Hello! I am an incoming freshmen honors student with a few questions. Whenever I begin to set up my first semester classes over the phone with my advisor, will he/she tell me the times of the classes, professor, etc.? Moreover, do they listen to my feedback if I would like a different professor or time? Also I am kind of concerned about getting into a few classes. Has anyone ever had trouble getting into the classes they needed/wanted? Thank you so much for any information about advising!!
As a freshman it is likely you won’t get your perfect schedule. Take a deep breath. You just need 5 classes.
You can do some legwork before your advisement. You can look at regular master schedule or on honors page to see classes. On the system master schedule you can see the times and professors. For honors classes, look under Honors from drop down list of subjects for courses that are unique to honors college - mostly topical stuff. To look for regular classes with an honors sections - look under math(for example) and find calculus and go through sections until you find ones with H before section number and usually HNR before title. You can see enrollment and spots remaining if you click on title. You can also search for classes that are not honors or don’t have honors sections. You are likely to have 1 or 2 of these depending on major.
For just honors, look here: http://students.schc.sc.edu/courses This is link on honors site and might be more user friendly. You can make a list of what you think you want. Yes they will listen to your feedback. Chances are not all of your classes will be honors (my D had 4 out of 5 but might depend on major). In the past, you can change non-honors classes at will so if you change your mind later, that’s fine. Honors classes require a call to advisor but yes you can do it. D changed her schedule twice over summer. You can keep changing schedule throughout summer if needed.
Don’t panic if some things look full. All of USC, even honors, will monitor enrollment and will sometimes open additional sections or seats. Again with my D, she started of in non-honors math but moved to honors section when they added more seats during the summer.
When we went through D registered at orientation and we got the following hints that I’m sure you will also get. Not sure what your major is so these may not apply. First is that they don’t recommend using AP credits for STEM classes if that is your major. D did use hers in Math to go straight to Vector so you can do it. They also don’t advise overloading on your first semester and they want you to do something of personal interest. They know honors kids are high achieving and they want you to have time to get involved in other areas of college life.
What else can you do to get ready? Read the honors student guide to get familiar with requirements. Maybe print off program of study for your major so see what is required. Look a the websites for major. Some are better than others but there is good information. For instance, somewhere on the math site is a plan of when classes are offered (yearly, spring only, etc). Religion usually has actual list of classes for next term with links to professors and sometimes a syllabus. Other majors may have something similar. D did get wrong advice about one class since guy was filling in for regular physics advisor but D got it fixed. This phone in system is probably better for getting to talk to the advisor for your major and they are really good.
Have fun and don’t stress. It will all work out. Just go in with open mind. If you aren’t going to be happy with an evening section or classes on Friday afternoon or an early morning class, then you are more likely to be disappointed. Remember you have 4 years and this is one semester. Spurs up!
@scmom12 Thank you SO MUCH!! This was extremely helpful (:
I agree with scmom…you just need five classes…and maybe only four if you think you will want to dive right in to a high time commitment extracurricular activity. It’s better for first semester to be too easy than too hard. At advisement, my DD was encouraged to sign up for at least one class that she thought would just be fun or really interested her.
@scmom12 @GCBMIB Do either of y’all know anything about the 2016-2017 cost for USC? I got a letter with my scholarship saying that resident on-campus cost of atrendance was over $28,000. That is $5000 more than this year! Do you know if that figure truly is the cost to attend USC this upcoming year? Thanks!!
Well actual tuition will not be finalized until July (because USC waits to see what state legislature does with budget before setting amount) so it is an estimate. That does look like a big jump from what’s on admission page but it may include more - for instance it may now include health insurance which you can opt out of. I can’t really tell. It might be a guess based on what they think the increase will be in tuition and more expensive housing options. If your letter was specific to honors, it may reflect the honors fee in the total.
Also, the admissions page total seems lower than the amount D was able to use in determining her scholarship which was around 24K a couple of years ago. You can’t get more scholarship than COA so that’s what it must have been then. So to be up to estimate of 28k two years later may be pretty accurate. However if you use less than they estimate on food like we did and if you don’t spend as much on books (never spent their estimate) it likely won’t cost that much.
You can always call admissions and ask if there is a reason for the increase such as including health insurance. My answer is just a guess. As a current student @GCBMIB might have more insight about this past years actual costs.
The short answer is you can get close to YOUR COA but really won’t know until tuition is set in July and then your classes are set and books are bought…but you can get within a few hundred dollars.
Each semester there will be an Honors College program fee ($325-450) and a Technology fee (that seems to have held steady at $200 per semester). Dorm residents also have a small activity fee. Language and science labs have a small fee. My DD hasn’t taken any business or engineering classes, but there are probably small fees associated with some of those classes. The IB students, I know pay fees for that program. Overall, the fees are not as bad as other schools. My DDs OOS tuition spring charge was $14,949 (before her scholarship was applied). Your COA letter includes on-campus housing, food, books as well as tuition less your scholarship. It sounds like it is a most-expensive-case scenario – as those letters are supposed to be.
scmom12–
Thanks for all of your helpful advice. My son is strongly considering going straight to Math 241(Vector), he pretty confident that he can handle it. He’s a freshman Math major in the Honors College. With that in mind, do you (or your daughter rather) have any teacher recs for this course?
Thanks!