Have you explored why she is struggling in math? So many kids missed some important foundational concepts during the pandemic and that’s why they’re struggling now in math. Everything builds on everything else. I work as a tutor and I have seen several students who can understand the bigger concepts in algebra 2 but they can’t complete the calculations because their basic algebra skills are not up to the task. Being unable to do basic operations with fractions is another common trouble spot. These are fixable and do not mean the student is bad at math. Doing some review with the tutor over the summer might be enough to get her off to a good start in a math class next year.
I think she should take four years of math both because many colleges require it for admission and because she may need to take math in college as a core requirement. It doesn’t need to be the hardest math class. Stats is useful for anyone. Maybe she can retake algebra 2 for a better grade also. It’s more important to address the weaknesses than to be impressive at this point, so she can enter college with confidence and maybe a story of how she overcame a weakness.
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My daughter struggles with math. She did algebra, accelerated geometry, accelerated algebra 2, and her senior year they had an “Intermediate College Math” which is kind of an entry level tech school class. She is a 3.2/3.3 kind of kid who went test optional. Prestige and competitive schools were of no interest to her. I don’t think she has a clue about what the acceptance rates were to any of the colleges she applied to. She got into over 20 colleges almost all with merit. She plans on majoring in social work. She is headed to Central Michigan University in fall. Total COA for OOS with the merit she got is 20k (but we received a 7k federal pell grant making it around 13k/yr).
I wouldn’t take AP Stats. I would take math all 4 years. I would find at least 1 or 2 schools with a 70% or higher acceptance rate that you can afford that she would enjoy going to. One subject alone does not make or break a kid. But make sure you are looking at her as a total package and not trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.
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My child was a terrible math/science student (barely managed a 500 on her SAT math after tutoring and taking it 3x) but excelled in her other subjects, was an accomplished dancer, and had 50+ hours of community service, among other accomplishments. She applied test optional to Dickinson and received their highest merit scholarship. For the lone quantitative reasoning credit during college, she took an online summer course from home. There is hope!
For the record, she took Algebra 2 in her junior year of high school and was strongly encouraged to take math during her senior year by her guidance counselor, so she took stats and did okay with a very supportive teacher.
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I’m surprised no one has mentioned the possibility of going to college in the U.K., where you just do your subject and have no GEs. A history major wouldn’t do any math in college, just like a math major wouldn’t write a single essay. Oxbridge use SAT scores as a filter, but don’t expect advanced math from applicants in arts subjects. Other universities don’t even require SAT scores, just good AP scores in your area of interest. However you do need to know exactly what subject you want to study, there’s no such thing as being undeclared (or doing a double major).
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Is Canada more like Britain or more like us?
There is hope. It’s like threading a needle. My son has dyscalculia and it was diagnosed late, he didn’t want accommodations and we never found someone who could help with it.
Everyone said he probably just wasn’t good at math. Teachers understood that some kids who have difficulty reading may be dyslexic but even they didn’t know there was something very similar for math.
We had to go to a physician with special training in learning disabilities about 2 hours away for the diagnosis. It became clear one day when he was struggling and said it was hard because the numbers keep moving and that they sometimes moved off the paper. What!?!
My son is a college grad, serving the country now. He’s not a financial planner or accountant and likely never will be but we fought hard together to find a way through so my bottom line is to say you can do it if you work as a team. Don’t let it be all up to him to figure it out on the fly. Be there to navigate a system and world that demands math proficiency.
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