<p>While scheduling for Sr yr...</p>
<p>Can anyone speak to these AP courses?</p>
<p>Length? Work load?</p>
<p>K2 has the oppor to take them online/virtual.</p>
<p>I think that they are all considered to be on the less valuable end of the AP spectrum, in terms of content. Especially Psych. If I am not mistaken, Psych is usually a 1-yr course, and both of the econs are 1 semester.</p>
<p>Personally, I’m not a fan of any of those AP’s. IMO, they are better left to colleges. (The vast majority of high school teachers are just not academically/professionally prepared to teach them.)</p>
<p>All three are so-called, AP Lites, in that they only cover one quarter/semester of college material, but maybe taught over a whole HS year. (Contrast them to AP Chem which attempts to cover a full year of college material, in one HS year.)</p>
<p>But the workload will depend on the teacher. AP Psych is probably the easiest AP for which to self-study, so it ain’t very rigorous. (But obviously, a teacher can make it so.)</p>
<p>DS took AP Psych and said the greatest advantage was to skip to higher-level psych classes his freshman year. Psych 101 classes tend to be large (even at his tiny school) and he didn’t feel he has missed out on anything by jumping ahead. Most schools he looked at also accepted the credit for a distribution so it did free up space for his STEM classes.</p>
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<p>Note that introductory psychology is usually not a very difficult college course either. I.e. AP psychology starts with a relatively easy semester-long college course and spreads it out over a year in high school. Introductory economics is generally not that difficult in college either, though some colleges have just a semester-long course covering both micro and macro, while others split it over two semester-long courses.</p>
<p>My son took AP Psych as a sophomore at school…loved it…easily one of his favorite classes and he said was one of the most valuable (even tough it was very easy for him). He got a 5 on the exam. As a Junior he took AP Micro, started the class 2 weeks late and had no prior knowledge…he is a strong math student and found this class to be one of the easiest APs he has had. We don’t know how he did on the exam yet, but he thinks he got a 5. These would probably be the easiest to do online.</p>
<p>I thought AP Psychology is a great course for students who are otherwise going to end up in engineering etc… to get introduced into this field. No harm in taking them if you can fit into the schedule. If you are choosing between AP Psych and AP Economics, then it is an individual choice. S took both the senior year.</p>
<p>My son took micro and macro econ as a sr in HS. Did well on in the class and on the AP exam but his teacher told him to retake the class (as a finance major) again in college. Only problem was he college would not let him take the class for credit because he had the AP credit. I think it depends on intended major. If he is going to major in history, english, etc than getting credit for psych gets him out of taking a required science class he really has no interest in and lets him focus on topics he is really interested in.</p>
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<p>He can look at the old final exams for the college’s introductory economics course to see what he knows and does not know from there, and self-study the gaps. College introductory economics courses are typically not difficult courses.</p>
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<p>Exactly. Another reason to save it for college. Premeds bank on the easier A. :)</p>
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<p>With this, I disagree, at least the typical Intro course for majors. Since Econ 1 is the entry course for finance (and obviously econ) majors, it tends to contain a lot of gunners – as the premeds are in bio. This is particularly true for pre-biz majors at a school like Cal, where one needs to apply into the B-school – early grades are paramount, so the competition for A’s can be brutal. Moreover, unlike Psych, intro Econ courses can be graded on a rather strict curve.</p>
<p>I guess the Wall Street Wannabes get an early start on the dog-eat-dog world. :D</p>
<p>If your school teaches AP Microeconomics in one semester and AP Macroeconomics in the other semester, that’s not AP lite. That’s a full year of college work in one high school year. Plan accordingly when you consider the workload.</p>
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<p>It may be full of gunners, but the actual material in the course is not difficult.</p>
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<p>The introductory psychology course might share the same characteristic, since psychology at Berkeley is more popular than the department’s capacity, so students need to meet a GPA minimum to declare that major.</p>
<p>The possibility of heavy grade competition in the course is a different issue from whether the course material itself is difficult.</p>
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<p>At some schools, introductory economics is a one semester course covering both micro and macro economics.</p>
<p>AP Econ Macro is offered at our school. It is a semester class and is grouped with AP Gov (Gov is first semester, Econ is second semester). Econ is a required class so we figured why not take the AP Econ. He will not get credit for it because the college he is going to does Macro and Micro together. But I feel like it was good exposure to the material. It ended up being one of his favorite classes.</p>
<p>What are the alternatives?</p>
<p>And what kind of colleges is (s)he looking at? </p>
<p>My kid had a college interview in which one question was “Why are you taking a gut like AP psych?” None of the colleges my kid was interested in gave any credit for the course. Why? In college, it’s often taught as a lab science. In high school, it usually isn’t. So, if the OP’s kid does take it, don’t think anyone is going to treat it as if the kid had taken AP physics C. </p>
<p>None of the colleges of interest to my offspring gave credit for AP Econ either. Why? High school AP courses rarely involve as much math as college intro courses do. </p>
<p>Between the 2, from an educational point of view, I’d recommend econ…especially for the kid who isn’t good at math and therefore might not want to take it at a college where econ is mathcentric.</p>
<p>But if I were the OP, I’d check a few schools of interest to see their credit policies. It might be that one of these gets college credit and the other doesn’t.</p>
<p>It would be better to take “real” APs.</p>
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<p>The right (and perhaps only) answer is “Because I’m very interested in the subject, and the AP Psych teacher at my high school is terrific.”</p>
<p>At the high school my son attended, there was one teacher who taught nothing but AP Psychology. Five sections of it, every year, and they were all full. She was an excellent teacher, and the kids took the course because they liked her and the subject matter. The course didn’t fulfill any graduation requirements, and it obviously didn’t impress people. But it was the school’s most popular academic elective.</p>
<p>I see nothing wrong with this and plenty wrong with that rude interview question.</p>
<p>In fact, I see nothing wrong with taking any AP course – or even a non-AP course – that interests you. Often, these elective courses can spark a student’s interest in a field, which can lead to a college major or even a career. For both of my kids, AP courses confirmed their interest in the subjects that became their college majors. In one case, the course was AP Computer Science. In the other, it was AP Macro/Microeconomics. Time well spent in both cases.</p>
<p>My daughter will be taking AP Psych next year because she is interested in it. Her strengths are math and science, but she expressed an interest, so I encouraged her to take the class to explore it further. I’m disappointed to read all the negative opinions about AP Psych.</p>
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<p>LOL! That is almost word for word what my D did say.She learned that she wasn’t all that interested in psych and didn’t pursue it in college. Frankly, eliminating it from consideration was worthwhile.</p>
<p>It’s still true that most people consider it a gut.</p>
<p>Actually, it is perfectly fine to take AP psychology as an elective of interest, as long as there is no expectation that it will be seen as equivalently rigorous as some of the other AP courses that exist.</p>
<p>At my son’s school they have AP Govt for 1 semester and then AP Macro for the other semester. My son is planning on being a engineer. He took those 2 AP’s to get them out of the way BEFORE he goes to college in the fall. They fall under the general ed requirements at a lot of schools. He is not interested in being a Govt or Econ major.Assuming he did well on the AP tests he will get credit for them and we didn’t have to pay for tuition,fees or books!</p>
<p>My oldest son took AP micro and macro online in high school, and he loved the classes so much that he was an economics major in college. He was an outstanding math student, and economics allowed him to use his math background in a variety of ways. His younger brother plans on taking the two AP econs as a HS senior – one online with an outstanding teacher and one in the classroom. The workload for the two classes should not be overwhelming, which is good since he has several other APs on his schedule.</p>