<p>This was posted in a class-specific thread but may have broader interest here.</p>
<p>UNC-CH is no longer considering more than 5 APs to be a plus. Not a negative either, but they found college GPA bump from APs taken in HS maxes out at 5.</p>
<p>Study</a> finds that more AP classes may not be better – University Gazette</p>
<p>Our school doesn’t weight grades so this is irrelevant :D. Ask any college bound kid in our high school and they will say that the prefer the AP classes even with a lower grade.</p>
<p>SteveMA, if you read the article you will see that they are talking about the <em>college</em> GPA, not HS.</p>
<p>Of course, the article also states that students take APs just to bolster their HS GPAs. Since grades aren’t weighted at our HS either, the kids who take APs usually do so because they want to be in more challenging classes with the other motivated kids. I really get annoyed at the constant insistence that kids only take APs for weighting.</p>
<p>So kids who took 10 AP classes in high school don’t do better in college than kids who took 5 AP’s. My D would laugh at me if I told her not to take AP classes, that she should take easy classes and be bored.</p>
<p>Our school doesn’t weight either (though they are changing that next year as an experiment). But colleges still consider lots of APs “most rigorous” and it sounds like UNC-CH is dropping that preference for kids with lots of APs.</p>
<p>My son took APs - 4, as I recall, Euro, Gov and the two Englishes, because he enjoyed those subjects. He liked that the classes moved quickly and class time wasn’t taken up with lots of repeated explanations and busywork.</p>
<p>I found the article disappointing due to its lack of detail. I don’t believe all AP classes are equally demaning and rigorous - Human Geography and Psychology are definitely not the same as Calc BC and Physics C. My guess is that the study treated all AP classes equally, even though students taking more than 5 APs are likely to have a number of the “easier” classes. This would account for some of the plateau. The article doesn’t indicate whether the study did any filtering for which AP classes students took, or even if they actually took the classes or did a self-study program.</p>
<p>Also, the article does not offer any alternatives for students to consider for increasing the rigor of their course work. My kids take APs simply because they are the hardest classes offered, not because of the “AP” designation. They would take them even if they will not recieve any credit in college. Would UNC prefer that students take more dual-enrollment classes? perhaps take easier non-AP classes? Study hall?</p>
<p>I definitely agree with SteveMA - the brightest students want to take the most challenging classes. At most high schools, this means taking all AP classes available.</p>
<p>DD14 will be choosing her senior year courses in the next few weeks. Some of the AP classes she will take are easy choices - AP Calc, a science (Bio or Chem is still undecided), and AP Psych because those are what interest her. AP English will probably be chosen because she will enjoy being in the class with her classmates who take school more seriously. Honors English doesn’t have kids with the same level of commitment. English is definitely not her strongest subject, but it’s worth the struggle to have a much better class environment (plus I’ve heard the teacher is great and she’ll learn a lot). Guess the big question will be whether she takes 2 AP sciences or just one.</p>
<p>In our experience, the AP classes were more challenging, taught by more experienced, engaging teachers (some former college profs) and just generally better prep for college. Some didn’t necessarily teach to the exam either. But overall, the most rigorous offering at Ds high school. And the whole point was to be better prepared for college 
That said, I will counsel her to retake those courses in her major, ie. calc & physics/chem so that she hasn’t missed anything important. It was never assumed that she would shorten her time there by accumulating credits going in. If she can skip composition 101 then that would make her happy. </p>
<p>I can see why a higher number of AP courses becomes a problem when so many here “self study” & take the exam but perhaps missed an opportunity to really learn the material? I do personally know of a freshman who placed into second or third year calculus & experienced a debilitating fall semester.</p>
<p>UNC isn’t suggesting that students should take something else for rigor, etc. if AP courses are what is available. They are just saying that students who take 10 are not going to do massively better their freshman year of college than students who only took 5, so in terms of evaluating college readiness for admissions, they will not consider the student with 10 as being twice as ready (“yea! let him in for sure!”) as the student who only took 5 (“what a maroon, REJECT!”). </p>
<p>I don’t know why posters are getting all defensive about their kids maxing out on the APs. No one is really criticizing that, in fact the admissions officer says if that’s what interests them, then it’s a reason to do so. Just not to do so in hopes of getting more favour in admissions.</p>
<p>What they don’t mention is the many schools (like D’s) that significantly weight AP’s so that a student who has only taken a few will rank wayyyyyy below a student who has taken a lot. Thus UNC may say “above 5 is not factoring in” but then favor the student with 10 because he/she ranks so much higher.</p>
