<p>So my friend was accepted to BC early action, and she asked me to post this for her. She’s wondering why she didn’t get into the honors program…stats:</p>
<p>gpa: 4.0 weighted-this is what our school sends to schools. 3.89 unweighted
sat: 2150 cum
sat II: 770 math II, 700 history, 680 biology
class rank: 2/206
Massachusetts resident
heavy courseload relative to school offerings-bc calc. Ap English. Ap history. Ap biology
AP test: 4 US history
idk the ec’s tho but there are lots I’m guessing including math team co captain and tri m.</p>
<p>She also wants to know what a student at bc has to do to apply and get into the honors program once enrolled. any feedback would be great!</p>
<p>Tell your friend I had slightly better stats than her and I did not get in EA. I was deferred. So I have to say that a lot of these decisions are a bit random.</p>
<p>D was accepted into honors program. Don’t quote me, but I believe the benchmark for the SAT for honors is around 2250. D had 4.0 UW and 11 APs (all 5s), lots of ECs with leadership, and volunteer hours. If I were guessing, I’d say your friend didn’t get in to honors primarily because of his/her SAT. Above a 2100 is great, but perhaps not good enough for honors. Again, just a thought. Make sure your friend knows they can apply for honors for their sophomore year.</p>
<p>nahh jc40 my friend got into honors as well and she only had a 2180 SAT super scored.
but then again she beasted out her junior AP exams and is valedictorian soooo maybe that had something to do with it.</p>
<p>and i got deferred with a 2270 and a 33 so i’m not sure what they wanted…</p>
<p>Double, your SAT is the equivalent of a 34 on the ACT. Did you submit the 33? Just curious. I’m not sure why you were deferred. GPA? Rigor of schedule? ECs? Honors/Awards?Teacher recs? Who knows, but if you want to attend BC, I hope it happens for you RD. Good luck!</p>
<p>eezm, there might be several answers to your question. One, the EA pool this year is bigger than previous ones and since the EA pool usually draws more competitive applicants than normal, there are more qualified applicants to choose from. Second, the Honors Program has only a limited number of seats and it has been their goal to have seminars with no larger than 15 students per class, they are very conservative with the number they admitted. I know for my year they over admitted a few and there were seminars with 18 students. Finally, the Honors Program focuses heavily on the Great Books. There are those who love it (me) and those who don’t like dead white males’ writings, so sometimes students with less than amazing record can get into Honors Programs because of their demonstrated desire to study the Great Book while students who are brilliant, but whose focus might be on other things, might not be admitted. Of course, the last point is pure conjecture on my part.</p>
<p>I got in EA to CSOM honors - SAT was 2080, ACT of 31, GPA of 4.41W or 3.96UW - 5’s on all APs (took all the ones I could at my HS) - did a TON of extracurriculars (Editor of nationally-ranked newspaper, slew of Model UN awards, founder of the Business club, service stuff, band, etc) and really unique things outside of school (started 3 businesses beginning at age 12, several sate-level investing awards).</p>
<p>To get into honors I think you either need to be academically spectacular (like top 1%) or you have to be in the upper ranges academically and really stand out in EC’s and everything else.</p>
<p>My D got into A & S honors via EA this year. The letter sent by admissions congratulated her on being within the top 5% of applicants. So I think the critieria for it in A & S is to be in the top 5% of applicants. Not sure how they determine that–combination of scores and GPA and ECs? She had 34 ACT, 4.0 UW GPA, class rank of 1, and 4s and 5s on all of her AP tests to date and a lot of devotion to her main EC. I know that BC had a very strong applicant pool for EA this year. She was not in the top 1% though which is the criteria for the PSP program.</p>
<p>my GPA is a 3.7
SAT 1900-2000
ap classes- junior year : AP language and composition
ap classes for senior year: AP economics, AP environmental science, AP Gov, and a possible AP lit. my grades range from a B- to A’s
(rest of classes are honors)
i play piano, am in tri-m, and in 2 clubs…are my chances of getting into BC good?</p>
<p>Because of the set-up of the A&S honors program (being humanities-based), reading and especially writing ability are very important. I have been told that even being in the top 5% of applicants overall will not necessarily get you into the program if your abilities are clearly more quantitative than verbal. For example, if your SAT scores are something like CR 700/M 800/W 700 – or if all of your AP classes were in math and/or science, with no history or English – then you are less likely to be invited into the program.</p>
<p>But this applies only to the A&S honors program. I don’t know how CSOM chooses its honors students.</p>
<p>I was accepted into the A&S honors program with SAT 2070 (1470) three APs already scoring all 5s and 4 APs this year, i have decent ECs, which are heavily service based, and stellar essays and teacher recs from what others have told me. obviously if the whole literature based thing on your SAT was true then I should not be accepted, however, i was told that BC does not really consider the writing portion of your SATs by some other honors students there. eemmzz10 my guess is that your friends teacher recs, essay and extracurricular were poor to nothing special. Also, I would assume that the only taking 1 AP by the end of junior year, and that being the most popular AP probably did not help either. In addition, I am not positive if this is true, but since you are a Mass. resident, it is possible that the Honors people are also invited into the honors program regionally, and BC is most heavily represented by residents from Mass. so this may have made it harder for you to get into honors. Then again i’m also from one of the highest represented states at BC. Finally, jc40 i don’t know where you heard that but at the accepted honors day they stated that the only way for people to get into the program is by being invited, that may happen during your sophomore year, but it does not mean that anyone may apply. I am sorry if I am sounding ostentatious right now because i don’t mean to. hope this helped.</p>
<p>xX…You’re right; I meant to say that they could be “invited” at the end of their freshman year:</p>
<pre><code> “Superior first-year students are also admitted to the Honors Program as sophomores each year, on the recommendation of instructors in their first-year courses.”
</code></pre>
<p>Also, you’re right, the writing section of the SAT isn’t weighted as heavily as M & CR. According to BC’s website, </p>
<pre><code> “Students generally have combined SAT’s in the range of 1450 and are usually in the top 5% of their high-school classes…”
</code></pre>
<p>I will say that in reading these threads, though, there have been occasions when I’ve seen kids with 2250+ SATs and 3.8+ UW GPAs not only NOT be offered honors but get deferred EA, so who knows? I believe they’re looking for the “whole package”.</p>