Good luck to everyone accepted and waiting! My D accepted another school and let VT know so hopefully others will do the same and WL will move soon.
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Oooo. So prolly RD decisions come out this Friday!
March 5th. Just like last year.
So eagerly waiting for it to release and see of they take waitlist.
@hopeforthebest123 Looks like from last year’s thread that wait list pulls did not start until around April 13.
For me, the honors concept is a strange one in college. I think there are really three reasons to do an honors program.
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That particular program does specific things you really want to do, and does them well. For example, it has an exception study abroad opportunity that was along the lines you wanted before going to college.
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Money. The program is offering you a significant discount on tuition.
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Prestige. You just really want everyone to know you’re in an honors program.
We have no interest in #3. In fact, my children think that an honors program at many college is sort of like extra work, an additional minor, and it may even interfere with what they want to do at college (socially, academically, free time to study). That is fine, if it fits what you want to do (or offers you money), and my D is very interested in one of these programs and has applied for it. But just being in generic “honors” and not getting one of these benefits, makes little sense to me. As you said, graduating with honors beats out just being in an honors program.
Question for all: for job searches, what is the practical difference between graduating with honors and being in an honors program? Do either show up on a transcript or diploma?
My gut feeling is that employers think that graduating with honors is the same thing as graduating in an honors program. I’m guessing that employers associate college honors programs with a high level of academic achievement versus some school-defined holistic interpretation.
Do employers know that College X selects honors program participants based on stats and College Y selects based on holistic measures? I’m guessing employers don’t know the nuances and they assume everyone “with” honors or “in” honors are the smartest kids academically speaking. But maybe I’m wrong?
FYI…Hank…we are in CT too…hi neighbor!!
Maybe this aligns with your #3 reason, but perhaps an honors invite (and whatever perks that includes) makes a reach or safety school more appealing in the eyes of the student? The programs sometimes allow students to be part of a cohort with smaller classes or special housing so those things would be a plus. Often they get preferred admission too, so there may be practical reasons. I think there is a lot of variation from school to school on what it means.
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Cum Laude and higher distinction Latin honors do appear on the VT diploma, but I can’t imagine an employer asking to see that or a transcript. Rather, the student is going to list it and their GPA if applicable on their resume. I wouldn’t list being part of an honors program if I did not graduate with the applicable level of performance for cum laude or above. Having some hiring experience and relationships with others who work in HR, etc. I can say and have been told that high-stats don’t necessarily make the hire. Case in point being an engineering business owner I know who has hired a number of students from VT. Their opinion? Their best hires have been graduates with broad experiences and problem solving skills and mostly fell in the above-average range re: grades but weren’t 4.0’s. His business requires enhanced people/customer skills and his experience has been that the super high stat kids on average are more suited to research type jobs. And I have personally experienced a C+ level student outshining some brainiacs during interviews. It all depends on the job I guess.
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100%. At Tech it can be housing if the student desires that, but biggest perc seems to be priority course registration.
Howdy @DoingOurBest - hope you are enjoying this lovely CT weather too!
I can try to answer this question. In my role, I interview a lot of people for our firm. Interns, senior experts, etc. I am a manager in technology, and we are looking at “engineers”, just mainly the computer science ones. We recruit from top schools (better than the one I went to, that’s for sure). I am a part of the intern selection program, and hire the people for my teams as well. I am also asked by other managers to help them with “team fit” for their roles.
What I can tell you about hiring and interviews is that it’s a lot like applying to colleges. Just like with college you never know who is really reviewing your child’s application, the same is true for business. Different reviewers have different views.
Usually kids will put on their resume if they were in the honors program, or graduated with honors. Some of my co-workers put a lot of value on high GPAs or honors programs. Ironically, those are often people who were high GPA or honors themselves. Like minds.
Personally? I ignore it entirely, it’s almost never of any matter in the working world. Honestly what I see when someone lists a 3.9 GPA or honors is that I know this person will always try to do exactly what they are told to do, which can be a good or bad thing. They are “studious and academic”, which only helps a little in the working world. This may be more important in research or academic fields, in business and tech, it’s more about how creative the person will be, how they deal with adversity, how they communicate, and how they problem solve. None of which is really evident between 2 students who have different GPAs.
There is an old expression, “A Students work for B Students”, and I find that to be true. I look for kids who do a solid job, but if they graduate with a CS degree from a school like VT, I already know they did a solid job. If they have a 3.2 instead of a 3.9, I may assume they spent more time socializing, playing sports, double majoring, and so forth.
I personally have never chosen a resume based on an honors or GPA listing, but I know people who have. I’ve never let a high GPA or honors on resume HURT someone’s chances. I just don’t factor it in much. Unless they went to a sub-par school and really killed it, that to me shows they turned their work ethic around in college.
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Hi everyone, I have a 1410 SAT and a 4.15 GPA (3.7 unweighted) pre senior year and a 4.25 (3.8 weighted) through the first semester of 12th grade (roughly top 25% ish in school). Was concurrently enrolled into a 4 year magnet school, had ok ECS, good essays and was waitlisted in state for computer science. I know there are a lot of high ranking students getting waitlisted, but can someone give me a perfectly honest opinion on what they think my chances of getting in are, would appreciate any feedback.
Totally @rbc2018 - there are perks, and it also makes a kid feel good. I’ve discussed it with my kids, and they always feel it’s a tradeoff. My D’s have said “Yeah, but then you are stuck with a smaller group of kids for everything, what if you don’t get along?” or “What if you would rather join the environmental club and instead you’re forced to always do the honors program things you don’t like?”. You do give up some control for the perk. I’m sure it does help a lot for a few semesters when you’re a sophomore and can get class selection easier, but that begins to be less relevant junior year.
I also agree that it’s very different from school to school, and from program to program within a school. Also, each kid is different. For some kids, it’s a real motivator. For others, it sounds like someone deciding for you how you should spend your free time. My kids are really cherishing that they can finally choose their own adventure at college. But like I said, my D has one particular honor program she is applying for at VT because she really believes in the spirit of it.
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In 6 semesters my son has gotten almost every class he has wanted, even the preferred times, so at VT I don’t even think priority registration is a big advantage (I know at some schools it is). But yes, that’s used as a selling point.
All good points. My two currently in college weren’t interested in honors programs (more hoops to jump through in their opinion), but my current senior is intrigued. At some of the schools it seems to give you access to research opportunities, and she’s interested in that. I went to a public flagship (50k students) and was in the business honors program. It was nice to have a cohort at such a big school for the core classes and it didn’t impact my free time in any way. But I don’t think not getting in honors is a reason to reject a school if it’s a good fit otherwise.
Same… and only one 9:00 AM over that time too! Kid had some serious luck early on.
We know a hack to avoid the early classes 
I applied as a finance major RD. Will my major make it harder for me to get admitted?
I would think not. I don’t think their business school is even ranked. They are known for engineering.
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At least in the past, only engineering and architecture had their own set of admission standards. What might make it harder is that you are RD. Virginia Tech said most of the class will be filled from ED and EA. Good luck to you!
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Their business school is ranked 38th in the country.
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Where did you see that? USNWR, Forbes, NIche?