I’m taking AP Chem and AP English Lang and hope to get 5s on them.
I want to take APUSH, AP Micro/Macro, and AP European History. I am fairly gifted in history and have an intrinsic interest in both economics and history, so I would be able to get 4 or 5s on them.
Problem is, there are so many hours in the day. I haven’t taken the SAT yet, so I am studying for that. I will take the May one and if I get a low score, I’ll retake the June one. I’m looking at 3-4 hours of studying a day and I still have to manage my online business too. The online business, I hope, is my hook to get into college.
My intended major is History, but that really isn’t definite. I love history, but I want to go to medical school. So, I’m just doing what interests me right now.
So, are the AP exams really necessary? I want to take the SAT II subject tests as well, so the AP exams are good preparation for them.
AP exams are only used for college credit and each school has their own requirements for the credit you receive. Taking a rigorous course load in HS and doing well on the SAT/ACT is far more important.
I do not think so. They are interested in a to g coursework. You can use AP to satisfy requirements in some cases instead of taking the class (or you can use the SAT II in some cases) but if you have enough a to g I don’t see any reason to take extra self study AP exams when the SAT is more important. I would take the exam if I took the course because you can get advanced standing or even credits if you want. http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/freshman/requirements/
It means that you don’t start at Cal I, you go to Calc II, for instance. Skipping the intro class and starting with advanced standing even if you don’t take the credit, if allowed to.
Usually, they give general credit and advanced standing, but do not allow any AP scores to substitute for General Education requirement fulfillment. The AP-derived credits do not count against the UC max. unit count.
One way around this, especially recognizing UCs push to encourage the Community College pathway, is to satisfy IGETC (partially) with your AP scores, which by definition satisfies your General Education requirements. It is likely that after 1 year at a community college, you could graduate with your AA, and transfer in to a UC with “Junior” standing. There is a Transfer Regents’ Scholar program, as well, that you could be eligible for, if you are not a Freshman Regents’ Scholar candidate (top 1 or 2% of entering class, essentially).
Then you could take the next 3 years (or 2) to take the upper-division courses in your major that are interesting, less difficult to get into, and smaller class size. The added bonus is that the community college professors (unlike UC profs -in general-) really love to teach the lower division courses, and the class size is much smaller.
So if you can self-study and do well, you are basically shaving time to graduate, and buying expensive courses for the $100 testing fee (plus study book cost). Make an appointment and pop by your local community college to see how this works.
Not many top students take this path, so you will likely be at the top of your community college classes, as well.
I couldn’t take a more rigorous work load because I moved across the country and subsequently arrived late to school. Combined with limited course variety, I could only secure two AP classes. Believe me, I wanted to take 4 or 5 AP classes. It’s pretty easy for me and I don’t have much homework. Although it did help me in terms of focusing more on my business.
@ItsJustSchool what is that transfer regents program? If I get top 1 or 2% of my community college grades, I can get guaranteed admission or what?
Also, I heard that transferring from a community college is not as easy as it sounds. I would rather get in as a freshman than a junior if possible.
Regent’s Scholars are offered to the top 1% or so of entering students. That is 1% of freshmen or transfer students on that UC campus (by some criteria including an interview). They are rare. Here is a link to UCLA’s:
Transfer rates in many majors are higher than acceptance rates as freshmen. It is hard to transfer from a CC if you are stuck at the CC because of poor HS performance and you are still using the same brain with the same friends and the same study habits. For you, you may even reach higher in your UC acceptance.
It is something worth researching, anyway. It seems to be a surprisingly great path for high-achievers that nobody really looks at. To me it seems to give an extra year’s worth of classes, while still spending 4 years in college and getting the same three-year “college experience” that rushing achievers are after. Just tack an inexpensive year onto the front end, and then graduate from a UC in 2 (or take your time and go for 3) years.