<p>Like consolation said, the tone of the article is that kids are taking them not because they want to challenge themselves and learn, but just to bump their GPA’s to get into college. We disagree.</p>
<p>I would guess that the kids who have the opportunity to take and do well in 5 AP classes are the same ones who would take more, and that it has more to do with the students than the classes. Why shouldn’t a superstar student who can take and do well in 5 be “maxed out” and be as good a student as the kid who takes 6 classes? There’s a ceiling effect.</p>
<p>To the extent that kids are taking tough courses because they enjoy the work (or at least like it better than the less rigorous course in that topic) and not to bolster any sort of credentials, the number of classes labelled AP is less important than the learning choices kids are making. The kids who like the tougher courses continue to take the tougher courses because they WANT to, not because they feel they HAVE to.</p>
<p>Kids can still take as many AP branded classes as they want, it’s just the colleges who may change their attitude. Frankly I’m surprised colleges swallowed the AP pill to begin with. Our high school only offers 5 AP branded classes but frankly the absolute most rigorous (interesting, challenging) classes that my kids liked the best were not AP branded. </p>
<p>So I’ve never “understood” why colleges didn’t get the whistle blown on them for giving credit for AP branded classes but not giving kids without access to multitudes of AP branded classes an opportunity to earn college credit (at colleges that give credit for AP). I always thought it smacked of collusion between Collegeboard and colleges (although we all know that’s a fairly incestuous relationship to begin with).</p>
<p>UC and CSU calculate their primary admissions HS GPA with maximum of 8 honors/AP bonus points for such courses taken in 10th and 11th grade.</p>
<p>A UC study previous found that honors/AP courses did not predict college grades very well (though performance on AP tests did):
[CSHE</a> - The Role Of Advanced Placement And Honors Courses In College Admissions](<a href=“Publications | Center for Studies in Higher Education”>Publications | Center for Studies in Higher Education)</p>
<p>In practice, this means that nearly all UC applicants have UC admissions HS GPAs about 0.3 to 0.4 higher than their unweighted 10th and 11th grade academic GPAs, since even applicants to Merced averaged more than 8 semesters of honors/AP courses according to the now-defunct UC Statfinder. The current policy may be intended to give some incentive to take the more rigorous courses, but not give excess advantage to students at high schools with large numbers of “AP lite” courses that students can run up their count of AP courses with.</p>
<p>^I agree momofthreeboys. It seems like at some point interesting, challenging became synonymous with AP and vice versa. Unfortunate, IMHO, but maybe a change in admissions policies would eventually lead to some balance.</p>
<p>In my experience, the best students usually don’t go to schools where much actual credit is given for APs, and the goal of the students is usually to take MORE classes in college, not fewer. They want to learn.</p>
<p>I can certainly understand that there are kids for whom getting credit and paying for less school is important, though.</p>
<p>No matter what the colleges do, kids will still still take more APs because that’s how many high schools determine Val and Sal…the ones with the highest GPAs get selected…and usually the APs are the bump.</p>
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<p>Colleges give credit for AP exam scores, not classes. It would be difficult and time-consuming for them to figure out which high school courses are being taught at the college level, and since they lose tuition revenue from students who use credits from high school to graduate earlier, they have no incentive to make an effort to do so.</p>
<p>I look at the shift in admissions policy at Carolina as saying, “If you want to take a large number of AP courses, that’s fine with us. However, if you want to take courses you otherwise wouldn’t take because of APs, we’re not going to penalize you for that.”</p>
<p>The students in our children’s high school who plan to apply to more selective schools routinely must choose between taking 10-12 APs and leaving room for courses for which they have a passion, like a third language, graphic design, forensics, or theater (which is a tough course at our school). Nearly all of them choose the AP route, missing out on some other enriching courses that would likely hold them back in the admissions process. Maybe this will help, at least with the students who are aiming for Carolina.</p>
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<p>That is likely the case that students with large numbers of AP courses are likely taking a lot of “AP lite” courses.</p>
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<p>However, such students would likely prefer to take additional advanced courses instead of repeating freshman level or other introductory courses that their AP credit can substitute for. Presumably, the schools in question have some sort of procedure to place students who know the material well into more advanced courses (or they should).</p>