Both are college level courses and very rigorous, but both are weighted the same at my high school.
Here is my tentative senior year schedule.
AP Calc AB
AP Gov
AP Physics
Dual Credit Econ
Spanish 3
Environmental Science
AP Language/Composition or Dual Credit Composition???
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Does it matter which one I take for college admissions?
I hear that the AP Language/Comp teacher is really strict and makes the class super difficult/unfair, while the Dual Credit teacher is less strict and more likely to give you a good grade. Both classes are taught at my High School but a certified college teacher teaches the Dual Credit class for college credit.
Should I just suck it up and take the AP or will it not make a difference to college admissions?
Usually admissions view both as rigorous for college admissions, but for reasons different than those of AP.
Dual-credit courses tend to be more fast-paced and require more independent studies than their AP equivalent (none of that “applied practice” stuff). They may not be necessarily harder than AP, but they can certainly show that you mastered the material more.
For example, AP classes offer much more than just tests and quizzes to cover up a bad grade, but dual-credit courses really require you to know the material more because you won’t have as many opportunities and may be stuck with taking just formal assessments.
Community college courses tend to be more on the intuitive side–that is, the try to limit themselves to just making sure you know the material more than their applications. Some university courses can be more applications and researched base.
Overall, because your school does offer AP English Lang, but you are opting out of it to take a dual-credit course as a replacement, it may raise some eyebrows in the admissions room.
The dual credit class is taught at my high school by an approved teacher though a program from a 4 year university. I get college credit from a university and it will be on my college transcript as well as my high school’s.
My school makes it sound like an AP course and Dual Credit course are the same rigor.
What State are you in and what are you targeted (top three) Universities? Some State Flagship/State University look more favorably at Dual Enrollment (DE) Courses, probably more so than AP. The State of Florida for example, have put a lot of resources into the DE Program. A lot of their Student complete their Associate Degree (60 Credits) by the time they finish High School and many complete Universities after only 1.5 - 2 years after High School.
Again, depending on your target Colleges and where they are located, I prefer Dual Enrollment to AP classes, since some universities/College will not accept less than a 4 or 5 in AP, while DE courses completed with a C and above are transferable to most Universities that I know of.
I live in Indiana but I’m going to college out of state, though Purdue and IU are in my top 10. My top 3 are USF(San Francisco), Washington, and UCI.
I honestly don’t care about getting credit for college, I’m pretty much just taking the class just to impress college admissions and to raise my GPA if colleges will weight it.
I just want to throw in the thought, are your parents OK with paying the $23K min OOS cost for CA (on top of whatever other admission offer your get)? UW is close to $50K OOS as I recall.
If you are pre-med or pre-law, remember that college courses taken during high school do count toward your GPA for applying to medical or law school. This can be good if you preload your GPA with A and A+ grades, but bad if you get grades below A-.
You may be able to get some idea of what each college’s opinions are on AP credit versus college courses taken while in high school by comparing their transfer credit pages for both AP credit and other college courses. Some are more generous with AP credit, while others are more generous with college courses, even if nominally the same material. The greater or lesser generosity may indicate what the college thinks of the rigor of each option.
Another option is to take the college course and then take the AP test as well. You will not get double credit, but if you matriculate to a college that prefers one over the other, you will be covered either way.
But I’ll be a senior next year and the AP exams are in May, well after all college admission decisions are made. Will it help if I mention on “additional information” that I will take the AP exam?
The evolution of all of this is about high school students who finish high school curriculum early. New courses were developed to allow High School students to stay in high school and learn at a college level, with the possibility of receiving advanced placement (AP) credit at college for their efforts. Not college, exactly, but “equivalent”.
The other option is to go to college, and suffer the vagaries of needing to self-study, follow a syllabus, and compete with real college students. By placing a college lecturer on your campus, this is yet another option.
You may see, however, that the DE option could easily have more clout than the “AP” option. And by the fact that you could not only get college credit for it but also (perversely) take an exam that shows its equivalence to a college course (the AP exam), that it represents a “superset”.
OK, I think we have overthought this much more than an admissions officer would.
Which classes are your friends taking? It would be fun to have a study group.
Of course, how AP versus dual enrollment is seen by college admissions readers depends on the college that you will be dual enrolling at, and the colleges you apply to. Since you have not mentioned them, no one can help you further, so you need to check on these matters on your own.
Note, however, some colleges look down on dual enrollment courses taught at high schools, as opposed to high school students going to colleges to take the courses. Check whether this is the case for the colleges you are applying to.
Many, if not most, selective universities won’t count a DE class offered in a high school setting, because there aren’t any college students in the class and there’s thus less “control” over the pace and depth of content.
However, a DE class could help you stand out, depending on what it entails.
In my opinion, your choice should not be based on what will “look better” to adcoms, but rather on syllabus: is there a difference between both classes? Which is it? Pace, content, approach, methodology?
I actually prefer classes that are self-study, I’ve actually done so for all of high school haha
@MYOS1634
Hmm, interesting. I also have the option of taking the class at the actual university and it will be on my high school transcript, however it’s 1 semester long since it’s college. Would that look better? If it matter’s, the university is IUPUC.
Yes, taking it at the actual university would look better. It’s 1 semester long because that’s “college paced” (whereas, I assume, on the HS campus, it’s stretched to a year.) It also means that you could either take another IUPUC class or have a free period next semester, which could come in handy when senioritis hits.
It may depends on the college you are going to. The AP credit policy is usually posted on their website. However, dual enrollment credit sometimes would not be accepted for transfer if it is not from a college the school recognized. My D’s friend took Calculus I to III in dual enrollment in California that UMich does not recognize them. She would have better off if she took AP Calc BC exam instead.
