Prospective ILS students must first apply to the University of Maryland. The top applicants are offered direct admission into the Honors College, and students can then preference their choice of program. Honors College applicants who have exhibited outstanding performance in college-level courses (AP and IB programs as well as classes at local colleges) in biology, chemistry, and mathematics are encouraged to preference ILS as soon as they are certain of their choice. Typically, entering ILS students will have also earned college credit in a few other courses in the arts, humanities, and social sciences.

In order to be prepared for our accelerated curriculum, students must have completed the most rigorous coursework in the life sciences at their high school. Many of our students transfer in college credit that the University of Maryland registrar recognizes as equivalent to the freshman biology sequence BSCI170/171. Course waivers for this sequence are granted for a score of a 4 or 5 on the AP Biology exam, a 6 or 7 on the Higher Level IB Biology exam, and comparable community college and university courses.

*Note: You can see if your college credit is equivalent to our requirements by accessing the UMD Transfer Course Database. These are the credits the UMD registrar awards from other institutions, these are not decisions made by the ILS staff. If your course is equivalent, the column will read Accepted BSCI170/171.

Students applying to Maryland from the international community are encouraged to contact the ILS office with questions about equivalent scores.

No. Successful applicants are those who have completed the most rigorous coursework in the life sciences throughout high school. Completing coursework such as AP, IB, and community college credit in biology will result in increased preparation for our advanced curriculum, and many of our students will have transferred in biology college credit, but it is not required.

No. ILS is interested in recruiting the most talented, creative, and accomplished students in the life sciences, regardless of their career goals at the time of their admission to UMD. It has been our experience that students often change their career goals over the course of their undergraduate education. Therefore, our admissions decisions are based on the likelihood of each applicant's success in the challenging and exciting ILS program, not a student's current career aspirations.

Yes. UMD Honors students who have finished the first year of their Honors program, and do well in first-year Biological Sciences sequence (BSCI170/171) have the opportunity to apply to ILS for their sophomore year. This is a highly competitive process and subject to space availability. Please see the Admissions tab for further details.