Junior hours sophomore classification?
 

Hey guys! So I've got a unique situation on my hands. I went to Texas A&M University in the fall of 2013-2014, but this past year I had to take time off for personal reasons. I'm applying for Readmission in the fall (of 2015), and I really want to rush! I'll be junior in hours due to AP credit, but I'll be a classified sophomore because I'll have at least three more years to complete my major. On my resume and information, the sororities will see I graduated high school in 2013 so it'll look like I'm a junior, but if I write class of 2018 on my paperwork do you think they'll accept me? I really want to be apart of a wonderful sisterhood, and I'm just concerned I won't get a bid due to my year off from college.

Any input is appreciated!

Thank you so much!

You are a junior, even if you have three years to go. Don't lie about it. Just have your rec writers indicate that you will be at TAMU for 3 more years. They can also explain your situation.

I think you have to ask Pan Hell. I'm rushing at IU and I have enough credits to be classified as a junior but I'm considered a freshman because I enrolled fall 2014. It varies by school so you should contact your Panhel

First, your story isn't unique. It might be unpleasant or difficult or even unusual or rare, but it is in no way unique. Second, the word is panhellenic, or panhel for short. They may be challenging, but you are not crossing hell to get to them.

That makes no sense.

Sorry I'll Clarify, I came into Freshman year with enough credits to be classified as a sophmore due to taking College classes in high school and AP tests.when added with my first semester credits, academically I'm a junior but I am in fact a freshman and I had to clarify with them that I'm actually a freshman because my transcript looks like that of a junior.

You can have a bunch of hours that are meaningless, because they don't apply to your major, so the classification by hours alone doesn't tell the true picture. I think I started college with 45 credit hours from AP exams, but that didn't mean that I could have graduated in only five semesters.

In any case, I think the advice to ask the GL office is good.

If your transcript says you are a junior, you are a junior. It doesn't matter how many years you've been in school. Class standing is by hours. Someone in school 4 years with junior hours is still a junior.

I think this would vary by school. At UCLA (admittedly, 10 years ago), it was incredibly common for students to have a full year's worth of AP credits going into school, but it rarely actually sped up your progress to a degree. We defaulted to using first year, second year, and so on as the indication for what "year in school" you are. A common expression was "I'm a first year with sophomore standing", and people rarely just said freshman or sophomore.

In our case, it would have been misleading to say that you're a sophomore if you meant that you're a first year with enough credits to be a sophomore. Everyone would consider you a first year in that case, and for the purposes of Panhellenic recruitment, you would be registered in the "Freshman quota" group rather than the "upperclassman quota" group (which included anyone from second year and up).

Seconding LAblonde. At one of the schools I work with, class standing is synonymous with year. If it's your second year, you are a sophomore, regardless of how many credits you have or how many years you have left. Some privileges are reserved for juniors and seniors. If it's your second year, even if you took AP courses, are on-track to graduate in three years, and are a junior by credits, you don't get access to these privileges.

Both examples are just semantics. You may have been "considered" the same as your class year, but you were really whatever classification your hours determined. It doesn't really matter how it effects your graduation date, especially considering few people graduate in 4 years. If your transcript says you are a junior, you are a junior. The only difference these anecdotes have raised is a campus tradition of calling students first years rather then freshman. There are schools that call any class standing "first years" if it's their first year at said school. Those students may be first years AND sophomores, juniors or seniors depending on their hours. They aren't mutually exclusive.

Fine. Semantics. But we both gave examples where you'd be expected to use "freshman" even when you have sophomore credit standing. It still means that there's room for confusion for this young lady, and she needs to know how to handle it according to her campus.

kolive - Hooosier indicated that you should contact your Panhellenic office, and I second that. In my experience as a former recruitment advisor at UCLA, I can tell you that we expected women to indicate what year in school they were (first year, second year, etc.), NOT what they're credit standing was, unless the woman actually planned to graduate early. I believe at the time the online enrollment form for fall formal recruitment used freshman/sophomore designations, in which case you were expected to use "freshman" if you were a first year, regardless of your credit standing. For spring informal recruitment it would have been different. I have seen women mislabel their applications, to their own detriment.

Contact your Panhellenic office - they'll know how best to handle it to avoid unnecessary confusion.