Hi,
So, I’m currently taking AP Physics 1: Mechanics in school, and just got an email from college board about letting them know if I’m in an AP. So, I clicked yes and then clicked on AP Physics 1 and under the “possible careers” and “possible majors” section, it said nothing about Mechanical Engineering. Only AP Physics C had Mechanical Engineering as a potential career. Does this mean that what I’m learning in Physics does not correlate to what you need to know as a Mechanical Engineer? Thank you.
Any kind of physics in high school will help you prepare for physics in college. Obviously, mechanical engineering majors need to take calculus-based physics in college, so the AP credit from physics 1 will not be useful for them, but mechanical engineering curricula and sample schedules at almost all colleges do not assume any AP credit. So don’t worry.
Even AP credit from Physics C is often not useful for engineering majors since many schools restrict engineers from skipping the physics sequence unless they have a 5, and sometimes they simply don’t allow it at all. That’s because physics is the cornerstone of an engineering education (along with calculus). The non-calculus-based physics is still useful in that it will expose you to the sorts of problems you will see in a calculus-based course, but it isn’t going to use calculus to solve them, so most likely it will be relying on canned formulae that you sort of have to take on faith until you learn calculus. Of course, just being exposed to those formulae means when it comes time to take the higher levels you will have a sense of what the end goal is.
If you liked Mechanics, you may very well like Mechanical Engineering… especially if you also like calculus.
The concepts from AP Physics 1 form a basis, along with calculus, for mechanical engineering, but most schools will not take the credit for that course.