<p>I'm trying to get into University of Michigan and my major is undecided so far.
Honors or AP Calculus is not offered at my school so I wanted to take AP Stat just for the AP, although I'm a senior and will not have calculus on my transcript. I was wondering how important it is to them or any school of that caliber and if you could explain why that would be great!</p>
<p>-My (pending) schedule for next year:
AP Spanish IV
AP Physics
AP English IV
AP Stat
Honors Latin II
Graphic Design I/II
Systematic Theology/The Ignatian Way (Religion classes :( )</p>
<p>-I did not try at all last year in Algebra II/Trig and I got a 92 for the year so I know I could handle calc.</p>
<p>Unless you haven’t taken pre-calc yet, I would roll with AP stats. AP physics involves calculus and will stretch your abilities in similar ways that AP calc would.</p>
<p>Is calculus the next normal class in the sequence at your school? I’d be in favor of taking regular calculus over the AP Stats class. My reasoning is that the calculus is part of a core sequence of math and the AP Stats is more of an elective, although a math one. I think that getting to calculus is stronger for your resume.</p>
<p>"If you’re aiming for highly selective colleges and universities, most admission officials consider calculus to be more challenging than statistics and thus look upon it somewhat more favorably. However, if you’d be taking stats at the AP level and calculus at the regular or college-prep level, we’d vote for the AP class. You’ll probably find the stats to be a better bet for a business major, too, although in many business programs–especially the more elite ones–you will be expected to take both stats and calc.</p>
<p>Overall, this is a close one, so, if other concerns intervene (e.g., scheduling conflicts, teacher preferences), you can’t go wrong with either."</p>
<p>Majors that need calculus include engineering, science, economics, and business. If you are certain that you will not go into such a major, statistics may be more useful in general. But if you will go into a major that needs calculus, then calculus is likely more useful. Of course, you need a strong knowledge of algebra, geometry, and trigonometry to succeed in calculus (you have had all of these math courses so far, right?).</p>
<p>But it is odd that your school does not offer any AP calculus, even AB, which should not be an especially difficult course for those who are a year ahead in math to reach calculus in high school. Seems like they’d really have to dial back the course rigor to make calculus course less rigorous than AB (perhaps emulating the first semester of a “calculus for business majors” course?).</p>