Honestly, if standing up and seeing what % of people are likely to get into med school is enough to break someone, I’m not entirely sure medicine is the right field for them.
To be completely honest, “weed-out” as used by many people I know was actually more like “oh my god, I actually have to study?! I don’t know how to do this since I breezed by with all/near-all As in high school.” By the next level, they know how to study so the material seems easier.
I remember way, way back when I was an accounting major. Second semester, possibly Intermediate Accounting?, the class started with two dozen students. The prof was quite clear that prior data showed about half of us would make it through. No. There were 8 of us left in the end. All 8 of us were in the A/B range for the class. The others clearly were not up to the task of 2 hours of homework each night. This was before computers, we used adding machines lol. It took me one semester of accounting to realize I needed a machine with tape so I could go back and look for my input errors.
D’s roommate at college now is (was) pre-med. They have taken three of the same classes. I know the last class was OrgChem, known as a weeder class of course. Was it easy, no. Again, this particular student did not have the study skills or tenacity to do well, though she did put effort in. She is currently mulling over what her new major will be.
I personally think there is a place for “weeder” classes, if only to highlight to students the amount of effort it will take to pursue particular majors/careers and give them the opportunity to switch out before its too late.
I would never do a stand up activity, though I am very clear on how few GSs get tenure track jobs. Even so I had a very smart GS bemoaning her lack of a TT job. When I responded that she knew how few got TT jobs, she said, “I didn’t think it pertained to me.”
Students engage in a lot of magical thinking, because they are young and haven’t experienced much failure. I don’t think many institutions or professors want “weed out” classes, but there are just moments when people hit the limits of their abilities (to study, do math, publish). Then they may blame the class, the professor, the institution. I am always happy when some rises to the occasion, sometimes to their own surprise.
Here on CC we often have parents posting about kids who want to become engineers or major in CS or physics but “struggle in math”.
Math is the language of engineering and CS and physics. A kid who is interested in the conceptual components but can’t complete a problem set is not going to be a happy engineering CS or physics major. That’s reality. Does that mean the kid should chuck it all and become a HS gym teacher? No. But a reality check is in order. And if that means sweating it out in a Freshman “weed out” class where the kid realizes that he/she is working twice as hard as everyone else for a low C grade- I think that’s a valid educational experience. It gets harder going forward, not easier even though the junior/senior courses are no longer weed out.
Accounting? Kids often claim they want to major in accounting because it sounds employable, respectable, and leads directly to a career. Being in a class where it’s not enough to bang out a calculation- but you actually have to understand the logical framework- sounds like a gift. You don’t need a degree in accounting to get a job at H&R Block doing people’s taxes. If you are investing four years of your education in an accounting degree, the sooner you understand what the field is all about, the better, no???
LOL. That’s going to be my D18 in a couple of years. I think OMG moment is the where the increased difficulty of the material collides with the actual interest in the major.
That, and they’re probably doing something more interesting to them, which makes it infinitely easier (at least for me). You go from “I just need the answer” to “I want to figure out the answer”.
My department does not teach any classes with the intention that they will be “weeder” classes. The courses are set at a level so that students will be competitive with graduates in the same field, from other universities across the US, at the end of a four-year degree program. This gives them better opportunities for employment, certification, or grad school, or professional school, depending on where they want to go. Also, in some of the coursework areas in my department, a student who doesn’t “get it” with the subject could pose a serious hazard to the safety and even lives of others. We try quite hard to give the students the chance to “get” the subject.
The students may still perceive the courses as weeder courses, though, just because they are hard.
There is some suggestion that weeder courses are artificially difficult and the ones afterward are easier. That is definitely not true in my department. The courses just keep getting more difficult. I am not sure how the people who think that the courses are artificially difficult have reached that conclusion. The grade averages in the later courses are higher? Well, that would be expected if the students in the later courses are the same students who did very well in the introductory courses.
The service courses in math and physics for engineering majors are (in general) not more difficult than the subsequent engineering courses that rely on them. In some cases, they may be pitched more abstractly, which could cause difficulty for some students. If a student realizes that he/she has difficulty with the abstractions, there are usually a lot of types of help available on-campus.
I don’t think colleges purposely make classes “weed out” classes. The reality is…some courses are challenging in some majors.
You still get alot of drop outs even at the top schools. Here is the ASEE enrollment information for Duke which direct enrolls into their engineering school. If you track the classes over the years, there is about a 14 percent drop-off between Freshmen and Junior year.
For example, there were 297 juniors in 2016.
http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/7288/screen/20?school_name=Duke+University+
Out of a starting class of 345 in 2014.
http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/6419/screen/20?school_name=Duke+University+
Schools with large pre-med weed mercilessly. If a school starts out with 800 pre-meds, and they know they can realistically only place their top 200 students into med school, it make sense for them to identify the 600 students who are least likely to make is and get them to change majors as early as possible.
I remember speaking with a pre-med at WashU who said that he got a 26 out of a possible 100 score in organic chemistry. After the curve, it was an A and one of the highest scores in the class. He added that the number of students who self-identified as pre-med declined by 50 in the first semester, and then by another 50 percent after the second semester. At that point, there were still some drop out, but the numbers stabilized.
Let me add a third option–weed out classes can be a form of kindness. It’s really sad to watch a student slog through a curriculum only to find out at the end that med school (or dental, or DPT, or whatever) isn’t an option. Best to know early on that a change in direction is required.
Is it possible that Intro to Chem can be a “filter” for aspiring Mechanical, Civil, Industrial, and other non-Chemical engineers?
Asking for a young friend.
Non-chemical/biomedical engineering students typically need just one or two semesters of general chemistry. That may be a prerequisite for a few later engineering courses, though. But it is not generally a “filter” the same way math and physics are. However, if the engineering program is designed as a “weed out” program (where more frosh pre-engineering students are admitted than program capacities and are later admitted by having to meet a high college GPA threshold), then general chemistry can be part of the “weed out” process (where a C or even B grade is passing but could endanger the student’s chance of getting into the desired major).
“Weed out” programs would be like those at Purdue, Virginia Tech, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Ohio State, Penn State, Washington (for those without direct admit), and Texas A&M.
Romani–"To be completely honest, “weed-out” as used by many people I know was actually more like “oh my god, I actually have to study?!”
Thumper–“I don’t think colleges purposely make classes “weed out” classes. The reality is…some courses are challenging in some majors.”
Obviously you’ve never been in a weed out course. They exist. I hit a couple along the way eons ago–one specific series of Chem classes and Organic Chem which were used to weed med students. We were on the quarter system. I was only required as a pre-req to do two quarters of Organic because the third quarter specifically was reserved to weed any med students still standing. That third quarter was well known as a horrible cut throat “don’t turn your back on your neighbor” class. Learning was not the goal–jumping through the hoops and surviving was the goal.
When I got into Pharmacy school, we needed Bio Chem and the department had students sign up for a Bio Chem class which was not in the pharmacy school. They changed their minds when they realized the Bio Chem class was actually a weeder course for pre-med students. They came up with the money to put the class back under their control. It was a total reboot.
Like mentioned above the Chem weed out courses failed out half of the class each quarter. 700 show up, next class will be 350 and after third quarter only 150 would be left. For regular chemistry there were different level series–some students who dropped/failed would sign up for a different series of classes–and make A’s and B’s.
I’m not sure I would characterize Virginia Tech as a “weed out” program." You are admitted to general engineering and choose your major after completing the initial courses. If you have a 3.0 , I believe you get your first choice (that is what the current info on the website indicates). That does not seem to be a particularly crazy requirement. There are programs for entering freshman to help with the transition to college, programs like Hypatia for women and Galileo for men, advising and tutoring, office hours by professors and TA’s, etc. The reality is that some kids are not going to make it in engineering, or just don’t want to put in the effort to avail themselves of the resources available, or just decide that engineering is not for them.
At my kids’ school, fully 50% of Intro to Chem students receive Ds and Fs and only 10% get As, definitely a weed out class. It is a required course for all science and engineering majors including nursing and physical therapy. It is not uncommon for students to take it 3 times. According to a Chem teacher friend, the tests are much harder than the ones offered at more prestigious UW. Luckily, both S1 and D covered it with AP credits.
@Magnetron wrote:
Care to share which school?
@gouf78 --well, I can’t believe they weeded out ALL of the pre-meds! And I think that that still counts as what @Thumper said–some people might not be cut out for some programs. As I understand it (humanities person, here, no chem for me!), organic is a reasoning course. Both my H and my D took Honors Chemistry and Organic at challenging schools–by both their reports, you did well in this course by thinking and solving puzzles, not by sheer memorization. (Neither seemed to have serious trouble with cutthroat behavior, though H did say he heard of it). In that sense, I like that in my doc. I want one who can reason and critically think, not just works hard to memorize stuff. So if that’s how they’re “weeding”, then fine. (Incidentally, both my family members got A’s, though neither considered themself to be pre-med when they took it.)
Like I said in my post…as an engineering student in one of the schools where you’re not admitted to your major until 4th semester…I don’t believe they do exist in the form people commonly think of. I believe some people are going to struggle with engineering or insert-major-here and they’re going to get weeded out sooner or later. That’s not the program’s fault; the program is however hard it is. They’re not sitting down at a table saying, “How many people’s graduations can we delay this semester?? Mwahaha!”
It’s on the students to adapt to it or figure out that they’d prefer to pursue something else.
And obviously you’ve never been in a weed out course.
As I said–learning in a weed out course is secondary to jumping through hoops.
Like I said–it was eons ago and I sincerely hope they are less prevalent these days.
If weed-out courses are as prominent as you claim, how is it possible that a junior in chemical engineering at a big state school who has taken calc 1-3, DiffEq, gen chem 1 and 2, physics 1 and 2, and organic chemistry 1 and 2 has never encountered one?
The less selective admissions is, the more students are “weeded out”. They probably should not have been admitted in the first place anyway.