And to add to the other very fine posts-- I promise you the world is not running out of math. It will still be there when you get to college; there will be classes on topics you’ve never seen before, there will be logic and philosophy and proofs and topology and crazy stuff. If it takes you an extra semester or year to get to it- it’s not going anywhere.
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I’m sure they notice. What I am frankly less sure about is whether it gives much of a competitive advantage in most college admissions scenarios.
Maybe a few–like there are some colleges or specific programs where they are very much looking for Math outliers. So if MVC, Diffy Q, LA, and so on are an option for you just comfortably following along at a good pace for you, great.
But the vast majority of first year curriculums for STEM majors even at highly selective colleges are set up assuming at most through Calc 2, and often there is a way to make it work without any Calc at all.
So if you max out your normal math sequence in HS and get good grades, will you actually be at a competitive disadvantage to applicants whose HS goes farther? I am not sure that really happens much.
I guess my point is I think college-bound HS kids should go through math at whatever pace is a reasonable challenge for them, but no more than a reasonable challenge. And part of it being a REASONABLE challenge is it does not cause them to lose sleep, have to drop valued extracurriculars, have to turn down most opportunities to have fun with friends, and so on.
And to the extent they sometimes hear the message from peers or whoever that pushing themselves faster than is reasonable for them in math will be a golden ticket to more success in college admissions–I think that is usually not true, and specifically is not worth the risk it will end up having much more cost than benefit, both personally AND for college admissions too.
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I was all set to say, go for the Calc 2/3 and get back on track next year, until you told us that it was very hard for you to do Calc 1 in one semester. I think you’re really asking us, “am I still among the very best math students in my school?” and we cannot answer that. Also, if the answer were “no,” you could still go to a ton of wonderful colleges.
People always say “calculus is advanced anyway” but I know what you mean, that you have a school in which the “best” kids take a couple years beyond Calc BC, so for your peer group, it’s not helpful to hear that many students end senior year in Calc AB.
In addition to math being wonderful and fun, it is also dependent on some developmental leaps in a kid’s brain. There are kids who struggle with Algebra II if they try to take it early (before say age 14) but who then catch up. But there are also kids who still struggle at age 17, and then you would have to say, OK, you’re not in the “top math group” (if you go by that distinction).
We don’t know you, and why you struggled in Calc 1 last year.
One objective measure might be: did you take the Calculus BC exam yesterday (this year)? If you get a 5, which you’ll know in July, in plenty of time to change your HS schedule, then that tells me you could do the Calc 2/3 sequence next year.
If you took the exam and got a 5, then your GC can write in their letter that your schedule only allowed for AB but you made up the difference on your own, and have a look that you got a 5, and so forth.
There is a general problem with the extreme math/etc. acceleration - kids who naturally love the content and are skilled at it, seem to fly through and have a great time and really succeed. Meanwhile, kids who struggle in grade-level classes, seem to have a bummer of a time. Observers may see this and think that accelerating leads to more happiness. This would be the wrong conclusion.
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OP- learning the difference between stretching yourself (taking something hard, working at it and mastering it) is VERY different from having to shut out all activities in order to master the material. This is a great lesson to learn before you get to college, where there aren’t many guardrails to taking on too much too soon.
The sweet spot is the right amount of challenge FOR YOU. Not for someone else.
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