@bridgygo You sound like such a thoughtful, insightful mom. Your daughter is in good hands. FWIW, I’m also a NYC mom with a child in an intense high school. I know firsthand what it’s like to have your child jump through hoops to get into the right middle school and then the right HS. I remember in 4th grade when everyone was getting their kids tutored in order to get into a certain middle school. The craziness continues. If you ever need support, to vent or someone to bounce ideas off of you can PM me
It’s only 4 questions on he sat, and 5-6 on the act - a kid who picks up math quickly can meet with a tutor and go over the few points tested. It’s much more important to have a strong foundation in algebra (+ geometry and reading data).
It’ll be no trouble :).
It was not a disadvantage to my kid to have precalc senior year. And yes, she did have some math tutoring for the SAT, but I considered that as a double benefit for her trig class that year. If your D isn’t a math oriented kid, don’t force the issue. She will be as competitive as any other student if she takes precalc in senior year. Give her room in her courseload to be the best in the things she is interested in.
I sense that you still aren’t quite convinced. I have just looked at the high school requirements pages for Duke, Stanford, Yale, Williams, and Princeton. Duke and Princeton specifically state that calc is required ONLY for students applying for the engineering program. All the others say nothing at all about calc, and Stanford says specifically that they require four years of math, with an emphasis on algebra, geometry, and trigonometry. Yale’s page was interesting, in that it didn’t even give specific requirements, except to say that they only expect applicants to take the most rigorous courses they can in what they are interested in. (NO foreign language requirement! Hmmm, might see if my language-phobic son is interested…
In fact, their page was so interesting, that I have decided to share it: http://admissions.yale.edu/advice-selecting-high-school-courses
It seems universal that all engineering programs expect students to have calc. As far as I know, only MIT, Cal Tech, and Olin require calc.
When she is able to, she can take AP stats. That’s a good way to get a math-oriented, rigorous course on her transcript. Many students really enjoy it, and it is useful. My not-math oriented D loved AP stats, and in fact, her stats teacher wrote her rec for her. Does her high school offer honors level math classes? She can do those to bump up rigor too.
Using my D again as an example, she found ninth grade very stressful, taking all honors level courses (our school offers no APs to freshmen.) High school was a wake up call from middle school, and while she did great, she realized something about herself: she didn’t enjoy all the pressure. In tenth grade, she decided that for her, it was best to either do math or science at a regular level. So she took H Geometry and regular chem that year. It helped enormously. Junior year she took AP stats and H physics, but regular alg 2/trig. Senior year she took 4 APs, but regular level pre-calc. That was her way of coping with stress, and it worked for her. She did very well in the admissions process. Let your D have the flexibility to find a path that works for her, and try not to fixate on what you think colleges want. I guarantee you she is going to go to a great college:-)
If he is language-phobic, he should realize that Yale has a foreign language graduation requirement that is greater than at some other schools: http://catalog.yale.edu/ycps/academic-regulations/requirements-for-ba-bs-degree/
Actually, most engineering programs do not require the student to have had high school calculus. Their sample schedule templates assume starting in calculus 1 (so the student has to be at least ready for calculus, though having has calculus in high school is a bonus).
http://web.stanford.edu/group/ughb/cgi-bin/handbook/index.php/Mechanical_Engineering_Program#Mathematics_and_Science
http://www.me.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/undergraduate/CurriculumFlowchart.pdf
http://me.engin.umich.edu/academics/ugsh/bachelors
http://www.me.gatech.edu/files/ug/program_of_study_me1617.pdf
However, a student who completes precalculus in 11th grade or earlier and is aiming for more selective colleges or majors which use calculus would find it favorable to take calculus in high school. (This is not the situation that the OP’s kid is in, with math placement leading to precalculus in 12th grade.)
@ucbalumnus , my son has zero interest in Yale, have no fear:-) He needs to be within an hour of decent snowboarding, so U Vermont will be high on his list I imagine.
Re engineering, I am just trying to give the OP some perspective, as she is concerned that her D not doing calc as a senior will be detrimental to her chances.
Thank you @citymama9!!
@Lindagaf
Thank you for the info and link
I think I sound a bit unconvinced because I read a thread - or part of one - before I made my post. That thread was made of posts of kids who had just gotten accepted to Brown. I only read a couple of pages but every accepted kid had calculus!!
And I generally tend to worry about things.
Again, of kids at our high school (kids I have mostly known since K), Harvard guy, Columbia girl, Brown kid 2, Cornell guy 1, ND girl, none of them had calc for sure. You will probably find just as many students on a different thread who didn’t have calc. And why does it matter if a bunch of kids had it anyway? The fact is, it will not make a difference unless it is relevant to the field of study.
Re your reference: That’s a few kids out of the thousands not on this website.
