<p>Going into freshman year I can choose between AP geography (6 grade points) or freshman soccer? Which would you say would help me out the most? </p>
<p>AP Geo lol. You can play soccer after school with your friends or at a rec league. </p>
<p>Why is it one or the other?</p>
<p>Soccer is a class at my school. It takes up two periods </p>
<p>Is this AP human geography? If so, do soccer. Most colleges do not give AP credit for AP human (its considered on of the easiest APs).</p>
<p>I play soccer outside of school too, though… If I got straight As this year my weighted gpa would be around 5.5 with the ap class. </p>
<p>Then do whichever one you like more. Just know that AP human doesn’t look any better to colleges. Be careful about falling into the weighted gpa trap- most colleges don’t really care about this to a certain extent. It can help with evaluating course rigor and plays its role in class rank (if this is what your class rank is based on), but colleges will focus on your unweighted GPA. High schools use too many different systems for weighted gpa and there are flaws in every system. However, unweighted shows exactly what kind of grades you got.</p>
<p>Does high school soccer look any better than soccer outside of school? Is it good to do both? </p>
<p>Do whichever you’ll enjoy more. </p>
<p>I wouldn’t worry about AP HuGeo, lots of schools (like mine) don’t even offer AP classes freshman year. If you are taking an otherwise rigorous course load, you should be fine without it. </p>
<p>The AP is better for college. Colleges look at the rigor of your classes more</p>
<p>@university89 except for the fact that colleges don’t really consider AP human rigorous and most won’t even grant credit for it no matter what score you get (that includes a 5). Please don’t get caught up in this trap and spread misinformation. Just because a class is an AP, doesn’t mean you have to take it. There are honors courses that are much more rigorous than some AP courses. You should take a rigorous curriculum relative to what you are offered. Don’t pile up on APs just to impress colleges, they’ll see right through that.</p>
<p>No college considered any AP easy. That would defeat the purpose of it being an * Advanced* placement course. Everything you hear about something being “AP Lite” is a myth. Difficulty is subjective and college admissions officers know that. It’s also common knowledge that no two teachers reach exactly the same way. Some teachers will make a class extremely hard, and some will make it fairly easy. I’m sure some teachers have found a way to make Bio an easy course due to poor teaching skills. And I’m sure some teachers have found a way to make AP Psychology a difficult and demanding class. I would go for AP Geo. </p>
<p>@AnnieBeats of course they don’t consider it easy, but there’s a reason a lot of colleges don’t offer credit for it. APlite isn’t a myth, it just has variations and exceptions. Colleges will know if a school has an exception to it. That’s not to say that if you’re planning on taking a supposed “APlite”, you shouldn’t take it. You should take a class because you want to not because it has an AP label on it is what I’m trying to get at. For example, one of the most rigorous courses at my high school was advanced math techniques (which is weighted on the AP level, but for a good reason), but its not really even a post-AP (it does require calculus because it is calculus based, but is a pure elective math class). The class average is a D for it every year (until the end of the course, most people manage to pass). Taking this course is much better than taking AP stat, even though its not an AP.</p>
<p>IMHO, taking AP Human Geo would be a good way to ease into APs. You’d have the experience of taking an AP class and test before taking more rigorous AP courses.</p>
<p>It doesn’t make any sense to me to take HS soccer under the conditions you describe. Colleges won’t be particularly impressed by one year of what amounts to a glorified gym class, and it sounds like you’d have to give up the opportunity to take classes your sophomore, junior and senior years in order to continue with it.</p>
<p>Continue with soccer outside of school and take the academic courses that make most sense for you in school. That doesn’t necessarily mean loading up on AP’s by the way.</p>
<p>I think you should also join the school soccer team because the schools like to see students join the HS teams and they know that the teams compete against other schools. It shows the colleges how you are able to balance and use your time management skills to complete your year.</p>
<p>@guineagirl96 Well UPenn doesn’t give credit for any APs at all. That doesn’t make them less rigorous. Colleges choose where to offer credit based on two things: Money and their general requirements. </p>
<p>For the first point: The more credit a college offers from APs, the less money they get from students. Colleges try to maximize the amount of money they bring in. If UPenn, for example, gives credit for all the APs their students take, that’s a lot less money they bring in and consequently, they can’t give as much need based aid. </p>
<p>For the second point: If a class isn’t typically part of a school’s General Ed requirements, they won’t award credit for it. And if you think about it, it doesn’t really make sense to take an AP exam if more often than not, you won’t be offered credit for it. (i.e. Studio Art)</p>
<p>It is important to note that the Penn example is a little different. Part of the issue with some of the elite schools is that their entering freshmen, due in part to the rigor of their (often) elite high school course loads is that they are actually entering as the equivalent of college sophomores. As a result, the school relegates them to freshmen to get four years out of them which also increases the courses they are exposed to which is helpful in developing skills.</p>
<p>The question here is if this AP course will be important to the kid. It sounds like he would prefer to play soccer. If that is the case, he should play soccer. If in a year or two soccer conflicts with AP Biology and the kid has an interest in Med School or something then at that time it is appropriate to determine which is better use of his time. </p>
<p>As it stands, I don’t see this course being that significant. Any school that offers AP courses to freshmen is a school with the ability to properly prepare students. There is no reason to chase AP courses for the sake of having AP courses. You are not going to miss out on your dream school because you didn’t take this AP course.</p>
<p>If the kid is happy and enjoys the sport of soccer then taking the course may actually make it so that they perform better in their other courses. Only the kid can decide but it shouldn’t be absolute that APs are always the default. </p>
<p>If the level of your club team is high enough (certainly the case for Division 1 or Premier level, but probably for Super2 players from what I have seen in Texas) then the high school freshman team will be much weaker unless you can make varsity as a freshman. Varsity sports help, but I doubt that missing your freshman soccer at school will damage your ability to make varsity as a sophomore (assuming your club soccer team is high enough level).</p>
<p>In the end though it also depends on how much you are willing to work outside of class and how much fitness work you would do on your own if you didn’t have the “soccer class” in school. My son found it tough to remember to do the fitness work outside of club soccer (club soccer expects that you do most of your fitness work outside of practice) when he wasn’t in a varsity sport at HS.</p>
<p>The AP class does improve the rigor of your schedule but you might be able to study for it outside of a formal HS class if you are highly motivated. See related discussions on college confidential e.g. <a href=“***OFFICIAL AP Human Geo 2013-2014*** - AP History & Social Sciences - College Confidential Forums”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/history-social-sciences/1507104-official-ap-human-geo-2013-2014.html</a></p>
<p>But don’t forget the social considerations - the soccer team gives you an opportunity to build a different group of friends from the normal group taking AP classes - for some that is important as they adjust to a new school</p>
<p>Play soccer.</p>
<p>Seriously, do what will make you happier overall, don’t make a choice based on those six points. Is the freshman soccer team a good group? Will you make new friends and have people to hang out with? Will it be the stepping stone to varsity? This is assuming you like soccer and want to play more years. Or do you have plenty of social and athletic outlets and are keenly interested in taking that class? </p>
<p>I have a kid who played two sports and music and so missed out on some of those extra point AP opportunities because the sport and music took class periods. He graduated number two because of it. Missing those points caused him to miss on being val. But hey, his best friends were from the sports and the music, and he continues to play both in college, so I think the sacrifice was worth it. fwiw all his classmates and teachers knew he was number two because he didn’t take classes just for the extra points. </p>