Is this a rigorous courseload?

<p>I’m looking at HYP (applying to M, not sure why as I won’t get in) Columbia, Penn, even brown and cornell (much to my parents’ dismay, since they don’t think it’s worth the trips and such), Johns Hopkins, NYU… my dad recommends I don’t bother applying to really bad schools just for the sake of safety since I might not go 100% if I do. Idk. It’s kind of strange, since the schools I’m applying to are crapshoots.</p>

<p>And yeah… no one at my school takes APs in 9th or 10th which really really upsets me.</p>