Skip math classes with nothing in between

After taking algebra 1 in high school, I went to my localcommuni college for a math assessment after studying the next couple of years. The test placed me in pre calc and my high school offered to place me there as well. Can I jump to pre calc or do I have to show me taking the classes in between?

If you have placed out of the others…you can go straight to precalc.

Hi Jrdn12–Have you taken geometry? If not, although you could jump to precalc, you might want to think about it. You don’t need to “show” that you are taking the classes in between, but if you are planning to continue in science or math, you will need ideas that are normally covered in geometry. The local community college probably does not teach geometry, or does it? If not, that could explain why they would place you in pre-calc.

Normally, the trigonometric functions are taught in geometry, and then used later in pre-calc, but it is assumed that the student has encountered and used them before. If you are competing in any high school math contests, results from geometry are very useful. They are also useful for the ACT and SAT, though usually those are the simplest geometric results.

If geometry is taught using proofs in your high school, that could be an additional reason to take geometry. (Not all high schools offer proof-based geometry, though).

In my high school, logic was also taught in the geometry course. In my spouse’s school, they spent about 6 weeks on non-Euclidean geometry. Both are topics you are not likely to see elsewhere in the typical math sequence.

This question may be less about what you are allowed to do and more about what you SHOULD do. Did you learn geometry and algebra 2 already, outside of school, or does the community college have a rather weak placement test? The latter might be a distinct possibility. I would not skip learning geometry and algebra 2, regardless of how or when. There may be more than one way to accomplish that; if your high school’s math courses are lame, perhaps learning outside of school and skipping ahead to precalc might be one way to go, but I don’t think it makes sense to skip studying the geometry and algebra 2 material entirely.

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Maybe use summer to brush up on your alg2 and geometry. There are untold resources for you and I doubt you need to pay a CC class cost. This sort of math is grade 7/8 where I am so even homeschool resources would apply to you, used saxon or singapore stuff, khan on line, you will find lots of cheap or free resources that you could use. Saxon on line has placement tests, give one a go to see how that goes too.

I’d talk to your guidance counselor and a math teacher in your HS before making a jump.
And although it isn’t required for pre-calc, I would not skip geometry.

My son took the community college placement exams in 8th grade because he was looking at taking a dual credit class his freshman year. He placed into his choice of either discrete math or I-can’t-remember-the-level-of-calculus. We think it was a bit of a fluke and kinda laughed it off. One person did encourage me to enroll my son in that level of math, instead of proceeding with the standard high school progression. I can tell you that we decided to go with the normal high school math classes and he has indeed learned a lot. I think if he’d have “skipped” he would have had holes in his math that would have made the higher class more difficult, and possibly made him hit a wall at some point. He’ll be in calculus next year (junior year) and I think he’ll do much better in it than if he’d taken it freshman year.

You’ll likely not do great on the SAT or ACT if you don’t take geometry and algebra 2.

I assume you are attending CC. If so, what is your intended major? If it have nothing to do with STEM, then go ahead and try it if you want, but be prepared to put in a lot of work and get help. If you are majoring in anything STEM, take the classes.

SAT or ACT<<<<<<<<

      This just takes revision though, even for my kids some of that math is back to 6th grade. Lots of kids that take even a mildly accelerated track have to revisit such material via a handy dandy red book etc. 

If a student hasn’t studied geometry ever before, then concepts will have to be learned that are second nature to someone who has studied geometry before. The person who has studied geometry previously will be revisiting ideas that are further along, while the person who has never studied geometry has to learn the both the geometric ideas that stick with a geometry student and the geometry ideas that don’t, from scratch.

The OP might be able to study geometry seriously over the summer, and be set. But it would take some commitment to do that.

Interior angle of a regular pentagon anyone? And prove it?

I was a math major and was always very good at math. I think that skipping entire classes is probably a mistake. Most of what is in high school math does end up being used again many times.

A typical high school math sequence is:

  • Algebra 1
  • Geometry
  • Algebra 2/Trigonometry
  • Pre-Calculus
  • Calculus
    Which can be combined or skipped or self-studied? Probably none.

This thread is just ridiculous. Basic geometry as taught in lots of American high schools – probably most of them – covers nothing that couldn’t be learned by a talented math student in a month or two of systematic self-study. The OP seems to have been self-studying math for “a couple of years.” It may well be the case that he or she has to do something to make certain there aren’t important gaps in understanding and ability to manipulate basic concepts of geometry, but the answer isn’t automatically and obviously to take what may be a crappy, learn-nothing geometry course.

I wouldn’t recommend skipping a high-quality math sequence, but a high-quality math sequence is far from a given in this country.

I don’t know what state the OP is in, but the UC system requires that geometry or a class that covers geometry be on the transcript.

Not sure what’s ridiculous here, but I think the bigger issue is that many colleges, and the UCs come to mind, state that they want geometry and other components of math. If OP is that gifted in math, he needs some way to prove competency in geometry and any other expected math courses that various colleges expect to see. OP should look at the schools of interest and see what their requirements are.

That’s absolutely right about the UC system, and a very good point.

It’s also, as far as I know, unique that the UC system has such detailed requirements about exactly which classes a student has taken in high school. It’s certainly the fussiest set of requirements I have seen.

While JHS makes a good point about the quality of geometry classes in many high schools (skippable), I think that the “month or two” of self-study would need to be rather concentrated, and not a month or two on the side, in addition to normal academics. The various math competitions have made a point recently of including geometry problems, because there had been a general consensus that students were not focusing enough on geometry. In a typical math major, all of the other courses would be covered at a deeper level in college, but often high-school geometry is the end of geometry until grad school. (This may not be true in some places.) Also, while the two-column proof disappears after geometry, the formal analysis that goes into it does not.

My son decided he wanted to skip Precalculus. After some research on that, my rules were that he cover the topics using the Art of Problem Solving text on Precalculus, take the community college calculus proficiency test (the easiest step), and get a high score on the Math Level II SAT Subject Test.

@eiholi Algebra 2 and Geometry can be taken together but that’s about it.

OP: Try a Math Level 1 practice SAT subject test to see if you really know the concepts covered in those classes. Note that the SAT is probably not comprehensive but it will give you a good idea if you know the topics at all or not.