What is an "in honors" school student in the US?

I came across this sentence on an American website

Aron is a student in honors in his class

I was wondering how to phrase this for a UK audience.

Solution 1:

More context is needed before we can say definitively what meaning is intended, as honors and in honors are ambiguous (as, indeed, is class), but as Dan Bron notes in a comment, this is likely a reference to tracking in American education. I do not think an exact equivalent exists in the UK.

Being in honors in my class would be ellipsis for being either

• enrolled in the honors version of a course, i.e. a more rigorous or more advanced version of a general course: honors chemistry, honors French, honors algebra, etc.
• enrolled in the honors track, i.e. taking a course load primarily of classes designated as honors classes.

The Merriam-Webster definition of honor includes

6e. honors plural (2) : a course of study for superior students supplementing or replacing a regular course

and similarly the American Heritage Dictionary offers

4. honors
   c. A program of advanced study for exceptional students:

   planned to take honors in history.

@lbf suggests in honors refers to being an honor student or being a member of an honor society or graduating with honors. Frequently that may be the case, but not always. A student in the standard track could receive scholastic recognitions. Likewise, a student in the honors track could perform poorly and receive no honors.

Students in most traditional U.S. schools, public and private, are assessed based on standardized testing, scholastic performance, and other measures, then placed into tracks. Instead of enrolling at a separate gymnasium, lyceum, or grammar school as historically done in various parts of Europe, high-achieving students will attend the same school as others, but take separate classes featuring a more rigorous curriculum.

Both the theory and practice of tracking have been controversial, but this system has been the norm in mainstream American education since the early- to mid-20th century.

The more advanced classes are frequently called honors classes, although they may also be known as college prep or advanced or many other names. The specifics of what the label entails vary more considerably, and schools may have any number of tracks. In some cases, honors overlaps with other intensified curricula such as the International Baccalaureate, the Advanced Placement program, the New York Regents Diploma, and so on, while in other cases it is distinct from them, and either the more or the less rigorous course.

In informal conversation, being in can refer either to enrollment in the honors version of an individual course, or in the overall track identified as honors, a usage likewise extended any reference to a track:

Did you finish the Oedipus Rex reading yet?
No; I'm in honors, and we're doing Philoctetes instead.

Are you taking AP Physics next year?
I can't; it's only offered during second period, and I have to take TOK then, because I'm in IB.

This is largely a colloquial and conversational usage. More formally, one would write out I'm in the honors class or I'm in the honors track to specify.