My S is a rising senior. Junior year, first semester, he took Pre-Calc and got a B (a years class in one semester). Second semester, he took AP BC Calc 1 and got a C+ because he didnt hand in some homework and didnt study for the final (he had a B going into the final). For senior year, he can continue with BC and hope to bring up the C+ or he can drop down to AP AB and probably do very well. Advice? Will this C+ hurt his admission chances? He’ll graduate with 9 AP classes total.
More specifically, would admissions officers like to see him stick it out with BC or drop to AB for a better grade?
Imagine adcoms knew that your son couldn’t be bothered to turn in some homework or study for the final. Do you think that would affect his admission chances?
Of course adcoms won’t know the particular reasons, they’ll just see the grade. But they’ve been playing the game long enough to understand that poor grades may be the result of something like this. They’ll look at his SAT, overall gpa as well as in particular classes, what his recs say, etc. One low grade doesn’t doom someone. But if you want someone to say “nope, his chances are exactly the same even with this grade” I don’t think that is realistic.
More important, IMHO, than trying to juggle classes to buff up his transcript is to look at the big picture. You have a kid that in 1 year will be taking college classes. Even if he never takes another math class in his life he is unlikely to find college classes that don’t require homework and study. Living away from home, surrounded by all the temptations of college fun and his friends goofing off, the odds that he does the work needed seem to go down. What are you going to do his senior year in college to change his approach to school before it is for keeps in college?
good points and I do think he has learned his lesson. It was a bit of anomaly. He is actually the kid who does his homework. He just took his foot off the gas in the last month of school in that particular class.
I actually found the resource and answers/advice I was looking for, so I would delete my original post if I could.