@hgtvaddict I’m so sorry for your daughter! How incredibly frustrating. Good math teachers are so important. Two of my kids did DE and had excellent calculus instructors at the community college. My other two were stuck with a mediocre high school teacher. He wasn’t a GPA buster but they didn’t get a good foundation in calculus like my two DE kids.
@socaldad2002 Your DD did pretty good on PSAT Math correct? Does she want to try SAT?
@hgtvaddict Is your DD continuing AB next semester or starting BC ( means a new teacher maybe)? DS was lucky to went directly into BC last year. Some of his friends were taking AB with a bad teacher. I heard there were kids crying at the exams. That teacher is no longer with the school district.
Good luck, socaldad. That is a hard decision. If she is a humanities major, I might stop now. As you note, there is certainly a risk the scores drop.
@roycroftmom i think she is majoring in business or Econ? They probably want to see her Math scores higher?
Thanks everyone.
@roycroftmom thanks for the encouragement. Since I didn’t take Calculus in high school (let alone college), the whole thing seems a bit daunting to me. I do need to remind myself and D that it will all work out.
@whataboutcollege she’s staying in AB with the same teacher next semester.
@ebh87 I wish she could switch to an equivalent class at the community college next semester - she loves taking classes there - but all of the equivalent classes there are closed.
@bigmacbeth She’s not sure what she wants to major in, but thinks she wants something STEM-related.
Socaldad, I think it depends on what schools she is considering, and whether those schools have a competitive admit to a business program. Personally, I found it was very good for my student to be in a business program with students of similar math ability to her. She likely would have changed majors had the students been much more quantitatively skilled. As it was a good match, she stayed in the program and thrived. YMMV.
My D20 wants to be done with her 34C, but we are sitting right to see how her athletic season goes. If a lottery school then becomes a possibility, I may try to convince her to take it one more time.
Has anyone noticed an increase in marketing e-mails? We seem to be getting a ton of emails for expensive summer programs. Received one today for a $8K program with a very generous offer for $25 discount off of the application fee. 8-}
@hgtvaddict, you have all my sympathy. We’re living with almost exactly the same situation. The teacher isn’t to blame, though he is a factor to a small degree - S2 idolizes him and doesn’t like to “seem stupid” by asking for additional explanation. At this point we know the grade will be a B- at best and probably not climb to that. For us, the grade is the least of our problems. It’s more that the whole subject has become raw and demoralizing to S2 and his idea of his capabilities. He’s decided he can’t handle it, and can’t seem to hear it when the teacher (who taught him in honors precalc last year and recommended him for BC rather than AB) tells him he can do it and does belong in this section. DH and I just want him to get his feet back under him and understand that it’s a hard class, not his actual bete noir (sorry, can’t format that from my phone).
He doesn’t want a tutor so we’re giving him some time to try minimum 1/2 hour a day with Khan Academy practice. If he keeps flailing, we’ll do the tutor thing anyway.
I’m hoping the break and some extra sleep will help restore some perspective.
*Edited to add that DH and I would be more than fine with his shifting over to AB, and it may well be possible without disrupting the rest of his schedule, but we aren’t sure whether that would offer relief, or undermine him. Open to opinions!
Is everybody on break now?
@HarrietMWelsch What are his plans for math next year? Can he move to AB now and take BC next year?
@HarrietMWelsch
My opinion is to consider moving to AB. That is still advanced for a Junior, and just moves at a slower pace, basically covering one semester of college calc vs 2 for BC. Hopefully, that will allow him to get his feet under him again and regain some confidence. What’s his plan for senior year math? He could do BC then. Ive heard of one very rigorous private school in Boston that encourages their students to take AB one year, followed by BC the next…or AB then Multivariable Calc +BC exam. (I think they may even have multiple levels of AB.) I just would much rather have him confident in his math abilities, which are clearly strong or he wouldn’t be taking Calc junior year.
BTW, my H and I both majored in math, and worked in a math field. My junior is also in BC, and my senior is in AB, and both seem to be appropriately placed.
