Your sanity vs. your transcript?

Pre-College Topics High School Life
1

<p>On a thread about what to do with my newlyfound free period, I am faced with a question … take a study hall, or take another academic? </p>

<p>Your sanity vs. your transcript? </p>

<p>Which did you pick and why? :)</p>

<p>Edit: On an afterthought, you could rephrase it as “Your sleep vs. your transcript.”</p>

2

<p>Sadly, i lost my sanity for my transcript then ended up losing both. Sigh.</p>

3

<p>lol. Can I hear the story behind this, bananafreak2u?</p>

4

<p>i was in the same situation and chose my sanity…</p>

<p>seriously, having one more AP or class is not going to make or break your app</p>

5

<p>I agree. I take a free period, and I would be failing without it. I need that time, and I doubt a fifth AP would make or break my app at all.</p>

6

<p>Sanity (/sleep). </p>

<p>Why? Because I think taking more than 3/4 APs a year produces unnecessary stress. Pushing yourself is good, pushing yourself to the brink of insanity (generally) is not.</p>

7

<p>Also, if you reach a point of insanity/burn out your transcript will suffer anyway.</p>

8

<p>Transcript - unless your transcript suffers without sanity.</p>

9

<p>Sanity. If you’re just taking a class for transcript points, don’t. It’s transparent, and as long as your schedule is rigorous, colleges don’t care if you have 10 APs or 3.</p>

10

<p>Let me put it this way: In 50 years, you won’t remember AP Chemistry. You’ll remember your friends, and that road trip with a close, and when you realized what you wanted your future to hold. You’ll probably remember a few good teachers. </p>

<p>You don’t want to be the person who remembers his or her class rank. It’s worse than being an old man whose glory days were all spent on his high school football team. If you don’t have more than enough memories to counterbalance your academic ones, you’ll probably feel pretty regretful in the end. That’s something to avoid.</p>

11

<p>Nicely said!</p>

12

<p>We’re under a block scheduling system. For second semester, I was signed up for Organic Chemistry 3rd period, and Sociology 4th period.</p>

<p>I’m already suffering from senioritis. I though Sociology would be fun and interesting. It turns out it’s an absolute joke class with LOTS of busywork. I have neither the time or the paitence to deal with a class of bull**** that, it turns out, is taught by a teacher I hate. So I dropped it, switched into 3rd period chemistry, and now have a study period at the end of the day which I use to do homework and/or go home.</p>

<p>Good thing I was already into my top choice by then, because Sociology was an honors credit and having one less class is not exactly a good mark on my transcript. But what can I say, senioritis is a crippling disease, and I’m starting to get real sick of high school monotony. </p>

<p>I have never been overachieving academically like most on here. I make average grades at best (as in mostly Bs <em>gasp</em>). Most of the strength from my application comes from extracurriculars, which I only do for fun and not out of a conscious effort to make my application look better. It’s worked pretty well for me. I tried to enjoy my high school experience rather than making it all about being a perfect student.</p>