What’s the allure of the Honors colleges? I know some give scholarships but what’s the requirement? The allure? The perk? Is it worth the extra effort?
There is a huge variation in honors colleges school by school. Both for admission and the perks.
My D is in honors college at Purdue. She was in a new honors dorm, had priority scheduling for both classes and housing (and will continue to have that going forward), smaller honors classes, honors research opportunities, honors job opportunities, honors study abroad, etc…
Ii can mean smaller more discussion based classes versus large lectures. Priority registration can also be a perk. Extra merit money might come with it as well.
My D was invited to the honors program at our public flagship and while she ended up attending an LAC instead, the primary appeal to her was the honors dorm for her first-year. It was a very nice dorm, excellent location, and she’d heard from folks she knew there it was a great place to connect with other ‘driven’ students like herself. They also offered special advising for honors students. While they had honors classes, you didn’t take that many of them and I don’t think were a big part of the draw.
There were a lot of other honors opportunities but at this university students outside the program could also apply for them .
As earlier poster said, these programs vary a lot.
As everyone has said, there is tons of variation. Often the perks are worth it even if the content isn’t really that special of the program itself. You may get guaranteed housing, a dorm with the other honors kids, better advising, and a perk worth its weight in gold (early registration)
Also, some schools have honors colleges and some have honors programs. I think the former is generally preferable to the latter, but we do not have experience with either.