<p>I'm in my university's honors program. Unfortunately, I am not doing well; the honors program turned out to be an extensive English class (my worst subject). My GPA dropped to a 2.66. Now, I have to make a tough choice. I can drop the honors program, get my GPA up, and apply to med school. Or, I can keep going and hope that it gets easier. How beneficial is the honors program for medical school? Currently all it is doing is killing my GPA.</p>
<p>With a 2.66 no one will even see you were in the honors program as that gpa would probably get screened out by the computer.</p>
<p>I believe that you get dropped automatically, but it depends on school. I am surprized by your assessment. Many will agree that Honors are somewhat easier because prof. is much more accessible. The huge benefit of Honors is of course, priority registration which played a crucial role in my D’s ability to register for classes while having minors and strong desire of not taking summer classes. Another benefit was additional Merit award. her Honors English was one of the easiest but very time consuming classes where she learned nothing, but again it depends on school and your skills, both reading and writing.</p>
<p>What year are you? That may make a difference; that said, other than early class selection, never saw the advantage of honors programs for medical school admission. It’s not like HS where extra points are added to GPA; med schools work from the GPA you get with AMCAS. So unless there’s another reason, may want to opt out of honors, take the required med school courses with solid grades, and knock the MCAT out of the park. And how are your EC’s? It seems this is a good time to take stock of your goals and how far along you are on the way to achieving them.</p>
<p>Thanks. I am a freshman in college. Frankly, I’m quite worried because the professors grade our papers like we’re graduates. No matter what I do, I can’t seem to get higher than a B. The problem is, some idiot made the honors program count 6 credit hours, so my “C” last semester shows up twice! I admit that I’ve been on a slide, but these books are so boring. I’ve been reading and catching up, but I might drop it anyway, despite the benefits. How many med students were honors students in college?</p>
<p>Guess that depends on your definition of honors. I took many classes from the honors college and graduated magna cum ladue–which shows up on my degree. If that counts, then I guess I was an honors student in college.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s going to matter to med school that much though. It certainly won’t provide adequate rationale for a 2.7GPA.</p>
<p>"Guess that depends on your definition of honors. " - at D’s school, Honors classes were called Honors. For example, it was Honors English as well as regular English (they were not called “regular”, they just did not have “Honors”), so it was not up to a student to define. the biggest advantage of Honors classes was that they were much smaller. I suppose it is different from school to school, but Honors program at D’s school when she was there (has changed since then) had only 200 spots, so, it was correct that only very top HS kids got in. In addition to Summa Cum Laude, my D’s diploma is saying “with Honors” which means (at her school) that she has graduated from Honors program. In addition they had "Honors with distuigush) which meant completion of thesis paper by graduation. D. did not care to do that, but one of her pre-med friends did. All of it has no effect on Med. School acceptance, including D’s award (monetary) for the most outstanding pre-med in her class (only one was awarded), means absolutely nothing for Med. School (besides the money and recognition at her UG). The only important result in regrad to your UG diploma in connection to your acceptance to Med. School is your GPA.</p>
<p>Kristin was referring more so to the question “how many med students did honors?” For example, I graduated with honors from Brown. There are no honors classes or honors program at brown, there are just certain things you have to do in you major to get honors (for example in bio it was do research and write+ present a thesis while maintaining a 3.5+ gpa if I remember correctly). Kristin’s point was would someone like me count as having “done honors”? What about my friend who graduated magna cum laude (top 20% of the graduating class) but didn’t go for honors in his major, does he count? Etc.</p>
<p>Brown’s right–sorry if I was unclear!</p>
<p>“Taking classes from the Honors college” means taking classes that start with “Honors…” In the end, I had taken enough classes from the Honors college to graduate “with honors,” achieved the correct mix of research+presenting+GPA to graduate “with departmental honors,” and had earned a high enough GPA for my university to consider it “magna cum laude.” The extra lines on my undergrad diploma are quite comical to me.</p>
<p>But the point is–it’s hard for anyone to make a sweeping statement like “be part of the Honors College” because who knows what that means at your school. At Miami’s D’s school, honors classes were great. At mine, they weren’t all that different from regular classes. At Brown’s, they didn’t exist. At yours, it sounds like they’re annoying. So if you think it’s hurting you more than it’s helping you, you’re probably right. </p>
<p>^Typing it all out makes me look like quite an over-achiever…</p>
<p>It sounds like it is different from UG to UG. But at the end, Honors does not matter for Med. School admission, as everybody agree. So, you decide, based if Honors make sense to you or not. Again, for my D. Honors meant priority registration, smaller classes, additional Merit award and “Honors” on her diploma, and ABSOLUTELY NOTHING else. So, look for yourself what it means to you, is it important and decide to opt out or not (if you are kept in Honors with GPA of lower 3.0)</p>
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<p>Not me. IMO, honors is a minor soft factor, which is nice-to-have in the application. That being said, it only adds value, to the extent it adds value at all, is for comparing two candidates with essentially the same GPA. (Honors coursework will do nothing to boost a weak GPA.) </p>
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<p>Unless you were in the Adcom discussions, how do you really know with (caps) certainty? :)</p>