My advice @HarrietMWelsch is actually to sit down and talk very frankly with him about a tutor or other resources. He’ll be well served in her first semester in college if he understand NOW that there is absolutely nothing wrong with finding the appropriate resources when you need them. Too many freshman struggle unnecessarily as they see office hours, TAs and yes tutors as a failure instead of a resource. Does his current teacher offer office hours? His teacher from last year? We insisted our D21 in Calc BC go in after a 72 on a test to his teacher’s office hours. He thought we were being crazy as he still had an A in the class and didn’t feel like he needed “help”. Our mantra was it’s better to sit down and make sure you thoroughly understand the material NOW than move on to the next section and that is exactly what office hours are for. It was more about destigmatizing asking for help than anything else. These high achieving kids need to understand that it’s okay to ask for someone to explain it again that it’s okay to need extra practice. Good luck!
@MAandMEmom Judging by your post count you’ve been around for a while. Do you think once you’ve cracked the 34-barrier that a higher score is going to help in admissions to top tier schools? Or is it more about the other stuff at that point. Plus, taking it again seems like it makes one appear ‘greedy’. I would be a terrible admissions officer, because that’s the way I think… 
@bigmacbeth I believe it depends on many factors. Is the student chasing merit and there’s a cutoff, is the student in a naturally more competitive pool like an ORM, or in the case of my daughter who is a recruited athlete, might she benefit a boost in the academic index at a lottery school? My DD attends a pretty competitive boarding school where grades are not weighted and she takes a challenging course load, resulting in a lower GPA. Test scores compose a good portion of the AI so she may benefit from an additional test to aim for the 75%, which is typically 35. Most schools do not superscore the ACT so sending multiple sittings really doesn’t make sense unless you’re required and I think Georgetown might be one of the only institutions left with that requirement.
Here’s an interesting article that talks about the importance of testing as part of the AI: https://www.noodlepros.com/blog/2017/09/18/raise-academic-index/
Interesting article. Thanks for sharing. We don’t have a phenomenal sports program at our high school but still have a decent amount of kids playing sports at schools like Dartmouth, Princeton, Columbia and Pomona.
D checked her portal and she got a 91% on her AP Calc AB final. Her semester grade is a B…better than the C grade she anticipated. She may not have a “perfect” gpa anymore, but she worked harder for that B than any other grade before. I’m really proud of her effort!
Excellent @hgtvaddict
in my experience Calculus does take awhile to click for some students and a.rising grade around this point is a good sign.
@hgtvaddict
Congrats! DS is not a straight-A student (his school’s 6-point grading scale is brutal, lol) and I actually think it is not a bad thing to get some imperfect grades in HS.
@MAandMEmom
I have thought ACT of 34 is a very good score, according to the concordance table 34 ACT is equivalent to 1500 SAT (range of 1490-1520), way above SAT 1400 stated in the article. Have your DD talked with any potential coaches? The coaches would have told her whether she needs to retake the test.
Messing around with some of the online AI calculators, it seems that for my DD going from a 34 to a 35 yields an additional, and possibly important, four points. I think in her case she’ll need to wait until the end of her season (March) to know if she’s a recruit, especially given that she doesn’t participate in her sport year round like the other 99% of the athletes with which she will be compared. Coaches need to arrive at an average for all recruits (we were told this by one) so having a higher AI might help in her case. Otherwise, certainly she’s done and it’s an excellent score.
Her brother, who is a senior this year and is not an athlete, also received a 34…twice. We were thinking he might want to chase high merit so he took it a second time with the same result – although first time he got a 33.75 and the second a 34.25.
@MAandMEmom
What sport is your DD in? My DS is a potential swim recruit and he is actively communicating with coaches now. We are looking mainly at D3 schools and the timelines will be later than IVYs which are D1. One of his friends who was interested in one of the HYPSM schools had a subject test score of 720 and was told by the coach that he should retake it to make it to 750.