As of now, I’m a Junior in high school. Engineering caught my interest and I want to become a Mechanical Engineer. Right now I’m in Algebra II and was wondering what math class should I take next year that’ll be beneficial for college and my future career. I have 2 options, AP Stat or Precalculus. Thing is, if I take AP Stat next year, my Senior year, I’ll still need to take Calculus in college which requires Precalculus. If I take Precalculus next year I could get into AP Calculus AB my Freshman year in college, but I would be missing out in Statistics. Or I could probably take Precalculus during the summer, if my school offers the course during summer school, and go into Calculus my Senior year. What do you guys think is my best option?
Take precalculus next year, or over the summer if you would like.
2nd that^^. If you’re really smart and free over summer, take Pre-calc, then AP Calc AB senior. Double up with AP Stats during senior. Advanced math and science are important!
Pre-Calc is the more important class, so I recommend you take that over AP Stats, especially because Stats isn’t a class you need for Mechanical engineering. You could take Pre-Calc over the summer, and that would be the best option if you can handle it, but you dont need to rush
AP Stat is invaluable for research imo, it’s helped so much for me. pre-calc = alg 2 review + calc intro. - I’m selfing precalc over the summer for AMC and other purposes
Definitely either take pre-calculus (honors) next year or over the summer. My friend is a senior in honors pre-calculus, and he wants to be a mechanical engineer too. The colleges he applied to required him to have take pre-calculus, but I don’t think he needs to take stats at all.
precalc. i in the same boat (junior) as you except i want to major in computer science.
Do the precalc-summer thing and calc senior year. As an engineer, you’ll need to know calculus, and most of your peers during college will already have taken it.
@Decepters Look at this: http://www.cs.vt.edu/undergraduate/recommended
It has nothing to do with VT, but if he takes no Calculus at all, well… you get the point. Hopefully you’re in AP Calc 
or Honors Pre-Calc… Math is important to top college (for CS) won’t accept either on of you if you don’t even have any knowledge of Calculus. (I wouldn’t think!)
A few people in my grade are doubling up on AP Calc AB and AP Stats senior year. That’s what I would recommend
Don’t skip out on pre-calc! Find a way to take it and AP Stat if you can.
I highly recommend taking precalclus in some form or another. It is essential for what you’re going to be doing. It is really up to you whether you think you can learn it within a 3 month period or would you benefit from the regular year long program
@Anish14 lol you just stated my point. he should take precalc or calc next year thats what i was saying
Many school districts will pay for community college. Ask you guidance counselor about concurrent enrollment. Take PreCalc at community college (they have online and evening courses, too, if you have athletics, a job, transportation issues, or some other distraction during the day). AP Calc during senior year. Pre calc + Statistics at community college over the summer. Note: AP is meant to be “college equivalent.” If you take it in college, you don’t need an “equivalent.” It already IS college credit.
Do both then move onto calculus
At some schools precalc is mostly a review of algebra 2+trig.
So, if you get good grades in algebra 2 and you understand the material then it might be a good idea to take precalc over the summer then take ap calc next year.
If precalc at your school isn’t mostly a review of algebra 2, then you should take precalc and ap stat together next year.