You would need to take Spanish 5-6 and get a B or higher for UCLA.
What’s the rest of your schedule like?
English =
Science =
Language = Spanish 5-6
History = APUSH
Math =
Elective =
@MYOS1634 here is the rest of my schedule, as planned so far.
English: AP American Language
Science: AP Environmental Science
Math: Math Analysis Honors (this is pre-calc & not offered in AP)
Elective: Either Spanish 5-6 or AP Human Geography
History: APUSH
Other Elective: Teacher’s Aide
Senior Year I’ll be taking 3 full year APs & one 1 semester AP. As a sophomore I took 2 Honors classes.
Spanish 5-6 is more valuable than Ap Human Geography, which is an “AP Lite” (whereas Spanish is a “core class”).
Do you have one each of Biology, Chemistry, and Physics (at regular or honors level)? Having those three would matter more than having APES.
@VickiSoCal @usualhopeful @InamoratiAnon Sorry to hack OPs thread, but my question is somewhat relevant to his situation. Would not taking a fourth year of language be cause for rejection even if other factors (test scores, gpa, course rigor) are solid? And if I had to decide between not taking a science or foreign language, which would cause more harm?
OP, I’m sure you would have no trouble with those classes and could probably afford to add a little more rigor. I’ve done APES, APUSH, Lang and Pre-Calc, so if you need any advice for tackling those classes (study methods, prep books etc), feel free to ask 
On its own, not taking a 4th year wouldn’t be cause for rejection (but note that OP would only have 2, which may well indeed result in rejection). However, when most applicants have 4 or more years of a foreign language, you’d need a darn good reason not to have that 4h year. Taking APES wouldn’t be it.
To be competitive for a school like UCLA, you want to exceed the a-g course requirements, so taking the minimum may hurt your chances. You want make sure you are taking a rigorous class schedule in comparison to your fellow HS students. Your GPA is competitive so far, but since you have not taken any AP classes yet, make sure you try and keep up your grades with the more rigorous Junior year. Remember UC GPA is calculated based on your 10-11th grades only and the extra honors points in the calculation are only for Honors/AP/IB or DE course during these 2 years.
Spend time on test prep Junior year and do well on the SAT and/or ACT. Good Luck and when you finish your Junior year, re-evaluate your college list. Make sure you select colleges that match your stats not the other way around.
Good Luck.
Schools typically looks down on a teaching aide experience, regardless of your career outlook. Only completing the minimum requirement for a foreign language is also looked down upon. I’d say (if possible) drop the teaching assistant elective and replace it with AP Spanish. Your weighted GPA is at an average right now, and with the senior year APs that should bring it up hire, so you’re fine in that department. I can’t really gauge your applicability without an SAT/ACT score + ECs, though.
@Gumbymom I know that grades 10-11 are by far the most important of high school and what the UC schools look at the most. However, I was always led to believe that they also look at the cumulative GPA over all 4 years. Is that true? I know taking AP classes as a senior is beneficial to me as far as being prepared for college goes, but would it help me for college admissions? I was told that colleges usually ask you to send in your senior year grades from fall semester as soon as they become available & that those are also used when considering whether or not to accept the student. Is that true for UC schools?
@ambitionsquared any advice you could give me about APUSH would be fantastic. Any information on how much time you spent for the class on homework/studying-wise nightly, the hardest parts, & what skills the class mostly consists of. Also, how much time you spent nightly on AP Lang would be helpful
@MYOS1634 would you say only 2 years could result in rejection from all UC schools, or just the more competitive ones like UCLA and UCB? If I take 5-6 I’ll for sure need a tutor, & keeping my grade higher than a C will be an immense challenge. I think a C in 5-6 would hurt my chances at admission more than not taking the course at all, when I have quite a few other advanced courses as well, but considering I haven’t any experience applying, I would be unable to say for sure.
The top schools are going to expect, at a min
4 years of a foreign language ending in an AP
The 3 core sciences plus one AP
3 years social studies
4 years English ending in an AP
3 to 4 years math ending in an AP
1 year or more fine arts
That’s the min target and obviously people will do more in their area of interest.
If your school’s offerings or schedule somehow prevent any of these you should explain.
@VickiSoCal, would you say the most competitive UC schools are UCLA & UCB? Excluding UCSF since it’s a graduate school, would any of the other UCs be considered extremely competitive?
Where are you guys getting that UCLA and Cal will want you to have 4 years of a foreign language? First I’ve heard of that. 3 years should be fine if you’re taking the requisite AP courses in other subjects.
@youcee I’m getting it from the “perfect” students at our high school getting rejected by both. Even with 5.0 GPA’s and all AP’s their junior year.
@uclafuture01 you need to review the stats on this page.
http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/freshman/profiles/
Right now, UCB, UCLA, and UCSD are extremely competitive, UCD and UCSB are very competitive, and UCI and UCSC are competitive, meaning you’d be okay with 3 years at UCI and UCSC but it’d be iffy elsewhere.
The program presented in #27 is spot-on, except I’d say you need 4 years of history/social studies for UCs, ending in an AP for UCB, UCLA, UCSD.
The only UCs you’d have a shot at with only 2 years of a foreign language are probably UCR and UCM. Three years would already be below expectations for UCB, UCLA, and UCSD but wouldn’t automatically disqualify you.
(An exception would be if you attend a lower-performing school that only offers 2 years, but that’s not your situation).
If you struggle in Spanish, get to work. You’ve got 8 weeks to bring your level to an A. Watch Spanish television - whatever you enjoy in English - sports, soaps, shows…- watch in Spanish, then comment on Spanish websites. Learn songs in Spanish. Use Quizlet for vocabulary. Find friends who speak Spanish and try to talk with them (watch TV together, or play videogames together, sticking to Spanish). Borrow English Grammar for students of Spanish to know the big differences between Spanish and English grammar. Dedicate one hour to watching/singing and one hour to reading/writing/grammar/vocabulary, 5 days a week. No excuse, no shortcuts. 10 solid hours of work each week.
@VickiSoCal Seeing something different at our HS where 60+ kids (really) will be entering Cal or UCLA this fall. Now I don’t know all their schedules, but my impression from my kids being in the same classes is that the number of APs (9-10) and whether they are core APs (AP Lang/Lit, APUSH, AP World, Calc, Physics/Bio/Chem, other advanced math, etc) is a big factor. I could be wrong though.
^ that’s what VickiSoCal is saying: you need 4 years in all 5 core classes culminating in AP’s, plus academic “personal picks.”
UC’s don’t count more than 8 AP’s though.
@VickiSoCal I checked out that link: do you know what it means by up to 8 honors courses? If someone has more than that between 10-11 grade, do they not get acknowledged for it?
@MYOS1634 No,I’m saying I’m not seeing kids necessarily taking 4 years of foreign language which she was saying she observed at her school. The recommended 3 should be sufficient IMO. They may say they don’t count more than 8 APs, but on the UCLA and Cal sites they show the average accepted student has more than 8 APs and a GPAs that would require more than 8. If the top students in your HS are taking 9-10, that’s what you’ll be compared to.
UCLA and UCB do not cap the weighting. All other UC’s do.
We had a girl get in to Stanford and not UCLA.You need to be the best+