<p>Question: I am a junior in high school and I chose to take AP Environmental Science this year. However, midway through the year, I discovered psychology and I was immediately enthralled by the subject. So second semester, I dropped AP Environmental (which I got a B in) and switched into psychology, which is a one-semester […]</p>
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<p>Have you ever encountered a case of a student who switched an AP class between semesters, and how did this student fare in college admissions? How would an admissions officer look upon this situation?</p>
<p>It happens all the time. In particular, it can be very tempting for students who have already been admitted to top-choice colleges during the first semester to want to lighten their loads in the second. Admission officials, especially at the more selective colleges, do not like to see a student drop a rigorous class for one that is less so. However, they will also consider the reasons behind the switch. So the drop is certainly not an automatic deal-breaker.</p>
<p>You mentioned “heavy hitters” such as chem, physics, calc- do you have an opinion as to how language and stat fair?</p>
<p>Some admission officials treat AP Stats as something of a second-class citizen. Don’t shoot the messenger here because I think it can be a very rigorous and useful class, but commonly it is viewed as less of a “heavy hitter” than calc, physics, chem …</p>
<p>Language is probably somewhere in the middle … i.e., typically not seen as being as grueling as some of the other AP courses but less lightweight than psych, econ, etc.</p>
<p>Like beauty, much of this is in the eye of the beholder … i.e., not all admission folks share the same opinions.</p>
<p>I’m actually a little surprised by your answer re: Stat (not questioning it though!). It is actually quite rigorous as you said, and it’s far more useful for an ever increasing number of studies. Technology/mathematical analysis are “invading” essentially all college majors, and certainly nearly all graduate level work.</p>