I need help. I have obtained some wonderful opinions but am curious what the “experts” here think. My daughter has taken technically 4 years of math – (Alg 1 in 8th grade, geometry, alg 2/trig, and stats as a junior). She did not take pre calc as the teacher is horrible and our district has had a nightmare switching to common core. So…senior year she does not want to take ap stats. My question is: does she need math on her transcript for her senior year for a BFA MT application but for all schools, including CMU, Emersons, NYU’s and Michigans. Do they care? Do they want to see you taking a 4th year of math (she technically has 4 years of math as she started in 8th grade). If so, I am going to sign her up for an online course – if it is necessary. Senior year she is taking ap physics but that apparently does not count as a math. I realize if she were going for Engineering at Berkeley this would be a no brainer – but for MT – do the top tiers want to see a 4th year of math? Or does it frankly not matter…help appreciated.
It “might” matter for schools like NYU and Michigan since you have to be academically (as well as artistically) admitted to both of those schools - and both have higher than not academic standards. But there are lots of others- including CMU - where it would’ve make a bit of difference.
My daughter did not take math as a senior and it seemed to make no difference in her getting in places. She did take several AP classes and did an independent study in theatre, but not taking math was a huge relief for her! She was academically accepted to U of Minnesota as well as several other schools. Her top choice was CalArts, and they could care less about her academics – it was all audition based.
It is better for some schools to take 4 years of all academic subjects–English, language, math, lab science, and history. For NYU, acceptance is based 50% on audition and 50% on academics.
Since she did not take pre-calc, I think it could be a negative. Many students at schools like NYU and Michigan start with math in 8th grade and end with calculus (AP) in 12th. The sequence is usually algebra, geometry, trig, pre-calc and calc. Some kids take AP stats instead of AP calc if they want an easier math for 12th grade. But most have completed pre-calc by 11th grade and did not substitute stats. And when they do take stats it is AP stats after pre-calc.
Northwestern, U of M and NYU not having pre-calc may be a dealbreaker - but for the vast majority of MT BFA programs, it won’t be an issue.
When in doubt, I would email the adcom and ask.
(I will say that my MT kid dropped 2nd semester science her senior year like a hot potato when we figured out it didn’t matter at all to the schools she applied to. She coasted the last couple of months … and she deserved it after working her behind off for 12 1/2 years!)
@mtmama2020, it might be best to have your daughter ask herself what her goals are for her course selection senior year with respect to college applications. She could absolutely get accepted to schools like NYU, CMU, Emerson and U Mich without 4 years of math. CMU in particular will not care. All of the schools will just see 3 years of math as the 8th grade algebra is not part of the HS transcript and as others have pointed out, it’s pretty common among applicants to the schools you listed.
So back to her goals. If she is truly interested in schools like NYU and Michigan and you also mentioned Emerson though I’m not sure it is as critical there, she could look at taking a 4th year of math no differently than any other activity she does to build the strongest application possible. Why create a reason for a school that is paying attention to one’s academic record to decide to take the next equally talented girl instead of me? In the end, there will be anecdotes that people can cite about students that were marginal students, or didn’t do precalc or only did 3 years of math that got into any of these schools. For sure it happens and you will never be able to tease out why unless you are an admission counselor who was in the room when the go/no go happened. There are even more examples of students with 5’s on AP Calc, 4 years of math, AP or honors everything else that don’t get in. She has to decide her priorities. I can tell you that if merit money is a priority, you want to present the strongest academic application possible.
Full disclosure, I’m in favor of math and I think statistics is one of the math classes that has practical value well beyond the classroom. Stats and Algebra. Buy the t-shirt. But anyway back to goals, another goal to consider, which doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with admission, is trying to get to college with the right kind of AP scores in the right subjects to be accepted for credit at the schools she wants to attend. That will give her more flexibility with what she takes once she gets there and possibly create some openings for work, study abroad or other opportunities. Might be worth her time to research what counts and doesn’t. If AP Statistics as an example, doesn’t help her out anyway with college credit, and she hates the idea of taking it… that’s a data point that can help her weigh what she wants and what she might take instead. It’s about goals.
Good luck.
As Halflokum just said, I know several kids at NYU, Michigan, CMU and others that did not take pre-calc or calculus. My opinion would be to decide whether her time would be better spent on studying or preparing for auditions. If studying calculus is going to interfere with auditioning, then I would definitely not take calculus.
Check each school on your list to be sure of requirements. As an example, Coastal Carolina required four years of math, which I believe was a requirement for all South Carolina state universities.
The thing is, she has 4 years of math – most colleges will accept Algebra 1 in 8th grade – the issue is whether she should have 4 years in high school… but I appreciate what everyone is saying. I don’t want to miss out on an audition opp because she didn’t take pre calc …after all this hard work that would be insane.
I don’t know if this helps or not, but here is my d’s story:
She took Algebra I in Eighth grade and it appeared on her high school transcript along with a high school science course and Italian I which she also took that year. These counted in the “4 year” requirement for colleges. She skipped math her junior year and took “Advanced Quantitative Reasoning” (“how to balance your checkbook”) her senior year. No Precal or Calculus and no AP Science. She did not take a science course her senior year. She had good grades and test scores (3.71 GPA-unweighted, 4.23 weighted, and 30 ACT). She did take almost all pre-AP and AP courses and was an AP Scholar (several 5’s in US History, World History, English Lit, etc.).
