<p>Hahahaha… Exactly, but it was his next step. :-)</p>
<p>I don’t have time to take Cal BC, I could take it second semester (have block schedule) but I don’t have enough room in my schedule. I’m already taking World Religions over the summer to take AP Physics I couldn’t choose so I just chose both :)</p>
<p>AP Physics is good. My son took that too. He thought AP Chemistry was the toughest class he took. AP Physics was a close second. Good luck!</p>
<p>I took AP Chemistry and it was hard. Solution Stoichiometry sucks, same with equilibrium. That is why I am scared about taking AP Physics but it’ll look really good on my application. On every AP Class I took so far I recieved an A in every course and I want it to continue that way haha.</p>
<p>Keep it up! You’re on your way. Physics is very hard (lots of hard work) but you can do it! How did you do on the exams? My son actually took 13 AP classes (I know, crazy), but the credits are coming in handy for college next year.</p>
<p>I’ll have completed 8 AP by the end of my senior year (definitely not 13! Haha). What school is he going to? For AP Chem I recieved a 2 (my teacher didnt prep us for the test haha). I’m recieving my AP Bio and AP English results soon and I didn’t take the APUSH exam because 1. I didn’t have enough money and 2. when I did and had the chance to take the APUSH, the girl sold that test for my AP Biology one that she forgot to order.</p>
<p>The AP Chem test is tough. There are many that don’t do well on that one. I hear you on the money for the tests. It cost almost $500 dollar this year for my son! He took 3 freshman year, 5 junior year and 5 senior year. Don’t compare yourself to my son. He’s the exception, not the rule. He’s a National AP Scholar so he did very well on all of his tests. He is going to UC Berkeley for engineering. He got into UCLA, UCSD, UCSB, and Harvey Mudd. He was waitlisted at Columbia and MIT. In the end, he decided he wanted to stay in state so he chose Berkeley. Go Bears!</p>
<p>At least he got into the best public school in the United States (in my opinion). Berkeley is a very very good school, congrats. I always try to take the most challenging classes but my school only offers 12 AP and some I can’t take because they’re either sophomore AP courses (world history, they barely put that on this year) and language AP courses like French and Spanish (I’m only up to Spanish 4).</p>
<p>You are doing just fine… Just do your best because that’s really all you can do. I’ve got three kids who will all be in college next year. The one thing I learned is that admission to the top schools is a crap shoot. Every year strange things happen with admission. Work on your essays, pursue things you really enjoy, do your best and most importantly, ENJOY YOUR SENIOR YEAR!!! It only happens once. As for my son, he only applied to those 7 schools. He wasn’t interested in the Ivy League and he didn’t like Stanford. haha… He is actually a very talented athlete and was recruited to play his sport at MIT and Harvey Mudd (as well as others), but in the end, he found Berkeley to be the best fit. He’s smart, but he wants the whole experience (ie. FOOTBALL GAMES!). Glad to hear you respect Berkeley. Their engineering school is really, really good (ranked #2 in the country) so my son was really excited to get in. Where do you want to go?</p>
<p>That’s cool, I want to go to the George Washington University. I plan on majoring in International Relations in Foreign Affairs with a concentration of Asian studies to learn Chinese (and Spanish) and also minor in dance.</p>
<p>Okay, well you know what you need to do… You can do it!!! Best of luck to you. Have a great summer and a super senior year. :-)</p>
<p>Q1: My only question is whether I should find a way to take calculus
A1: Yes. Definitely.</p>
<p>Q2: if so; are there any routes that you would recommend where I could take precalculus outside of school.
A2: Go to a Community College. I am in CA and both my kids finished K-12 in the CA public school system. It used to be easier to take classes at a local CC. But I got the impression that high schools want to keep their students (more students in a class = more fund), they might not give you the HS release form if the class (that you want to take in a CC) is offered in your high school, plus they cap the maximum credits a student can transfer over from a CC to his/her HS transcript. One way is to take classes at a CC in the Summer, but I don’t know if you can still get all the paper work …etc done as most school offices are closed and there is registration deadline at CC. (But, one advantage is you are a freshman going into sophomore, there is still time for you to work on this option. In my area, a student needs his/her HS to give him/her a release form, take it to the local CC, take an assessment, if he/she passes the assessment, apply to the CC, register for class/es. The student goes thru the processes (minus the assessment) next time/semester he/she wants to take class/es in the CC.) Never mind about not being able to transfer all the credits over. When doing your college applications, you can report classes that you take outside of your HS, and you can send your CC transcript to them. Also, most CC classes are considered Honors or AP classes and got weighted. That is, if you do well, you raise your GPA, unfortunately, the opposite is also true.</p>
<p>You mentioned you want to go for top UCs and schools, then go for the “top” curriculum your school offers and beyond. Taking AP Calculus (BC if possible) and do well in it are definite pluses. Both my kids took AP Calculus BC in their school and Multi-variable Calculus in our local CC. I cannot say for sure these helped them got accepted by some of the “top” schools you mentioned (and more). But numerous times have I read and heard that colleges want you to challenge yourself and do your best. So, don’t let your HS stop you. Go for whatever you can (say, taking a class and its prerequisite class simultaneously. Of course, you need to prove to the teacher/admin that you are capable of such task) and want to. If your school is not too responsive to your request, ask your parent(s) to talk with them. Wow, it’s a long reply, thanks for your patience. Good luck.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice I will definitely look into community college.</p>