I’m about to complete my freshman year and I feel like I haven’t pushed myself enough this year. I’m trying to improve my extracurricular activities because I don’t really have much in that area. Also, I’m very interested in the medical field. Can I get any suggestions on specific things to improve for my plan (below)?
Freshman Year Classes:
-AP Physics 1 (B+ avg)
-US Government Honors (A avg)
-English 1 (A avg)
-Algebra 2 Honors (A avg)
-French 2 (A avg)
-Music (A avg)
-Intro to Business (A avg)
-Gym/Health (A avg)
Sophomore Year Classes
-AP Calc AB
-AP Chemistry and Lab (takes 2 classes)
-Biology Honors
-English Honors
-US History Honors
-French 3 Honors
-Gym/Driver’s Education
Junior Year Classes:
-AP Biology and Lab (takes 2 classes)
-AP English III (Lang. Comp.)
-AP Calc BC
-Public Speaking Honors
-Global Studies Honors
-French 4 Honors
-Gym/Driver’s Education
Senior Year Classes:
-AP College Public Speaking
-MCLA (AP weighted)
-AP Statistics
-AP Environmental Science
-AP Psychology
-Human Anatomy Honors
-French 5 Honors
-Gym/Health
And lastly, the few extracurriculars:
-playing piano for 9 years now (won awards, distinctions in ABRSM exams, played at competitions, etc)
-created a club at school to give mental health care packages to those in psychiatric hospitals and clinics
-internship position for a magazine that writes to girls in high school/college
Thanks to anyone who actually read all of this… I really need advice!!
A few questions: Where is precalculus? Does your school allow you to skip from Alg 2 to Calc AB without a precalculus course? Why are you taking driver’s ed for two years? And do you have to take gym every year? Also what is AP College Public Speaking? I’m pretty sure that’s not an AP class.
I also have a few questions, I don’t need a specific name of a school, but what types of schools are you looking to apply to? Are you looking at going to the easy public universities? Difficult private colleges? Ivy Leagues? This will give me an idea of what you want to get out of your time in high school. Also, what are things you’d be interested in majoring in? This can determine what you should take.
I’m mostly looking to apply to private universities and colleges with honors programs. I don’t really have any specific schools, but I’m open to applying to as many colleges as possible.
I’m fairly certain that I want to go into the health care industry, and some majors I’m interested in are clinical psychiatry and pharmacy. If one thing’s for sure, it’s that I’m not interested in performing any kind of surgery
I’m not sure I would recommend skipping pre-calculus unless you take your school’s pre-calc final and perform well on it. You may be missing out on key concepts that the AP Calc teacher assumes you know.
What sort of math are you taking that you can skip precalculus? Would you be taking precalc over the summer or something?
Freshman Year Classes:
-AP Physics 1 (B+ avg)
-US Government Honors (A avg)
-English 1 (A avg)
-Algebra 2 Honors (A avg)
-French 2 (A avg)
-Music (A avg)
-Intro to Business (A avg)
-Gym/Health (A avg)
Sophomore Year Classes
-AP Calc AB => TAKE PRECALCULUS HONORS unless you’re 100% sure that reviewing on your own over the summer will be enough
-AP Chemistry and Lab (takes 2 classes) => Have you taken Chemistry before? If not, take Chemistry Honors, since AP Chem is the second level in the sequence.
-Biology Honors
-English Honors
-US History Honors => Can you take APUSH?
-French 3 Honors
-Gym/Driver’s Education
Junior Year Classes:
-AP Biology and Lab (takes 2 classes)
-AP English III (Lang. Comp.)
-AP Calc AB
-Public Speaking Honors
-Global Studies Honors => Why not take AP World History?
-French 4 Honors
-Gym/Adult Issues
Senior Year Classes:
-College Public Speaking
-MCLA (AP weighted)
-AP Statistics => Take Calculus BC. Kind of a let down in rigor to be taking AP Stats and makes skipping precalculus pointless. (AP Stats is an AP lite for students who can’t/won’t take calculus)
-AP Environmental Science => Again, massive drop in rigor after doubling up in science all those years.
-AP Psychology => What about AP Economics, AP Government, AP European History?
-Human Anatomy Honors => take that OR AP Psych
-French 5 Honors
-Gym/Health
Your senior year is problematic because you piled up 3 of the easiest APs (known as AP lites) in a year when you’re supposed to prove college readiness. Instead, AP calculus BC + AP euro/econ/gov + APES would work, but having these three together doesn’t work. The choices of college classes is OK, assuming MCLA is an English/Humanities class.
Wow, thank you so much @MYOS1634!! I really appreciate your feedback.
First of all, AP Calculus AB is known to have an excellent teacher, and he is the same one I have right now for Algebra 2 Honors. I feel comfortable taking that course next year.
I have taken Chemistry 1 over the summer and received an A in the course. APUSH is an option, but I have heard that taking it with Honors English is too stressful to handle in sophomore year. I’m not sure about how the APUSH Exam is as well.
Global Studies is a requirement at my school for junior year. Honors Global is the highest level of the course.
MCLA is Multivariable Calculus and Linear Algebra. It is notorious for being the hardest math class available at my school.
And lastly, I’m interested in taking both AP Psychology and Human Anatomy Honors. I think that these courses are essential for those who want to pursue the pre-med route.
You need to have Precalculus BEFORE you take calculus. You cannot skip a level in the sequence.
You do NOT need to have MV calculus and Linear Algebra even in college as a premed and in most majors beside CS and engineering. However if you do well, sure, why not. Just be aware that premeds must take one semester of calculus and one semester of statistics or biostatistics in college. You should not need to preview it by taking AP Stats.
AP Psychology may help you preview the intro to psychology class you need for med school but you’ll have to take it in college anyway. You can also use it to skip to a higher level psychology class but that’s about it - you will need to take at least one psychology class in college as a premed.
Human Anatomy isn’t really important - none of the premed classes are “medical” in any way, you just take 2 semesters of the basic Intro to Biology course that most Natural science majors take, the only difference is that you have to rank in the top 10-20% in order to have a grade that’s med-school worthy. Human Anatomy could complement APES.