She was academically accepted everywhere and received an academic scholarship at every school she applied to, most were the top (or just below the top) merit scholarship offered (Presidential Scholarship, Gold Scholarship, etc.). She did not apply to Michigan or NYU, but she did get academically accepted to “top 100” National schools or “top 10” Regional schools including Penn State, TCU, Baylor, Elon, Illinois Wesleyan, and Florida State. She was artistically accepted to Illinois Wesleyan and Baylor (she ended up cancelling her auditions for Penn State, Elon and Florida State). Illinois Wesleyan in particular offered her a very large scholarship and Florida State offered in-state tuition.
I took challenging courses throughout high school (lots of AP classes), but math and science are NOT my strengths. I doubled up on sciences sophomore year and didn’t take one senior year. Senior year, I also took the very easiest math class available. I don’t think it negatively impacted me. I was waitlisted at NYU, and, while that could have been the dealbreaker, I doubt that it was. Just make sure the classes she IS taking are engaging and challenging.
Something that hasn’t been brought up, though, is that you need to make sure your senior year schedule is manageable. You’re going to be missing a lot of school for travel and auditions (I missed almost three weeks, collectively), and, if AP Stat is going to be a course she’ll struggle with and need consistent help in, DO NOT TAKE IT. Having the course on her transcript isn’t worth having the bad grade on her transcript, nor is it worth all the additional stress when auditions roll around.
Very interesting @EmsDad and @HannahMTheatre thanks for sharing! mine has a pretty strong transcript full of AP’s, honors, etc, although her gpa is not as high. She is taking ap physics this year, she loves physics, but that does not count as a math – go figure.
Honestly, IMHO your daughter already has a very strong academic record, and for 99.9% of MT programs, this won’t matter a hill of beans. And the ones it “might” matter to, she’ll have a 5% or less chance of getting into artistically. I say if she hates it, enjoy her senior year. Like Hannah said, audition year is not the year to be over-stressed with academics.
Do check with each school because there are some that require 4 years of math, as has already been stated here is the case with Coastal Carolina. Having said that, we do wish we had allowed D to take easier classes and have less stress senior year. Missing those classes was very stressful trying to make up the work.
@mtmamma2020 I think what everyone is saying is that you never know what the deal breaker is when it comes to admissions, so you want to try to give them what they want whenever possible. I would go with the assumption that most academically challenging schools will want 4 years of all academic subjects in high school–they do not care if you started the sequence in middle school–they still want to see those academics as part of your senior year schedule instead of electives or free periods.
But there are exceptions to that rule. My D, who was accepted into NYU as a studio art major (same basic criteria as MT–50% talent/ 50% academics), ended up dropping pre-calculus her junior year. If she didn’t, there was a strong possibility that she would have ruined her gpa with a really poor grade. So she withdrew under the advisement of her guidance counselor. She did, however, go back to math in senior year by taking college algebra which was an easy course and she was able to take get a high grade.
I do not think her guidance counselor was ever asked about her math courses. But is was evident by her overall grades and scores in math that it was not her strongest area. But here’s the thing–she balanced that with really strong verbal skills–24 math on ACT, but 35 Reading (31 English). 610 math on SAT, but 720 verbal. So her math score was barely at the 25th percentile for NYU, but her verbal scores were above the 75th.
Now in your D’s case, what real reason does she have to not take math? If it is her busy schedule as a MT applicant, then that may not be a good enough reason at academically challenging schools. Because she will be measured against her peers–other kids with strong passions, talent and crazy busy schedules.
Remember, that all those other kids are also being advised to take all 5 academic subjects. And most of them will. There are a lot of kids that she will be measured against for academics that are also talented. A school like NYU has a lot of applicants in film, MT, art and music performance that are also being accepted under similar criteria–so they know what a strong applicant looks like in a talent program. And they also know that a MT student in an academically challenging school will still need to balance a busy schedule with academics in their undergraduate program.
I would discuss this with your D to see what kind of environment she wants as an undergrad. Does she want challenging academics–or does she want a program that will allow her to focus most of her efforts on MT alone?
My daughter took Algebra 1 in 8th grade and it did not show up on her high school transcript. Therefore, she only showed 3 years of math in high school and was not able to apply to a couple of schools she was interested in because they required 4 years. However, EmsDad says that his daughter’s 8th grade Algebra 1 did show on her transcripts, so I would check to see if they are showing on your daughter’s transcripts. If so, you should be fine.
D also took algebra in 8th grade, but the school did not consider it “HS credit” (some schools do, some don’t) So she was in the same boat. One of the criteria on her college list was strong academics - so she had schools like. NYU, Brown, Boston, Northwestern, and Syracuse where it was more likely to matter. Therefore she took the 4th year of math (ap stats for her)
As a teacher- (and this is just MY opinion) I don’t advise the “easier” schedule for senior year. I totally get why it makes life/the audition trail simpler- but I worry about kids GETTING to college, and struggling in their NON theater classes- I have seen that happen a number of times over the years- including a couple of very talented kids who flunked out of Michigan and Ithaca respectively.
My daughter’s 8th grade classes do show on her transcripts, per her guidance counselor however we have decided – she is taking pre calc or ap stats, done, not debating it anymore. She wants to take it online – and I am going to acquiesce on that one, but she is taking it.
MOD note: editted for privacy.
Hope it goes well - and that she has a great senior year overall
If your HS offers a dual enrollment college algebra class, take it. Most programs will not require a higher math than that. Just FYI, many schools won’t consider your AP stats class as fulfilling the math requirement.
And AP calc is easy? Maybe if you take AB or BC as a full year class.