Seeking guidance on my junior daughter’s course rigor. She is taking the most rigorous courses in all five main subjects (Math, Eng, Science, History, Language) offered at her high school ( up to AP Lit, AP Calc BC, AP Physics C, AP Gov, AP Latin). She will graduate with 11 AP classes. She is doing an independent study in a second language not offered at her high school and plans to continue with this senior year.
She could take additional AP classes (Psych, Music Theory, Computer Science), but she is not interested in them and prefers to take an early release class so that she can work on her independent study. She also has a ceramics class that she genuinely enjoys to fill out her schedule.
Many of her classmates are taking more AP classes, especially those who plan on majoring in the sciences. I don’t see the sense of her doubling up on science APs (taking AP Bio or Chem at the same time as taking AP Physics C). She took Honors Biology and Honors Chemistry, which are prerequisites for science APs at her school. She does not plan on majoring in Science or Engineering
She is asking if she should drop ceramics and her early release (and do her second language in her limited free time) and replace these with other AP classes. I think it’s a bad idea all around. She is worried she will be compared to her classmates in the admission process.
Is it enough to have the highest rigor in just the 5 core subjects?
And if she wants to study science, you can do it anywhere.
What type of schools is she seeking?
Her rigor will be fine but frankly it’s about more than rigor - GPA, test scores, and more.
Mine took nutrition and did fine.
In the end, you want to be challenged, but not overly strained…these are kids and so many are over stressed to the point of ad nauseum…what these other kids are doing, it may not be healthy for them.
She enjoys ceramics - so why would you stop? With such a rigorous schedule already, why would you take other classes that don’t excite you and aren’t needed.
I agree with you.
Do we know what level of school she seeks? What major? For most science, you’ll be going to grad school and many ‘lesser’ names are the highest % of PhDs on a per capita basis.
Some colleges* prefer or require at least a year of high school art (or semester of college art) for frosh admission, so she may want to keep ceramics to avoid problems with some colleges if this will be her only high school art course (AP music theory could also fulfill the art category).
*e.g. California and South Dakota public universities; Arizona public universities require either a year of art or a year of career / technical education.
However, if she is not interested in the AP courses offered, then replacing ceramics with those may make the year less pleasant.
If she is concerned about counselor rating for “most demanding schedule” and for academic achievement (in the counselor’s school report used by some colleges), she may want to ask her counselor if possible changes to her schedule will affect those ratings.
There is more to life than academics. There is more to university admissions, including admissions to the highest ranked and most famous universities, than piling up A’s in AP classes.
11 AP classes is a HUGE number of APs. You can’t compete with everyone in the world. There are too many of them, and some of them are obsessed to an unhealthy degree.
You and your daughter might want to read the “applying sideways” blog on the MIT admissions web site. As I understand it, the blog recommends that we each do what is right for us, whatever we do we should do it well, and we should treat people well. That is what my family has done, and it has worked for us (including admissions to MIT and a few other highly ranked universities and/or highly ranked programs – the four of us attended 8 different universities, one each for undergrad and a different one each for a graduate program). We each did very different things. We just each did what was right for us.
Then she shouldn’t take them.
Different students vary in terms of how much free time they need. At least two of the smartest people I have ever met need quite a bit of free time. Some other people I know are just driven and can keep working on a wide range of tasks for what seems to me to be an unending period of time. We are not all the same. However, some of us really do need to keep some free time, and in many cases that does not stop us from being very successful in life.
I do not think that she should drop ceramics.
Yes.
I do not think that anyone can tell you for sure whether any particular level of rigor will or will not get a student into Harvard or MIT or Stanford or Princeton. However, I can tell you that people who graduated from any of these four highly ranked schools, or other highly ranked schools, routinely work alongside graduates from any of a few hundred other very good colleges and universities. Also, graduate students at these top schools typically come from a huge range of undergraduate schools. You can do very well in life with a degree from any one of a huge number of universities.
And I can give you a complete list of what I did in high school specifically for the purpose of getting accepted to MIT: Nothing. I just did what was right for me at the time.
One additional thing that I think might be worth mentioning: AP Music Theory is tough. My older daughter was a very talented musician and was very good at math. She took AP Music Theory. At the beginning of the year the teacher said that by the end of the class the students were all going to hate her. Well my daughter didn’t hate her, but she did find AP Music Theory to be a lot of work and a tough class. Some of it involves something resembling normal studying. However, I also remember playing thirds and fourths on the piano and having my daughter listen and tell me what each was (this was a test after she had being playing thirds and fourths on the piano and on her guitar by herself). There is some ear training involved. I don’t recall what else was involved but it is not easy and is definitely only appropriate for someone who really wants to do it.
I would suggest she keep the ceramics (which she loves and might even continue), and the independent study (which shows more initiative in my view than any new AP class). College admissions at top schools can be holistic. She needs to meet benchmarks, and then it tends to be about other things- assembling an interesting mix of interests in a class, for instance. Instead of piling on AP’s, maybe there is an extracurricular she could devote time to.
I think she should be herself and follow her interests and she will end up in the right place.
Ceramics and independent language study show more intellectual curiosity& independence than 2 extra APs, especially since she has the highest rigor already so those 2 APs are pointless. In fact, those qualities would be more valued than 2 random classes (it’s not a game of who has the most APs, wins, as Stanford used to say). As a bonus, it’s always good to study what you’re interested in. She should enjoy her senior year Win-win.
Unless she has a burning desire to learn calc-based physics or the Physics C course is simply a year-long mechanics course, I’d switch that out for a different science
If the student knows calculus, calculus based physics may be more understandable than physics that tiptoes around calculus when (for example) explaining the relationship between velocity and acceleration.
As noted above, AP Music Theory is very hard unless the student already has a lot of music theory knowledge. Our students actually take two intro courses in music theory BEFORE taking AP Music Theory. And most of them did not pass the exam.
Her courseload is sufficiently rigorous. She has earned the right to take a class (ceramics) simply to explore and enjoy (and who knows, the ceramics class may even lead to an interesting college essay).
If yours is a highly resourced high school (let’s say offering 20+ AP classes) and you take only 2-4 of them, then yes, AO’s at top colleges take that into account and ding you for it. But that doesn’t seem to be the case for your child.
“AP maxxing” once you get beyond a certain number doesn’t help you. If the top kids in such a highly resourced high school typically take 8-12 AP’s, then someone taking 16 AP’s isn’t better off. AO’s will often say “8-12 is good enough to show academic rigor” and they move on to other evaluation criteria like letters of recommendation or EC’s or essays.
Win-win.