Hey, possible future Govies! So, in a few weeks some of you will be doing interviews at our school, and that can be a little stressful. For some of y’all, it will be the first time you come to this school. I’m a current junior at GSSM, and I know it can be kind of daunting to decide whether or not you should leave home two years early to come to boarding school. If you have any questions about admissions, academics, social life, sports, campus life or anything like that, I’d be happy to answer!
Do you any USAMO or ISF people at the school?
Is it better to go to GSSM and take the AP courses there or just self test AP at a below average high school?
I’ve heard that some colleges look at which high school you come from. So if I self-test (I know its gonna be hard) and do well, are my chances of college admission higher than if I would have gone to GSSM?
For my year at least, we haven’t had anyone get USAMO, but we did have one student in my grade qualify for the AIME. Not sure about ISF either.
For the AP classes, it honestly depends on the class you’re thinking about doing it for. If you’re trying to get ahead on taking AP Compsci and you’re good at java, I say go ahead. I wouldn’t recommend it for anything like math, lab sciences or history because those can be pretty hard to learn completely on your own.
Yeah, it’s true that some universities look at which school you go at, so in that aspect it would be better to go to GSSM. And it would be super hard to self-study, since it’s way easier if you’re taking it in a class setting. One of the downsides of this school is some of the teachers don’t teach to the AP exam, they teach at the college level, which is not necessarily the same. Usually you’ll end up knowing everything for the exam plus a little more, but it can be more difficult than an AP class. The only thing I can say about taking AP classes is that it would probably be more favorable to see that you took a rigorous class at a rigorous school.
Ya, I really wish the GSSM campus was in a better place. Hartsville is a nice, small town but it doesn’t have a lot of industry. In my opinion, when the school was being built in the 80s, they should have picked an area where there was more industry or a technology focused school (ex.Clemson). I think Greenville would have been a good choice with Clemson, the Governor’s School for the Arts, BMW Plant (near Spartanburg), and the Michelin Plant nearby.
This way, students could have gotten more industrial experience, research, and internships.
But I also like Hartsville thou. Qaint American town
It was basically built in Hartsville because it was started at Coker. You’re right about the town not having any internship opportunities, but to be honest you wouldn’t have time for them anyway.
Don’t come here, it’s actually awful and you can do just as well by staying at your old high school and taking AP courses there.
There are only 3 aps in my school. APUSH, AP HUG, and AP English Lit.
Hi! i got accepted to gssm but, I don’t know if I want to go because, if I stay here I will not have to take anymore english or math courses. And my school offers dual enrollment, which is accepted at my preferred university, washington state. Should I go?
@asomreh What do you plan to major in? If you want to go into STEM, then GSSM has a lot of other classes. Can you please be more specific?