Choosing between AP English vs. English IV Honors ACP

Parents Forum
1

I don’t care about getting college credit or saving tuition money. I’m most concerned about how it looks when I apply to college if I’m seen as taking rigorous courses. What should I take?

2

What is ACP?

3

We’re gonna need more info. What classes will you be taking with this English course? 1 AP? 5 APs?

The general advice is to take the number of APs you can handle while being honest with yourself and realizing that it’s senior year and what your strengths/weaknesses are.

4

Since I’ve never heard of ACP, I’ll vote for AP as better for your college application.

5

Looks like ACP may be dual enrollment in the high school through Indiana University: https://acp.iu.edu/current-students/courses.html

6

^I think ACP is something like College Prep English 4 in HS. But I’m not sure if it’s “honors” or not.

7

AP vs Dual Enrollment

AP

  1. AP tests are well known nationally and are uniform across the nation
  2. You can look on any college’s website and see what credit you will get for what scores on the AP tests
  3. AP Courses are given at your High School

DE

  1. There are more of a variety of DE courses available at a CC
  2. DE courses will count for your college GPA…make sure to do well.
  3. Private and Out of State Colleges may or may not give you credit. They may not give credit for courses taken to fulfill HS requirements. You do not know what credit you can get ahead of time.
  4. Public In-state schools will give you credit for DE courses. You may be able to get up to 2 years of credits.
  5. DE classes may be taken at the local Community College…how will transportation work?
  6. For DE classes, the “grade” doesn’t rely on one test on one day but over a whole semester.

I think for “Rigor” both are most rigorous.

8

I think either would be fine. Both my kids opted to take English electives senior year because they liked the reading lists better. They weren’t even weighted for honors, but they got A+s and actually enjoyed English class senior year. They both got into highly selective universities (including Harvard for the older one.) They had lots of other APs and state level awards in science related activities.

9

What would the rest of your schedule look like?

10

I don’t think we can answer this without more info. What other courses are you taking? What are your current interests and goals for college (which can change, but a snapshot). What are your extracurriculars (for instance, if you are very active and accomplished outside of school in some area, like the arts, selective schools will understand a lower level course choice and you can write a note).

I also don’t know what Honors ACP is :slight_smile: