I am currently a sophomore in the IB program and am planning to take a mix of IB and dual enrollment courses my junior year. I am currently in pre-calc honors right now and am wondering if SL or AP Calc is the best route to take?
What’s your plan for college? Ap Calculus is a higher level of math than IB SL (which is mostly pre-cal).
I was thinking about doing a pre med major or economics.
Then definitely AP cal.
Would you take SL AA or AI? Look at the descriptions and ask your math teacher if you’re not sure of the difference.
All in all though, Math HL (either AI or AA) would be better suited to your plan.
Of course, that’s assuming your school does HL1, HL 2 - if it does SL-> HL then you’re fine. The two year seuenxe covers more than just calculus.
Alternatively, AP calculus AB or BC would work.
AP calculus AB is typically considered more advanced than IB math SL (based on college subject credit and advanced placement for the respective exam scores), although some high schools top up IB math SL courses to cover the AP calculus AB material so that students can take the AP as well as IB exam.
Both economics and pre-med commonly require calculus. If you are exempt from calculus 1 with a good AP calculus AB score, you may still need calculus 2 in college for both economics and pre-med. Note that you can do the pre-med courses alongside an economics major.
I’m not sure, but my school does offer an HL, but I personally don’t think math is a strong suite of mine, so I’m sticking close to SL. The local community college also offers college algebra for juniors, do you know what the difference is between that course and the AP/IB.
My school offers use to take dual enrollment so I was also thinking off taking calculus 2 over senior year and I was thinking of majoring in economics and pre med or bio/chem pre med.
Unless you are full diploma, SLs are pointless IMO.
Any other suggested routes?
“College algebra” is commonly a math course on the level of high school precalculus (although it may or may not include trigonometry). It is usually for entering college students who did not take math beyond high school algebra 2, or who did poorly on the college’s math placement test and need this course as a prerequisite to calculus.
I’d ask about the material at your school. At ours, the 2 year SL curriculum included everything you needed to take the Calc AB AP exam (for those who wanted that credit.) Math Studies, otoh, did not.