<p>My school has a two-year American history curriculum for APUSH. I'm a sophomore in the first year and want to self study the second year half of the USH course, mainly because I would have to drop AP Euro senior year if I had a two year history curriculum.</p>
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<li><p>Is it manageable? The course at my school is intense, from what I've heard - but how hard is the exam?</p></li>
<li><p>If I do decide to self study, what do I have to do? Not necessarily for APUSH, but for any course in general. Do I register with my guidance counselor something?</p></li>
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<p>I’m confused. Why would your school choose to do APUSH in two years over one year? Do they think it’ll be easier on kids? A better all around education perhaps? It doesn’t sound very rigorous at all from my perspective, but maybe i’m not understanding something right.</p>
<p>I don’t think you could do the second half by yourself unless you are REALLY good at time management and keeping facts organized. It’s not that I think you’re incapable of studying that amount of material, as most schools do twice that amount in one year. However, it’s the fact that you’re essentially taking two history courses on the same society at the same time; keeping things organized is going to be nightmare. </p>
<p>If you do decide to do it, you register with the counselor. There’s usually a form you have to fill out and then you pay for the test. Get a “cracking the APUSH exam book” and get down to work. It’s going to be hard but it’ll pay off if you get a 4 or 5.</p>
<p>OP – Are you at a public school? NJ state law requires 2 years of US History as a graduation requirement. That is why so many NJ schools break out APUSH into 2 years.</p>
<p>Check with your guidance department first to see if the school/state requirements would even permit you to only have 1 year.</p>
<p>I can’t tell from your post whether you would be self-studying the second half at the same time as you were taking the first half. If that’s the case, then I would definitely say it’s too much to take on. However, if you’re talking about taking the first half one year, then self-studying the second half the next year, then I"d say it’s feasible, and it’s definitely worth it to be able to take AP Euro. </p>
<p>I would check with the teacher to see if he/she will let you take the quizzes or write the essays - if you don’t, then it will be very easy to slack off or fall behind. I would say to just read AMSCO and Crash Course. Those were all I used last year, and I got a 5 pretty easily. The course is mainly about memorizing events and people, then tying them into major themes. The thing is that you need to become familiar with the events and people, not just memorize them. Normally you would become familiar with them through classroom discussion or lectures, but since you wouldn’t be taking the class, I would say more read-throughs or writing practice essays would be the best way to develop familiarity.</p>
<p>Ah, this is the part that worries me most. Yeah, I do go to public school in Jersey. Wasn’t aware of this until now, sadly. What I’ll have to do is convince my guidance counselor make the APUSH exam I take (and hopefully pass) count as a credit towards my graduation requirements.</p>
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<p>I should’ve clarified. My plan, originally, was to take both in one year, but I think your idea would work much better. I’ll definitely discuss this idea over with my guidance counselor.</p>
<p>I’ll schedule an appointment with my GC on Monday and see what happens.</p>
<p>Curious for an update – my kids attend a private in NJ and I’d like to know if any schools are finding methods around the 2 yr requirement if kid can test at a certain level.</p>
<p>Yes, I did talk to my GC. She said I would have to apply to my school’s independent study program in March and request self-studying APUSH. I would have to do a certain project or somehow prove that I know and understand the coursework. I would only get the credit for the course after I prove that I understand the content of APUSH - and that’s the most important thing. </p>
<p>Basically, I can self-study and take the AP test whenever I want. The most important thing, however, is to have the credit for the course in order to fulfill graduation requirements.</p>
<p>I thought some schools would have to have a method in place – Independent study course makes sense. Could work well if you could do the independent projects over the summer.</p>