The point of ASEE initiative is to retain rather than dissuade people from studying engineering. This may be a useful fact for OP - most schools are under pressure to avoid needless weeding out of engineering students.
Ds came >< this close to transferring to another engineering program for this Fall, one that had a supportive program. He’d enrolled and everything; he would’ve taken a hit credit-wise but could’ve succeeded in the end. However, again, we were under the assumption that if ds worked hard enough, with supports, he should be able to accomplish what his peers at BBU had accomplished. Until I started sensing something was wrong and then, well, today I finally figured out what. The 2.0 “in major” requirement that the accelerated track took 2nd semester, ds took first semester and got a B. That should count for something…but while they were taking the “need-a-C” class, he was taking TWO Soph classes that are at least as hard if not harder (as I explained above). I can call myself all kinds of stupid (and seriously, dh is an engineer and hadn’t realized any of this) but ds wanted to go back to BBU and was determined to succeed-we just hadn’t understood how much the deck-and school personnel, honestly-was stacked against him. (The Office of Disability Services gave me his advisor’s name to talk to, as if that’ll get us anywhere…)
OP - Don’t kick yourself. There are many different combos of scenarios.
Although my current advise to most engineering students is to repeat STEM classes even if AP credit is possible, thirty years ago I took my AP credits for Physics 1 and 2. At my school that turned out to be a good choice. Physics 3 was far easier than Physics 1 and 2. While most of my freshman engineering pals were spending 40% of their time just to pass Physics, I was able to concentrate on all my courses.
I did opt to skip the AP calc exam and repeat calc. I knew a good understanding would be key to the other engineering classes.
@colorado_mom , my son’s understanding of this debacle is that, since he’d had AP computer prog, his advisor told him to skip the freshman comp programming class and to go directly to the 2nd semester class; which then naturally led to Soph classes that same 1st yr. This seems suspicious to me because the description of the 2nd track (which he was accelerated beyond) is that it was created for kids with programmjng experience. Ds was told that his AP class counted for the track 2 class, even though he knew of nobody else doing this. Either nobody else took AP comp programming (out of all the BBU freshmen interested in his very popular major?) or nobody else got such rotten advice (minor googling discovered she’s only been there a few ys, a spousal appointee of an important hire), idk, but here we are. Thank you all for the very helpful feedback, especially understanding of the challenges he faces of an Aspie and encouragement of our supporting him right now (we tried too hard not to helicopter last year…), and for encouraging us to go talk to someone. Dh calmly boiled it down to things we will ask for (what do we want). Fingers crossed!
@ucbalumnus , @eyemgh , @xraymancs , @colorado_mom , I think you all have raised an important point that is not getting enough attention. If financials permit, my suggestion would be for Engg. students to not skip any of the basic courses (Calc I, II, etc) but go thru the recommended course curriculum for each stream. I have come across time and again wherein bright students do not do well in their 1st year as they are unsuitable for the next level of courses (eg. Calc III) and this in turn hurts their future.
As a person who completed his ME undergrad from one of the original IITs, I did not have a choice to skip any of the fundamental courses, irrespective of the background of having gained admission there. And this has worked well for me and other students of the IITs. My D2 just completed her Freshman year at GTech. I insisted that she repeat some of the courses that she was eligible to skip due to her AP exam scores. Now that she has a 4.0 GPA, her confidence level is sky-high considering that the average GPA of her 1st year class was around 3.2. In our case we are paying full fare and this thinking should be more prevalent for students who have to get over a certain GPA to meet their scholarship demands (3.2 in Gtech for Hope Scholars). And this pertains to cases such as the OP’s son who has to meet a certain GPA just to get admitted to a particular Engg. branch. In some cases, this requirement is not obvious to the folks who are applying. For example, you need a minimum 3.2 or so at Purdue, UMinn and UWisc to gain admission to these highly competitive streams.
I would suggest that you start a thread educating folks of the pitfalls of having a too advanced or heavy course load for Engg. at the outset.
And I am going to start such a thread because I do have a question on this…
It’s a good thread topic. I know of a student with a lot of AP classes that went to Stanford for engineering and got advisor suggestions which included a junior level class during freshman year. (I don’t know if there was even credit for the AP class). It was too much, and he ended switching to another major.
Now back to OP’s son. It sounds like you have a good plan to move forward. Best of luck!
