Does anyone fail out of U Chicago? I assume yes, but don’t hear of it very often. I suppose I am asking the current students that post on here, @HydeSnark and @DunBoyer. Maybe I am getting nervous for my DD 8-|
I cannot talk as a student at UChicago, but I suspect that those that flunk out “choose” to and it isn’t a factor of intelligence. That was me 30 years ago. I wasn’t stupid, but definitely immature. Once i returned to school, through 3 degrees, I never received a grade below a B. Once I got married, never a grade below an A.
Everyone who gets accepted to UChicago is smart enough.
First of all: I wouldn’t worry too much about this. The 6-year graduation rate is 94%. And for a "typical "student (not low-income, not first-generation, not international, no diagnosed health or mental health issues) I’d wager it’s significantly higher.
But yes, people do fail out of UChicago. I would agree with @BrianBoiler that everybody here is smart enough. I will grudgingly concede that this is true even of the running backs, the DU brothers, and the development admits. Based on what I’ve seen, and what I’ve read on education policy, failing to graduate usually requires academic struggles exacerbated by some other factor, partly or wholly outside a student’s control. This can mean health problems, mental health problems, family emergencies or tragedies, problems with financial aid, problems with a scholarship, and more. Not to mention more exotic reasons; David Axelrod, in his autobiography, recalls searching far and wide for a coach to administer his swim test on the day applications to graduate were due.
I wrote out a very long post that I had to split into multiple parts. Below, I talk about a factors partly or entirely outside a student’s control that can materially increase their odds of facing academic probation or suspension, and some difficulties involved once a student is placed on probation or suspended.
A couple of caveats:
- I am writing this as a social science major who's had a few ups and downs at the College, but never been in any danger of flunking out. I am not speaking from personal experience.
- I am writing this based on the experiences of people I know, with a very light smattering of campus policies and what the research says on risk factors. **This is mostly anecdotal evidence. Treat it as such**
RISK FACTORS
Intelligence is a small part of getting through college. Prior coursework and background knowledge are far more important. So is time management. By looking at grades, courseload, and test scores, UChicago tries to screen for a combination of these things. Extracurriculars add some dimension of “having it together” to the mix.
Unfortunately, UChicago is picking from a crop of students who’ve always been in the top 10% or 20% of their school. Half of that group is about to be below-average. 10% are about to be in the bottom 10%. Handling these situations calls for a very different background and set of skills, which are much harder to glean from an application because few students who’ve had to demonstrate them are in the running for UChicago. And some students face special challenges in trying to navigate the first major struggles of their academic career.
Some students struggle because their academic background is weaker than it seemed. An A in AP Bio can mean very different things at different schools. Test scores are a single data point. Everyone, regardless of background, takes similar courses at UChicago. Students from elite public or private high schools will have an advantage. Others - often low-income or first-generation college students - will need to do a lot of catching up. This is especially true in STEM - majors more reliant on prior knowledge, with less forgiving grading, than most subjects. For a student, this could mean learning 1.5 or 2 quarters’ worth of material, or making over a quarter’s worth of progress in their writing, on a compressed time scale. Best case, these students catch up a few weeks (and several quizzes or p-sets, or maybe an essay) into the quarter. Worst case, they reach the midterm exam/paper or even the final before that happens. Or it never does happen.
Health or mental health concerns make everything worse. These can compound academic difficulties, which in turn leads to heightened stress and anxiety, with consequences for students’ mental and even physical health. The College, by mandating a leave of absence for certain mental health diagnoses - which cuts students off from their friends and much of their support network - has created a disincentive for students to seek the help they need, so things can go from bad to worse in a hurry. None of which is helpful in trying to turn around a quarter that’s started badly.
Many first-generation or low-income students don’t know how to navigate certain situations, because they don’t have a support network or parents familiar with the norms and expectations of college. Quite a few students have, at one point or another, asked for an extension on an assignment, or gotten a second chance on a weak paper. Some have even asked for extra credit not listed in the syllabus, or flat-out challenged a grade. With varying frequency, all these requests are granted by some number of professors. But first-gen or low-income students might not know how to ask - or even think to ask in the first place. The same difficulties apply to students looking for mentorship opportunities or a support network. This has nothing to do with intelligence, and everything to do with one’s socioeconomic background. And it’s a major determinant of whether academic struggles snowball or stop.
