<p>I somehow missed your post prior to my last post. That is very troubling to hear, especially since you are in pre-engineering. My son will have many ap units, including calc ab and bc (calc 1 & 2), statistics and maybe chemistry. The rest of his units do not relate to his major at all, but he will have many-the equivalent of 11 classes, if he passes his ap tests this year. But as far as engineering goes, he will need most all of the entry level classes. I know Barrons is going to call someone, but I am going to see if I can speak with an engineering academic advisor on Monday just to see what he or she has to say about the issue. However, if Barrons has connections with people higher up, that will probably be more effective. We will have to know this problem is worked out before he signs on the dotted line to attend UW.</p>
<p>Do that CalMom. Believe or not big organizations are often unaware os such problems unless somebody stands up and complains. My connects are in admissions, L&S and business. At UW schools/colleges are pretty much independent on such things. I sent out a long email today. This sounds like a classic Catch 22 situation.</p>
<p>CalMom05 – I can’t speak to the issue of graduating from engineering in 4 years, but I’d like to mention that the AP credit issue isn’t unique to Madison. I have one child at Madison and one at Michigan (I know, I know – what were we thinking?) My child at Michigan is a freshman in engineering. She’s getting ready to register for second semester classes and because of her AP credits, she has to decide on an engineering major now, so she doesn’t “waste” the classes she takes next semester. She’s not ready at all to make that decision and she’s stressing out about it. I don’t blame the university, it’s just the unfortunate flip side of the AP beast. My other child was a senior by the end of freshman year, but he added a second major and that worked out well for him. Best of luck. You can’t go wrong with Madison. My daughter says there’s no comparison between a football game at Madison and one at the Big House. Maybe she’ll change her mind if they have a winning team while she’s there.</p>
<p>BigTenMom, while I understand your daughter’s dilemma at Michigan, and that is an issue in and of itself, your daughter at least has the opportunity to make a choice and can continue working towards the degree she chooses. The high credit first year students at Madison can’t. Many of the classes they need are restricted to students in the particular schools/programs (engineering, business, etc.) to which first year students haven’t yet been admitted. Sometimes first year students can try to register for those classes if the schools/programs open them up to all non-school/non-program UW students, but the kids my daughter knows have said those classes are full and they’re locked out - plus, they can’t get an override or permission to register for a ‘full’ class because of the catch 22 again - they’ve not yet been admitted to that particular school/program.</p>
<p>The kids that have told my daughter about this (my daughter almost went to UW, but the Madison Initiative $7,500 increase for 4 years for OOS students in addition to the annual tuition increases made UW unaffordable for us - we have another kid in college elsewhere :eek:) are upset that they weren’t told this would be a potential problem for them. They’re forced to waste at least one semester taking classes that don’t make progress towards the degree they wish to pursue, as AxeBack said in post 15 of this thread.</p>
<p>I just got off the phone with one of the Engineering academic advisors. She indicated that if students are first year students, but with enough units to be locked out of the freshman only classes, they need to contact the department and explain the situation. She said it can usually be worked out. Also, if a student has enough units to be catergorized as a sophomore, they get to register with the sophomores. As far as the kids that need the next calc. class-calc III, but only have enough units to be considered a freshman, the student should contact the department. </p>
<p>As far as being able to graduate in 4 years, she said most students can do it, but only 25% do, mainly because they take time off for interns or co-ops. You only have to pay tuition for 1 unit credit during the semester you are working at a co-op or intern (which is about $1000 for OOS students), and the students are usually paid during this time. </p>
<p>Finally, she said that many students are registering now and some of these things will be worked out if they just contact the department.</p>
<p>What I didn’t go into is that my son is graduating from the Business School with a second major in English in 4 years coming in with 45 credits. It can be done. You just have to work with the department and your advisor. In the beginning it was hard to get classes because he wasn’t admitted to the Business School until after registering for the relevent semester, but then he rearranged his schedule and it worked out fine. It’s not easy, but it can be done. It just takes some work on the student’s part. It shouldn’t keep anyone from going to Madison. Now as far as OOS tuition, that’s another subject.</p>
<p>I still think forcing young students to negotiate things on an individual basis is not the best way to handle a common problem. Changes in policy are. This is not a cost issue for the school. Just rules that were not up to current reality. 20-30 years ago when most rules were written you did not have freshman with 30-40 credits.</p>
<p>barrons is right. BigTenMom, there are students in this current situation at UW who have tried to negotiate with the different schools/departments. Every one of them has run into a brick wall on this. A lot of them are having a hard time getting advisors that understand that this is a problem. The business, engineering, etc. school profs and administrators are frustrated as well because even though they would like to accommodate the first year students (who wouldn’t?), they already have more student demand than class slots available for the students already in their schools/programs.</p>
<p>The problem has been described to my daughter (at UIUC, which admits directly to schools/programs so this isn’t a problem - seniority for registration is based solely on credit ranking) by friends at UW as a combination of UW having no policy in effect for first year students entering with a lot of credits and a shortage of classes offered for the students already admitted into the schools/programs.</p>
