<p>This can’t be repeated enough: even if you get a 5 on the BC exam that doesn’t mean you will have a sufficient grasp on Calc II. There’s a ton of **** you learn in a college Calc II course that isn’t even mentioned in the AP. So when you come back here crying because you couldn’t evaluate an integral on a test in your fluid mechanics course, I told you so.</p>
<p>I’ll disagree with the rest of the board. I took only calc BC (I have no idea why some schools make people take AB before BC but that is a whole different issue) and was able to do every integral that I came across in calc III and differential equations and effectively use taylor series when it is required. Quite frankly, for 99% of integrals all you need to know are u substitutions, integration by parts, and trig substitutions. Sure, there are some integrals that require some more sneakyness but for the most part those three methods will allow you to solve most integrals.</p>
<p>I know plenty of people at school now who only took AB and decided to jump right into multivariable calc, differential equations, and linear algebra and they are doing fine. Yes they need to be willing to do some catch-up but they have been able to manage.</p>
<p>I say if you feel like you can handle it go for it. It would be obnoxious to take BC over again since so much of the material overlaps. Just make sure you do a really good job of teaching yourself taylor series and if you don’t know integration by parts or trig substitutions teach yourself those too.</p>
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<p>I really feel like it depends on how the AP is taught, I don’t feel lacking in calc knowledge compared to people who took calc II in college.</p>
<p>You were definitely an exception then, firehose. Most AP courses are taught quite poorly, and the AP tests really don’t adequately test one’s ability to perform at a college level. I know plenty of people who are a counterexample to your examples. It just varies way too much to be able to say with certainty whether a particular individual will get a good taste from an AP class, but the probability says that they likely wouldn’t.</p>
<p>I definitely agree that the situation I presented was not the norm and I apologize for not making that clear. I just don’t want the OP to get the impression that taking the course is impossible. To be honest, we here over the internet don’t know the OP’s individual situation and without that knowledge we can’t really tell him what will be best for him. The collective feel of the thread was making it seem as though it is impossible to do what the OP is proposing and I wanted to show that under the right circumstances it makes sense to carry out the OPs plan and that it does not always result in disaster (although more often than not it is a mistake).</p>
<p>Also, I am really not the best person to be taking math advice from. However, I am generally a fan of being bold so a big part of me wants to tell you to go for it.</p>
<p>I’m taking AP Calc BC online course by uccp.org. for junior year</p>
This thread is over 6 years old! The OP is probably out of grad school by now.