Personal tragedies, financial difficulties, scholarship trouble, etc. can be a major source of stress, and disrupt any semblance of a workflow. If someone’s family gets evicted or a friend commits suicide, Core Bio won’t be the first thing on their mind.
Some professors are understanding of all the above, and structure their courses to keep people from falling through the cracks. Mandatory review sessions are good. Extended office hours are good. Minimizing reliance on pre-UChicago coursework is good. Openness to extensions is generally good. A sink-or-swim approach, with few TA sessions and minimal review, is bad. Incredibly specific or random test questions are bad for any number of reasons. And a prime example of what not to do comes from one professor who told a sexual assault survivor he couldn’t grant them an extension on one assignment - because then he’d need to grant one to anyone who asked for an extension after being sexually assaulted. There is a special place in hell for that man.
Being first-gen, being low-income, getting sick, struggling with mental illness, dealing with personal tragedies, or simply having a professor be a jerk, are things students don’t have much control over. And once students end up on probation, or academic suspension, the picture gets more complicated. I’ve hit the CC character limit, so I elaborate on that below.
ACADEMIC PROBATION AND SUSPENSION
Once students have a bad quarter, they face new hurdles. A student who completes fewer than three classes or has a GPA below 2.0 for the quarter will be placed on academic probation. Unless they complete at least three classes with a GPA over 2.0 the following quarter, they’ll be suspended - generally for a year. A student who finishes the quarter with a GPA below 2.0 and completes fewer than three courses can be suspended immediately, no matter how they previously did.
This presents a few issues.
First, the GPA requirement has been raised. As recently as 2015-2016, it was 1.75: http://collegecatalog.uchicago.edu/archives/2015-2016/thecollege/gradingandacademicstatus/. This makes it easier to end up on probation.
Second, a student who ends the quarter on academic probation faces a very difficult choice.Students can drop their major, and gamble that they’ll maintain a 2.0 and complete three classes in an unfamiliar major and/or Core classes outside their area of specialty. Or they can try again next quarter, sticking to what’s been their strongest subject through K-12, with the risk that they’ll face similar issues and be suspended for a year. It’s a huge decision - especially if the problem quarter is the first quarter, when many of these issues show up. Changing majors with a quarter’s worth of evidence is a tough choice. And success in a new major is hardly guaranteed. This situation is particularly tricky for STEM majors; grading is generally tougher, and the grade distributions have long tails, making it far easier to fail classes if they stick with their major. I personally think two quarters of probation would make more sense - the first time a student ends up on probation, if nothing else - because it would allow them to try both approaches if need be.
The third issue is that , a year’s suspension cuts students off from their friends and support network in Chicago. If they don’t have a place to stay near campus, they’ll end up back home while most of their friends are in school - not a great situation, especially for those dealing with mental health concerns.
Fourth, students who are placed on academic probation or suspension, depending on their particular academic situation, may see their financial aid reduced or revoked. If a family is relying on financial aid for a large share of costs, there’s no coming back from this.
Finally, returning from probation often comes with requirements - e.g. holding down the same full-time job for a period of time (leaving one job to take a raise elsewhere won’t do) - that are tangential at best to the sort of work students do on campus.
An aside: we’re talking about a relatively small share of the College’s population. Without some of the risk factors above, or exceptional circumstances, your kid is unlikely to ever be in this situation. It is not the norm.
Some students are put on probation, restored to good standing, and do fine afterwards. Others end up on academic suspension, and many in this group won’t return - or return some time later at best. Based on the experiences of people I know, I believe support to keep students from ending up in these situations, and help those who are placed on probation or suspended, could improve. The process could also be more accommodating and less inflexible while still fulfilling the College’s key goals. But that’s just my $0.02, so take it with a grain of salt. I think I’ve done more than enough pontificating today.