And to put it another way, if your child doesn’t get inot Brown, et al., it will not be becasue she didn’t take all as a senior. Should your D’s app make it to committee, providing the grades and test scores are there, it is going to come down to other factors like the essay, recs, and ECs.
If you are aiming for an elite college, then you need to make sure that your DD is on a path that when the time comes for college applications the College Counselor will be able to mark that your DD took the most rigorous curriculum available. This means different things at different schools, but the bottom line is your DD is competing with her classmates for that designation. Can you go in and meet with a counselor to get an idea of what it generally takes to get that designation at your daughter’s school? All the students from my daughter’s school who got into elite colleges in the 2016 admission cycle took either Calc BC or Multivariable Calc as seniors. Good luck!
Thanks @Lindagaf!
Good to hear that!
My D’s school is very intense. So kids will have calculus and beyond. That worries me.
@Ldoponce
I’m looking forward to getting that exact question answered Re: most rigorous. I emailed the counselor but got an out of office reply. I didn’t want to have to wait until school actually started but I’ll have to.
I would prefer not having this problem as I believe she would handle algebra 2 without doing algebra again. I would hire private tutors if I needed to. She had very high grades in algebra.
If I can’t change it and she is not in track for calculus I won’t worry too much. She’ll have other strengths.
I helped a friend’s unhooked kid with his SCEA application to Yale this last cycle. He never took honors math, although at our high school the next tier down ends in AP cal AB (honors feeds into AP cal BC in senior year). He applied as an English/physics major. I thought applying as a physic major would be a mistake bc his application didn’t support that discipline. He didn’t have the higher level math, his SAT math score was a 680…in yale’s bottom 25%, and he didn’t take the math SAT2 (his CR score wasn’t particularly strong for Yale, either, at a 720…their 25%). And his ECs were regular high school fare, no wow factor. Well, he was deferred SCEA and accepted RD. Was dropped off yesterday for pre-O. What he did have was excellent grades…95 UW GPA, probably ranked 5-12 of his class, and excellent recommendations. I know he had a great app bc I helped him edit all his essays. Taught me you don’t need to be extraordinary to gain admissions to a tippy top school.
@Bridgygo if you are willing to hire a tutor and your daughter did well in Algebra 1, then I would push for the Alebra 2 class for her this year.
If OP’s girl isn’t planning stem, she just doesn’t need calculus and pre-calc is fine (though humanities kids who get to AP calc and score well can look pretty good.) But at Stuy, to stand out from the horde of stem kids aiming high, she really needs to be on her game re: her major, get the right experiences and other ECs. Not just float through with a couple of usual clubs, any old titles, and the default X hours of any old comm service. She should stand out for what she does want and how she pursued that, not be looking over her shoulder at the stem brainiacs.
You should try to learn what those more competitive colleges do want to see.
Thank you @RenaissanceMom good to hear. That’s so interesting. It seems class rank is very important.
I just want my D to have a great four years and a lot of opportunities. She’s not going to be in the top 12 of her class. But she might do really well and she has strengths. She even has a few special interests that could turn into something. We will see what happens!
@Ldoponce I’m pushing for geometry for this year. The issue according to what I read in the school paper is kids being prepared for algebra 2/trig which would be in tenth if you start with geometry.
@lookingforward I agree!! And my D is a self starter. She will likely be very interesting and specific with her EC’s and some classes.
Just scour the college web sites to understand what they really want to see. If she’s a self starter, thinks outside the same old hs box, she could be intriguing. But that’s more than the usual CC idea you get a few leadership titles in clubs, found one, raise some money, claim some “passion,” win some any-old award. Lots of Stuy kids will apply to tippy tops. People like to share anecdotes, but in general it’s good not to rest on those. Those other kids may have held other cards.
“I would prefer not having this problem as I believe she would handle algebra 2 without doing algebra again. I would hire private tutors if I needed to. She had very high grades in algebra.”
Repeating algebra1 after getting a 90 on the regents. That seems like a waste of time to me. If she wants to take geometry, I don’t think the algebra is going to hold her back. She can work on it a little over the year and/or brush up next summer before she takes algebra2.
@MurphyBrown, according to our public high school naviance, his over 1410, 2180 SATs made him an outlier for acceptance to Yale. We honestly didn’t think he’d get in, especially after he was deferred bc the valedictorian with 2400 SATs got in & another student was recruited as an athlete. Yale rarely takes more than 2 students from our suburban NY school, and sometimes takes none. (And our school, while decent, isn’t Scarsdale or one of its peers.) His class was around 350-370 kids. His ECs included co-editor in chief of school newspaper, track (but not recruitable), orchestra, one summer college course, model UN. Other summers he spent as a local camp counselor. No out of school ECs, except for summer course, and no national, regional or state awards. Just a hard working kid that teachers loved. He got lucky with his essay because he wrote about something that according to a note from his Y admissions rep reminded her of her youth & resonated with her. He had no hooks.