@lookingforward I received said 3 in AP World History freshman year; our teacher was suffering from diagnosed depression and didn’t teach us beyond the eighteenth century, and no student received a five. This year, I had six AP exams, and in Macroeconomics our teacher taught half the unit then stated he would finish the rest post-AP (we have block scheduling and this was second semester). I do realize I should’ve taken it upon myself to learn the rest of the course on my own, but I had four AP courses that semester and far too many other exams to prepare for.
Unfortunately, I want to major in Political Science/concentrate in Government, so the issue of receiving both threes in the social sciences is what drove me to create this thread and subsequently stress to no end.
So cancel the score. Harvard doesn’t ever have to know about it. They might wonder, but hey ho. The downside of canceling is that there are colleges that will give credit or placement for a three, but you likely won’t be interested in those colleges. A college is unlikely to ask where your other scores are, and most colleges claim not to look at AP scores anyway, thought I have seen an admissions video from Amherst and they discuss the fact that the applicant had numerous fives. I think it’s logical to assume that if you have a slew of fours and fives, a missing AP score won’t be that noticeable, but if you don’t, a missing score may be noticeable.
At any rate, you shouldn’t be stressing about what you can’t change. Don’t get into a downward spiral of freaking out that you may not have the best possible application for Harvard, when there are dozens of other top notch colleges that would love to have you. And don’t blame the teacher. If you took too many AP courses and couldn’t handle it, that is not the fault of the school or teacher. You have probably already heard that taking umpteen APs isn’t the key to getting into tippy top schools. Do well in classes that you can handle.
I blame the high school offering AP World History freshman year. Why would any high school think that is a good idea?
Honestly, I’d be proud of a 3 from a 9th grader.
Do you have poli sci/govt ECs outside school?
I agree the 9th grade course was early, before you had much hs/AP experience. But you know the econ is an issue. What other related APs (EH, US, govt) and what scores?
How much do you know about H and what it looks for? You need to understand how to make the best presentation in the app.
It’s semantics, but you can only cancel the score through 6/15 of the year taken. However, you have the option to withhold the score (for a fee) from the score report that is sent to colleges.
You don’t have to do any such thing, at least for Harvard. Foe basically all colleges, the AP score report goes to the registrar’s office for credit/placement purposes, not to the admissions office.
Well, that’s getting way off topic, since the OP is not saying that s/he will lie on the application. However, in the quoted situation, the risk of recission is not from sending and AP score report or not, it’s from lying on the application.
@skieurope , I meant that if you self-report scores, then once you are enrolled you need to send the score reports if you want credit or placement. I didn’t mean once accepted, so apologies. I am aware it goes to the registrar. CB says on the score cancellation form that requests not to send scores to colleges have to be received by June 15. It says scores may be cancelled at ANY time. And re my comment about rescindance, from the inital post, I wasn’t sure if that wasn’t something OP might have been thinking of, which is why I said it.