Well reasoned, based on actual experience. Cognizant of the fact you try to bring in a kid with a 1000 SAT to compete in the classroom with kids at 1400+ you are asking for trouble. But apparently ND does just that. I have said it before it is a modern day miracle a bunch of kids with 1000 SATs can make the grade in classrooms with 1400+ students. Hats off to the athletic department, the tutors, and to these kids. So I readily acknowledge that is the difference, we have to really look hard at the kid and trust that he can make it through that rigor. But we now bring in a lot of these kids a semester early, most stay for 2-3 summers and take classes, and many finish in 3 1/2 years so somehow they are doing it. Not hard to believe as I would assume they knock out 12 credits with early enrollment and then take 6 credits each of 2-3 summers. You need 120 to graduate in most majors so these guys have 24-30 credits from summers and in case of early enrollees that first spring semester. That leaves 90-96 credits in the other 8 semesters or 11-12 credits per semester. When I was at ND I took 18-21 almost every semester due to engineering and ROTC. Not many of these guys are taking engineering, or physics, or biomedical engineering, or pre-med, so let's not kid ourselves into thinking they are.