My counselor refuses to put me in AP or Honors classes. This limits me to only getting a 4.0 GPA at the most out of our 5.0 scale. I’m making straight A’s and have no trouble with the classes at all. All my teachers say that I should be in AP but my counselor just won’t do it. Now she is saying that the deadline to change my schedule has passed.I do have a special case though. I moved back to the States after living abroad for two years after eight grade. So when I came back, my credits were all messed up. I had to take all of the core classes over again because the only credits I got were for electives, foreign language, and PE. I tested out of all the freshmen classes. Then took sophomore and junior classes last year. Now I’m taking junior and senior classes this year. When I first got here, my counselor said that I should just test out what my workload will be like since I’ll be doubling up on everything. I did amazing and she didn’t put me in the AP classes, even I personally requested to be put in. She also won’t return my emails or my parents emails. So I’m pretty sure that I won’t be getting put into any AP classes. But my real question is, How will this affect my chances of getting accepted into colleges? I also don’t have many extra curricular actives. I only have four. One for each year of high school. They are Dance Company (abroad), Mountaineering Club (abroad), FFA, and NHS. I want to join a club this year but literally nothing interests me. I don’t know how much community service hours affects things but I don’t have much either. I’m going to have at least 30 hours this year, but I didn’t have anything last year. So I’m not so sure my chances are very good right now. Also, is there anything I can do to improve my chances?
1° it’ll seriously affect your chances at selective colleges and public honors colleges. Only directional and minimally selective colleges don’t expect some honors classes at least.
2° Time to get a parent involved. They can meet with the GC, point out your A’s, and say you’ll be placed in Honors/AP for every class where you got an A. If that doesn’t work, go higher up.
Does your HS have requirements for volunteer hours that have to be met? Check that out.
Make sure you are getting whatever requirements are necessary for graduation.
Some issues require a face-to-face meeting vs just e-mails. It’s too easy to ignore e-mails. Make an appointment and bring your parents. No need to be confrontational in the least. But you should know what you want for the outcome.
If a meeting can’t be done timely (you don’t want your GC just “waiting you out” or doesn’t give you the satisfaction you are seeking you need to think about who up the ladder to go see.
Don’t make an enemy of your GC–you need them but don’t let them walk over you either.
Talk to the teachers of the classes you want to be in. Make sure they’d be happy to have you. Even if you enter a class a tad late.
One aspect of taking AP’s is that with a good score on the exams many colleges accept them for college credit.
It saves a lot of money and time in college. Even if you don’t use an AP college credit for its intended purpose for a particular major some colleges will still give you credit towards electives. It helps free up a college schedule. Instead of trying to get in 17 hours in a semester you may need only 14 to accomplish the same thing for example.
My own advice is that colleges are looking at what you do with opportunities you have. You can explain somewhere that your experience abroad was invaluable, but that it also meant getting shut out of AP classes due to concern the education wasn’t the same as stateside by your school. I think you want to do well then in the regular classes, hit them out of the ball park, then mitigate this “lost” opportunity by showing your caliber in other ways, including taking AP tests in subjects you self study. (perhaps) or other ways.
^unfortunately, very selective colleges don’t really care about self studied APs. They want the student in the classroom, learning at a high level, fast pace, and depth.
disagree - some colleges like Stanford say how students do on AP is the best indicator of success in college. My two students got into top notch world class colleges. Everything counts in love, war and college admissions.
Well, Stanford also says “This is not a game of who has the most AP’s, wins.” And, typically, self studied AP’s don’t really “count”. They really want students in the classroom taking the AP class, not “self studying” it. They may treat OP as a homeschooled student for whom AP scores “validate” academic preparation, but it’s not common. So, hopefully OP’s parents can convince someone to let him/her take honors and AP classes.
It’s hard to believe in this day and age of crazy parents that you are going through this. And I’ll bet the farm that you are not in California. Looks like your parents need to visit the principle or at least watch a few episodes of “The Goldbergs” to see how its done.
Also have you thought about running cross country. Easy sport and your part of a team. A good EC.
What do you mean by a directional college?
Often, public universities in your state that have a “direction” in them, like Western Z State University, Central university… They recruit mostly from a geographical radius around the university and rarely have D1 sports or high-research status. Sometimes they have a real name, like Christopher Newport University, Troy University, Mansfield University…
If you don’t like your classes, talk to the Head Guidance Counselor with your parents.