<p>My S goes to a small public high school in suburban New Jersey that offers 13 AP courses. He took/takes 5 – English Lang & Comp and US History as a junior (5’s in both), and Spanish, English Lit and AP World History now. (I happen to think that it’s impossible to teach a “World History” course in one year at anything close to a college level, by the way.) The ones he didn’t take, other than French, are mostly in science and math (not his forte), plus, I think, AP Art.</p>
<p>He saw no earthly reason to take more than 5, and neither did I. I don’t think any of his classmates took more than 7 or 8, although (from what he tells me) there are a lot of kids who really aren’t able to do the work at a high level who take courses like AP US History because their parents insist.</p>
<p>Taking “only” 5 AP courses didn’t hurt him with colleges, I think, since he got into the University of Chicago and Johns Hopkins, among other schools; his only rejection was from Yale (like 92% of everybody else who applied, no matter how many AP’s they took!).</p>
<p>I don’t know if he can get credit for any of his AP’s at the University of Chicago other than Spanish (if he gets a 4 or a 5), so most of them probably didn’t have much practical value except to the extent that he enjoyed the courses and/or that they may have helped him with college admissions.</p>
<p>Back when I was in high school, sometime before the Flood, I took 4 AP exams, which was fairly standard at my school. (A private high school in NYC with 106 kids in my class, 25 of whom went to HYP, and a total of 50 to all the Ivy League schools.) I suspect that the average is somewhat higher now! I actually used my AP credits to get through Yale in 3 years rather than 4. In retrospect, I dearly wish I hadn’t. Another year in college would have been nice, and I don’t know why I was in such a hurry to get on with life!</p>
<p>Donna</p>