My S21 was only offered DE, so the school obviously said there were nothing but advantages over AP classes. In hindsight, I think it is definitely a mixed bag.
For admissions, I don’t think it was an advantage. Every AO knows what an A in AP classes requires and can appreciate a 5 on the test. However, DE may or may not carry the same weight.
We did have excellent outcome with getting the credits transferred. We came from CA to UT Austin, and every Community college credit transferred, and credit given for expected class requirements.
I think any convo about college at this point with 2024’s is too much. I have a S21 who is happy go lucky and could not be dealing with college talks. The only thing we talked about early on was what he wanted to do in college and from that, I filled him in on what he didn’t know and then we mapped out what would make sense for him throughout high school. They may have been more around when it made sense to prep for ACT, types of ECs. But nothing more than that. They have quite a work load with school right now and ECs, as well as adjusting to in-person high school.
D24, on the other hand, has had her sh3t together since she was a kindergartner. If she joined a sport, she’d ask things like, “What is the cutoff time for my age group for junior olympics?” And then she would work on qualifications while her S21 brother would come to me and ask me if I tracked his best 50M free best time for some swim teams write up that was due the week before. Totally different so I live in a constant “bi-polar” world as their mom. Even now when S21 is in college. D24 already knows what S21 should be doing right now but isn’t :). But even with D24, we are only talking about when she would prep for ACT. She knows types of colleges based on her brother’s experiences but the only college-related things we deliberately talk about is really how much more school spirit Yale has thru watching Gilmore Girls than Brown (her brother’s school). And we may have some convo about the holy trinity of Ivies thru the old Gossip Girl series :). Or how UCSD 7 colleges or Yale housing assignment is so much like Hogwarts. Have to keep it light with the serious kid. I’m truly concerned about burn out by senior year since even the Teflon, happy-go-lucky S21 kid felt burned out with colleges by Jan 1st.
UCs have 4 PIQ’s and I don’t think they change much. The Activities list takes a long time because the character limit is 350 (it’s tougher to write the shorter essays than the longer ones!).
The schools on common apps will tend to have 2-3 supplemental essays. These do change from year to year. Colleges will adjust the essay prompt or even a slight wording based on what and who they need to fill their community for a particular year.
I don’t recommend having the kids start before end of junior year because mindset can change, ECs can change, passions can change. Other than bullet points, you risk locking your child into a narrative. This will change from 10th to 12th grade as the kids evolve. The strategy varies so you have to determine which essays you start with. I knew S21 would get essay fatigue. We prioritized his top choice/ED. For the program he applied to, this required about 7 essays, including common app. He worked on the 5 short essays for MIT also but didn’t end up applying because he didn’t feel like he would’ve been a great fit for them. A ton of effort was put in those essays so after he was done with them, he was able to repurpose them for UCs and the rest the ones on his list. My cousin does college admission app coaching and she usually plans for two weeks per essay, from ideation to draft and reviews. That’s for a kid who can articulate insights about themselves. Timing takes into account reg school work, sports, etc.
Also, one watch out with taking community college classes/dual enrollment. If your child plans to apply to grad school, med school, the grades they get at the junior colleges will be part of their record and GPA calculation when they apply to grad school.
Agree. We are having no college talk beyond working hard at school will give you more options at college time. I did let her know that the Gilmore Girls’ process was not happening. I was very low key over the PSAT 10 as a practice run. My D24 has had some real anxiety over returning to in person for sure and unfortunately doesn’t have the same zeal for learning as pre-pandemic, though I think she has recovered academically and is likely to finish with all As. We’ve got two B+s from last block quarter. Oh well. Next semester is the musical so I think she will enjoy school again. She is at least thinking about where to volunteer in the summer. Desperately needs hours. She’s very protective of her free/me time these days. It’s a post-pandemic “is this all there is?” mentality at the moment. Kinda tough for a bright 15 yo. She does have a spring vocal competition in Hawaii to look forward to.
It’s a little hard because who knows where the pandemic will go? and it would be kind of nice to show her some campuses and get a feel for size. I think this one is likely to stay closer to home - no planes - so perhaps I don’t need to worry so much about not being able to travel when we need to.
Wow lot of great input from Parents who have gone through this before. I think starting Essays summer after Junior sounds good time to do the main essays.
@i_am_taxed we are in CA also and our schools does DE. We did discuss this with our GC and were informed that in general they recommend taking an AP if one is offered compared to DE class. One exception would be if you cant fit due to school schedule conflicts and in that case you explain as part of your application.
My son’s school offers something slightly different, I think. The school says this practice is more common on the east coast.
