Then I got worried because I want to major in Chemistry or Chemical Engineering and I chose AP Human Geography next year because I hear it’s a 9th grade course that everyone makes As easy and all the information of the class is so spread out.
SO. I don’t think AP Human Geography will get me to graduate college earlier. Or help me with stuff.
Can someone help me understand the idea of college credits?
It is possible that AP Human Geography will get you out of “general education” classes, if the university you choose has them. I have to take classes in the areas of humanities, arts, social sciences, health, culture, science, and math. My degree (ChemE) covers the science and math ones automatically. My AP credits from AP US History and AP World History cover the humanities and culture requirements, which meant I could take fewer classes per semester and also focus on the classes I like better (creative writing >>>>>> history).
In college you have requirements for your major and general education requirements that they make everyone take. They make you take about two of each subject (math, science, history, etc) in college. Taking AP classes will reduce the amount of classes you’re required to take in college. This is assuming you pass the AP exam in May of course. They won’t give you college credit if you fail the AP exam.
Not to answer for waterangel501 but just to offer my experience again – I took AP English Lang and English Lit and neither got me out of anything in college. It will vary by school. Take the AP classes you can take and learn what you can from them and then if they give you additional benefits later, great. I still learned and improved by taking AP English classes even though they didn’t give the bonus of skipping English later.
Depends on the college, each college will set it own rules. Some don’t accept ANY AP credit some will give lots of AP Credit. You need to look very carefully at each college you apply to and understand their rules. My daughter is a freshman at OU and they awarded her tons of credits for her AP scores but for her degree her department says she can only use a total of 32 AP credits toward her degree.
I have one son at a California UC that got 32 credits due to his AP classes/test scores, but they only went to elective credits and did not get him out of any major related classes.
My other son is at a California State University (CSU), he got 38 units of credit and he was able to opt out of 5 classes (2 major requirements) and 3 (GE Requirements).
Again as everyone as stated, it will depend upon the school(s).
Depending on the AP, the department’s policies, and your score, AP’s can a) count towards credit for a major, b) count as general education requirements, or c) allow you to skip introductory material, but not count for credit. If it counts as credit for your major, it will usually also allow you to skip. Policies, especially towards gen-ed credit, vary a lot by school. My school gave me credit but they’re just raw credits, they don’t count toward any requirements, either gen-ed or major, so I will essentially just be graduating with random credits on my transcript. I could theoretically take a semester of three classes at some point but it’s hard to finish all my requirements doing that. On the other hand, I have a friend with a huge ROTC time commitment who judiciously chooses to take semesters with three classes in order to give her more time to study for her toughest courses, so they can be useful.
You’re a freshman and you’re going to be changing a lot in the next four years, but assuming you do end up majoring in science or engineering, the most useful AP to plan to take is calculus (AB is usually equivalent to Calc 1, BC to Calc 2). The vast majority of schools grant placement for it. (Note that your score does matter - sometimes a 3 is acceptable, but more often a 4 or a 5 will get you placement. Some schools require a 5.)
If you’re waffling about whether or not to take AP Human Geography, don’t let the college credit you may or may not get be the deciding factor. It’s a really interesting class which teaches you a lot about the world; I took it and I think it’s worth it, but if it sounds terribly boring don’t force yourself to take it just because it’s an AP.
My advice is to take AP classes that interest you and you think you can do well in. The college credit is just an extra bonus. As stated by many posters above ^^^^ some schools give no AP credit, some give credit for only 4 and 5’s on the tests and some will give credit for 3,4 and 5’s on the tests.
Do not base your HS schedule on the premise that AP classes will get you out of some required courses in college.
I second what @Gumbymom said. Also, even if you take an AP class and get a 5 on the exam, you may end up not applying for the AP credit anyway, if the class is essential to your major and you’d like to “brush up” by taking the equivalent course at your college. It’s a good way to start off with firm footing.
If you’re going in to a science, you’re going to need to take it at some point. It’s a fundamental part of the mathematical language and a hugely important tool in the sciences and in especially in engineering. It’s good to get it out of the way in high school so it isn’t constricting what you can take in college. Most colleges accept the AP Calc test for at least placement, which is not true for a lot of the other APs. I won’t pretend to know a ton about engineering, but my impression is that most people in engineering programs come in with at least some calculus (@bodangles would know more about this).
Calculus tends to be more standardized in content, and more easily checked in an exam format.
While this may be true at those engineering programs with the most competitive admissions, most engineering programs assume only that the student is ready for calculus (i.e. has completed precalculus in high school).
If the course that you can skip with AP credit is an important prerequisite for other courses, it would be a good idea to try the college’s old final exams for the course to check how well you know the material by the college’s standards.
Most college courses are generally 3 credits sometimes one with labs are counted as 4 credits. Some colleges will give you credit for multiple courses if you score a 5 on the exam this is especially true in language classes. Colleges that award credit for AP scores usually have a chart on their web page with their policies.
You can figure out the number of credit hours a course by looking at the last number in the course number. (This again is college specific! I’m just mentioning it for this example.
My DD took the following AP exams the number after the exam is her score followed by the OU courses she was given credit for the course numbers in red can be applied to her degree requirements.
Chemistry (5) CHEM 1315, 1415
Computer Science (5) CS 1323
English (5) ENGL 1113, 1213
German (5) GERM 1115, 1225, 2113
Math-Calculus BC (5) MATH 1914, 2924
Physics 1(5) 2 (4) PHYS 1114, 2414, 2424
Physics C (5) PHYS 2514, 2524
World History (4) HIST 1913
US History (5) HIST 1483, 1493
Music (4) Non-Aural (5) MUNM 1123, MUTH 1511, MUTH 1522
Having AP credit for CS 1323 although it doesn’t count to her degree allowed her to start with a higher level CS course so even though she can’t use the actual credit for her degree it still helped.
I can’t stress this enough, each individual college will have it’s own rules! If you know a few of the colleges where you might like to go you should look up their particular AP policies. If you’ve done the math on the AP credit my D can apply to her degree you see she is two credits over the limit they ended up only giving 3 credit each for the two physics class and not credit for the labs. She will appeal but as of now it looks like they may require her to take two one credit physics labs but not the associated classes which is just weird. Had she known about this rule earlier she would have done things differently.
But I don’t think chemical engineering is much like the rest of the engineering field. It is building molecules to do stuff. Not building cars or robots to do stuff.
That’s an oversimplification of both ChemE and the rest of the engineering fields. Chemical engineers work in lots of places doing lots of things. So do other types of engineers. There’s even overlap.
Edit to add: My internship this summer will be in food manufacturing. I’ll be helping optimize existing manufacturing processes. No molecule-building involved.