<p>When assessing whether or not you’ve taken the “most demanding curriculum,” do adcoms factor in what electives you’ve taken?</p>
<p>Imo I think they are talking about AP’s. For example, if your school offers 20 AP’s and you only make the move to take one, something may look abit off.</p>
<p>^I get that sense as well, or that they just mean most demanding “core” curriculum, since electives are usually a joke anyway. Thoughts?</p>
<p>I’m not sure what you mean by ‘do electives matter’. Personally, I think an interesting choice of elective courses can be very illuminating to the admissions office–if they genuinely complement your interests as presented in your application. i.e. I’ve had HS students tell me they worry about taking courses they enjoy such as a special service related course or a drama class with an excellent teacher because they feel pressured to take AP Human Geography or something. My advice? Take the course you’re generally excited about. Honestly, Harvard gets enough applicants with 7-8 APs on their senior year schedule. It gets a bit boring seeing that over and over, application after application.</p>
<p>Thanks. I should probably clear up exactly what I mean by “electives.” While I do have the choice of taking AP/Honors courses or regular courses (I take as many AP/Honors as I possibly can), an “elective” at my school is a class that lasts for one trimester and is usually something like “model design,” “digital art,” “study hall,” etc. Since these are simply one trimester courses that the teachers – much less the students – hardly take seriously. Do they really matter when being considered along with true academic courses?</p>