I’m a junior looking to go to the upper ivies (HYPWS) for business/economics and am deciding on whether I should take AP Lit or English 41 next year. I took AP Lang/Comp this year and currently have an A among other rigorous AP classes. I genuinely enjoy reading, but I had so many other responsibilities (Other classes, athletics, ECs) that I found myself resorting solely to cliffnotes for the majority of books I had to read.
This hasn’t affected my grade, but I’m not sure if I should still take AP Lit next year because of my similar schedule next year but am worried that the top colleges will see English 41 as not taking the best classes available to me and see it as me not having a love for learning. Will opting for 41 hurt my chances of admission?
–I don’t think anyone here even knows what English 41 at your particular HS is.
–Typically one more or less AP won’t matter a ton. The person to talk to is your HS guidance counselor. Any top school will want to see that the guidance counselor has checked the box saying you have taken the most rigorous schedule available at the HS in his/her recommendation. You need to check if your proposed schedule without AP Lit would be sufficiently rigorous for that box to be checked off.
–The idea of a “upper Ivy” is almost silly given today’s competitive environment. The typical acceptance rates for all Ivy is under 10% (with the exception of Cornell at 14%) making admission to any one of them exceedingly difficult.
–W and S are not Ivy League schools. It doesn’t make those schools any less desirable, but they are not Ivy League so be careful with your nomenclature.
Resorting to Cliff Notes hints maybe an Ivy isn’t your ideal "it’ school. I don’t object to them, but to the notion you relied on them solely.
You want humanities. Ivy adcoms will scroll down the transcript looking for 2 prime AP history and 2 AP English, Lang and Lit. If you were hoping STEM, would you ask if it’s ok to skip an AP math-sci class, your schedule is busy?
And not all the Ivies have an undergrad business major.
If this is a real question, I’m curious: just what else have you packed your schedule with? Hope it’s not a string of the non-core APs, thinking it’s the quantity that matters. It’s not.
If you didn’t have time to read the books in AP Lang, you will not have time to read the books for AP Lit because there are far more to read, analyze, and understand and it emcompasses a lot from Shakespearean times.
I read whenever I could and “solely” was an overstatement on my part. Also I would major in economics for the schools without an undergraduate business school. Also I’m taking only the APs in core subjects this year (Calc BC, APUSH, AP Physics 1, AP Lang/Comp) and next year will take AP US Gov, Multivariable, Physics 2, AP Latin and possibly AP Lit. Do you think the omission of AP Lit be a problem for admissions?
I really did read whenever I could and do genuinely love to read/learn, but after coming home from practice at 6 only to spend another 6 hours on my other homework/internships, its hard to find the time to read every book they give me. I’ve frequently been given a book that sounded really interesting and that I would love to have read but and felt horrible that I couldn’t. I know I’m missing out on a lot, but its not due to a lack of love for learning