I am currently a sophomore in high school and have some questions regarding the importance of course selection. For my freshman and sophomore years I have taken mostly honors with the exception of 1 course sophomore year and 2 freshman year. This year my courses were, World History, Honors Chem, Honors Precalculus, Honors English 2, Honors Latin 3, Honors Engineering and Design, Honors Project Management, and Honors Computer Science 1. I currently am in the top 10% of my school, around 60 students with the lowest possible GPA of 100 (weighted). Junior year seems to me to be the most important because it defines your GPA and SAT/PSAT/ACT scores for college. For these reasons I feel that I need to take a less rigorous course load especially since I have extracurricular’s. My course selection right now (of 8 possible courses) is:
AP Calculus AB, AP Physics 1, U.S. History, AP English 3, AP Computer Science 2, Honors Robotics, and 2 off-blocks (no class). Since Robotics and my extracurricular’s will add on to my workload, I feel that taking 2 less classes than possible can free up more time to excel in my extracurricular’s and have more time in general to put into everything that I am doing. However, could this might be seen as slacking because other students of my caliber and better are taking only one or no off-blocks junior year nation-wide? How much of a impact does taking 2 less courses than other students make? Should I be concerned or add another course? Please advise.
I would continue with Latin…most top schools want to see you get to the 4th year of a foreign language. Instead of taking no class, can you take a fun class?
The prevailing wisdom seems to be that your junior year schedule should be your most-rigorous, and certainly not be perceived as a step down from your sophomore schedule. At the very least, as mentioned above, I would continue with Latin.
It depends on the schools you’re hoping for. If it’s top 100, one off block is okay. If top 50-ish, no off block. If you’re looking at a public directional, then it won’t matter.
If you’re aiming fo a top 50ish university/LAC, continue with Latin and take one “fun” class (choir? ceramics? current events?)
Latin 4 is a AP Course and I do not want to over load myself. Fun classes are not a option for me because I either need honors or AP or no course because on-level courses damage my GPA which hurts my chances for top 6-7% which grants me auto-admit to some state schools.
Maybe if you dont want to take Latin you can take hn history instead of adding another “easy” class; that way it will bring up your GPA and you’ll have 2 periods for the extra workload.
@iamnotironman I wish my school offered Honors U.S. My school offers AP or normal so I opted for normal because I don’t feel the need to arbitrarily take a AP just because it is a AP course.
This leads to my dilemma as well, most students end up with a B/C in AP Latin and our teacher is new at my school so nobody else has taken AP Latin 4 with her yet. If I take that class I could risk my class rank which means I lose some colleges.
Wait what field do you want to go into? If you’re interested in going to a technology school, you don’t need the 4 years. Like I know MIT only requires 2 years of a language. Also a lot of colleges are perfectly fine with 3 years.Maybe you can forget about Latin and take a random honors class. Or- you are already taking 3 sciences so if you are worried about stress it wouldnt be terrible if you left 2 classes open.