I am wondering how important ap classes are to getting into a good college? I am a junior in high school and i am taking 3 ap’s (ap chem, ap econ, and apush). I had the choice of taking ap lang but I chose not to because I thought it would be too much work and I wouldn’t do well in the other classes because of the heavy workload. was that a mistake? Next year I am probably going to take 5 AP’s (AP Lit, AP Calc BC, AP Physics 1, AP stat, and AP Spanish). I won’t have to take the ap exams for all of them cause i will be a senior. I am also going to self study for the ap comp sci exam this year. Will these ap classes be sufficient for ivy league caliber schools? The main thing im worried about is ap lang… did i make a mistake not taking it? will colleges think im not taking the most challenging courses?
As long as your guidance counselor checks the “took the most rigorous courses offered” box on the company., it is not going to hurt you. Ask your GC what their criteria is for determining that & plan accordingly.
Don’t shamelessly bump. @csdad is correct. Many of us will have an opinion, but it’s your GC’s that matters.
FWIW, yes, I do think it’s a mistake not to take AP Lang, but not because it’s an AP. AP Lang will teach you writing skills, which in addition to being a great life skill, will be incredibly helpful when you are writing college application essays.
Don’t take AP Stats, it won’t “bring” anything extra to your application. Taking AP language to increase your writing skills would indeed be more important - unlike AP stats, which is an “AP lite”, AP lang is a “core” AP and what they teach will be essential for your application, for college in general, and then professionally.
No, not really. AP language and composition teaches you how to write and defend an argument. AP Lit is Classical Literature on steroids :), not the same at all - you read lots of awesome classical literature, but it’s literature, not “language and composition” as the name implies.
See if you could take AP Lan senior year?