However, making all students apply to the major requiring a high GPA or competitive admission process “weeds out” lots of students, and can encourage grade grubbing and cutthroat competition that is more often associated with pre-meds.
I would not suggest this as a blanket recommendation, since many students would end up wasting time and tuition retaking courses that they already know. Better would be for students allowed to skip introductory courses with AP credit to review the syllabi of the courses that can be skipped, and try the college’s old final exams for those courses to assess their knowledge. They can then make more informed placement decisions.
I highly encourage students to follow @ucbalumnus’s advice and look at old tests and syllabi to see if they are ready. If they are, there is no reason to repeat. The problem is that AP courses, despite the attempted standardization, are not created equally. Some teachers teach the math. Some teach the test. My son’s first semester Calc III honors class was a great example. Many students scored in the 30s on the first exam. In order to be invited into the section, a student had to have taken AB and BC AND scored 5 on both AP tests. Clearly, not everyone was ready. For those who are, the benefits are many, earlier earnings, broader/deeper course work, MS in the time it would take for a BS, minor, slower pace, the list goes on and on. Starting ahead should not be blanketly dismissed.
Students who completed BC (including the AB material) in one year in high school and therefore only took the BC exam (not the AB exam) were not invited?
Of course, college tests are not like high school tests. High school tests are often loaded with easy problems so that C students can get 70% (or whatever the C threshold is) correct. College tests are often mostly harder problems, so that a median student gets around 50%, but the grading scale is “curved” so that the median student gets a B- or whatever the expected/desired median grade is.
My guess is that eyemgh is talking about AB subscores on the BC test, those could or should be 5s for an honors calc III class (which isn’t even offered at most schools, and no one can really place out of Calc III).
ASEE paper I referenced has 5 or 6 specific examples of improved student outcomes. Many if not most include extensive advising and tutoring support for struggling students. The goal is more engineers with more practical training not limiting engineering to high school or college freshman superstars (who are maybe more likely to take on a more academic major such as math or physics, engineering undergrad can actually be to pedestrian for some tastes, lots of “to solve this problem, use this equation”, you need to be in a MS program before you learn about the details of fluid dynamics or whatever).
OP, to keep your son and your family from taking this all too seriously (he is only 19 and would probably be welcome at 50% of the engineering schools in the country since he successfully completed a freshman sequence with pretty good grades) … consider seeing if school B will consider him (defer enrollment) for spring or even next fall. Losing a few credits or even a semester or two might not be as bad as just feeling like he failed entirely. If BBU works out, which it still might, he can stay, otherwise, you pack his bags and move to more supportive U (MSU ?). I still think an Aspie in a BBU might be an issue all 4 years, having gone to one myself, just too little interest in any one student.
Talk to the adviser too, she may be able to put an explanation in the file that explains why your son was in higher level classes and it may help swing the decision in your favor. If the sophomore classes were not complete disasters, those professors could be willing to write an explanation as well or maybe at least talk to your son about how to get an A in their class. I think you need to really avoid blaming her … my guess is that your son seemed bright and really eager to take hard classes and she found him some. Programming skills maybe hard to measure, but I certainly can’t imagine a AP test could really do it. AND … your son could have stopped the madness after one semester … but that is too late.
School personnel at large state schools don’t have any real interest in stacking the deck in favor of or against anyone. Likely your son is just a name in the database. Kind of pointless to fixate on other people, you have no idea what it took them to get eligible for the engineering program. People don’t typically discuss tutors, summer classes, hours in the library, hours in review sessions, etc.
@ucbalumnus, maybe it was just 5 on the BC test or 5 on both if you took both. Not sure. As for curve, not in that class. My son pulled his grade up to an A, but experienced something he never had previously in his life on his first exam, a C on a math test, 76%. The scores in the 30s were deep Fs. It was a class with 2 “midterms” and one final and students were allowed to drop the worst of the first two tests.
At UMich CoE, the requirement for declaring major is quite easy (GPA >2.0) except for BME (and perhaps another major) that has a GPA 3.0 requirement. There is a cap for certain major though. Basically, if one cannot keep a GPA 2.0, it will be kicked out of CoE. So admitting into specific major or not is usually not a problem at UMich.
A student who has trouble keeping a GPA of 2.0 or higher probably has other things to worry about, like academic probation and dismissal from the school.
I wonder if there is perhaps the remedy of litigation or at least the fear of it to motivate the school.
