<p>Does anyone have any sense of how admissions officers look upon college credits during high school as attempt to take the most rigorous possible academic load if AP courses are simply not offered (small school, less than 50/class)? Is this something a guidance counselor would need to specifically address in a recommendation in order for it to be understood for what it was intended?</p>
<p>If your school does not offer many AP courses or none at all, then your GC simply needs to explain it in the school profile. Usually, school profiles include information about the school's requirements and offerings.
If you have the opportunity to take college courses, by all means do so. Ordinarily, colleges prefer students to take AP classes as these have a well defined curriculum and the AP exams serve to compare students nation-wide. You do have the option of taking college courses AND taking the AP exam (my S did so for Bio), but if you are a senior, the exam score will come too late to be considered for admission (however, you may be able to get credit and/or placement) at your college if you do well.</p>
<p>Thanks Marite.</p>
<p>So colleges are more apt to award credit or placement based on AP results than college courses? </p>
<p>Does it make a difference which college the courses are taken at (not that any local choice is highly ranked, but one option is a community college and other is a very small, third-tier masters university and I am not sure if either one has an edge)</p>
<p>
[quote]
So colleges are more apt to award credit or placement based on AP results than college courses?
[/quote]
It depends on the college and on whether it is a part of a dual credit system as with the UC. But , otherwise, the answer is yes, credit is more likely to be given for a good AP score. However, a student may be placed into a more advanced class if /she has taken a college course in the subject. For example, my S took Multivariable Calculus and Linear Algebra in college. He will not be asked to repeat those courses, but will not receive credit for them--even though he will be attending the very university where he took the courses!</p>
<p>As for the community college/third tier university, I do not think it will make a difference. You should choose on the basis of the quality of the teacher and, if it is a consideration, convenience of schedule and commute.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So colleges are more apt to award credit or placement based on AP results than college courses?
[/quote]
It depends. D's very selective LAC gave her a semester of calc credit for AP score (taken junior year) and another semester of calc credit for the community college calc class she took her senior year. A friend with the same preparation was not given credit for the cc calc class at a less selective LAC. Go figure. Check things out with the individual departments of those schools you are interest in. Originally the registrar had given her 3 semesters of credit, which she knew had to be incorrect. She talked to the dept. chair and through investigating all syllabi, it was determined she'd had about 2.5 semesters worth of the material, which placed her in Calc III with an easy time at the beginning.</p>
<p>Cross-post with marite (like minds?).</p>
<p>Just to elaborate a bit on what Maize&Blue and I have written, we need to distinguish between credit and placement. With enough credits, a student can graduate earlier, provided that the college offers the possibility of Advanced Standing. My S#1's LAC did not offer that. My S#2 was notified he is eligible at his university, based entirely on his APs rather than the courses he has taken at said university. With or without Advanced Standing, good AP scores allow a student to place into more advanced courses or to satisfy distribution requirements; this also applies to college courses. Without Advanced Standing, however, a student will need to spend all four years in college instead of possibly graduating in three.
So a good question to ask would be whether college courses would count toward credit or only placement.</p>
<p>Interesting. Apparently there is no predictable pattern. But, would you both agree that even if the ultimately selected college did not even grant a placement advantage (let alone credit), there are the dual advantages of (a) having a more stimulating year and (b) becoming a more attractive applicant in the admissions process? (there is a concern because the distance to either college is significant and the student has to get back to the high school at the end of the day for sports every season of the year and if there is no practical advantage whatsoever, it makes you wonder if it is worthwhile).</p>
<p>Some additional points. We're in the process of finding out which of our S's college courses will be accepted through transfer at his school this year. I realize that policies around transfers in particular vary by school, so this may not apply everywhere. We have a lot of courses to work through, so we're seeing a variety of things.</p>
<p>The biggest issue we ran into was his college level Calc II class which didn't include all the material that the AP course would have. It wasn't accepted for transfer and he gets to take the course over.</p>
<p>Courses outside his major were accepted more readily than ones within it. A general requirement like Biology was pretty automatic, where they poured over classes in the major that were key prerequisites. In this, they were really trying to make sure the students were prepared for the courses they were going to enroll in, so we're grateful.</p>
<p>There's less work getting a transfer accepted from some schools than others. For instance there's a formal policy for course transfer within our state university system. No questions would have been asked if he gone to our major state U. The school my S is going to,1200 miles away, required course descriptions and syllabi to explain what was taught in them, a pretty big burden given how many college classes he took. If your student does take college courses, keep the syllabi!</p>
<p>Finally, in our case, we found that the classes taught in some areas were vastly different between the two schools. If our S had taken AP history courses, he would have received general elective credit, but because there was no corresponding courses for the specific courses he took, he didn't get any.</p>
<p>Right about now, I've got to believe that AP credit is easier than what we've gone through, though I can't say which really prepares the student better.</p>
<p>I started my post before your second post Marite. Your last statement "So a good question to ask would be whether college courses would count toward credit or only placement" almost infers that most colleges will give SOME sort of recognition - pending satisfactory performance. Even if the credits are from a third-tier college. Has that been your observation? [This student is in the not unusual position of having to decide to enroll for the courses or not, before knowing at all what colleges she is interested in and how they might treat her college coursework]</p>
<p>Ohmadre:</p>
<p>It really depends on the college course whether it will be more stimulating than an AP course; and it also depends on the quality of the AP course and the teacher. Despite the common curriculum, not all AP courses are of equal quality, hence the huge variations on AP exams. Several years back, the AP-Biology teacher (with a Ph.D.) was so awful (according to S's friends) that many of them opted to go to the Extension School for introductory Biology. After that teacher was not renewed, a new AP-Bio teacher was hired (without Ph.D.) and received raves from students. They stopped going en masse to the evening classes.
