That is wonderful! My dd’s schedule did not fare as well. She had to drop one AP class and still has one free period all three trimesters. The issue is with her year long 3rd period Band class and her first trimester 5th period Marching Band P.E. Those are unmovable, but that leaves my dd with no classes to take 1st period on trimester 1, and 5th period trimester 2 and 3. She is very stressed about that because it is a significant drop in rigor from her requested schedule. I suggested taking a CC class but they are all online and she can’t mentally take it any more after a whole year of virtual classes.
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Congratulations! We are nowhere near that point yet. Inching very very slowly towards the goal here.
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Yep, band is usually one of the problems. Each level can only meet one period, for obvious reasons. She had already talked to the Band Directors about dropping down a level as top-level band and the single Physics C class had been the same period for a couple years. For some reason, Physics is now 1st period (which is a problem for the much larger main band, 2/3 of all banders.)
S22 has experienced many band related schedule conflicts as well. Each level band only offered one period, same with jazz. So many conflicts with Chinese. He’s taken classes before school and summer to accommodate music. Other schools, including neighbor HS, offer band after school as an EC, which seems to make more sense schedule-wise, but diminishes the academic nature of the program. College may provide more flexibility in scheduling.
Interesting article over the weekend in the WSJ….
Wait-Listed at Colleges of Your Dreams? Some Offer Semester Abroad as Way In - WSJ text`
W&M offered 4,700 people spots on the wait list, up from around 4,000 in 2019. It expects to admit a total of between 30 and 40 [from the wait list]. In addition, the school expects to enroll about 100 students from its wait list for the 2022 spring semester after they spend the fall studying abroad. [That was a huge wait list for just 30-40 getting offers and 100 more being offered spring admission.]
I know of some privates (like USC, SMU and Miami) offering spring admission and a first semester abroad or on your own. Now it appears W&M is on to that as well. I’m not aware of any public universities outside Texas that offer a first year outside the main campus with a pathway. Florida seems to have a couple alternative engineering pathways but it’s not real clear.
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We know students at Cornell and the College of William & Mary (a public university) who were offered programs to defer admissions for a semester.
But I think those were kids who were admitted, not waitlisted, at Cornell. For the schools that were over-enrolled, some offered options like a discount on tuition if they would start in spring or the option to study abroad fall semester freshman year as to avoid the crunch in the dorms on campus. I remember Virginia Tech back in 2019 was overenrolled and they offered admitted students $10k to take a gap year and a guarantee of a good dorm spot when they enrolled that year later
Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, as it simplifies the situation), both WUSTL and Vanderbilt have a bad transfer credit policy as far as DE credits go. S22 has no desire to repeat most/all of the college level math classes he has already taken. If anything he is already eying graduate level classes.
Not sure about USC and Duke.
Kids got their schedules yesterday. S22 has one conflict. He wanted AP CSA, but it conflicts with a required class. He can either take it online or as independent study and be added into the Google Classroom. The teacher is fine with either option. I think he’s leaning towards independent study, so long as it is clear on the transcript what it is. And as long as it’s still weighted like an AP.
He’s making progress on the Common App, etc. Nothing on the essay yet, but says we can put time into that this weekend. I hope.
Transfer credit for DE courses at private universities is a rarity. The student may be able to waive classes that duplicate past coursework, but it is also common that any college math course at the MVC-level or above will cover much more material than a DE course with the same course name.
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It’s really not surprising for private colleges, though MIT allows students to test out of the usual suspects (MVC, differential equations, linear algebra, … ) and get credit for them. He has all that plus some.
In our case, the combination of “needs merit” and “won’t go to college to relearn what he knows” go well together, and right now his list includes only public schools. He understands he might have missed a bit here or there, but he would rather learn a couple of weeks of material on his own than be bored through weeks of math he already knows.
S22 has contacted a few public universities regarding his DE credits (which are from a 4-year institution not a community college). Most math departments have been extremely helpful and offered to evaluate his classes or have already done so. We were very impressed by their willingness as he hasn’t even applied there yet.
There may be some confusion about the term Dual Enrollment. I believe there are some DE courses that are made for high school students and provided by an arrangement with the high school and perhaps a local CC? This is when the high school chooses this route for their rigor? I have seen the debate here on this site regarding the rigor of those classes vs AP.
I believe that is a pretty different version of DE vs taking a course at a 4 year university side by side with the college students. My S22 took MVC and now Discrete and Linear at CU-Boulder and it will show up on his high school transcript and will also be a college transcript that will follow him around.
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He might be able to test out of some math at MIT but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t “get credit for them”. He would just start in the math class that makes sense for him depending on what he’s taken so far and, likely, an MIT placement test.
I know of MIT students who did exactly that for credit.
I’m surprised! Our son is a math major at Bowdoin and it doesn’t matter how much math you’ve taken - no credit just advanced placement. Maybe it’s different if the math classes are college classes and are considered transfer credit. Looks like they review the syllabus for classes taken.
https://firstyear.mit.edu/academics-exploration/ap-transfer-credit/transfer-credit/
Advanced placement is significantly better than repeating a class. He wouldn’t mind taking extra math classes, but he would certainly mind repeating most of the lower level math classes he has already taken.
He is exactly the kind of student people mention when talking about the possibility of running out of math classes in smaller colleges. Being able to take at least a few graduate math classes as an undergraduate student is high on his list.
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They get credit if they pass. Penn is another private university which offers internal math exams for credit. But they are the minority.
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You might look for schools with progressive degree or 5 year BS/MS programs.
I hope the tone you are sharing doesn’t come across in his essays. I’m not sure how many colleges want a student who “won’t go to college to relearn what he knows.”
Kudos to him. Many kids who go into first year general engineering at large, well-regarded public universities retake Calc I or II in order to get an “easy A” to get the requisite GPA for their choice engineering major.
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