<p>I've been hearing from a lot of people that AP classes are an important part of admission to Ivy Leagues. Is it really necessary to take AP courses to get in? I know a couple of kids from my home country that got into Harvard, Yale, and UPenn without taking any AP course. AP isn't available in many schools in my home country, so it made me curious. I also want to know if AP classes are necessary in order to have a fair chance of admission to any good US college and not just the Ivy League. Thanks!</p>
<p>No, it is not necessary to take AP courses.</p>
<p>However, you should take the most rigorous options of courses you have in high school, and do well in them.</p>
<p>If they are offered at your school then it is necessary to take them in order to have taken the most rigorous schedule possible, unless your school also offers the IB program and you do that instead. If they are not offered at a student’s school, then they are not expected to be taken and no one is penalized for that. But, as mentioned above, you are still expected to choose rigorous courses.</p>
<p>Very few successful international applicants take AP classes or even self study for AP tests. That curriculum is simply not available in most of the world. In the US, AP courses generally reflect the most rigorous courses available to HS students, so they are the courses high achieving students take. As an international student aiming to be in the range for highly selective US colleges (whether ivy or otherwise) you don’t need APs. You just need to take the hardest curriculum available to you and do extremely well.</p>
<p>I’m sure it is possible to get into Ivy leagues without AP classes, but then how many actually get in? I’m sure statistics aren’t very encouraging.
However, its a different story if your school doesn’t offer AP classes or you were taught in a different educational system. Then you would be compared with your peers and not American high school students.
So apply if you think you have what it takes to be in an Ivy league, irrespective of AP classes.</p>
<p>So I’m in 8th grade and I want to go to Cambridge University. I get straight A’s and my school has AP and advanced classes. My problem is that we can’t choose if we are in AP or advanced classes. I can get a 4.0 and still not get into AP. I go to public school but we have a tremendously long waiting list just to get into a advanced class let alone AP. I plan on keeping my straight A’s and I’m one of the top 50 students. I am even taking a Spanish class early unlike most kids in my school system. My Spanish class is for high school credit. Is their any chance of me getting into Cambridge?</p>