When he takes AP Bio next year, we can basically select the dual credit option (pay fees to the college). On the high school transcript, he gets AP Bio credit at the same time he gets BIO 101/102 from the associated college. Essentially the class taught by his high school teacher counts as both an AP class and a college class.
Assuming he does well in the class. I don’t see any downside other than the fees. Wouldn’t this basically raise the rigor by admission office getting college transcript showing A?
GC suggested that this shows rigor but wasn’t really clear how beneficial it is for the admission.
I was wondering if there are any parents who has an experience with it.
There is a small risk with dual enrollment, if the grade is not an A, keep in mind that the grade might be included in a college GPA calculation if he seeks grad school admission. Not sure it adds to rigor if it’s already an AP course.
@NateandAllisMom Way to go with the B+'s!! It’s so hard to transition back to school. I see it with my most focused STEM kid here, so I can only imagine how tough it is to get back to the routine, have outside life, and have passion for areas that are minority subjects in school vs mainstream subjects.
@i_am_taxed I think having AP or DE would demonstrate rigor on the transcript for admissions. The only risk you have is like I mentioned with the grades being permanent on the transcript for grad school through college credit. I don’t know how this would work with some of the schools. For example, (it’s not as relevant to us since S21 didn’t have any DE that were applicable) at Brown, the credits don’t allow you to graduate early or enter your concentration early. AP credit may get you placed in a higher class, but that’s about it. My son didn’t turn in any of his AP scores because he preferred to retake the class and be taught by someone who really knew the STEM topics. Because classes are sequential, it’s been better for him to get the refresher while also learning new material through his college professor. In chemistry where he chose to place out of the truly intro chem class, he’s struggling in the next level intro chem class! It will come down to if you need to pay additional money for DE and for AP and if it’s worth it. With S21’s original UC plans, he would’ve used the AP credits for some direct GEs while others for graduation credits. He still would’ve retaken the STEM classes. His friends, however, had actual college credit through linear algebra and differential equations at CSU Sacramento and jr college, so basically skipped all of the math req’s for his engr. major between those jr college/CSU classes and AP.
@MommaLue Are you saying DE classes will become a permanent part of the transcript of the undergraduate school you are attending? or is there a requirement to send in all college-level transcripts to graduate school admission?
It won’t be part of the undergrad institution record unless it serves as a class credit. I don’t believe it is part of the undergrad university gpa, either. However, when your student applies to grad school, your student’s DE/jr college credit and grades for those classes will be included in what grad schools review, not just the undergrad college record. They have to submit all of that to grad school.
If your student is applying to a PhD program, prob not a big deal. For law school, med school, it could be a big deal if it messes up their undergrad gpa.
Great information… I guess we will need to be careful in case. Maybe that’s why the school allows the dual enrollment to be filed at halfway through the first semester.
I just checked my old grad school admission site… looks like a transcript is required for any post-secondary school if you attended more than a year.
@MommaLue you know I do keep it real! One of the B+ was math, which was a shame. The second was a tough UC credit honors chemistry class. My daughter couldn’t care less about chemistry and will never use it. She’s very capable and has settled in but hates it. Since she’s block schedule she’ll be done with chemistry forever in January. There might be a cake involved.
The whole discussion about DE classes has me realizing it has a lot to do with where you end up. My S went to a selective private school and only was able to use two APs and could not use other 4s. No credit awarded for any of the city college and DE classes. But I know kids in D24s class who are loading up on DE and CC and gunning for CA publics. That can help when it’s hard to get the classes you want, though I know that some kids do repeat STEM classes as mentioned above. 19 times out of 20 the DE/CC classes are a cake walk here for top students.
My personal hunch is if we continue with TO admissions at many schools into 24 then it will be helpful to have good AP scores in your pocket, especially if you are not part of an institutional priority group. Hopefully my D will step up on hers and they will be ELA based subjects in her case.
@NateandAllisMom you know, someone like your D24, I just want to hug because I find kids like her the most fascinating kids to work with. At work my IT co-op is getting her masters in violin. I am willing to give her a ton of flexibility because she’s an amazing contributor and it allows her to go to school, perform in the orchestra. Kids like her need what S21 has and probably doesn’t 100% take advantage of other than he doesn’t feel obligated to major in bio for premed. Your D24 would love an open curriculum school. Then she would NEVER have to take STEM again. At this point in my career, I’m thinking, “Heck, I would never want to take STEM again! Give me all the history and comp literature classes!” I think you make a great point on AP scores as an unspoken factor for UC admissions since they can’t use ACT/SAT.
