Hi there,
I’m taking
AP Physics
AP Eng Lit/Comp
AP Gov’t
AP Calc AB
Human Anatomy
Theology 4 (A requirement for Jesuit schools)
Out of the 6 classes, I have to take an English (AP Eng), math (AP Calc), and Theology
I have a gut feeling that I will end up dropping AP Calc because I barely got a B- from the past year’s Alg 2 Honors/Trig class.
I wanted to drop AP Gov’t (because I have not yet read the summer reading book and I have two more that I have to read for English) and also because I have not yet bought the two required books which cost at least $200 combined.
However, at the same time, I also feel like I shouldn’t because one of the majors I am considering in college is Political Science. Thus, I feel like dropping AP Gov’t will be a huge mistake if I do end up majoring in Politics.
As for AP Physics, I have heard mixed opinions on how difficult the class is in general. If it helps, I have been in all advanced math classes from freshman year to junior year and have never had a C+ in any of those advanced classes. Although, I have struggled with Geometry Honors and Alg 2 Honors.
Human Anatomy would be the last class I am considering on dropping because I got my H.A. textbook today and had flashbacks of when I struggled with Biology Honors. I struggled with remembering so many terms and I figured that memorizing so much material is not my forte.
Any advice on which subjects I should drop or if not, any advice on how to handle everything along with my college quest? Thanks so much in advance!
It is very difficult to know whether any particular course load will be too difficult for any particular student because it depends so much on the preferences of that student. However, there are a few comments that might be worth making.
First of all, remember that “research universities, visit universities, apply to universities, study for SAT, take SAT, get admission results from universities, visit again, decide which to go to, and so on…” will add up to as much work and as much stress as essentially another AP class. Thus there is some reason to go a bit light your senior year.
AP physics can be a very reasonable effort or a huge and difficult effort depending upon the student. Physics is significantly more mathematical that other sciences. That is why I loved it much better than any other science. However, other students definitely did not agree with me (and preferred other sciences that I avoided). To a large extent how you do here will depend upon how you do in math.
My introductory college physics had calculus as a co-requisite, and they would teach something in calculus and then use it a few days later in physics. You should check what the relationship is between your AP calculus and your AP physics, and see whether it makes sense to take physics without calculus. One daughter took AP physics in high school with AP calculus as a co-requisite and liked it quite a bit. She they had to re-take the physics all over again in university but they taught it without calculus as a prerequisite, and taught it without using calculus. She said that it was a LOT more difficult the second time even though she already knew it, because not being able to use calculus actually made a lot of the math much more difficult to do and more difficult to understand.
There are 2 different types of AP Physics. AP Physics C Mechanics and Electricity/Magnetism (2 classes) require at least concurrent enrollment in Calculus AB. AP Physics 1 and AP Physics 2 don’t require calculus (Algebra 2/ Pre Calculus is good enough) but they are not easy classes.