Because I am EDing, they wont get my grades for my calc class as a senior. They’ll only get my pre calc and below. I am applying to top schools, and I believe the rest of my application is competitive. So will this hurt my chances a lot?
Well first off - it’s water under the bridge at this point so why worry about it? Engineering schools will care that you’re taking Calc, they’ll care that you consistently did very well in high school - especially in math and science - and they’ll care about your standardized test scores. If all those are awesome, I don’t think the fact that you are currently taking Calc AB and they can’t see a grade yet will work against you.
Yes, it will hurt your chances. How much depends on what school you’re applying to. Obviously if you’re applying to something like Rutgers it won’t be too detrimental – in fact, it might even be a bonus.
If you’re applying to a good school like MIT – save your application fee.
Okay, that’s a relief to hear. I’m just a bit stressed about college apps, but thanks for your reply.
Calculus in 12th grade is one year ahead of the normal expectation of precalculus in 12th grade. A few colleges do explicitly expect their engineering applicants to have calculus while in high school, but none explicitly say that calculus needs to be taken in 11th grade or earlier.
The issue that the OP has is not whether colleges need BC or not, it’s that 95% of the applicants to top Engineering schools will be applying with BC in hand or currently taking it. Which may make the OP less competitive.
What you may want to do is to sign up and take the BC portion of the exam instead of AB, and indicate that on your applications. The BC exam covers both AB and BC. If you are taking the traditional Calc AB class that covers 2 quarters of college calculus, there’s not that much extra to cover for the BC exam.
@ProfessorPlum168 I agree that at this point the OP might be less competitive for engineering schools than those that have completed or taking BC, but at this point what is signing up to take the BC test going to do for college admissions? The test won’t happen until after college decisions are complete. You think just stating that they plan to take the BC portion of the test will make a difference with admissions?
If your school only offers up to AB, you won’t be penalized for not having BC.
My D only was able to take AB as a senior and did fine with college admission for engineering.
you list the AB class in your admissions and in the additional comments section you state you are taking the BC exam because the class wasn’t available for registration. It shows initiative.
At my kid’s former HS, they won’t open up an additional class ie Calc BC unless a mulitple of 20 kids sign up for, and they have a maximum of 25 or something like that for a class. So every year you get kids who get screwed by not being able to register for the class, so they wind up going this route.
If I was an AO, this would only show me someone paid $90 to register for a test. A student could also sign up for GRE, GMAT, MCAT - I don’t think signing up for a test shows much.
OP’s question was about no grades being available, not AB vs. BC. I disagree that 95% of students will have finished BC. My D’s Freshman roommate at a T10 engineering school took a pre-Calc class first semester, to get ready for Calc 1 second semester. Many others had finished pre-Calc or AB.
I don’t know about other parts of the country, but here in the Bay Area, it’s pretty much the norm to track to BC by the time they are in 11th or 12th grade. So I can tell you that > 90% of the EECS admits to Berkeley will have taken BC and/or have taken the BC exam, and the majority will have gotten 5s.
Re: #9
UCB’s fall 2019 class schedule shows the following enrollments in lower level math courses:
MATH 1A: 1073 (3 lectures of 416, 380, 277)
MATH 1B: 784 (2 lectures of 404, 380)
MATH 53: 911 (2 lectures of 445, 466)
MATH 54: 874 (2 lectures of 426, 448)
MATH H54: 26
Note that this sequence is for those majoring in math-heavy majors (i.e. not biology, which uses the MATH 10A, 10B courses, or business, which uses the MATH 16A, 16B courses).
Note that the highest enrollment is in 1A, calculus 1 for those who have completed precalculus (most students are presumed to be frosh). 53 and 54 have substantial enrollment, but that is a combination of sophomores who completed 1B the previous year and frosh who earned 5 on AP calculus BC. Somewhat smaller enrollment is 1B, calculus 2, presumably mostly frosh who earned a 3 or higher on AP calculus AB or a 3-4 on AP calculus BC. H54 is the honors version of 54.
So the idea that “every” frosh at UCB has a 5 on AP calculus BC seems to be an exaggeration.
Professor was talking about EECS specifically and most of them probably did get a 5. Also even if you got a 4 or a 5, lot of kids retake Calculus to make sure they have at least one class where they’ll do ok in their first year.
the EECS 16A (applied Linear Algebra System Design/Circuits engineering class required for all CS majors, EECS or LSCS) class every Fall has 1000+ students, of which at least half the class are freshmen. In order to take the class as a freshman, all of them would have had to have already taken a year of actual college-level Calculus, which means for almost all of them, they would have to either gotten a 4 or 5 in Calc BC for the EECS students (or a 5 in Calc BC for the LSCS students).
The original point of the post was the premise that a majority of students applying to top Engineering schools will have taken Calc BC, and I think that is more or less true.
So another first time poster giving no info on the rest of his app. Nothing about the college targets or whether he/she has a suitable background for those, in the first place.
Taking AP calc now is ok. Not ideal, but it happens. Better, if there’s something about the high school’s tracking that limited him to precalc, last year.
A wise move, if OP has a decent profile for a competitive college (the works, incl other rigor, not so much fluff, and the right mix of ECs, etc,) may be to provide an LoR from this calc teacher.
Yes, it’s early in the school year. That assumes the teacher knows him well enough, maybe from prior years or somehow. Second choice might be the precalc teacher. Or, if he had AP in lab sci in junior year and did well, possibly that teacher. Someone who knows to write about intellectual traits and successes- not just amble on about ECs or “always has his homework ready.”
edited
However, if half of the 1,000 students are frosh, that is only about half of the 1,000 EECS + L&S CS students per year, indicating that there are many such students who do not take EE 16A in frosh year. Probably at least some of them do not have 5 on AP calculus BC, so it is not like “every” EECS or L&S CS frosh has that.
The vast majority of the freshmen taking that class are EECS majors. Once again you’re going off the track just to try and disprove something that means nothing to the conversation. EECS students can get a 4 on the BC exam and still skip the first 2 Calculus classes. The point here, once again, is that pretty much every admit for a top program like Berkeley’s EECS will have taken AP Calc BC and/or the exam, and I would say that would more or less be true for other top Engineering programs as well.