My own point of view on DE–I didn’t push my son to do this and I won’t push my daughter to do this because for any reason they get a bad grade, I don’t want it to come back on me not giving them guidance. “Mom, I was 15, 16 years old. Why did you not stop me?! These grades are messing up my grad school app!” Nope, I’m not touching that one unless it’s maybe a fun art/elective class where I know it won’t affect their science GPA (no artistically-inclined kid here other than one who loves hip hop dance). If the group of colleges on your kids’ wishlists value DE’s, go for it. It will absolutely save you time and money. If they don’t, eliminate the unnecessary stress. Stick with AP’s. The school report will only say how many honors and AP classes your school offers. Admissions will go off that and won’t expect your kids to be dual enrolled in a JC.
My D luckily has a really good young teacher for chem who keeps them accountable. D apparently makes impressive models of animals from the extra clay during their group / lab projects. The chem teacher said “you’re my most creative student”.
I suspect that AP scores will play a bigger role at many selective schools if TO is still a big thing. If enough of the 21 / 22 TO kids do not as perform well before the 24 app season this may be even more true. I listened to a really I interesting podcast from the NACAC guy saying that colleges were worried about this and pandemic gaps in learning. Also kinda wondering if AP will soften the tests a bit while things are still nutty.
There is also the rise of equity grading in play for the 24s. Faced with soaring Ds and Fs, schools are ditching the old way of grading I would think showing you’ve mastered the AP content relative to your national peers will greatly help demonstrate rigor and achievement in this environment.
It’s also possible that AP tests/scores will follow this trend. If the AP scores become more important, then there will be even more uproar since AP offerings vary so much from school to school. It might not happen by the time 24’s admission though.
Personally, I like the system I went through. I was a 1.5 generation living in a state with automatic admission to a top state school was available if you had a certain GPA or SAT score. Most of my friends didn’t stress out for admission. And many of my friends including myself ended up in extremely competitive grad schools without any problem.
When I go through resumes to fill my reqs, it’s true that prestigious college resumes do get more eyeball time. but these days, I’m not hiring anyone without a graduate degree so I wonder if it’s better to focus on long-term plan that includes graduate schools.
This is my hope - that if you do really well on the APs that you do have, it doesn’t matter quite as much how many you have - at least for the lesser competitive majors. My D24’s school offers many unfortunately, though with her arts classes she can’t fit in many. Keeping my fingers crossed that she does very well on the ones she takes. And she won’t have any room at all for DEs.
There are a lot of ways college admissions could be improved imho but we have to play the hand we are given.
I was reading in another post about a high school student who was interested in a STEM major later in college. One piece of information that came out is that they may only take three years of science in HS when all is said and done. Some of the comments in that post mentioned that not taking science one year may have been a misstep, and recommended that the student fit in another science class. Their situation is a bit different, but brought up a question for me.
In my hs sophomore’s situation, he is not taking science this year - I will give details why if anyone wants that information - but I am not sure it is pertinent to my question which is:
Will this affect his admission into a STEM major at some schools?
He is currently in Honors Math 3 and AP Computer Science A, which is considered an additional math. He is enrolled at a junior college in a science class that would satisfy the Life Science GE requirement at many universities. He was not able to take the corresponding lab as it was not offered this semester.
Last year he took Honors Biology in high school.
Next year he is planning on physics and in his senior year, chemistry.
Would his jc science course be considered another year of science while in high school? I guess I am confused about how admission personnel consider jc courses while in high school.
Can someone explain how admissions looks at the two types of classes (high school vs. college) before graduating high school, while also considering my son’s choice of no science this year in high school, just the jc class?
Both UC application and common app have sections you can upload course information from other high schools or community colleges. During the admission, colleges will see ALL classes and grades. You will need to send a transcript from the junior college as well.
so I think it will count as another year of science.
As others mentioned, the JC/CC will be considered for certain graduate schools, I guess you want to be mindful and strategic about it.
Taking outside classes that you can take in your own high school is looked frowned upon. If you are taking classes because that’s not offered by your high school shows the rigor and initiative according to another parent.
My niece took night community college courses extensively during her junior/senior year… took classes her school didn’t offer - general psych, 2nd level stat, multi-variable calc, and linear algebra. She ended up in UCB and because of the CC courses, she started as a sophomore standing.
I think it depends on how selective his college list is. If he wants a STEM major, taking AP physics and chem junior and senior year will help him.
If he’s taking a science class now at the JC, it would count as taking four years of science. For whatever reason (there’s a section in the app that you can use to explain if you think it’s warranted) the JC class was needed this year, the explanation can be captured in that section.
She is at least thinking about where to volunteer in the summer. Desperately needs hours. She’s very protective of her free/me time these days. It’s a post-pandemic “is this all there is?” mentality at the moment. Kinda tough for a bright 15 yo. She does have a spring vocal competition in Hawaii to look forward to.
There might be a cake involved.