Colleges consider Personal Finance like PE or Health, something useful or perhaps necessary for HS graduation but unrelated to college requirements.
Selective colleges typically expect US history, World or European history, and a couple more, generally 2 more - Ap Human Geography, Ap Psychology (both among the easier APs), US and/or Comparative Gov, Micro and/or Macro Econ, African American history, Sociology, Regional history, Art history…
As a result, if your child is required to take
Personal finance, then they should add another “legit for selective colleges”, Social Science/History class.
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I just want to say…I think it’s great that your high school requires a course in personal finance!
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Thank you! This makes sense!
Not to keep worrying at this bone, but this thread is 100% contrary to what my kids’ college advisors have told them at our middle and high schools. Starting with their initial 8th grade HS orientation, kids are specifically told that the civics/us history/personal finance progression is the college prep track for social studies. Yesterday, on this thread, was literally the first time I have ever heard even a hint that that isn’t actually the case.
Now, I will grant that our HS advisors assume that the only schools our kids will even consider are UNC system schools, so they only mention the requirements for admission to those schools. I did hear one, once, mention that kids should check to see if schools out of state have different requirements, but even there, I’ve never seen a college mention that they have specific classes that qualify as social studies classes, let alone that this excludes econ/personal finance.
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Personal finance curricula help kids understand “what’s the difference between a debit card and a credit card”; what is a credit score and why is it important; how does compound interest work.
In what universe is this as academically rigorous as learning about the factors that led up to the Russian Revolution, the triggers for WW1 and WW2, how has slavery impacted society in the US, what’s the difference between a parliamentary system of government and other forms of democracy or totalitarianism?
Personal finance is great- but it would comparable to assuming that a class in sex education (also great) can replace bio or chemistry as a science.
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Econ “counts”, either the generic HS Econ class or the more rigorous 2-semester AP Micro&Macro version.
“Personal Finance” is very useful&practical but is not a social science or history class.
The main academic fields are: History -
Anthropology- Geography- Sociology- Psychology- Economics- Political Science - African American studies - Women’s/Gender Studies - Demography.
In NC, only 2 units of social science, including US History, are required for thr state university system, so adding 1 semester or year of personal finance to US history and freshman social studies doesn’t really “count”; but most students admitted to selective colleges (including UNC unkess guidance says a course wasn’t available) would certainly have an expectation the 4 courses would include 2 history courses and 2 others from the list in post #20.
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Which is not uncommon.
Also very common is that econ can be used to meet the personal finance requirement.
Econ is a social science; personal finance is not.
Just because a school or state may categorize a course differently or require a course at all does not mean the colleges will view it the same - they won’t.
Many schools also mandate PE or theology, but those are still viewed as electives.
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My son class is DE with a community college and gets credit for MGMT 117
I’m not claiming personal finance is as academically rigorous as a normal social studies class. I know that it isn’t. Frankly, I think it being a state-mandated “social studies” class is ridiculous (and indicative of the absolute contempt our lawmakers have for the concept of education). And yet it is – every single kid who comes through an NC public school takes this class as their 12th grade social studies, without it ever being mentioned that the class isn’t actually considered social studies.
That’s my only point – that if it’s true that colleges treat all applicants from NC as if they have not actually have taken the recommended number of social studies classes, this thread is the first time I’m hearing of it. And it seems weird to me that colleges would penalize kids for doing exactly what the state mandates, and that they’re told is a college prep curriculum.
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I did not have a HS diploma when I enrolled in college. (I got it eventually due to parental pressure). There was a state mandated class which I never took (too lazy, too bored, couldn’t be bothered) and so I was allowed to “walk” at graduation with an empty envelope instead of a diploma.
I couldn’t care less then- and still could not. But I made darn sure that I had fulfilled all the requirements for every college on my list (none of which were in-state btw) and indeed- the colleges which accepted me could have easily seen (if they cared) that I was not on track to graduate.
I’m sure there are still school districts which have “on the books” that a Home Ec class which covers both “feeding a family on a budget” and using both a sewing machine and a serger is a graduation requirement for girls (boys had an “Industrial Arts” requirement which included auto repair which I’d have found incredibly useful). But one thing (graduating from your own district) and getting into college (potentially out of state) are two completely different things.
My school district did not require a foreign language. I had four years (including AP) and every college I applied to required “at least three” years of a foreign language.
We don’t live in a country with a national curriculum!
It sounds like the standard progression in your HS for students seeking rigor has three social science courses at the AP level, including two years of history at the AP level. That ought to fulfill requirements for most colleges, including most selective colleges, although some will want to see more history.
There’s a recent thread here that discusses the specific requirements for history and social sciences at some highly selective colleges; you might want to check it out: Confused about recommended units in HS for History and Social Studies
Economics is frequently considered to be included in “social sciences” (although the Calfornia UC/CSU system considers it an “elective”). Personal finance isn’t normally included in that category. But even without including the personal finance class, it sounds like your HS schedule would be extensive and rigorous enough for most colleges’ requirements. The advisors are correct that the student should also check to see if a college has additional or different requirements. (And there’s always the question of how much it may help to go above and beyond the stated requirements, too…)
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My guess is that, if the student attends a well-resourced NC public school, they’re expected to have 3-4 social science/history classes in addition to Personal finance and/or to have taken the AP Econ version of the requirement.
