College Calculus in High School

<p>Here's the thing. I'm a freshman at my high school taking precalc. I was going to be taking honors precalc, but my counselor said no because I am already taking AP World History and Honors Bio. Because I'm taking regular precalc, I have to take AP Calc AB skipping AB to BC. </p>

<p>But a friend I was talking said I should take Calc at the local community college over the summer. He told me this would let me skip AB and BC (will it?) letting me go to either AP Stat or AP Com Sci. I will also be taking summer school to finish up an easy grad requirement. </p>

<p>Is college a lot harder than regular precalc or calc at high school?
And have anyone you done this and know if Calc boosts GPA.
Also, I will be having a of studying to do over the summer. I have to test out of English 10 (or whatever its actually name is) to take AP Comp and Lit. English 10 isn't too bad. I also want to take AP Micro-Macro, instead of USH or APUSH (you need to complete one of those to graduate). So, A couple of friends and I are studying over the summer. I also need to study to test out of Spanish 2, which is easy.</p>

<p>This also leads me to my second question:
Is to-be sophomore schedule too hard?
Science- AP Bio: Pretty much tortue like any other school
Social Studies- AP Micro-Macro: Simple and fun.
English- AP Comp and Lit: pretty fun in our school. Don't know about how hard it is though.
Math- AP Com Sci(if it all works out): Hard and challenging.
Foreign Language- Spanish 3- if i pass.
Elective- some blowoff class.</p>

<p>In terms of the curriculum, calculus at a community college is roughly equivalent to AP Calculus, however the pacing may or may not be different (some HS’s including mine are slower and do AB in one year, most places do the equivalent of AB in 1 semester, and some colleges do the equivalent of AB and BC in one semester). May or may not be significantly harder.</p>

<p>Slow down. Your plan seems to be one of avoiding high school. Engage at high school. Community College and self study are overrated. Take advantage of what your high school has to offer. The notion that an Elective is easy and a blowoff is unfortunate. You may well end up with a confusing transcript when it comes time to apply to college, and selective colleges may well pass on you regardless of your stats.</p>

<p>You ask at one point is “college math a lot harder than high school math”? If your comparison is with a local community college than think about the level of the students at the college. But if your comparison is with a rigorous and selective college than “harder” may well be an understatement.</p>

<p>College calculus, especially in the summer, is going to be much faster paced - think about 1 week worth of HS calc in a day, or 2-3 days of AP Calc AB in a day. Don’t plan to take another class unless you’re absolutely sure it’ll be easy for you, and don’t take more than 2 (you will not be able to take USH, calc, and spanish during a summer session, although you may spread it over two summer sessions. Be aware that typically one semester of college language = 2 years of HS language although it tends to be less so in the summer due to the compressed nature of the class. You may take College Spanish 1 summer session 1, and College Spanish 2 summer session 2, then enroll directly into Spanish 4 at your high school, something that would look good but is going to require serious commitment on your part unless you’re a heritage speaker).
Community college calculus may come as “regular” and “honors” and I would advise taking CalcI “regular” because going from regular HS precalc to college calc, honors, would be too much to bridge. It’ll allow you to bypass Calc AB, but not calc BC. Then you’ll either take Calc II at the community college or Calc BC.
Do you intend to study math or natural sciences at the college level or would you be studying languages, social sciences, humanities?
Right now though colleges would see you go through your requirements without a plan (except getting rid of them). What subjects fascinate you? What electives would you take “just for fun”? Is there something you know nothing about that you could take?</p>

<p>You are already ahead of a lot of people your age so don’t worry about going too slow. Enjoy hs!</p>