Do Class Difficulty and School Ranks Matter?

Answers to various questions regarding the SMART Scholarship application process. Includes many tips and statistics.
Guest

Do Class Difficulty and School Ranks Matter?

Post by Guest »

Hello,
So I was wondering if SMART also takes into account and distinguishes between the kinds of classes taken? I'm asking this because higher ranked schools tend to have more difficult classes. I was wondering if SMART distinguishes between the kinds of classes taken in the curriculum as well as from which school it is.

Guest

Re: Do Class Difficulty and School Ranks Matter?

Post by Guest »

Although higher ranked schools most likely contain some level of increased difficulty, it generally has nothing to do with the ranking; ie higher ranked schools are not more difficult than a lower ranked school. The undergraduate rankings are done by applied/admitted stats in addition to sending out questionnaires to all department heads whom then rank the schools. In general, the only way a department head is going to know the caliber of a school is by individual contacts and name recognition. Unfortunately most department heads wont have any insight about the EE program at the University of South Carolina and thus how do they fairly rank them against a school like MIT. If they hire somebody to the faculty from USC and he seems like he knows what he's doing then that can lend insight.

Generally the undergraduate program rankings have nothing to do with the caliber of the classes, just name recognition. The only real investigation that goes on is for ABET accreditation. Now the Faculty research and and Graduate programs are ranked by an independent government agency. Like wise, I believe USC undergraduate ranking was somewhere in the realm of 100, but I know this year the Graduate School Ranking placed 7th in the nation, and the Faculty research ranking was 6th in the nation. With such high rankings amongst the graduate and faculty programs, I have no doubt that this year the EE undergraduate program will receive a huge boost in its ranking.

Guest

Re: Do Class Difficulty and School Ranks Matter?

Post by Guest »

I don't believe they look into class rankings much either. With that being said though, students attending a higher caliber school are still more likely to get accepted into the SMART program. This is because students attending those higher caliber schools typically (not all the time) have stronger and more impressive resumes/histories.

So in order to be safe, a student looking to enter the SMART program should try their best to achieve a high GPA no matter what school they attend. Never count on your school's reputation to put you over the edge. Take it upon yourself to show that you are better than other candidates.

Also, it is worth noting that while GPA and school performance are highly important, the SMART program is filling spots that are needed by each facility. Needs change on a yearly basis, and some majors are harder to get a spot with than others (engineers seemed to do well this year).

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