<p>Another daVinci question. Is it worth it to be in the honors program if you are in daVinci? If you don’t need to take general Ed as a daVinci scholar, and are mostly taking classes in your major, then the classes should be smaller anyway, correct? And you will meet top students in daVinci. Is there an advantage?</p>
<p>As I understand the Honors program, it simply gives him access to the ‘H’ courses which are by definition smaller, more interactive and a more aggressive tempo. He can choose to take them or not. If he does AND takes 24 credits worth AND gets a ‘B’ or higher AND keeps better than an overall 3.5 gpa then his diploma will state “with general honors”. there are some other requirements too:</p>
<p>[General</a> Honors Program | University of Miami](<a href=“http://www.miami.edu/index.php/academicbulletin/GeneralUniversityInformation/honors_program/general_honors_program/]General”>http://www.miami.edu/index.php/academicbulletin/GeneralUniversityInformation/honors_program/general_honors_program/)</p>
<p>If he is in the Honors program then he is in and its up to him to take advantage of it or not</p>
<p>Just to add, when grad schools / employers look at your transcript they will see that your son took lots of honors courses and maintained a rigorous course load to achieve the honors credentials. It will differentiate him a little bit. GPA and internships/undergrad research will differentiate him the most, so its a tradeoff. Which is better get a 3.85 with few honors classes or get a 3.6 and graduate with Honors. I don’t know the answer and it is case specific (degree, pursuits, national competitiveness of program etc.) Unfortunately in undergrad GPA usually trumps what classes you took in my experience. But he should do what he loves to study, as it is the one time in his life when he has the freedom to explore lots of areas of interest before he settles into a career path</p>
<p>Here’s what Dr. Greene had to say about the General Honors program when I did the Singer Stamps Weekend a year ago. Basically, the Foote Fellows program is like an honors program on steroids (his words); adding General Honors doesn’t do much at all, and actually may negate some of the benefit of being a Foote Fellow. This is due to the fact that the course selection for honors courses is extremely limited; students actually have to go out of their way to get enough credits to satisfy the 24-credit requirement, which could mean having to take some of those gen eds that they are exempt from due to Foote status. Now, I have heard rumors that they’re going to be changing up the structure of the General Honors program, so that’s something to take into consideration. My advice (and this is what my plan is as well) is to accept the Honors Program invite, stay in the Honors program, and if you feel like you’d have to take classes that you don’t want/need to take, you can always exit out of the program, and it won’t be a big deal. It’s nice to have that “General Honors” tag next to your name on that diploma, but in my opinion Foote Fellow trumps that, and having something like departmental honors on your diploma or undergrad research/internship in your resume would be a much bigger advantage in grad school and job applications.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies. Great information. The daVinci advisor said there is really no advantage to the honors program because the DVP provides lots of attention to students and the classes are small. But reading your comments I think it wouldn’t hurt him to take some classes when possible but not go out of his way to get All classes necessary to graduate with the designation, BTW the daVinci program director is extremely helpful and responsive.</p>