High School Classes

Applying to College
1

<p>So I am currently a Sophomore and have to pick my classes for next year before Thursday of next week. So far, we aren't allowed to pick any classes except 1 elective. I go to a small extremely difficult sends "most" to top schools private school. I have about a 3.88 after 1st term 10th grade, top 15% of class.</p>

<p>So far, my course load for next year will be AP Psych, Honors Precalc, AP Bio or Environmental, Yearbook, and French 3. So really all I need to pick is a lit class, which brings me to my problem...</p>

<p>I have gotten 3 A-'s in lit for 3 terms. I was recomended for a non-honors class, mainly because my teacher doesn't really like me that much. He has already given me his approval to take an honors class if I want to. The honors class would be Peace & War. It is taught by one of the most well liked teachers at my school, but I don't know him very well and it is a topic that I am very interested in.
The other alternative is English and Irish Literature. Taught by possibly THE best teacher at our school, who loves me. We constantly banter about Soccer, and if I took his class, I could probably get an excellent recomendation.</p>

<p>I also think I could get a better grade in the Eng-Ir class than the honors.</p>

<p>So essentially, what looks better, an A in a non-honors, or an A-/B+ in an honors?</p>

2

<p>The honors class. The reason: colleges don't look at +/- grades. They calculate GPA on a straight 4.0 scale. So an A- in the honors class looks way better than an A in the non-honors, since both of them are counted as a 4.0 anyway.</p>

<p>Trust me, I've asked and gotten that response from admissions offices (Stanford and the like).</p>

3

<p>thats a hard decision
could you possibly take both?
or take one of them as a senior?</p>

4

<p>i can't take both, but i can take one as a senior... the only difference would be that i would have 5 AP's/Honors if I took the honors lit senior...... of course colleges wouldn't see the grades......</p>

5

<p>They would see the sr 1st sem grades.
And, yes, colleges DO look at +/-s on the transcript, although many will calculate your GPA the way your HS does it (i.e., w/o taking +/-s into account), but that doesn't mean a +/- isn't helpful/hurtful.</p>

6

<p>my school uses A, A-, B+, B, etc. (no A+)</p>

7

<p>I'd do the regular, get a great recommendation out of it, and take the honors class senior year.</p>