I have tagged a few veteran parents, but I am open to input from anyone. My D graduated from high school with 21 DE credits and 9 AP classes (28 credits by my calculation using the chart on the Michigan website). I believe this means she will hit the “Upper Division” (higher) tuition rate by the second semester of her freshman year. However, as far as I can tell, there is no real benefit to transferring these credits. Because she is a BSN major, her curriculum requires the full 8 semesters, with no chance of graduating early. It appears the AP/DE credits are just “extra” credits that will result in higher tuition earlier, with no tangible benefit. Is my understanding correct? Wouldn’t it be better for us to NOT send her AP scores and DE transcripts to Michigan? Or am I missing something….
Hi,
She has a set curriculum but I don’t know everything about her program. If I am reading this correctly she is accepted and starts this fall. The very best thing she can do it meet with her advisor in her program. You don’t have to wait for the official visit and talk about options. Our son got into Junior year early and it just meant we would pay the fee earlier since he didn’t even want to graduate early but could of. She might be able to by pass some classes and get into higher options but I wouldn’t eat up her electives that she might want to take with the credits. But an advisor would be the best person to weigh different options with her. The admissions people are very nice and want to help. I would be curious what you end up doing.
It does look like AP 4 or 5 on psychology and statistics can fulfill required courses, though that would just allow substitution of free electives, not graduating early. If the DE courses include one that is accepted for English 124 or 125, that fulfills another requirement. If any of this applies, perhaps look into whether it is possible to have specific AP scores or DE courses accepted (rather than all of them).
https://admissions.umich.edu/apply/first-year-applicants/ap-ib-credit/ap-guidelines#Nursing
https://nursing.umich.edu/program_plans/plan.php?id=36&year=2025
Wow I wish I could provide specific counsel here. In general, it doesn’t sound like it’d help beyond perhaps allowing her to take more advanced classes and/or lower level electives rather than required classes.
That said, is there any chance she’ll change major, perhaps to one under which those credits would allow her to graduate sooner? I ask because one of my droids, CS in CoE, has a semester+ under his belt and could graduate early (or take only 4.5 years to do SUGS). An awful lot of kids switch majors…
Yes, unfortunately she did not take AP Stats or AP Psych — which would have helped towards her BSN. And she tried (unsuccessfully) to get her DE English Composition course to count for first year writing.
The DE classes are 2 biology classes with labs, physics with a lab, anatomy/physiology, English Lit, and English Composition. The AP classes that might count for general credit are Calc AB, Comp Sci Principles, AP Lang, AP Bio, APUSH, AP Gov, AP World, AP HUG….
This is perhaps the best argument for submitting. Food for thought….
She will be taking a math placement test anyway. Again, I would sit virtually with a counselor and see that makes sense. Michigan likes AP over DE classes since the DE has to match their curriculum unless you already got approved?
I would think there would be useful electives she would want to take and not just eat up credits. The DE/AP showed the rigor that Michigan loves.
Also about submitting. I don’t think there is a hard fast rule if you submit you must use them. That is why calling admissions will be helpful. She will meet with an advisor once she lands on campus but because of the amount of credits she has I would come up with a plan prior if needed.
My S25 will be a sophomore in Michigan nursing this fall. As of last year, you needed 128 credits to graduate and the nursing curriculum was 120 of those credits. So, we transferred 8 of his random AP credits + his credits for AP psych (since AP psych credits can replace the first psych class in the nursing curriculum) but did not send the rest of S25 AP credits to Michigan. We didn’t think there was an upside to sending the rest of his AP credits and the downside was several thousand $$$ for hitting upper division much earlier. It was a bit disappointing to have all of those AP credits go unused.
Note that at the time AP stats credit was not accepted to replace the nursing curriculum’s stats class which was a bummer since he had the AP score for that. This has changed for fall 2026.
And he will still hit the upper division credit threshold a semester early (2nd semester sophomore year)…