<p>I just started my junior year at an extremely competitive public (top 250) school in Seattle. Currenly class rank ~50/430. My unweighted GPA for the last 2 years (at a private school) is 3.6, weighted 4.01. 5 weeks into the school year I have all A's, and expect 5 As and 1 B this year, bringing my GPA up to the 3.8 range. My SAT is ~2150 (will be retesting, didn't study for the 2150). Taking 4 AP and 2 Honors this year.</p>
<p>I am trying to make a decision whether I want to go from H Pre-calc this year to AP calc or AP stats next year. I do alright in math (my only B last year, A freshman year), but I'm not a huge fan of the more complicated material. I plan on majoring in Finance or Economics in college, and have a rough list of colleges in my head (U of Michigan, U of Washington, U of Texas, U of Virginia, Notre Dame, Penn, maybe USC). I don't want to risk having senioritis and having the harder AP Calc hurt my GPA next year, because I'm sure I will be in the B range in that class. Conversely, I know I would have an A and a 5 in stats. Should I take AP calc either way and have it hurt my GPA and get a low AP score, or should I take AP stats (more useful for finance) and have an easy-ish A?</p>
<p>Sidenote: English is my second language, I moved to the US in 7th grade. I have alot of EC’s, leadership, service. Just some extra stuff to inform your advice.</p>
<p>Hate to break the news to you, but a finance career requires calculus. So does economics. Differential equations. Multivariate calculus. You’ll need to stick with calc to have a shot at a career, or find a different branch of business that isn’t so math intense.</p>
<p>If you are planning on studying economics or finance, you should definitely take calculus. You will not find a slower, gentler class in differential calculus in college than AB Calculus, which teaches one semester of college calculus in almost two semesters of high school. </p>
<p>And if you don’t want senoritis to cause you problems next year, don’t indulge it. Senoritis isn’t something you contact like malaria. It’s a set of bad, lazy choices that many seniors make. If you don’t want the consequences of those choices, make better choices.</p>
<p>This question get asked over and over. Take the AP Calc AB, it is the stronger program to take. AP Stats is good, but treat it as an elective and add it if it fits in your schedule but do not let it take the place of a strong core course. Aim for an A, not a B. It shouldn’t be that hard.</p>
<p>To major in Economics or Finance, you definitely need calculus. In my opinion, AP Calc AB was pretty easy… there were a few sections here and there that I didn’t do so well on but I managed to get an A for both semesters. I got a 5 on my exam which made me really happy. My teacher is pretty nice and quite good at his job. I’m taking BC this year as a senior with him also.
As for the senioritis, I feel it sometimes but I don’t let it win. I still do all of my work, especially for my important classes. I’m in 3 AP classes this year. You can do it, you just have to stay focused.</p>
<p>For an economics or finance major, choose calculus over statistics in high school. These majors will require both calculus and statistics in college, but they may require a calculus-based statistics course as well as calculus.</p>
<p>If you major in economics intending to do PhD study, or study quantitative finance, you will need significantly more advanced math in college than frosh calculus and statistics.</p>
<p>Yes, you’ll need both calculus and stats as an economics major. I personally found calculus much more interesting, and it’s not as difficult as many people think it is.</p>