I am on track to get a B+ by the end of the year in AP Calc AB, and as a freshman it’s quite stressful. It’ll be extremely hard for me to push my grade up to an A-…my parents say that I must devote all my time to calc now and get the A- because top colleges will overlook me due to this B+. I get easy As in all my other classes, but I also don’t really have much else to put to the table at the moment, as a large portion of my life so far has been spent on soccer…consistent injuries mean that this might not work out for me. Is it true that my chances reduce drastically when I apply to top colleges such as MIT? Is all the extra time I might spend worth the A- which isn’t even guaranteed?
If calculus AB is “extremely hard” and “stressful”, it seems like you were inappropriately accelerated in math too far (4 grade levels ahead), perhaps under tiger parent pressure (which may be the case based on you saying that “my parents say that I must devote all my time to calc now”. Students who were appropriately accelerated that far in math should find all high school math to be easy A courses.
One B won’t hurt your chances. However, if indeed you were inappropriately accelerated, a second B in next year’s math could very well hurt your application for places like MIT. Proceed with caution.
I do agree I’m not quite appropriately accelerated…I took quite a few online courses, so my foundation isn’t very solid…it’s not extremely hard, but I do need to spend quite a bit of time on it…maybe because it’s my first AP class? The average in our class is about a 75 or so.
What part of the course are you struggling at? Students tend to struggle with the Algebra. Calculus has rules and once you understand the rules you will be fine. The problem is the Algebra. B+ is actually a good grade for some like you “Freshman”
Are you mentioning MIT as an example or is that the school you would like to apply to? The issue isn’t a B+ or A-. Chris Peterson of MIT is a rep on this site a lot. Maybe he’ll weigh in but read this-relevant for the highly competitive schools even if you have no interest in MIT: https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/applying_sideways/
MIT is a school I would like to apply to…
It takes a while for me to grasp the Calculus concepts, but then I just mess up on algebra or silly stuff most of the time. No matter how hard I try, I always make small mistakes even after checking my work…
My teacher hand-writes all of his tests, so the questions differ quite a bit from the textbook. It requires more in-depth thinking than a lot of Calc AB classes I believe.
It’s never a good idea for an average good student to skip math courses. Summer, in-line and credit by exam acceleration often leaves a bad foundation. It’s a sure way to shake their confidence and cause stress.
At this point, just do your best. One B grade in a senior course taken as freshman is not going to alter admission outcomes at MIT or any other top 20. Now don’t go on taking MVC or Linear Algebra, just because they are part of sequence. Take Stats and CS to keep a math course but not mess up GPA and rank.
The issue is that calculus depends a LOT on algebra, trigonometry, and precalculus. If your foundation is not very solid, then calculus is going to be quite difficult. If your foundation is very solid, then calculus is actually relatively easy, at least if you are very good at math.
Another issue is that calculus is something that you are going to use a lot in future work, at least in the “TEM” part of STEM and in physics.
Finally, I don’t understand what math you intend to take for the next three years of high school.
I am wondering what the plan is also. Might there be more Bs ahead if this student continues in advanced math? Will MIT like it if there is no more math after this year?
Only rarely are students so advanced in math that AP calc is the right choice in 9th. Certainly not with just online classes behind you.
Yes, a tippy top will see the B. And wonder why you took this class now, what thinking. Plus, to continue rigor, you’re going to need to a) find those classes and b) pick up the more basic knowledge (and comfort level) you’re missing. You need some remedial in algebra. No, stats and CS will not satisfy tippy top adcoms. They expect a progression.
On top of that, you’re naming MIT and I’ll bet you know very little about that college, what they want, what it takes.
Best luck. But read up, inform yourself, learn what holistic and stretch mean and how each college target has it’s own spin. And improve the algebra.
Nothing you can do at this point about starting in Calc AB rather than pre-calc at this point. It is unfortunate that schools push kids into higher levels of math at early ages. Looking back, I think it was harder on my son and I wish we would have pushed back in middle school when they had him in Algebra I in 6th grade…we just didn’t know better and he always got A’s so we didn’t question it. We did push back with our second child and I’m glad we did.
I don’t believe that one B+ is going to kill your chances at a top school. If you take BC next year and then, Multivariable Calc and Differential Equations Jr/Sr year and keep your grades up, you should be OK. My son did similar and got into his first choice school.
Talk with your teacher at the end of the year and see what they would recommend for summer prep to be ready for BC so that you don’t get another B or B+.
I got back my test today which essentially kept my grade from going up this quarter…the points I got taken off were from writing a decimal place so lightly my teacher didn’t count it in my final answer even though he saw it in my work; explaining that a polynomial is continuous and differentiable correctly but I drew an arrow which mislead my teacher to what I was talking about; forgetting that “speeding up” means acceleration and not “increasing in spead”; and finding the length of a curve which we haven’t learned about yet, as he used it to introduce us to the next unit.
Furthermore, I got 42/49 points but he entered the grade in as an 85, when it rounds up to an 86…
I’m not sure what I should do at this point. I can’t tell if the teacher doesn’t like me or something, but I believe I should just let all my points go and focus on midterms.
Post in the hs life forum and see if you can get the links to videos they recommend. Or other help sites.
Bringing this grade up would help with the B. But you’ve got to do the right steps in the right order. Surprised you didn’t drop back to honors calc in October.
You can’t go off speculating the teacher doesn’t like you. Many will not round up. The goal is to not be so desperate for that. Have you spoken with him, asked for help? Would a tutor (or peer tutor) help you avoid the sloppy mistakes?
He seems really nice, and I think he’s trying to act fair. He always rounds up, and I brought this up yet he replied that I don’t know how many points this was out of…I only know how many points I got, which is 42, but 42/49 = 0.857 but 42/48 = 0.84 so I’m assuming I got the former. He’s always strict, but I didn’t think he was going to get strict to the point of assuming I didn’t put a decimal.
I’ve tried my best to get my points back, but he’s stuck with his view. If I get someone else involved, he will see it as a big issue and I might get on his bad side…thus I don’t think I should keep pestering him, because I acted rather diplomatically with this issue and he appreciates me for that, and so I’m not on his bad side yet.
He asked everyone in my class if it looked like I wrote a decimal in my final answer and they said yes, but he still wouldn’t budge.
I’m not sure how someone can help me with sloppy mistakes; now, I’m taking all my past quizzes and tests and writing down all the errors I made, and trying to see if there is a pattern. Rarely do I not know how to do the problem, and the mistakes vary greatly.