<p>i've taken orchestra since 4th grade (my elementry offered it also) but seeing a lot of my classmates jump ahead of me with AP classes led me to drop it this year in favor of academic classes. Is this a bad idea? (i still take private lessons if that helps)</p>
<p>It depends. Are you dropping orchestra to take the only AP in your course load? Or are you dropping it to take a 7th AP class. Do you have a lot of other non academic interests or was the orchestra the only thing you did other than classes? Did you really enjoy orchestra and are you dropping it to take a course that you are not interested in but think will look good on your application?</p>