I am taking APUSH, AP Lang, Chemistry, and Pre-Calc Honors this year. I was planning on taking AP Macro too but due to a schedule conflict I have to take a regular level business class.
Would this schedule appear rigorous enough for a highly selective college (USC, UMich, Boston College) or should I add AP Spanish instead of a business class? (Even though I know for sure that I want to study business in college)
A few thoughts:
• No college is going to count AP courses year by year. If your GC rates your overall schedule as “most rigorous” then it does not really matter.
• If a class is available and you are unable to take it, then you’re unable to take it. Colleges know that schedule conflicts happen. If you can’t fit Macro into your senior year schedule, your GC can always mention the conflict on the Secondary School Report.
• If you don’t take AP Spanish, would you take a non-AP Spanish class next year? BC “recommends” 4 years of foreign language in HS, so if you only have 2 years, you might be disadvantaged. Additionally many colleges have a foreign language requirement for graduation, so the more you take in HS, the less, potentially, you need to take in college.
Colleges like to see that you have an upward rigor trend. For those colleges, I think those courses are definitely very rigorous. I’d say go for the business class. Just take the number of APs you are comfortable with and excel in them. Even if the business class is not an AP course, you never know what kind of skills you can acquire from the class ,especially since it pertains to your interests. From personal experience, I was in the same boat and I initially regret taking a business course over some AP class. Now thinking back to it, it was undoubtedly the best choice to choose the business class.