Does your kid’s high school even allow omitting senior English class? That isn’t a thing here.
Yes he took English I in 8th grade and finishes English 4 in 11th, I thought that would be awesome letting him explore other stuff or devote time to areas which will be challenges in college.
But now reading into admissions stuff, I’m more worried.
I should clarify I’m in NC and not Maryland, In NC kids can test into Algebra (Math I) or English I in 8th grade.
Unfortunately, neither of the lists below mentions how it is handled if a year of high school course work is “missing” due to having been taken while in middle school:
https://www.northcarolina.edu/prospective-students/minimum-admission-requirements
https://admissions.unc.edu/minimum-course-requirements/
You probably need to ask the colleges of interest directly.
In NC, English I and Math I are definitely on high school transcript and counselors make clear this HS graduation requirement is met. But in this crazy “rigor” race, I’m not sure if the expectation is that then they advance into a 5th year collegiate level. I don’t think of a speech and debate elective as slacking and a really useful skill my son should build and he seems interested in it. Maybe I will ask about this as we go see more colleges in the coming months.
Statistics is math. Every college will look at it that way. If she has completed Calc BC she is is qualified for every college, including CalTech which requires Calc BC in HS.
I don’t how your AP Lang & Comp class is, but I will say that my son has learned more in debate and speech class than any English class including AP Lang. A good debate class should teach students how to properly research a topic and argue both sides of an issue. This type of critical thinking skill is sorely missing in a lot of students. It also helps students become comfortable with public speaking. Debate is considered an English elective at his school. DS has taken speech & debate all fours years, but he has 3 friends who are taking the class as seniors. They are really enjoying the class.
Debate, speech, and film all frequently fall within the “English” department. I don’t foresee a problem.
Sahmkc, totally agree. I personally think it should be core curriculum. Anything that removes the multiple choice crutch and forces a kid to think and support his position and defend it through persuasive communication is a kid that has an invaluable foundation skill. I really hope what I am reading on “rigor” isn’t all about advancing into collegiate level classes.
@Duchesslt Unfortunately a lot of AP focus on teaching to the test instead of that critical thinking component. My DD is in regular US history (GASP!), her teacher gives 100% essay/free response questions on tests and I would say that she is learning more about US History than if she were in APUSH where it is focused on passing the test.
Couldn’t agree more. It’s a sad people think that AP is the gold standard to measure collegiate readiness or subject mastery. It’s great to be exposed to some of these courses because the material is quite aligned with what you’d be attacking in frosh/soph college - but a lot of those multiple choice test questions are ridiculous and reward weird test taking abilities.
I just scratched my head staring at an APUSH question asking the student to interpret an obscure 19th century painting trying to measure if a kid understood the various political schools of thought during and after the civil war. It was pretentious and weird!
Even better is when you look at the AP numbers and see how many kids get a 1 or 2…which means they have not at all mastered the material. I’d rather my child take a college prep level class and actually learn something and keep the stress level down.
ucb, we knew kids who headed to UMD for math courses in HS, after exhausting DiffEq, Complex Analysis, LIn Alg, etc. at a STEM program. We worried that UMD would frown on S1’s college app because a full year if Alg II is required for HS graduation and he didn’t take it.
At least in MD, one has to take English all four years. No exceptions. Finished AP Lang and Ap Lit? Take another Lit class. Take a speech/debate class. Take creative writing.
@Veryapparent , just wonder how her buddy is doing at MIT academically?
He is knocking it out of the park. We just visited him. He already has a job with Microsoft for the summer and is doing some kind of project in Japan in the spring. He is totally in his happy place.