In the case of Sain v. Cedar Rapids Community School District (http://www.iowacourtsonline.org/about_the_courts/supreme_court/supreme_court_opinions/recent_opinions/20010425/index.asp#_1), “the court argued that a student who felt that he had not been advised with due care and attention may pursue a tort claim against the adviser and the educational institution”(https://dus.psu.edu/mentor/old/articles/010709jp.htm).
i12575, I pestered Lake Jr. about the foundational courses MANY times before he enrolled at his engineering school. He had taken advanced Calc in high school and thus was approved for Calc II by the college. Well, he didn’t set the world on fire in Calc II as a Freshman. I don’t recall if his advisor counseled him about Calc II or not. You are right, kids need to understand that avoiding a foundational course and jumping ahead directly into “higher” engineering [math] is not always advantageous.
Feeling very confused right now, and not sure if I should even post because it’s possible (likely? ) that the advisor has been reading my concerns here but not sure it can get worse. The original ODS counselor I had been talking to all last semester for guidance (before ds was in ODS) told me to get appt w the Chair and to be persistent because it was critical to get back on the right track. I cancelled the appt with another ODS counselor whom I’d only spoken to twice about my son, rescheduled with the ODS we were familiar w, and I emailed the Chair for appt. Initially he told me to talk to the advisor (which I did do, to clarify their curriculum) but I remembered what ODS had told me so kindly persisted (1x). We made appt. DH and I met w him and the head advisor; she said she didn’t know what I was talking about (calling me a liar?) about being told by ODS to talk to the Chair because she’d talked to ODS and “they’d” (she and ODS) already decided the answer was no changes or consideration and she’s surprised I didn’t know that. Completely blindsided. Needless to say, it went downhill from there, as I’d felt on the defensive from that point. The Chair was kind enough but maybe aloof? I’m sure he’s a great guy and obviously an asset to the Unuversity but did not do anything to dispel the notion that BBU doesn’t care about individual students. Would they (BBU person reading this?) make things worse for ds? I’m crushed. I keep re-playing it in my head but I keep going back to the fact that ODS told me to talk to the Chair. I don’t believe she set us up so am not sure what happened.
It’s unlikely that you’ve been “set up.” I’d guess at giant BBU, getting ready to start another year, their concern and your concern are simply not in alignment. The chair may even resent a you strongly advocating for your child thinking it’s the student’s battle to fight. It would be unfortunate, especially with the aspie angle, but sometimes it simply is what it is.
It is now all water under the bridge anyway, so the options get pretty simple. Just like after a natural disaster, rebuild or move.
If rebuild is the option, I’d try to coordinate a meeting with his academic and ODS counsellors and plot a new path forward. I’d also give up on finding someone to blame, because two things are pretty clear. Rightly or wrongly, they aren’t interested in having any part of it. It’s also pretty clearly a source, rightly, of your personal frustration. Sometimes we simply can’t rectify those issues so the best option is to let them go.
If move on is the best option, then given the timing, a gap year, semester, or quarter are all options, as is part time at a local school, while you sort through plan B.
It sucks, but it will improve. Good luck.
I can’t help feeling confused though and, at the same time, blaming myself. The Chair did comment that they are very understanding of Aspie kids and that if DS had been with ODS last year, he (Chair) could’ve helped re-consider the application into major but not now. I was floored by this. My fault for not MAKING ds register, I guess, when we knew it’s what he needed? How ironic that his desire to be “normal” and his rigid sense of fairness-rejecting what he saw as an advantage (even when it’s not-it’s leveling the playing field for him) is now his downfall (?!). Ds of course now realizes how much trouble he had w organization and self advocating etc etc last year and WANTS help to do better now but … I guess the rule states somewhere that they won’t consider his disability last year if it wasn’t in writing last year.
You can be sure that they deal with LOTS of students in this situation, aspie or not, and have grown somewhat hardened to it. Whether it was your “fault,” your son’s “fault,” the school’s “fault,” or simply the alignment of the planets no longer matters. You can’t undo it and you know what your options are going forward. Lamenting will only cause you further distress.
As for organization, I can’t recommend this highly enough http://www.amazon.com/How-Become-Straight-Student-Unconventional/dp/0767922719/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=. It is a great synopsis of the study and organizational habits of the Phi Beta Kappa inductees of the Ivy League. It’s not about spending more time, but rather about being more efficient. Get it. BOTH of you read it. He will find it extremely easy to read and helpful.
Good luck.