<p>It’s a two-pronged problem, barrons. Hope you can get somewhere on this - it’s great that you’re being proactive! :)</p>
<p>I agree Barrons. The policy should be reviewed in light of the number of kids that come in with so many ap units. We also have to keep in mind that many 18 year olds are not as used to having to cut through a lot of red tape and may just say, o.k., I guess I’m blocked from that class, or will just wait a semester or two, etc. I can’t imagine that was the intention of UW when the policy was set up in the first place. But in the meantime, it is helpful to know that some kids can get some relief by contacting the specific department.</p>
<p>This is funny. My D (2nd sem frosh w/soph standing), who is enrolled in the desired class BUT blocked out of any of the specific ‘freshman only’ discussion sections that would smooth out her spring schedule better, went to the department this morning, after I (kind of) lectured her about learning to handle this type of situation on her own.</p>
<p>She called me a little while ago & said, “You would not BELIEVE how they treated me in there!”, and related that some secretary/bureaucrat/jerkoff had actually uttered the words, “…if we broke the rules for EVERY one of you AP kids, blahblahblah…”, and got nowhere, esp. when it’s a department that is not her major.</p>
<p>Barrons, you’re right in that these 18-19 year olds are definitely at a big disadvantage without the a priori knowledge of when someone is b.s.ing them & passing it off to another department. BUT…I still think it’s a valuable learning experience, and she’ll have to weigh how to prioritize this quest time-wise with other things, like her studying, and decide inevitably whether it’s worth the effort. It’s still a big bowl of wrong.</p>
<p>And JiffsMom, while your comments are well-written & pertinent, there’s no doubt you definitely still have some sour grapes for UW-Madison in general, thus I can’t say you’re exactly impartial here.</p>
<p>I’m disppointed to hear that the attitude expressed at UW is…
“…if we broke the rules for EVERY one of you AP kids, blahblahblah…” Sounds like they don’t want 'em there. </p>
<p>jnm123, students ARE having these very real problems at UW - others have confirmed it.</p>
<p>It has yet to be seen if these problems are just at UW or widespread. And I certainly do recall Jmom had some real out of bounds issues with UW about tuition. </p>
<p>Anyway here’s a list of time to graduate by major at UW</p>
<p>CalMom–I think the intention was to give AP kids the advantage of higher class standing which overall helps at registration time. The oversight was the impact on pre-reqs and freshman only classes.</p>
Sorry, but objecting to UW adding an extra $7,500 (4 year cost) to an OOS student’s cost AFTER the May 1st enrollment decision deadline is not an ‘out of bounds issue.’</p>
The oversight is also that first year students who have met pre-reqs through AP credits are blocked from continuing on in the pursuit of their degree. See AxeBack’s comment in this thread.</p>
<p>Ya, I can attest to this point here, but at least in my situation it’s not a “waste”. I’m applying to the business school after this semester and came into UW with 18 AP credits. I just finished doing my schedule yesterday, but I was rejected from a couple classes because I was “Not a Freshman”. While annoying, it wasn’t too big a deal and I could just finish some other prereqs for the business school this semester. Is it slightly annoying? Sure, but in the long run I think you all will be happy you had lots of credits coming into University for the reasons listed above.</p>
<p>There seems to be a couple different issues going on here. First, students with many AP credits being locked out of “freshman only” classes after their first semester. I don’t know much about “freshman only” classes; are they required, prevelant, desireable? If so, this seems like something that should be corrected and could be. The other issue seems like more like a question of direct admit. You have to register for a semester of classes before you find out if you are admitted, kind of a chicken and egg problem. My son applied to the business school after his first semester on campus (45 AP and language credits). This was before sophomores were allowed to enroll, so it’s quite similar to freshmen today. He registered for classes in the spring for the following fall, was admitted over the summer and then adjusted his schedule. I won’t argue the pros and cons of direct admit because I see advantages in both. My only point is that it doesn’t seem like an AP issue, but rather a problem of not knowing if you are getting in when you register. As someone upthread mentioned, when we ran around from building to building registering, we knew if we were in or not. AxeBack’s issues seem to be a problem first semester. As a freshman, he’s needs to register for some upper level classes and the upperclassmen got first dibs. That is not unique to UW, that’s always the case. By the time you get to your second semester, you should be on even par with the other sophomores (or juniors) and have as good a chance as them of getting the great profs or classes. Even those great 7:45 ones. You will be registering ahead of the other freshman, so you have an advantage there. My son is graduating in 4 years with a double major (degree in Business and major in English). He is taking off his second semester senior year for an internship. It can be done. Don’t be discouraged. You may have to get past some disagreeable people, but the good ones are there too. The only friends of my son that are taking 5 years are Engineers and they had co-ops. Of course, they may be the only ones with jobs!</p>
So there’s also a problem with first year students who have a lot of AP credits not being able to enroll in the next courses in the required course sequence for their major/degree for the spring semester of their first year. </p>
<p>The attitude jnm123’s daughter ran into at UW - “…if we broke the rules for EVERY one of you AP kids, blahblahblah…” - should be cause for concern for students likely to face these problems. Is there resentment of “AP kids” at UW?</p>