@mwmomtwins: the freshman retention rate is 99%. And guessing that most who leave do so by choice rather than being forced out by the school.
I don’t have any experience with U.Chicago, but I do have some experience with MIT. From what I have heard they are similarly academically very challenging.
When I was at MIT, very few students dropped out. At least in my experience the ones that did dropped out because they didn’t want to work that hard for four full years. As one student from a different challenging school once said: “You have to want to do it”.
If you get into U.Chicago then you are smart enough to graduate. Whether any particular student wants to work hard enough to graduate is largely up to the student. As a parent I don’t think that we can do much more than make sure that the student knows what they are signing up for, and pay attention when we hear from them.
My DD had a friend in that ended up on academic probation and then academic suspension after the first year. They applied for and received readmittance for the Winter quarter, so yes it does happen. She did mention that he drank quite a bit and rarely attended a class she had with him, so more of a lack of maturity then anything else.
^ Yikes. That person may not have housing when he/she returns!
A kid who came into BJ with me and was well-liked by all concluded almost from the first day that he wasn’t cut out for the U of C. He proceeded to spend the first quarter shooting pool and playing ping-pong in the BJ basement - or else methodically throwing darts in his room. One could hear the steady plunk of them hitting the board on his wall as one walked past his room on the way to class. He went to all the meals and probably a few other activities on campus, and he carried on just as if he were a functioning student. He just didn’t go to class or do course-work. He seemed not to be unduly anguished about any of this. I imagine he was reasonably smart and ended up doing mediocre work in a less demanding school.
Sometimes an element of depression is involved in such cases, but very often it is all perfectly rational - a kid discovers that a school doesn’t suit him and just stops all engines to await the inevitable. This fellow didn’t return after Christmas.
What a story marlowe1. I wonder what went through his mind as he played pool and darts waiting for the inevitable? I wonder what he thinks about that time now?
Flunking out isn’t a huge issue from my kids friends but as Dun mentioned earlier it can be very hard to go from top of your class in HS to bottom of your class in college. Even doing relatively well getting a few Bs maybe a C here and there while seeing other friends making Dean’s List isn’t a great feeling. Having an average to slightly below average GPA prevents one from joining some competitive activities reinforcing that feeling of failure even when they are really doing fine. Everyone at UChicago will have moments of feeling bad about their academic abilities. The core is going to be tough somewhere for everyone. Learning how to deal with that feeling and power through it gaining confidence is a valuable skill for UChicago students.
Sometimes - hopefully not the norm - a pattern of alcohol or drug abuse to the point of compromising academic standing might, in fact, be attempts to self-medicate in order to cope with more serious underlying mental health issues, some of which can manifest themselves during the stressful college years. Schizophrenia comes to mind. Not to sound the alarm bells, because most of these stoner or boozer kids probably do get a clue and grow up. However, if an otherwise bright and focused kid starts exhibiting out-of-character behavior during college, I’d totally be on top of that as a parent (assuming I found out) so I could help them explore the possibility of an underlying mental health condition.
Am very much in agreement with @ccccguideg . There is a narrative that says tough schools like Chicago destroy the kids that are merely smart/studious/talented but not quite in the genius category (vide Malcolm Gladwell). Those kids would be much better off, according to Gladwell, going to State U’s where they stand a chance of having their self-esteem validated through finding themselves in a pool of more ordinary kids like the ones in high school. He tells some horror stories to make the point.
No doubt there can be bad effects from learning you’re no longer the smartest kid in the room. However, it’s more often the case that that recognition, and coming to terms with it, (a) stimulates you to greater effort, and (b) humbles you in a salutary way. Being taken down a notch is character-building. A realistic appreciation of and adaptation to one’s limitations never hurt anyone. I see no real argument against putting yourself in the richest environment you possibly can and riding it out as best you can.
DadTwoGirls, DunBoyer’s description does make Chicago sound a lot like MIT. At MIT students on probation and even those who end up being asked to take time off are usually serious students who didn’t end up with difficulties because they were partying or goofing off. I’d guess same with Chicago. On a more positive note tho, MIT has moved to making it easier for students to return-a step in the right direction.