<p>Hi there, wanted to find out if it would hurt your chances at college if you do not take AP classes. My son is a sophmore in high school interested in theater+ engineering ( computer science part , I think ). He is taking the science courses but not the AP versions of them. He will be doing precal hopefully next year and might take AP math related in his senior year but that migth be the only AP course he takes. He has orchestra in his schedule as he is very interested in that. </p>
<p>His school offered AP bilology this year but since this was biology which is not his favorite subject, he took regular biology. He has signed up for chemistry next year.</p>
<p>We do not plan to apply to the highly competitive schools but will apply to the second level of schools with a good theater and engineering department. I am not sure if the U of Minnesota would be within his reach .... but will try University of Iowa .</p>
<p>Any and all advice is appreciated. Thanks!</p>
<p>Generally speaking, colleges want to see that a student has challenged himself in high school as much as possible. The more selective the university, the more this is true. For example, Minnesota will probably care more about this than Iowa. Still, there are plenty of people who get into decent programs without ever having taken any AP classes.</p>
<p>I don’t think you need to load up on APs for Univeristy of Iowa. Check out the common dataset for their stats:</p>
<p>[Data</a> and Reports - Communications and Reports - Office of the Provost - The University of Iowa](<a href=“http://provost.uiowa.edu/docs/data/]Data”>http://provost.uiowa.edu/docs/data/)</p>
<p>Also, CS is not an engineering major. Electrical and Computer Engineering is an engineering major but CS is usually a seperate school or department.</p>
<p>U of Iowa also has an honors program and that would require better grads/scores and APs might be something they look for.</p>
<p>Id highly recommend that he take one AP science course at least, whether it be Chemistry it Physics B or C. I wouldn’t bother taking AP Bio. AP course really do sweeten up your resume, and if he’s looking to get into computer science or EE or CE, than AP classes will give up the upper edge in admission and in college classes as well.</p>
<p>Plus you get college credit. So it makes university cheaper and you can graduate faster if you can get credits out of the way. </p>
<p>But no they are not required. They would only give you a leg up at schools that are competitive to get in.</p>
<p>For the BS in Computer Science at University of Iowa, only AP Chemistry and Physics C will satisfy the natural sciences requirement (assuming that he doesn’t like biology). For Physics C, they will take a 4 or a 5 on both exams (there are two, mechanics, and electromagnetics). For Chemistry, they will only take a 5. </p>
<p>I would consider one of these two if they are known to be good courses where getting a good score is possible. At some schools, the classes are not taught rigorously enough to score that high. It might still be worth it if he likes the subject and gets a good teacher.</p>
<p>Definitely take some easy AP courses like Psychology that can fulfill other requirements</p>