My daughter is an academic admit to A&M and her application is complete. Do academic admits have a better chance of being accepted in the school of engineering? Also, does anyone have first-hand info on the honor program (other than A&M’s website) - pros/cons/academic profile of those accepted? Nowhere could I find any test score or GPA requirements for the honors program. Thanks!
Prior to Fall 2017 admits (meaning 2016 freshmen were the last class), academic (as well as auto) admits had guaranteed admissions to engineering. Now that everyone undergoes holistic review, a lot of academic and auto admits will still get into engineering, because they demonstrate in their applications, the math and physics readiness that Look COE is looking for.
There are many high stat and top 10% kids who just are not cut out for the stress and rigors of engineering. It is no bad reflection on them. Many do not realize it until they are in it and Calculus is blowing them away, or physics or Matlab. Even high stat smart kids are not ready for the rigors of the engineering calculus and physics. Then throw in the adjustments of being on their own (some do well, some get homesick and depressed (happened to my son’s engineering roommate), and as with my son’s freshman class in fall 2016, he saw once full classes dwindle to roughly half of what they started with.
Due to such high drop out rates in engineering, they went to the holistic process, to chose the candidates most likely for success. Not that some still will find it is not for them.
First hand honors experience : so far it is really fun. The teachers are pretty great ! (As a matter of fact all my teachers are great except I got a pretty bad math teacher since I didn’t take it for honors 
) Its also a great way to make friends that are success driven and aren’t possessing a laid back mindset of how “c’s get degrees”. It makes freshman year so much more enjoyable.
Honors also has really useful seminars about professionalism, research, college tips, and etc. And I’m looking forward to early registration so I don’t get stuck with another bad teacher for a class I actually like! And for engineering honors, if you have auto admit stats, you will likely get admitted. I got in by writing the essay so an auto admit should be fine.
Here is a link for requirements
https://engineering.tamu.edu/programs/eh/admission
Good luck!