<p>Could have been a UC, could have been the University of Mars.</p>
<p>University of Mars… I think they take Atmospheric Placement credits. ;)</p>
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Was she given a choice not to be “bumped up”?</p>
<p>And , if not, would the strategy then be to sign your name and leave? ;)</p>
<p>If some universities are going to require students be bumped than students are either going to withhold sending their AP scores or purposely do poorly on their university placement tests.</p>
<p>If some schools do this, I would think a signature from the right dean or dept head would permit the student to register for the regular class.</p>
<p>Afterall, some kids take AP bio as freshmen or sophomores. There’s no way that they will remember all that they need to by the time they are in college.</p>
<p>My younger son “placed” into a 300 level Spanish class, yet he didn’t feel comfortable with that since he didn’t take Spanish as a senior in HS. So, the school let him take a lower level. no problem.</p>
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<p>Not that we knew of at the time. Perhaps she could have chosen not to move up. But we were newbies at this point and this was prior to my finding CC 
. The things you learn from experience …</p>
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But is it safe to say that she wasn’t presented that as an option?</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>I don’t think schools often present these things as options. I think they just expect the person to know/determine whether being bumped up would be an issue and either register for the lower class or come forward and ask for a waiver.</p>
<p>I think schools just tell you, oh you’ve passed AP Cal so you can take Cal II. It’s up to the student to say, “Well, I’m not that strong in Cal, so I want to take Cal I.”</p>
<p>Maybe it’s a bad assumption on their part, but I think they assume that kids WANT to be bumped up.</p>
<p>I don’t think it was presented as an option. We felt if she scored well enough on the placement test to move into the higher course, that maybe the lower course would be too easy (remember, we were new at this!) Also, this would allow her to take more of the upper level courses when she got there.</p>
<p>As I said, she was assigned a schedule for the first semester, she didn’t get to choose her courses, so I assume they just went by the placement test results.</p>
<p>That happened to me 30 years ago - was handed a tough schedule based on AP tests and achievement tests (precursor to subject tests, I think). After the first few classes, I decided to drop down a level in calc, which was easily accomplished with a couple of signatures. I stuck out the semester in honors physics, but dropped down to regular for second semester. Registering for a lower class may not be an option, but add/drop may be.</p>
<p>*As I said, she was assigned a schedule for the first semester, she didn’t get to choose her courses, so I assume they just went by the placement test results. *</p>
<p>I think you’re right. I think the school just went by placement tests. I think schools have this mentality that students WANT to move ahead. Schools really should ASK or at least have some kind of mention that the student doesn’t HAVE to take the harder class.</p>
<p>I wonder what schools do when a person has returned to school after a long absence? What if it’s been 5-10 years since the person took Chemistry at a community college. Would a university refuse to let the person take Chem again to refresh before moving on?</p>
<p>m2ck–Adults returning to school have gained maturity and often want to take the course again as a refresher.</p>
<p>As far as mixing and matching Merit and need-based aid, one of my son’s friends received a special merit grant from a private LAC for being a URM with good stats, but they just used it to replace another need-based grant he would have otherwise gotten automatically based on financial criteria. In a sense, if he’d been able to get the automatic need-based grant, and gotten the merit award they offered him, he would have been able to attend with only taking out modest loans each year. But once they awarded him the merit grant it reduced his “need” so he didn’t qualify for the need-based grant.</p>
<p>His family tried to work it out with them, but no go.</p>
<p>It was disappointing at the time, but he ended up getting a better deal at another private LAC (a much more presitigious one) that has pretty decent need-based aid.</p>
<p>*m2ck–Adults returning to school have gained maturity and often want to take the course again as a refresher. *</p>
<p>Oh, I completely agree! That’s why I don’t believe that a schools would refuse to let a student take the “real” class just because they had received AP Credit for it. Students are taking AP classes as freshmen and sophomores. By the time they’re in college, many have forgotten what they learned. They would need to retake.</p>
<p>^^The confusion may be that a student thinks he/she will get double credit. Question from student: “Can I take chemistry 101 even though I passed the AP Chem exam?” The advisor thinks the student wants to take the class even though he/she has AP credit, so the answer is no. Lots of misunderstanding when people haven’t gone through the process.</p>
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<p>If this is true, we are not going to be happy with our financial aid packages. We assumed the scholarship was in addition to financial aid.</p>
<p>Maybe if we had understood this, we wouldn’t have had D apply.</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Yes, this is true. Scholarships typically reduce loans, work-study, and gaps in FA packages.</p>
<p>They don’t reduce EFC unless the scholarship is so big that it is larger than the aid amount. </p>
<p>Our EFC is larger than COA for 2 kids, so scholarships reduced our EFC since we would have had to pay “full-freight.”</p>
<p>*Maybe if we had understood this, we wouldn’t have had D apply. *</p>
<p>??? You wouldn’t have had her apply to the school? or for the scholarship?</p>
<p>If your D’s FA package was going to include loans or gaps (which most do), why wouldn’t you want those reduced?</p>