Dual Enrollment is being coenrolled in high school and community college or university at the same time and can often get you a full year’s worth of credit and AP weighting for one semester if you pick your classes precisely based on the state you are in. CLEP is testing out of a college course. Just because are not offered at your school does necessarily mean that you cannot take them. The purpose of going down to regular or taking online course (i.e. flvs.net) is that you can take something else rather than spending your time on something you will not use. Taking dual enrollment courses is a complicated process, and you would have to ask around at local colleges. The reality is that it depends heavily, but at the very least you can find courses online that are fully on the web. It can vary from thousands of dollars to a couple hundred, so pick wisely. You do not have necessarily even have to stick to one high school either if you can transport yourself midday.
You get released early or get a late start by taking eschool or dual enrollment classes. If you want a lax period, take a class online and study at home. You do not even have to attend high school full time if you can come up with something like a porfolio. There are always loopholes that get you out of the jurisdiction of the district if necessary. It is your life. Take control of what you can and show some initiative. The road most traveled is not always the right one.
I am about to start the second semester of my senior year, and by the time I graduate, I will have taken a total of 20 AP or Dual Enrollment classes. I am in 5 APs, 3 DE, and 1 Honors first semester, and 3 APs, 5 DE, and 1 Honors second semester. I take courses that I am either genuinely interested in or that are mandated for graduation. Other than the fact that teachers seem to really enjoy piling on tests and projects at the same exact time, I really never feel overwhelmed with work, and I also have time for ECs, including a student government position. It’s also not uncommon for students at my school to take upwards of 8 APs throughout high school, reaching all APs or DE in their core subjects by senior year, and judging by your posts, you appear to be at least somewhat motivated and capable of handling advanced coursework, so I don’t see why you would have a problem with a similarly rigorous courseload, but keep in mind that during junior year, there may be a slight drop in grades as a result of the greatly increased difficulty of your classes (although your weighted GPA should actually rise if you earn mostly As).
Alternatively, if the OP’s HS offers a curriculum that is sufficiently challenging, there is not reason to explore options outside the HS, assuming said HS even allowed it. No college has the expectation that an applicant takes DE/online or anything outside the norm unless the HS is not challenging the applicant. Since we do not know the HS, one should be careful about such blanket statements.
If the high school offers a curriculum that is sufficiently challenging, there is less reason, but not no reason to explore options outside of the high school. The second statement is simply not true: https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/application-process/what-we-look. I used Harvard, which is an exaggerated example, but you should still get my point. Not knowing the high school being a blanket statement is a Nirvana fallacy; denying a statement because it is not perfect. Your rebuttal is invalid.
You cannot make this assumption. I suggest sitting down with your parents and running the Net Price Calculator on the website of each college you are interested in - only then can you begin to make assumptions about affordability.
Sure there is. For starters, the HS may not allow it in lieu of their own offerings (as mine did not). but I can’t say it applies here, since I do not know the OP’s HS, nor do you. Nowhere in your link does it say that the applicant needs to be stimulated academically outside of HS. However, you have expressed your PoV, and I expressed mine. Since we can’t debate the topic per forum rules, we can agree to disagree and let the OP decide what is right for him/her.
If it is allowed, if you want to come up with a Rogerian analysis of it to discover what is true about both of our perspectives, then PM me and I will discuss it with you objectively and formally outside of community input. I feel that we both could learn something from one another.
@Waterborne Thanks for your detailed advice! Although I do not agree with some of your points, I really appreciate it; however, I think the courses that I will be taking next year will be enough of a challenge for me. I will also be spending a lot of time doing ACT Prep (aiming for a 35) and being involved my extracurriculars. You seem to be very knowledgeable about academics though. Would it be fine if I pmed you in the future for more advice and help?
@r2v2018 That’s incredible! 20 APs is unheard of from where I live. I can definitely relate; I’m not taking these classes just for the credit. I’m taking them because I’m truly interested in them and want to improve myself in certain subjects (like writing in AP Lang). Thank you for your advice! I hope I can maintain straight As my junior year, although I probably will lose a lot of sleep because of it.
@skieurope I’ll have to agree with you. I think the courses that I take will be sufficiently challenging, and taking on more courses would lead to sleep deprivation and poor health. I think I am stimulated enough academically in school, and my time spent outside of school is only spent on completing homework and studying (which in itself takes more time than I would like it to take) and participating in numerous extracurriculars. Could I pm you in the future for anything relating to academics and high school?
@evergreen5 Thank you so much for your advice! I’ve been a bit worried since recently I’ve been looking through college admission results of others here on CC, and they’ve received good financial aid packages but had many disadvantages, such as being the first from their family to go to college, URM, or being in family that earns less than 70k. Because of this, I thought that I would receive, no to little financial aid. That was a huge relief.