If the student attends a rural school and AP Econ is not offered and neither any substitute social science class nor an additional class, they don’t penalize the applicant (hopefully this is made clear in the school profile).
A good friend of mine lives in NC, and her high school junior is at an IB school (public). My senior is also IB, so it’s been nice to chat with her about this less-common curriculum.
Like many of her IB Diploma classmates, she will be taking the second year of IB High Level History during her senior year. My guess is she can do a personal finance course over the summer.
But your child will be directly competing with this NC girl in college admissions, and HL History is no joke.
Thank you for the link to that other thread - that was super enlightening. The more I dig into this, looking at dozens of college CDS’s and admissions websites, the more I think that the vast, vast majority (but not all) of colleges only recommend or require at max THREE years of history/social studies. (I did not look at California colleges because California seems to be its own beast and we are not applying there! 
) Even UMich, which I referenced earlier in the thread, says explicitly on their admissions page that they only require three years (even though their CDS reports four are required). I have come to the conclusion that for many colleges, three years is sufficient. What this means for my child is that they can take personal finance in senior year and not worry about taking a fourth year of history on top of that. (This will not impact rigor as they are taking an incredibly rigorous schedule and not taking a fourth year of history actually opens up room for another rigorous science AP which they are more interested in.) Do posters on CC need to revise the often articulated advice that all students need four years of social studies/history?
If the CDS says four and the admissions page says three, I think your student would want to contact them to clarify.
I do think the standard CC advice is helpful: that is, students (who plan to apply to selective colleges) should ideally aim to include challenging courses in each core area in each of the four years of high school, and then add additional depth or electives, as space in the schedule allows. (And in some cases, an “elective” or two may also be required for a student, such as the CA publics requiring an arts class.) So I do think the “ideal” schedule, all else being equal, would include 4 years of social science / history.
When a high school has specific other requirements, though, especially if there are limited slots in the schedule such as a 6 period day… the student may need to make tradeoffs where their schedule might not be “ideal” in some aspect, but might still be sufficient. And when making these tradeoffs, it’s a good idea to look at schools’ stated requirements and recommendations (on their web site and CDS), as you definitely don’t want to fall short of requirements, and it’s probably not good to fall short of recommendations either. Of course the interests of the student and their intended major are going to come into play too, when making tradeoffs.
I know that’s kind of long-winded and peppered with a lot of “it depends…”
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IRL kids take what they take.
Every year (I don’t think we’ve seen it yet) an angry parent posts that their kid did not get into engineering at their own state flagship despite fantastic everything plus being an Eagle Scout.
It takes two weeks but the detectives on CC finally uncover the fact that the kid did NOT take the “recommended” curriculum for this particular college. So kid got admitted to Arts and Sciences, or the School of Education, but not engineering.
And then angry parent points to “someone I know” who ALSO didn’t take the recommended curriculum but DID get admitted.
None of us are Adcom’s. All of us experienced posters have observed many years worth of college admissions. There is a subset of colleges which are WAY more competitive than they were even 8, 9 years ago. There is a subset of colleges which are basically “if you have a pulse and can write a check you are in”. And then everything in between. Some of them become harder admits virtually overnight (looking at YOU Pitt), some of them become easier admits, and some become very hard to predict.
One of the few things a kid can control is his/her own decisions regarding courses and rigor.
Kid wants personal finance in lieu of AP Euro? Go for it. I’ll still advise kids who may be aiming for “highly rejective” colleges to think hard about electives. But that’s me. You do you…
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Note that for selective colleges many of the admitted students will have 4+ years of courses in each core subject area…regardless of what a given college might say is ‘required’, or the minimum. For purposes of this thread, I answered your question that the personal finance class is not going to count as a social studies at most colleges.
Most colleges across the US will happily admit students who have taken 3 social studies courses…because most colleges accept most applicants.
You might look at how many core credits and/or social studies credits the top students from your kid’s HS graduate with.
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I’m not sure if this tone is directed at me or some hypothetical parent? My questions have nothing to do with selecting Personal Finance over a rigorous course like AP Euro. At my child’s school, Personal Finance is required so that’s non-negotiable. The question is what to do with one open slot - either take a non-AP history course (because they’ve already taken all the history AP’s offered) or take a difficult AP science course that they think they will love. (They want to major in STEM.) So this isn’t about trying avoid rigor or get around requirements; it’s a genuine attempt to understand what colleges would like to see on a child’s high school transcript. If colleges say they recommend three years of social studies, why would my child feel compelled to take a fourth year that crowds out a more rigorous class they are more interested in? Most colleges say take 4 years of English - check! 4 years of math - check! 4 years of science - check! 4 years of foreign language - check! And 3 years of social studies - so why would we advise that all students take 4 when that simply isn’t what the majority of colleges are recommending? Wouldn’t saying that 3-4 years of social studies is recommended, depending on the school, be more accurate?
That is a good idea! Thanks!
That makes a lot of sense! Thanks!