Hello all,
I am currently a junior at my high school and I have some questions regarding the overall rigor/difficulty of my classes and whether or not the trimester system at my school is negatively impacting my application. At my high school, we use the trimester system and there are only five classes per each trimester. As a result, the maximum number of AP classes that one can take is five in one year.
During my freshman year, the only AP class that I could have taken was AP Human Geography but I decided against doing so since I am really only passionate about STEM and business classes. In my sophomore year, I took AP Microeconomics and I decided to forgo my only other AP option in AP U.S. History for the same reason as I had for AP Human Geography. In Junior year, I am currently taking AP Language and Composition, AP Physics 1, and AP Calculus BC. I could have taken five AP classes this year, but due to my involvement in band and Spanish, I could only take a maximum of three AP classes. For my upcoming senior year, I am planning on taking AP Literature, AP Chemistry, AP Statistics, AP Macroeconomics, and AP Spanish. I will still be involved in band my senior year, but I just won’t be taking it for one trimester.
My underlying question is that I don’t know if only taking nine AP classes will be enough to put me into consideration at schools like UChicago and UPenn. I have also wondered if it would be appropriate to mention somewhere in my college application that my limited number of AP classes when compared to other applicants is due to my school having a trimester system. I have seen the course rigor of many applicants who are vying to get into top schools and I am fearful that my high schools trimester system might hold me back even though I only could have taken four more AP classes over my high school career.
Thank you for reading my long winded post and if you have any insightful thoughts please be sure to comment them below.
Course rigor is relative to your HS. You won’t be penalized by the trimester system. Speak to your guidance counselor to determine if you have taken what he/she would consider to be the most rigorous courseload available at your HS.
It won’t. Many elite private schools, like Andover and Exeter, are on trimesters; it certainly does not impact college acceptances.
Nope. This comes off as whiny. Your counselor will send a school profile to colleges which will indicate that the school operates on trimesters (which is also evident from the transcript).
It’s not an arms race where the one with the most APs wins. 9 APs is more than enough, and will not result in your application hitting the circular file. In general, the law of diminishing returns kicks in after 6-8 APs in total;while there may be valid reasons for taking more, each additional one will not add to your application in any meaningful way.
There are many, many schools where you can’t rack up APs. For example, at our kids’ school, APs aren’t even allowed until sophomore year, and there are 5 required core subjects (math, history, English, science, language) with only 1 elective. Many kids use that elective to continue their performing or visual art. The school also offers no AP English and has a required senior Humanities class in place of history. I just tallied up that it would be possible to take 12 APs. But, the average for the advanced kids is probably around 8-10. And, the most rigorous math path has less APs available.
Who do you think a school would prefer? Someone who challenged themselves to upper level math (multivariable calculus, logic and probability), and/or was a serious painter/sculptor/photographer/musician/dancer with a good choice of APs or someone who just took more APs? From my kids’ school, kids who had a passion for whatever creative endeavor they chose, or who had a particular interest and took more courses in that area, seem to do better than those who just take every AP they can (though very few choose to do this).
I think you should think of high school through the lens of who you are and want to be as a person. Pick your APs to challenge yourself and get ready for the rigors of college. Continue performing if you love that! Become fluent in Spanish, Don’t fall into the trap of doing things just for the sake of getting into college, because it never stops. Once in college, it’s doing things just to get the “right” job, and so on and so on. (Disclosure: I recently read “Excellent Sheep.”)
But, since getting into college is a reality, I concur that you should check with your GC on your rigor. If it’s not where you want it to be, can you change that? Can you pursue more of your interests at a deeper level? If you don’t get into Chicago or Penn, it won’t be because you’ve “only” taken 9 APs.