My S will be completing pre calculus honors this summer. Should he take AP calculus AB or BC for his 10th grade? Is he better off taking AB 10th and BC 11th ? If he goes straight to BC then he would have no other math classes to take so I don’t know if colleges will frown on him not having any math classes beyond 10th grade. I realize BC incorporates AB into the class so I’m just curious which is the better option as far as colleges are concerned.
If he is 2 grades ahead in math in 9th grade, and uses the summer to get 3 grades ahead by 10th grade, it is hard to see why he would need to take the slower-paced calculus AB course. Someone that advanced in math will probably find calculus BC to be an easy A.
Completion of calculus BC early should not be an issue for admission at many colleges, since it is the usual highest level that can be reasonably expected. However, if he is really into math, you may want to investigate whether he can take more advanced math at a local college, or other math enrichment activities (whether an official course or not) after he completes calculus BC. For example, the Art of Problem Solving courses on number theory, probability, and group theory may be of interest. Or he can try a more rigorous treatment of calculus by reading and doing problems from Caltech’s Ma 1a course notes available on the web.
https://www.artofproblemsolving.com/school/catalog
http://www.math.caltech.edu/~2014-15/1term/ma001a/
@moscott what does his guidance counselor advise? What does his current math teacher recommend? I would think he should take the class that would be the most challenging. Like you mentioned, there is a lot of overlap with AB and BC. First half of the year is pretty much the same material. I haven’t heard of anyone taking AP calculus AB and then taking BC. It’s usually one or the other, but I could be wrong. Maybe he can supplement no math with math at a college for junior/senior years? Maybe he should contact a college admissions dept. and just pose the question. My S has done that and they have been more then helpful.
@ucbalumnus Thanks so you would say BC. His intended major is CS…would those courses be useful or is there something else he should look into?
@pkchamp89 Tbh his guidance counselor is of no help relying on me to set his courses. Sounds like you recommend BC as well. While he “technically” has a math teacher he actually is self taught using FLVS. He has no interaction(once per month) with a teacher whatsoever. Checking with the colleges seems like a great idea moving forward. Thanks.
CS major degree programs typically require (beyond single variable calculus that is covered in calculus BC) linear algebra, discrete math, and probability theory. Engineering based CS major degree programs would also require multivariable calculus and differential equations.
For CS theory or cryptography, practice in rigorous proof-based math, including abstract algebra (e.g. group theory) and number theory, is useful.
Different schools do it differently. Some teach AB topics Y1 followed by BC topics Y2. Others teach both the AB and BC topics in one year. There is no standard.
Anyway, getting back to the original question.
As a potential CS major, why, yes they will. And more importantly, I can’t imagine that your son would be satisfied not having math for 2 years. I absolutely concur with @ucbalumnus that there are other avenues that one can explore for advanced math if none exist at DS’s school.
@skieurope May I ask what potential effect will these other avenues have on his gpa?
Both D and S took AB and then BC. Well, in reality they took AB and then CC Calculus II and self studied for BC - school didn’t offer BC. They both wanted to poke their eyes out at the slow pace of the Calc II class after having taken AB.
I would recommend to just take the BC unless you have a school where you need to take AB first (where they don’t teach the AB material in BC).
That’s a HS specific question. I think I know where you might be going with the question - some HS’s don;t weight outside courses. Well, that’s not a reason not to take advanced math. Since there is not standard weighting scheme for US HS’s (mine weighted no classes), many colleges focus on UW GPA more than WGPA, or assign their own weights. So as long as he get’s A’s, there’s no worries. 
You want math all four years. Agree with ucbalumnus, if he is math kid, he should go directly to BC. My current CS student had BC Calc as soph in HS but they also offered Multivariable and Differential Equations for after BC, then of course there is AP Stats to plug a math space (and will be easy for many math kids), but it is also good to stay in the “practice of calc” according to an AD we talked to, so maybe DE at a CC in a calc class there? Sounds like you need to rely on some college or online courses (since he seems successful at being self taught online may work) if you need to fill math the next two years, but any admissions person in engineering wants to see math all four years. Also, he was able to bypass a few math classes and started at Calc 3 in college, allowing him to add math as a double major with CS a bit easier. Talking to a college engineering/science department is great advice.
My CS kid to BC Calc as a junior. There ended up being five kids like him and they offered a Linear Algebra class. We’d have looked for an online class if that hadn’t worked out. You can see what sort of math is typically asked for in a CS program here: https://www.csd.cs.cmu.edu/content/bachelors-curriculum-admitted-2014
Thanks for all the great advice everyone. I will definitely look at other options available beyond BC but the concensus seems BC is the next step.
what’s the rush of taking Precalc this summer? Why not do something else, instead, and take Precalc next year in HS?
^^agree. Expanding his horizons could be a great option. A zillion CS kids come in with top math creds, (which he will have regardless of when he does precalc) maybe he could do something new or that he likes that would make him more interesting and well rounded, while having more fun than he would in a summer of pre-calc…also if they start burning both ends by being all academics/all the time, before sophomore year, junior year could be fry time. It’s a long haul, not a race. Unless of course, he just looooooves math.
BC might be hard… especially since your son is rushing through Pre-Calc and is skipping the fundamentals learned in AB that are applied to BC.
My son jumped ahead from pre calc to BC calc. If he is strong in math it should be no problem. His school does not offer any other calc classes after BC calc.
I wouldn’t say he is “rushing” thru pre calculus this summer. To be more specific he started the course 2 weeks ago but is about 1/3 thru at this point. He will finish most likely right when school ends in June. He is also starting AP English language. It’s quite complicated but the long and short of it is he is a recruited athlete in football so doing the courses now allows him more time during the school year. He spends most of the summer doing football workouts at the HS but we also travel to camps. He will be going to Princeton and Dartmouth football camps this summer as well as a TSA National competition thus getting 2 courses out of the way now helps alot.
yeah, I get football time requirements. But what I don’t understand is to rush thru math to take the one of most difficult HS courses available (Calc) during…wait for it…fall football. Huh?
Plus, there is a risk…by taking PreCalc over the summer, it will have to skip certain items. Perhaps they are not necessary, but it would seem to me taking PreCalc at a slower pace during the year would only be a better foundation for Calc and enable a ‘better’ grade.
What about another course? Why math?
Just my $0.02
Protect that brain. Watch those concussions. Good job getting him appropriate classes.
That’s just the path he was already on in math and English. He’s just doing it now instead of during the school year as I said. We started football practice last week…have our spring game on May 20…then summer workouts and camps then when school starts he has 5 classes at school and 2 are finished. This allows him to start school 3rd period which equals alot more rest vs 7am-8pm school days and 7am-midnight Fridays during football.