have no problem handling the heavy load and working everything out on their own. However, there are others who need a bit more interaction with an advisor and the kind of monitoring that an early warning system provides. It is possible that even should your student be successful in improving his grades at a community college, UIUC might not be the right place for him academically and a smaller school with a more hands-on student-advisor interaction would be better.</p>
<p>Good Luck!</p>
<p>xraymancs, you are absolutely correct. With the information I have now about UIUC system, the disaster could have been avoided. I did send an email to an advisor after my child was still not doing well during the second semester but got no reply. Now I know that I should have pursued more. We are considering all possibilities now. Since you are a college rep, do you know if it is still possible to transfer for other colleges for school year 2012-2013 at this time or it is too late that community college first then transfer for 2013-2014 is the only choice?</p>
<p>Transfers can go on through the summer as long as the school you are interested in has rolling admissions. However, you also need to ask yourself if it would be better for your student to regroup for a semester in a community college close to home before transferring. Usually the admissions counselors can give you this advice if you just call them up.</p>
<p>One other consideration is that the Engineering curriculum in just about any university is packed and a lot is demanded of the student so another school might have the same pressures if Engineering is still your student’s major.</p>
<p>craymancs, thanks for your reply. Yes, my child still wants engineering to be the major. Is there any disadvantage of taking a year at a community college (UIUC won’t readmit for being away shorter than one year)? For engineering, the curriculum usually has very little flexibility. We are concerned that going to a community college for a year will push his graduation further back. Another problem is that nowadays community colleges in my neighborhood are very lack of funding so it is very difficult to get into the classes that my child needs.</p>
<p>Whattodonext,</p>
<p>What classes did your son take his first year at U of I? And what were his grades in those courses?</p>
<p>I’m curious to find out why his GPA is so low. Did he struggle with Calculus? Or the Physics sequence?</p>
<p>It is likely that there will be some delay in graduation if your student goes to a community college simply because the community college does not have the engineering courses that students take in their second year. In fact, most engineering transfers from community colleges take 3 years to finish an engineering degree. Of course, this is not terribly unusual because many engineering students take 5 years to complete anyway.</p>
<p>I think that the main focus for your student is not hoe he can quickly complete the B.S. degree but how he can successfully complete the degree. He is in a bit of a hole and this will require time and effort to get out of. If he tries to rush, it may not lead to success. I understand that an extra year of college adds to costs but I believe that a successful endpoint is worth it.</p>
<p>Bill73, He was not overloaded with classes. He took sophmore level calculus and physics. With his AP and placement tests, he was placed out of all freshman classes. He did not do well with both math and physics. I was surprised with math because that has always been his strength. This is a child that scored almost 700 for SAT math section while he was only three months into 7th grade. So I am not sure the issue here is totally about the difficulties in the class material. What do you think might have gone wrong?</p>
<p>Whattodonext,</p>
<p>It’s difficult to tell what went wrong.</p>
<p>Did he strugggle with the material, or did he not put in enough time to study and do the work?</p>
<p>My second week at U of I, I failed a Chem 107 quiz. I had studied a lot for it, so I knew I was in trouble if I didn’t do something right away. As a result, I met with a Dean and transferred from that course into regular Chemistry, which was much more manageable. </p>
<p>Your son needs to be honest with himself. As I said, did he try his best, but struggle? Or did he spend too much time enjoying college life outside his studies? If he did his best, I wouldn’t advise staying in engineering. With a low GPA, he will not be as sought after by recruiters. Additionally, he will not have fun the next few years in colllege if he is struggling to keep his GPA above a 2.0.</p>
<p>Thanks for all of your feedback. I appreciate it. Our S did submit a written appeal, completely written by him, with a brief letter from his MD to document his clinical depression. Now we wait to hear back from the Coll of Eng.<br>
In the meantime, S did “thaw out” a little and is beginning to talk more about where to go from here. Today S and H are meeting with a local college that offers same-day admissions decisions for fall 2012. S decided himself to apply as a business major and we are pleased that S is thinking about where he belongs.<br>
Next week he visits Rutgers that has an excellent engineering program in Newark (about the polar opposite of Champaign campus). I insisted last night that he log onto his UIUC student web account to show me official communications from Coll of Eng. He had emails there that were never opened.<br>
Our family seems to be recovering from the shock and is taking steps.</p>
<p>It’s absolutely critical that a student regularly check their email. It’s how the university (professors, TAs, College and University personnel) communicate with the student. It’s one of those critical things that is absolutely necessary in order to succeed in college, and it’s often neglected by incoming freshman because in high school, in most cases, it was secondary at best.</p>
<p>The other issue is the speed at which the material is presented. Usually at about double the rate of HS. The adjustment is tough for some, and one of the main reasons why a light load that first Fall is usually a good idea. That presentation speed also warrants the use of different study methods. In HS, a good student can master the material on his own much more so than in college where they definitely should take advantage of office hours and study groups, if they feel they are failing to grasp the material adequately.</p>
<p>I wanted to thank all of you and report back that our S’s appeal is accepted. His status is changed from “drop” to “college probation”. We’re not entirely sure what this means. I told my S he must call Coll of Eng and ask if there is a GPA or time requirement to fulfill.</p>