How important are APs?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Massachusetts Institute of Technology
1

<p>How important are AP tests and scores?</p>

<p>Don't get me wrong, I understand that it is extremely important to take challenging courses and AP tests are a good way to show that you understood the material in a way more objective than the grade you got in the course.</p>

<p>However, I am a senior in high school and I didn't even know APs existed until a couple months ago. I didn't go to the kind of school that advertised them, and I don't have parents who know they are important.</p>

<p>On the flip side, I have taken what is, in my opinion, an extremely rigorous schedule. Some of the better examples:</p>

<p>Calculus I, II and II
Ordinary and Partial Differential Equations
Classical Mechanics/Electricity and Magnetism
Computation Physics
Discrete Mathematics
Metric Topology and Graph Theory</p>

<p>How does the college confidential community think MIT (and schools of similar tier) will treat this rather peculiar situation?</p>

2

<p>…at my local high school the classes you’ve taken are far harder than any AP class…</p>

3

<p>You have nothing to worry about – MIT considers all applicants by looking that each individual high school and the classes available. AP scores don’t mean anything in admissions anyway; for one, you can’t compare someone with four 5’s and a two 3’s to someone with two 5’s. Plus, AP scores are self-reported. MIT’s main foci are the interest in ECs, recs, and essays. As Matt McGann [url=&lt;a href=“http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/on_aps_1]said[/url”&gt;On APs | MIT Admissions]said[/url</a>], “AP scores are not part of an admission formula.”</p>

<p>You clearly took a very rigorous curriculum, one that looks to be beyond AP level anyway, and MIT will realize that.</p>