Some community colleges cater to students in need of remedial education--which is not the case for AP classes, and some maintain a high level of excellence. You would have to judge for yourself whether the class is worth the inconvenience. Strick is right also, that college courses do not always cover everything that's on the AP curriculum, so you'd want to investigate that.</p>
<p>Strick:
We kept a catalog description of each of the college courses my S took and sent the list along.</p>
<p>Some schools do not offer credit nor placement for some AP course exams. Stanford, for one, has been dropping AP courses from its approved list for the last two years. While I haven't had any students dealing with this at Stanford, I have had a couple run into these policies at their schools regarding AP Stats. In each case, they spoke with a department representative as incoming freshmen, made a deal to take the final exam for intro stats, and passed with flying colors. Credit earned. For the OP, he/she should be taking college coursework if no AP is offered to demonstrate strength of schedule. As for credits/placement, I advocate discussing the particular situation with the department advisor and not depend on the course catalog and registrar.</p>
<p>Lots of helpful information here. Thanks.</p>
<p>Some more comments, inspired by M&B's. It really depends on individual college what AP course it will grant credit for, and what scores. Some will give only half (semester) credit others full (year-long) credit for the same AP course; some will give credit only for scores of 5 across the board, some will give credit for 5s in some subjects and 4s in others; still others will accept scores of 3 or 4 as well as 5.</p>
<p>I have seen the discrepancies in treatment of AP scores - they are wide and varied- and also the perhaps growing trend to stop giving any credit for AP. They were an option for my child and were treated quite differently from one school to another. </p>
<p>I was not sure whether or not college courses would a good "next best" option where APs are not available. Even if they only demonstrate strength of schedule, apparently they are. But from what I have read here, in order to maximize the results of the effort, one of the criteria in selecting which college courses to take, within the limitations of availability, might be whether or not an AP exam is offered in that subject. And one of up-front issues to determine in building a college list is how/if, college courses afford credit/placement.</p>
<p>One more thing to consider: many colleges do not transfer any credits "counted towards high school diploma" - i.e. even within a state system, a high-schooler will not get any credits at such school, and a transfer student will get credits for the very same classes.</p>
<p>Ohmadre:</p>
<p>Not all AP courses are considered equal. For example, not many of the more selective colleges give credit for AP-Govt& Politics, Comp Sci A, Environmental Science, and the likes. They are more likely to give credit for the more core courses; but Princeton will only give half credit for AP-USH or AP-Euro.
Whether your child takes an AP or college course will definitely help with applications. Whether s/he wants it to count for more than that will be a different matter. At HYP, it's been shown that many students who are eligible for Advanced Standing don't take it up. They use their credits to go abroad, take more electives and/or courses in their majors, double major, etc...</p>
<p>"At HYP, it's been shown that many students who are eligible for Advanced Standing don't take it up. They use their credits to go abroad, take more electives and/or courses in their majors, double major, etc..."</p>
<p>I've noticed that too. May be safe to say very few take it up. Its hard to enought fulfill core-type requirements, double major and go abroad in four years as it is. Advanced standing just cuts into that. The student I describe here might actually like advanced standing though - its hard to know - definitely finances will be a big issue and if some of the course credit can be essentially free, all the better. On the other hand, if she wants and gets into a need-blind school, I think she will be entitled to substantial, non-loan aid. She is going to have to come up with a list of schools that address a variety of scenarios. Thrown into the mix is the possibility of athletic recruitment. I unfortunately don't see athletic scholarship as a possiblity though. But if she is recruited as an athelete, I don't know if she would be required/strongly encouraged, to enroll for 4 years. I guess she is charting the right course for now by enrolling in the college courses - they won't cost her anything more than time and a complicated schedule.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Strick:
We kept a catalog description of each of the college courses my S took and sent the list along.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That was the easy part since it was all available online. A few quick cut and pastes and that was together. The advisor wanted syllabi that described the course work, textbook and chapters, etc. Our S was more organized than usual, but syllabi were still in three or four locations and we never found two or three of them. We made two copies of the entire set and are sending one in an organized folder(!) with our S since we've only been through the first round. He's still got transfers more to negotiate.</p>
<p>BTW, in our case, the university gives him full transfer credit, but it won't count toward standing until he's within enough hours to be considered a senior. What that means is that no matter how many hours he has in total, only the hours he's taken at the school count toward his classification. That means as a "freshman" with 30+ hours, he'll be one of the last students to register for sophomore level classess, and as a "sophomore" one of the last for junior level classes.</p>
<p>"That means as a "freshman" with 30+ hours, he'll be one of the last students to register for sophomore level classess, and as a "sophomore" one of the last for junior level classes". Had never considered that aspect. He is still ahead of the game but until classes get more specialized, toward the bottom, senority-wise, of the next level? It should pay off more as he starts taking more advanced courses in his field(s) of concentration I would hope.</p>