So far in high school I have been getting progressively lower grades every year, although marginally. Freshman year I got 2 A-'s and one B+, sophomore year I got 3 A-'s and one B+, this year I seems like im going to be getting an A- in APUSH, AP Lang, AP Chem, Linear Algebra and a B+ in Physics C Mechanics/E&M. Is this a really bad thing if I want to attend higher level schools such as Cal Tech or Ivy’s?
Your best, quick indication of attending a particular school would be to look descriptors such as SAT.ACT skills of students who were and were not admitted. If you find yourself at the low end or below of statistics of the school you like. If your stats are at the lower end I would think seriously about not applying. That could be a real whammy because you would seem to be under-prepared. What characteristics of the schools you like are most important to you and find schools that have what you want but may not be as pressured academically.
It’s not a striking decline (not all All A’s to B’s, which would be a red flag) but w/o any context about your school, doesn’t seem like a strong performance either. Typical applicants to the top tier schools would have mostly solid A’s with maybe an occasional A-/B+/B