<p>My D is being advised to repeat AP Chem, AP Physics Mech and AP Calc BC (regardless of scores) for first year chem engr. Has anyone, or do you know anyone who has ignored this advice? How did the students do of they went ahead? </p>
<p>D was planning to repeat AP Chem anyway, but physics and calc too? Seems like a boring first year to be repeating everything when she could be getting ahead and potentially avoiding the extra summer of courses in junior year.</p>
<p>A friend of mine is now a junior at Rice. He was advised the same thing. So he repeated all the AP classes. And he now tells me that his freshman year was a waste of time.</p>
<p>It depends on how prepared your daughter is, but i would say just skip the classes.</p>
<p>Go to the college bookstore and have her look at the books currently being used for specific courses and then make a decision. We went to the Auburn bookstore just to compare books in chemistry and Calculus to ones she took during dual enrolled courses over the last two years. It made her feel confident that her prior work was on the same playing field with what was expected.</p>
<p>Good advice regarding the trip to the bookstore. D took BC calc but was told to skip freshman calc, BUT she is not a Chem E major. Wasn’t there a calc for engineers class that had a prerequisite of AP calc?</p>
<p>Sent from my Eris using CC App</p>
<p>^^We will be at Camp War Eagle next week so we’ll check out the book store then.</p>
<p>We just returned from Camp War Eagle… Many good things and a couple of bad things. It turned out neither of us got any sleep last night (though we were at two different places) and just got home and will make some detailed comments/perceptions tomorrow. </p>
<p>Overall, everything worked out… but it was HOT (for students - put your sun-block in your purse/or backpack you keep with you and not in your luggage as you will not see your luggage from initial morning drop-off to late at night). </p>
<p>For dual-enrolled students (or AP students) coming in with lots of credits, it was stressful; as there were some rules that we didn’t know about after a year of investigation, and multiple visits and communications, that just ‘popped-up’ relating to the Honors College. </p>
<p>Our main concern relating to this thread is the Honors college had no openings for any Honors class for my Dual enrolled daughter and they also tried to mention “just have her repeat a class” to open up another possibility. </p>
<p>We told them: “that simply was not going to happen”. No way was my D, going to re-take a college class we already had paid for and she got an ‘A’, just to retake the same class, to provide an opening for the short-falls in the ‘amount’ of honors classes available from Auburn’s Honors college while wasting a ‘3-credit course slot’ for a redo that she may need sometime in the future. </p>
<p>Don’t get me wrong… Everything eventually worked out (not perfect, but well), but it took more effort than it should have and we used a few tricks to work things a little to our advantage. We eventually left with the same great impression of Auburn and their staff that originally guided my D’s decision to attend there over many other opportunities.</p>
<p>We are also concern with Dual enrollment and AP credits. The question is how is that going to work out with the Engineering Learning Community and the Honors College. S will do Chem and Calc 1 even when he has AP Chem and Calc BC. It should help with the transitioning and we are ok with that. The challenge will be with the History and Social Science classes. He basically has enough of those credits to cover all the Chem Eng curriculum requirements.</p>
<p>So for the first semester he is thinking on taking Honors English Comp2 and do MatLab , along with the Eng Learning community classes. Any comments?</p>
<p>Boatfoot, any good contacts?</p>
<p>Go to your advisor before Camp War Eagle (day before), and express your concerns (also some colleges have changed their core a little and not on the website). Some colleges give 3 credits for English Comp 2 if the ACT score was 34 or higher in English. Tell them your just concerned and you are trying to avoid causing problems our confusion for everybody </p>
<p>They will allow Honors contracts on courses that aren’t offered as Honors. You are allowed up to 6 credits out of the 18 honor core needed that way and for someone coming in with lots of credits they would probably allow an additional contract if needed. It would also be better to take that Human Odyssey or Technology and culture for 6 credits rather than retake classes that you have already earned credit. For my daugther she can squeeze in (2) 2000 level business honors classes, (1) Honors Macroeconomics, (1) Honors Fine Art, and will do two contracts on other items in a couple of years. Then there is always Honor Ethics, Logic, Political Economy, etc… You have enough credits to play with over 4 years so don’t worry about it until later. </p>
<p>The important thing is this 1st semester. If you don’t get a core honors then they drop you from the Honors Program. Everything my daughter could take without retaking classes she already had credit for were already closed (grabbed by Sophomores to Seniors). There was only one of each of the honors classes and they were all full. We registered for what we wanted, then went to the Honors bulding and they added a seat to an Honors Music Apreciation Class (yuck! But counts as fine art)</p>
