Which Living-Learning Program at UMD

So I was accepted into Honors for Computer Engineering, College of Engineering. Now the choice for which living program to choose. I understand there are 7 programs and I would have assumed I would join the University Honors however, I saw this on the website.

“There are seven very exciting and cutting-edge Honors College living-learning programs. Please be sure to read about them and then complete the form below to tell us which ones interest you. Your living-learning program does not have to align with your academic major. It can, but for most students, it doesn’t.”

It makes it seem that students join different programs from their majors…So can I hear from students on how they decided on their program and was it the right fit for you.

For example…I thought that I would to sign up for University Honors however, cybersecurity interests me, so then I would join that program? And how is this different from where you live…I would think most engineers want to dorm with other engineers…maybe I am confused.

No longer a student, just an alum, but since they are in classes and I am home on a snow day…yay!..will chime in…
Personally, I would say that if cybersecurity interests you, go for that…it’s new this year and the first of its kind in the nation. @jibler can possibly chime in on this especially re program…

Great dorm - brand spanking new. Only drawback is dorm is kinda on opposite side of campus from all the engineering classes (dorm is more central to rest of campus though), but small price to pay for awesome living space! (Might be worth bringing a bike if you are the type that likes to sleep in, ha ha)

In all likelihood, there will be a lot of compsci students and also a pretty fair number of computer engineering students in this major, so I would think you should be fine finding people to study with.

You will honestly find lots of engineering students in honors programs in general, so you should be ok, but if you really want an all engineering dorm experience, then there is VIRTUS/FLEXUS (male/female). http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-maryland-college-park/1455365-attn-engineers-special-living-learning-program-for.html#latest

Thank you, any other comments are appreciated

maryversity - I have been reading a lot of your posts regarding Virtus. You said you didn’t have first hand experience with it so what experiences did you have that you speak so highly of it? I hate having this deadline before
going back down for a visit. I emailed the program coordinator to find out about doing a stay over but that is still going to be after the deadline of selecting your dorm. After reading another thread about the one person who might loose her scholarship and ended up transferring out of engineering and going over to a math major makes me think even more.
So can you compare University Honors vs Virtus and if there is a General Honors Housing which is not a living learning program, I would greatly appreciate that. And why is that not part of the choices of programs I could make.
I only have the options for the LLP. If I don;t choose one of them, do I default to a general Honors housing?

It sounds you still get support systems but are that at the same magnitude?
eligible to take special classes?
still have small class sizes?
able to register earlier for classes then Regular admission?

I want to make sure I am as prepared for my first college experience. Don’t want to turn down other scholarships to go to UMD and find I wasn’t ready and then have lost money from other schools.

Another question…how does UMD handle transfer classes from other colleges. For instance, if I wanted to Chemistry at my community college and transfer that over is that ok, since I keep hearing AP chem is difficult and it sometimes its the professor. That is one class I did have a hard time with in school and transffered out early on in the class.

@collegenj, for your first question, maryversity has provided lots of solid advice and/or information throughout cc. She does lots and lots of research and she has a student in engineering. I think you are wise in asking about her experience, but as another cc parent, I would testify that she is spot on in her knowledge.

As for another student who lost his/her scholarship - I’m not sure if it’s the same person, but the one student who is in danger of losing her B/K scholarship had a 1220 SAT. While this is certainly a good score, it is much lower than other B/K scholarship recipients. (I was told my UMD directly that to be considered for B/K students should have 1500). That tells me that perhaps her high school didn’t have the best academics to prepare her/him. Clearly the scholarship committee saw something in her though. It’s a shame however, because it put the student in a position where he/she may have been in over his head before college even started. I sincerely hope it works out for her. So while again, you are being wise in realizing you need to maintain a high GPA, you might want to ask yourself what your scores, grades, high school prep was in comparison to other engineering students using engineering profile. I think maryversity has a link in one of her posts of this information, but here is one just for quick reference: http://www.eng.umd.edu/aboutus/facts-figures.

As for your question about General Honors - University Honors, in my opinion, is the “general honors.” They are all housed together and University Honors is the largest group. I can tell you that my son, who graduated last May in Computer Engineering, did University Honors. First, there weren’t as many honors options available when he started UMD back in 2010. Also, he felt that being in engineering, he understood that he would be with students who had exceptional abilities and wasn’t sure how he would compare. He felt there was less time commitment for University Honors which would allow him more time on his coursework. It worked for him. Some of the other programs provide amazing opportunities, but with that comes a time commitment. This is something you need to weigh and decide for yourself.

I’m not sure I understand your question about support systems. Are you talking in general, or within University Honors? Again, I am speaking from what I know about my son’s experience. He found his biggest support system to be within a smaller group of other computer engineering majors - especially during his Junior & Senior years. Earlier, if I remember correctly, he got a great deal of support through IEEE student group (for electrical - and computer - engineers). They did a lot of studying together and really helped one another. As a parent, I was glad that things weren’t so cutthroat that they didn’t want to help each other. This was not the case at all.

