I will be a sophomore in high school next year. My schedule is as follows.
English 2
Math 3
Ap European History
Ap Chemistry
French 2
Band
I would like to not have a study hall so I could take Personal Finance sophomore year. Any suggestions?
Does your school require a study hall? If so you need to go by your school rules no matter what anyone here suggests. Otherwise it may be up to you. At our high school only kids struggling academically can take study hall so a typical sophomore would be taking 7 classes.
I would say for college bound sophomores your schedule is pretty typical at our school.
This is common for 10 graders here
English 2 honors or AP ELA
MATh 3 honors or precalculus honors if advanced
US History 2 honors or APUSH
Chemistry honors or AP Bio (biology H is taken in 9th grade)
language 2 h (perhaps 3 or native speaker etc)
art/music/business/technology class (need 2 credits for graduation)
gym/gym or gym/health (1 semester each so some opt for a 1 semester elective) - need 3 gym 1 health for graduation
Study hall is neutral from a college admissions standpoint. We have high performing students who take one and we have high performing students who don’t. If your high school permits you to skip a study hall and you want to get the personal finance requirement out of the way, go for it. Your schedule seems reasonable enough.
The only thing is that I would like to take AP French senior year and if I don’t drop study hall sophomore year I won’t be able to do that.
You should not have a year’s gap in foreign language, so don’t drop French 2 regardless. The schedule seems reasonable as is. Is AP Chem typical for sophs at your HS?
AP Chem is not a standard course. I am taking it because I would like to major in medicine. I do not want to drop french 2, I would just like to drop a study hall so that i can take personal finance, which would give me room to take AP French senior year
Have you had a regular HS chem class? Taking AP Chem with no chem background may put you on a steep learning curve and impact your GPA.
If you don’t need a study hall, don’t take a study hall. 7 courses for a sophomore attending a school on a semester system is pretty typical.
It would probably better for you to take Honors chem before you take AP chem. Then take Physics and then either AP Chem or AP Bio. It is better to not take a course that you may not do better in. If most of your classmates took Honors Chem befoer AP Chem you will be an disadvantage.
Also if you are pre-med. medical schools won’t let you have AP credit for Bio/Chem/Physics You will need to take the classes in college.
You need chemistry honors before AP chemistry.
If you want to be pre-med, you’d take biology, chemistry in 9th and 10th. Then physics honors and AP Bio junior year. The AP chemistry (one of the hardest AP classes) senior year. Other possibilities: physics and chemistry in 10th, AP Bio in 11th, AP chem in 12th.