<p>You paid for those AP credits with money, time, and work… No reason to take them again, unless you want, simply because the Honors College doesn’t offer enough classes. Get the schedule you want, or the best you can, then run to the Honors College whining and complaining and they’ll work something out. Later semesters and years you will have more options and flexibility.</p>
<p>As for Learning Communities, my daughter had enough credits that she wouldn’t be really taking any classes with her fellow members unless she wanted to retake a bunch, so we didn’t give it much thought.</p>
<p>After registration, when you go to the Honors College ask for Kathy Mattox (and accept no subsitute). She’ll be the main one speaking at the Honors meetings, and she will offer the “re-take” classes thought. But she has the power… stand your ground, you give a little, she’ll give a little. </p>
<p>Don’t forget that starting July 19th to 5 days after classes start you can check the class availability every day for new openings as people add/drop classes, waitlists, etc… The important thing is getting one core honors (any core honors course), squeezed into your best schedule possible before heading home. </p>
<p>By the way, one reason to save as many credits as possible is maybe for something like the BET minor offered by the College of Engineering… it is an excellent addition to an engineering degree. [Business-Engineering-Technology</a> Program](<a href=“http://www.eng.auburn.edu/BET/]Business-Engineering-Technology”>http://www.eng.auburn.edu/BET/)</p>
<p>Boatfoot, thanks a lot for all the comments and recommendations. CWE for us is next week on the 16th. S can’t wait to get there!</p>
<p>Thanks boatfoot. I think we’ll definitely get to CWE the day before to talk to some people! I appreciate your input!</p>
<p>One more thing… try to make a schedule with backups using what is on Tiger I under the class lookup function including CRN’s and have some backup options before you go. </p>
<p>There are 350 students and the CWE student counselor with your student has only been trained to handle the lowest common denominator. Dual enrollment, AP credits confuse them (especially large amounts). The college gives them handouts that may be out-dated and wrong which they in turn pass out to students. These are the people your student will be working with to make preliminary schedules/practice. Trust Tiger I more than any handout. That is what is real. The campus is wireless, so the few times you get to be with your student, you can use a laptop, IPad or whatever to go on Tiger I and look at scheduling stuff and verify anything or clarify misconceptions/info relating to CRN’s for classes, times, openings, etc…</p>
<p>11:45a-1:15p on your second day is the last time you will have access to your student before the 2:45p registration. It is for lunch and something called Tiger Tables. You can use all that time to relax, go on Tiger I (if you have wireless), and clear up any misconceptions etc… The 3rd floor of the student union has a buffet table of sandwiches and there are plenty of soft seats, tables, and power outlets. </p>
<p>Good luck to all and War Eagle!</p>
<p>If you don’t plan on bringing a laptop, there are some computers on the 2nd floor of the student center. You can also access your Tiger I information there. If your student wants to add a class once he/she completes the initial registration, you technically have until around 7:00 pm to add something. Having a backup plan is rather critical going in; classes start to fill up quickly (or are already filled) and if your student is one of the later students within their college to register, choices will dwindle. My D was 102 out of 135 at COSAM (they drew numbers to determine the order) – she really had to scramble around to get 15 hrs, and ended up having to switch her honors interdisciplinary track in order to secure a chemistry course. She could fit no other honors class in (other than the interdisciplinary symp.) and was strongly discouraged from trying by the honors advisor (Ms. Mattox).</p>
<p>She tried to get my D to take one of those big symposium things… We said no way, wouldn’t fit with the other classes she had to have anyways. Your D needed to let her eyes tear up and upper lip quiver 
Mine deserves three credits for Honors Theatre for her performance she looked like she was going to have a meltdown. </p>
<p>As for retaking courses, we may have accepted with Stanford, Duke, Davidson, or Vanderbilt if that were the case. But having the credits and allowing versatility over the next 4 years was why we chose a public university. Retaking any classes or taking ones we don’t want defeats the whole purpose. Now if they want to pay us an extra $ 30,000 to retake 30 credits we might could work something out.</p>
<p>Also Ipads are handy for the wireless and Tiger eye classes display nicely on it.</p>
<p>RE “tear factor” with honors college advisor: LOL boatfoot – unfortunately, D saved the waterworks for her mother once she walked out the H.C. door. While crying in front of mama may pull on my heartstrings, it doesn’t help with securing a desirable schedule. 
