So I got a D my senior year in AP Physics (which mind you, I do not need in order to graduate!) This is my first D that I have ever gotten and I’m so terrified! During the time of finals however, I was very very sick, I could barely talk and I did not get enough sleep as I was studying (which didn’t pay off -_-) I’m scared now that I won’t get accepted into any college…My other class grades were B,B,A,A,A so I didn’t slack off really…I’m going to talk to my counselor as well so I can drop the course because I know colleges like improvement and I dont know if I can get an A in AP Physics. What I’m most scared about is that my major is Chemical Engineering…where Physics is used A LOT. So I’m scared colleges will think if I can’t pass AP Physics in high school, why would I pass in college?
Rule of thumb: No D’s or F’s Senior year in a-g courses or your acceptances could be rescinded. @mikemac gave you the link for the UC’s and for the CSU’s, each campus has their own policies but I would contact them as soon as possible so you can figure out your options and plan accordingly.
There is a silver lining here if you’re willing to listen to the lesson. Without a change in study habits you’re unlikely to last long in college engineering. Let me explain…
In college many majors accumulate knowledge. You are presumed to have learned and be able to apply the material in classes you have already taken, and nowhere is that more true than engineering. Any engineering class is going to assume you can use the math/science classes you take frosh/soph years, and each engineering class builds on the previous ones.
This chain is used much less in HS except perhaps in math. And in the course of 12 years of instruction they don’t even spend a day teaching effective study habits. So a funny twist happens. What a lot of kids end up doing is learning to pass tests instead of learning the material. It is easier. Really learning the material requires regular review and self-testing. Instead many kids cram the night or two before each chapter test and then promptly forget it, then cram to relearn everything finals week long enough to take their tests. This sounds like what you were doing, or wanted to do if you weren’t sick.
Cram-and-forget works in HS, it will not work in engineering. Part of the D grade may be attributed to being sick, but I’d wager that if you had not been sick but had not studied you still would have got a D. You learned to pass Physics tests, you didn’t learn Physics.
There is another way. I recommend you get the book “Make it Stick” which talks about the science of learning along with lots of advice for HS and college students. As alluded to above, part of it involves regularly testing yourself so the knowledge stays with you. The class covers Chapter 7 and you take the test, you continue to work a few problems from Chapter 7 every now and then or (even better) from a review book such as the “Physics Problem Solver” so they are problems you haven’t seen before.
There is a great post from a TA who taught a Linear Algebra class and forced the students to review. Here is the link: [Teaching linear algebra](Random Observations: Teaching linear algebra)