<p>Does the freshmen year at MIT suck? :o</p>
<p>I can only speak for my son’s experience – but I have NEVER seen him happier than in his freshman year. I think this is for a few reasons – first, the high school pressure of getting into college is over, and he was surrounded by so many like-minded STEM types – finally in his element. Also, MIT’s first semester is pass/fail, meaning that your grades don’t account. If you fail, then you take the course over – but there is NO pressure for grades. This allows students to get used to what is expected of them. Lastly, what most people outside of MIT may not realize is that the average MIT student is involved in lots of activities – they aren’t the kids sitting solo in the room by themselves. MIT is about collaborations – from homework assignments, to research projects. While it is very competitive to get into MIT, it is not competitive once you are there. Of course, most MIT admits want to do well for themselves, but it is not a “cut throat” environment in any way. MIT wants its students to succeed and graduate. Now in his second year, son is thriving and loves MIT so much that he is already thinking about staying for fifth year for his masters.</p>
<p>skibum4 is right that freshmen year at MIT doesn’t suck. One negative of being a freshmen at MIT is that unless you are pretty strong academically you have little freedom in selecting classes and need to take a lot of core classes instead of what interests you. But then a pretty common issue for science majors at many schools.</p>
<p>I am curious – if a student doesn’t pass a class in the first semester at MIT, does it still appear on their transcript as a “fail” or “no credit” or something like that? I know they have to retake if it is a core or major requirement class, but I am curious about how the transcript is handled.</p>
<p>It’s no record so it doesn’t appear on the transcript at all. I believe the second semester is A/B/C/no record for most freshmen as well.</p>
<p>It appears on the internal but not the external transcript, and unless [insert correct pronoun here]'s planning on going to medical school, the internal is ~irrelevant. (I believe it stops you from later taking the ASE but that’s it)</p>
<p>^Even most medical schools don’t ask for the internal transcript, AFAIK.</p>
<p>As far as I know, Hopkins does but most others don’t. That said, medical school being as stupidly competitive as it is…</p>
<p>That’s what I had heard, too – just making sure nothing’s changed in the past however many years since I knew anyone applying to medical school. 
I think it’s really unfair, of course, but Johns Hopkins doesn’t consult me when they make their medical school admissions policies, I guess.</p>
<p>My impression was that some med schools possibly just Hopkins wanted first semester grades not that they wanted the entire internal transcript which includes +/- modifiers although I’m not a premed so I’m not certain.</p>