She’s going to still try and get a foreign language class (3XXX level classes were already filled before registration), and possibly ditch the interdisciplinary symposium. Who knows. We too are trying to utilize as much of her AP credits as possible, though the pre-med adviser was really pushing her to retake chemistry. She agreed on the chemistry do-over, but we argued vigorously on not retaking that introductory biology class (honors or otherwise). D does not have as much credit as a student who would have been dual-enrolled, (like Boatfoot’s D) but we are still trying to utilize at least 18-21 AP cr. hours. </p>
<p>That being said, we understand the position that the honors college is taking. They just don’t have enough honors slots available to place freshmen in 2 honors classes during this 1st semester.</p>
<p>This is really awful. I would think that MOST of the honors kids are coming in with quite a bit of AP credit.</p>
<p>They probably do come in with a lot of credit, and for the most part, (ultimately) get to keep their credits. Keep in mind that Auburn also lets kids test out of certain classes through either their placement tests and/or standardized test scores (math, English, foreign languages). So, there’s a bit of overlap in certain cases with some classes. There are also sticking points with those classes that academic departments either absolutely require be taken as part of the major, or classes that advisors strongly feel should be taken in order to secure a better foothold in a graduate program. From our experience this summer, the latter was definitely an issue. Placement testing also became a factor. However, even though a student may test into say a 3xxx level class, they don’t have to take it; A 2xxx level would probably work too, for the reason of not getting “rusty” in any given language (if nothing else). The bigger issue with the upper-level foreign language courses is the lack of available seats, since sophs. and juniors have already registered and spots are really scarce. </p>
<p>The first semester is the true stinker semester – it’s very difficult for honors students to have “priority” (since the rest of the univ. has already registered), and their APs and final transcripts aren’t in yet, so the college can’t officially apply these credits. This round is rather dog eat dog, and they just have to get through it.</p>
<p>I agree that the scheduling was stressful at CWE. I had gotten a letter before orientation that said that honors students were going to have special honors advisors, etc. etc… When we got there they had group advising for 100 students and you got a few minutes with an advisor that walked up and down an aisle. It was stressful to try to figure out how to schedule with our AP credits and to keep a balanced load.</p>
<p>Yeah, I was not at all impressed with the scheduling process and especially the Honors advisement allocation. Even now, trying to correct a class that we were somewhat misinformed/somewhat misunderstood is a nightmare. We now understand that one course my daughter signed up for is not really needed (not clearly understood at CWE). So, trying to replace it has been next to impossible. When she checks the course lookup, every class she checks that would even remotely fit her curriculum is full (even through her junior curriculum schedule). Not only that, by some classes set up for 30 students, have 100 people waitlisted. What sense does that make? It almost feels as if Auburn has more students than classroom spots (especially at the freshman and sophomore levels). I have never experienced this before.</p>
<p>This is not just an issue at AU–it exists at nearly every big public university. A friend of mine who teaches at one said AP credits are very frustrating because HS teachers teach to the test so kids pass (and then sometimes the teachers are compensated accordingly) but the kids don’t always know the material the way they should–huge variability between schools and between kids. </p>
<p>When we went to CWE, we didn’t see our daughter or talk to her except the one hour session with the college advisor. She sought out the advisor a couples times on her own and sought out the dean of the honors college to make a change. He told her that he was impressed she was handling it on her own in a professional way and made the change for her. Another student from her floor was in the waiting area crying and her mom was demanding to see the dean–she didn’t get the change she wanted.</p>