<p>I suck soo much on tests!!! omg. I keep getting only 3s and 4s on like all the AP tests I take...only one 5 on AP calc :[</p>
<p>Would this hurt me?</p>
<p>You self report your scores to MIT. AP scores aren’t looked at as much as SATs/ACTs. However, I wouldn’t say that they’re useless.</p>
<p>omg…i’m in the same situation as you…i only have one 5…in chinese…which is almost worse…cuz i’m half chinese.:D…but i have more 4s…and mainly 3s…</p>
<p>I have no AP scores to report save APUSH, because that’s all my school offers.</p>
<p>As stated, it’s self-reported, so it won’t hurt you if you did well but in all likelihood its impact on their final decision is negligible.</p>
<p>You can get into MIT with 1’s…chill out! ha.</p>
<p>I’ve heard that most top schools see AP scores as evidence of your being prepared to do college level work, and also as evidence of grade inflation at your school. (So if you got an A+ in an AP-level course but a 2 on the AP exam, that might imply grade inflation.) But I don’t think AP scores can really hurt you even if they’re low, since they show that you’ve challenged yourself.</p>
<p>“You can get into MIT with 1’s…chill out”</p>
<p>But thats like saying you can get into MIT with an 1800 SAT score…which can happen too.</p>
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<p>Though better is always… better, I think this is just something to remember: you’re probably doing fine.</p>
<p>AP scores aren’t that important.</p>
<p>i was wondering the same thing so i emailed yale about this and this is what they said:
“AP scores are only self-reported on the application, so they do not directly affect admissions in that we never get confirmation of these scores from the College Board until after an applicant gets in and matriculates. However, the taking of AP classes and exams is evidence of a student challenging himself/herself academically, which is something Yale highly values in an applicant. Hope this helps! If you have any more questions, feel free to write again!”</p>
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<p>That is not a valid comparison. You must take the SAT, but you do not have to take any AP tests.
If a person gets a 2300 on the SAT, we can safely say he did better, on the SAT atleast, than a person that got a 2200.</p>
<p>However, you cannot say the following for AP tests.</p>
<p>Consider a situation where Person A got 5 on Calculus BC, 5 on Physics B, 5 on Chemistry, and 4 on European History…so that is three 5s and one 4.</p>
<p>Now consider a situation where Person B got 5 on Calculus BC, 5 on Statistics, 5 on Macroeconomics, 5 on Microeconomics, 5 on United States History, 5 on World History, 5 on Physics B, and 3 on English Language, 3 on Chemistry…so that is seven 5s and two 3s.</p>
<p>How can you compare the two people? They took different tests, different number of tests, and while Person B got more 3s, he also got more 5s. Also, maybe they had different school situations where one offered more AP classes…or perhaps, for Person B, his 3s are more of a reflection of his teachers than himself.</p>
<p>There are so many situations to consider with AP tests that one cannot make a valid comparisons. Thus, it still carries weight, but I do believe that it is meant as something that can only help you.</p>
<p>I did not get the best AP scores this time, but I am still reporting all of them on my application because a 2 is still better than taking the class and not reporting the score (either due to not taking the test or because you were afraid to report a bad score).</p>
<p>I don’t think AP tests are the most important thing, and a bad score or two certainly will not kill an otherwise scintillating application. Nevertheless, think of it this way: schools are looking for ways to accept students, not to reject them. It’s not 2-3 slots we’re aiming to fill, where the focus would be rejecting students. It’s a good, large number, albeit not huge when we consider how many apply. But the point is that you probably want to focus on why MIT *would * admit you. Perhaps, and this is only a perhaps, a huge number of AP classes taken in school with, say good grades, along with mediocre AP scores, will not help convince MIT you appreciated your coursework. But if you can explain why your scores aren’t up to it, and prove the rigor of what you’ve been doing at school, and/or make your case, you should not be hurt unduly by these scores. </p>
<p>My message to you is that you should figure out why you’re good for MIT, and communicate. The poster above me might have a point in saying that not reporting any scores wouldn’t exactly help, because it would give MIT no information at all about a standardized assessment of your AP work. On the other hand, if you present scores and then make a case for yourself (not in the sense of sweating the AP scores, but rather in the sense of showing what you’ve been doing to prepare yourself for a rigorous program, you should be fine).</p>
<p>someone asked this question to a Stanford admissions officer (I’m aware this is the MIT forum but it might help) and she said, like someone above said, that since top schools rarely offer credit for AP classes, AP scores are used to judge the difficulty of your school’s grading. If you got 3’s but A’s in the classes, they would view your grades as somewhat inflated, according to her.</p>
<p>This is all I can say:
Good AP scores help
Mediocre AP scores do not hurt
Bad AP scores can call your school’s grading system into question ;)</p>
<p>Does self-studying Physics C E+M without a class and pulling a 5 off help?</p>
<p>Or a more general question, does self-studying show initiative, discipline and determination?</p>
<p>Of course it does. You should be sure to note self-studied classes in your application, especially if you have good AP scores to show for them.</p>
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<p>What if your class was still super hard but since the teacher never taught the AP part of the subject, you got really bad scores?</p>
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<p>I’m not sure what this means… most of my AP teachers didn’t teach to the AP exam, and I still got pretty decent scores. If you know a subject well, I’d think you’d probably do decently well on the AP exam, even if it’s not a 5.</p>
<p>Could be totally wrong.</p>
<p>^This is kind of hard to give an example, but hypothetically, let’s say you had a physics teacher that was a hard teacher, but he only taught certain things in physics.</p>
<p>Collegeboards says that a % of AP Physics B is mechanics, b % is optics, c % is waves, d % is electromagnetism…and so forth.</p>
<p>Well, let’s say the physics teacher only taught the mechanics and optics sections, and he did not teach waves, electricity + magnetism, and so forth…</p>
<p>However, he graded really hard for each mechanics and optics test, so people in the class got like Bs and lower. However, the best students still got As.</p>
<p>Now, for the AP test, those students do really well on mechanics and optics, but since they have never even learned the other sections, they don’t do well on those sections, such as eletricity and magnetism. Thus, they get like 2s and 3s on their AP test (even the best students), but it wasn’t like their class had grade inflation.</p>
<p>Obviously, one can argue that those students could have studied in their free time. However, many of those students might not have known that the teacher did not cover sections that were on the AP test (they thought that the only things on the AP test were mechanics and optics), or they had other classes to study for, or perhaps, they knew but most students learn a lot better with a teacher helping them instead of self-studying.</p>
<p>So that’s what I kind of meant by that response. I see a lot of people saying that low AP scores must equal grade inflation at that person’s school.</p>
<p>However, I don’t think it’s always the case. I know a lot of people that don’t get as high not because the students thrive on grade inflation, but they make the best opportunity of the situation that they are given, but since they aren’t given a situation like the students at top high school’s, they may not get as high AP scores, but for their school, they still get very high AP scores.</p>
<p>Low AP scores/high grades could mean more than just grade inflation. My hypothetical example above involving the A students/2 or 3s on the AP test is just an example of how that is not a result of grade inflation.</p>