<p>So I'm currently in 8th grade and EVERYONE is scheduling their classes for high school.</p>
<p>My mother is having me sign up for all of my classes just in case anything happens.
But as I'm registering for the classes at my high school I'm starting to doubt boarding school.</p>
<p>My high school allows their freshmen to take 2 AP courses. AP Biology and AP History. I signed up for both because I got recommended for both. I was really impressed that they allow freshmen to take these two AP classes
and I'm starting to wonder if boarding schools allows their freshmen to take AP courses.</p>
<p>I applied to Lawrenceville and Andover. Do they let their kids take AP courses? I really want to be able to take some in 9th grade so that my college credits begin to add up.</p>
<p>I heard Lawrenceville doesn't even OFFER AP courses in general...</p>
<p>Schools might offer AP-level courses but they aren’t taught AP-style so they can’t be called that.</p>
<p>You should take this as a blessing. Lawrenceville and Andover are both super hard to get into, so if it doesn’t work, you know you have a great fallback option.</p>
<p>P.S. My school makes us register for high school classes even if we think we’re going somewhere else…</p>
<p>Don’t know a thing about your HS so I can’t really comment on the quality of education…it very well might be a great school…but I wouldn’t base a great review solely on the fact that a high school offers AP classes without pre-reqs. </p>
<p>Just because they offer AP courses, it does’t mean that the students are able to take the course or the exam due to lack of instruction. The schools you are applying to have some of the best teachers in the country who will better prepare you for AP exams as well as college.</p>
<p>Some of the top boarding schools do not offer courses that are called AP. however, the material in some of their courses will cover the things on the AP test. Some classes are actually college level, depending on where you are. </p>
At the top prep schools, the honors classes are much more rigorous than AP. You could eat the AP exams for lunch, as GMTson has already done in soph year.</p>
<p>^^+1 to GMT’s comment. Part of the reason we considered BS for our son was to REMOVE him from the AP rat race. He will not be taking any APs at Choate, but he will take a couple of AP exams which he is not worried about passing.</p>
<p>^^+1 Often the classes are “honors” classes rather than AP both so they can go beyond the AP curriculum AND so the teachers don’t have to teach to the test. Kids do totally fine on the AP exams-- and colleges understand the rigor of these classes.</p>
<p>One of my favorite comments made by an AO during our process with 7D1 was this, from our SPS AO (paraphrasing from memory, of course): “When people ask about how many APs we offer, they are missing out on the fact that the whole school is sort of an AP school.”</p>
<p>I am not a big “How many AP classes can you take” person…as that smacks of “teaching to a test”. 7D1 in BC Calc this year…teacher mentioned that recent midterm was has hard as the AP test itself.</p>
<p>Okay. I guess I understand now. That was kind of overwhelming I did not mean whatsoever to insult or degrade boarding school education. It is obviously very high and rigorous. </p>
<p>Definitely not an AP fan either but rareparadox- no worries, it was a fair question - and sadly many colleges do still seem to use #s of APs as one of the ways to measure applicants. I think the bs trend is away from APs but it’s hard to appreciate the wisdom of that when all your public school peers are racking up as many as possible. Chimneykid will most likely only take 1-2 at her bs - she would have taken 5-6 at her public school. I know she is getting a better education in boarding school but since she is at a NotHADES, I am a little worried that her public school classmates course load may look more impressive on paper than hers will - even though I know the reality is that her bs classes are much much more demanding. </p>
<p>HONESTLY, colleges understand the rigor of BS classes, the move away from APs, and the grades. I do admissions interviewing for an ivy, and THEY UNDERSTAND. It doesn’t mean every kid gets in, of course, but, if they don’t, it’s not because of APs.</p>
<p>Many colleges are no longer offering credit for AP course. I think Dartmouth announced that after 2016? they would no longer give credit for AP courses. BS and even day schools are responding by removing AP courses from their curriculum. The reason kids even got into the chase of AP courses was because they are under the impression that if you do not take an AP course offered at your school than you are looked down on as sliding or taking it easy. Colleges need to dispel this myth if it is not true. This is also why parents hound schools about AP because they are under the mistaken belief that without the AP course their child will look like a slacker.</p>
<p>You have the timeline wrong. I can’t speak for day schools, but my BS eliminated AP’s long before I matriculated. They feel that they should not teach to the test and do not believe that they need to be subjected to a course audit by the College Board. That said, many students here do take AP tests and score well.</p>
<p>Other than Dartmouth, I am not aware of any college that does not give credit for AP. Dartmouth’s policy change is effective for the class of 2018. While the perception of bad behavior has more to do with it than the AP change, Dartmouth’s applications plunged 14% this year.</p>
<p>Many private schools may limit the number of AP credits. Harvard and Yale grant credit only upon activating advanced standing. Brown gives credit, but still has an 8 semester requirement for graduating. Many do not give credit for specific exams. Human Geography and Studio Art come to mind. However, I don’t think a blanket statement that colleges are not offering credit is valid.</p>
<p>Many boarding schools offer AP-level classes without the goal of scoring well on the test. Lots of kids take AP tests without having taken the regulated class, and lots of these kids pass and score well. It’s much better learning this way, and you still get the benefit of having AP test scores to offer for college applications. So schools aren’t removing APs from their offerings- just the technical teaching to the test and regulated class- and that’s because it offers better learning this way.</p>
<p>Some schools will not give credit for the classes. However, these schools still look at test scores and can see that students took APs and scored well. It depends on the college and the class. APs are also just very challenging, preparatory classes, which can be great to take no matter the college. Whether or not a particular college accepts APs and will allow you to get credit doesn’t and shouldn’t matter. Taking APs and scoring well on the tests still shows, and you’ll still learn quite a bit and be wonderfully challenged.</p>
<p>I was speaking from my own experience. I know that some BS like SPS have eliminated AP courses for some time. I put a ? mark on the date for Dartmouth because I did not want to waste my time looking it up. Way back when I was a freshman, I recall a classmate of mine who entered as a second quarter freshman. He had attended Loyola HS and collected numerous AP credits. He graduated two quarters early because of this and enjoyed his time off before Med School. I know our alma mater does not allow this anymore. They want to collect the full twelve quarters of tuition dollars. However, on my visits to BS with my child there was a constant refrain from parents about the number of AP classes offered. Many of the faculty would like to dispense with these courses precisely because they do not want to teach to a test. I know very good private HS in our area actually have to add extra sessions to cover the material on the test. I think that many schools keep these classes in the curriculum because of the parent’s perceptions. </p>