My son is planning for Senior year. He is a strong student, loves school and is active in a variety of school activities (sports, art, music) - very well-rounded. He is a humanities kid, not weak in science and math, just not real passionate about it. He’s prefer to take two English courses, along with 4 other AP classes and advanced music classes. His GC says he should take AP Calculus AB - that is what the colleges want. My son would rather take a class that he is passionate about. Does he need a fourth year of math if he is already a 4.0 student and his schedule is full of other challenging classes? He is looking at highly selective colleges.
Taking AP calc would mean he is willing to take challenging courses outside his comfort zone. On the other hand, if he does not think it would be a meaningful addition to his education he should not spend time on it. See if he can spend his time on something much closer to his interests.
Don’t many highly selective colleges recommend or require to take four years of math? You should check common data set of the colleges he might be interested in applying.
4 years of math is highly recommended. Taking AP Calc is ideal, but if you son truly wants to take his other classes, it won’t drastically hurt his chances. Read up on some of the websites of potential colleges to get an idea of how each school deals with math and other subjects throughout high school.
For top colleges, AP Calc AB is recommended UNLESS you have something to offset it (such as 2 foreign languages at AP level, or something unusual… unusual and impressive is always better. :p)
However, even at Harvard, you have students who “only” took precalculus.
How many years of math will your son have? If he’s not interested in AP Calc, could he take AP Stats instead or another math class - what about Discrete math? Or would he be interested in AP Computer Science Principales, which has algorhythms and logic? what about taking a “Quantitative class for nonmajors” at a local college if it’s available/close enough/free or inexpensive?
Thanks - this is a tough choice because students should follow their passion and love learning, instead of spending time studying for SATS and taking classes just because colleges prefer it.