You also asked about small class size. Honors classes typically were smaller. To be honest, we tried to prepare him ahead of time to expect hundreds of kids in his classes. While he did have a few of these, it didn’t happen nearly as often as we anticipated. Additionally, it might encourage you to know that he had been homeschooled from third grade on. So yes, he went from a class of 1 to UMD! He didn’t have nearly the difficulty we thought he might have adjusting. He did do some things that I thought were helpful ie making himself known to the professors and TAs by stopping by their offices, he got involved on campus to get to know various people. This is important because not only did he get to know other students, but he met other professors, and also important, office staff! The office staff can be very helpful if you have questions/problems with regard to schedules, scholarship questions,…

Last, regarding your question about registering earlier than Regular Admission. To be honest, I can’t remember. Sorry! I’m sure maryversity or someone can answer. What I do remember though is that your AP credits are helpful in that UMD allows students with most credits to register for housing,… before students with fewer credits. So even if you can’t use the credits such as AP Lang and AP Lit, I recommend submitting your scores just to up your total credits. Having both won’t help you graduate any earlier, but can help you register earlier. Because my son went in with just a few AP credits, he got what was left. Also, I remember something about him continuing to check the course offerings for additional sections when he would register for classes. Apparently, sometimes when he would register for a course he needed, it would be filled. He would register for something else then, but continue to monitor the course he wanted/needed. He got it down to a science in knowing at what point UMD would add a section and could then get the desired course (and drop the one he originally registered for in the event his plan didn’t work) I wish he were here right now so I could ask him.

You are asking good questions and I think you will do well. I know you and many others are probably anxious about the B/K scholarship. That being said, I urge you to look at: http://www.engrscholarships.umd.edu/scholarships/additional-scholarships. My son did not get a B/K invite (1490 SAT), however, he continued to monitor this site and ended up with enough in scholarships to completely cover his educaton. So, while it was more work than if he had the B/K, he ended up with enough money to pay for his education - and he didn’t have the stress of losing as much money if he didn’t keep his GPA up to par (although this wasn’t a problem either).

Overall, he was VERY pleased with his experience in computer engineering at UMD (although stressful at times) He is gainfully employed, and had several great job offers prior to the start of his senior year. Good luck to you!!!

If you want to room with other engineers I would think cybersecurity would be a good choice, there are also a lot of engineers in Gemstone. I wouldn’t chose University Honors if you are interested in one of the other programs because while you can move back to University Honors for most of the other programs it is difficult or impossible to move into them after you start as a freshman. One thing to consider as mentioned above is that these other programs have specific course sequences that you need to add to your schedule, so in effect they limit what you can take. If you come in with AP credits this really isn’t a problem but you do need to consider you will need space in your schedule for the extra classes.

I don’t have firsthand experience with any of these specific programs. I am an alum of the university, so I do have firsthand experience with the campus/overall university, but I did not major in engineering. Fwiw, my days as a student predate the creation of the honors/scholars/virtus living-learning program concepts. So, my praise of the programs in question comes primarily as the parent of a third year engineering student. I did a lot of research/comparison between other engineering schools programs during my son’s decision process a few years back. I took a lot of notes at the engineering preview sessions and orientation sessions, and I pay attention to things I hear.

Suffice it to say that I held back a lot of what I would have like to have said to that poster that withdrew from engineering. However, did you note that another poster said that when her son was surprised by the difficulty of the work, she stated he attacked the problem by studying harder and joining study groups and was actually able to manage a B?

That’s what engineers do. Identify problems, find solutions and work hard to actually solve the problems. I found it shocking that the poster claimed that people who passed the class either had AP chem before or cheated - and she accused the majority of them of cheating! Wow. That’s quite a bold statement. And really? Her failure to succeed is due to lack of special attention at orientation? How is it possible that so many other students that received the same “lack of attention” were able to make dean’s list?

What I find inexcusable is her failure to acknowledge the possibility that other students actually worked for and earned their grades of A’s and B’s. Yes, I have heard there is one hard chem teacher, but I have also heard she curves the grades based on each class performance so there is a fair distribution of grades. So, remember, there is always more to the story. Do I feel bad for the poster that she is in danger of losing her scholarship? Yes, that’s why I showed some restraint in my response to her. However, I am giving you a more straight talk response since her comments have clearly given you pause.

Moving on. Here’s the database to check if the specific course at the college you will take chem at will transfer for credit for CHEM135 https://www.sis.umd.edu/tce/

Honestly, I can’t speak too much about the honors programs as my son did scholars…but I think the “general” honors housing is Ellicott, so it’s pretty convenient to engineering classes, but I don’t know what percentage of engineering students are in that general honors program…you need to contact the school directly to ask those questions and to find out if you want to do that rather than a specific program http://www.universityhonors.umd.edu/univhonorsoverview.php

So back to your question of why I spoke highly of ACES? Just a personal opinion based on assumption…thought it was understood it was an opinion when I prefaced the statement with “personally” but I guess I wasn’t as clear as I could have been…? Anyway, I think it’s a “hot” field and the fact that Maryland is pioneering the first living-learning program for cybersecurity is awesome. I’ve always observed that the firstborn child usually gets the biggest gifts, the most attention, right? Same concept. Whether it holds true or not, I don’t know, but I’m thinking that companies are going to give the biggest donations and pay the most attention to the first born cybersecurity living-learning program on a campus…why not get in on the ground floor and take advantage of the spoils?

Hi @maryversity - Just to clarify, the University Honors students are in Hagerstown Hall, which is in the Ellicott community

WOW!! Thank you so much for your detailed information @davenmame and @ maryversity. please in no way did I mean disrespect. You have been so helpful in your responses. I just wanted to know if it was first hand. I did end up hearing from the university regarding the Prospective Student engineers day which is held the day before Open House on March 5th. She said the application has not been posted yet on the website but one of the activities is to tour the VIRTUS/FLEXUS housing. So the site that is on UMD now is last years form.

Oh gosh, your question about my "experience’ was not taken as disrespectful in any way, shape or form! Trust me. As davenmame said, it was a good question. I typically do introduce myself on threads as the mom of an engineering student so you shouldn’t have had to ask, but lately I’ve gotten a bit lazy about it because I kind of feel like a broken record sometimes… If I sounded ruffled it was because of that other post - that still has me irritated. Lol.

@collegenj - good catch - thanks for finding out and sharing that info! I was a little surprised that it had filled up so quickly, ha ha. Good to know. Definitely a worthwhile program.