My suggestion would be School A only for the academic opportunities. Exposure is key - Your son doesn’t have to take all of the A/P classes but there are plenty to choose from and these advanced classes will help him decide the major he wants to get in.
Also - I’ve learned universities are looking at the rigorous of the curriculum and count on kids challenging themselves and always having an ascendant path.
Both of my kids went to a high school similar to Option A, took 11 A/P’s and got into engineering at Georgia Tech, Purdue, UVA, UIUC, UF and Carnegie.
If I would have to give any advise now I would say:
- rigorous of the curriculum - they need to take as many advanced classes as offered and get an A in these classes. AP exams matters less for admission
- GPA
- SAT - I know for the last years SAT was optional, however I believe kids who applied with a good SAT scored a bit more than the ones with no SAT. Good SAT = min 1450/1600
- leadership - kids need to show leadership in something - president of a club, captain of a sport, tutoring, camp councilor
- meaningful community service - this is vague but out of my experience - my S had community service through NHS and I feel was not significant. He had better stats than my D (higher GPA, higher SAT) and probably that helped his admissions.
My D was heavily involved in Special Olympics and Valerie Fund due to her best friend being diagnosed in 7th grade with brain cancer. She spent 4 years with these organizations next to her friend and she wrote her essay about how her friend’s journey changed her. I really believe her application stand out because of this as not every teenager witnessed and participated in such drama.
Now it is really unfair that my daughter “scored” due to her friend’s drama because not every kid in high school have the “opportunity” (for the lack of a better word) to do something out of the norm. It shouldn’t be like this - kids should be left to be kids and not pushed to find something out of the ordinary. In my opinion, the acceptance process is not fair - there are too many variables that count and don’t have anything to do with the kid’s potential to succeed in college and later in life. But it is what it is and we need to navigate it this way.