<p>My daughter will start HS next year and I'm trying to figure out her course load. We are in NJ and I know the standards for graduating. She is a honor roll student, but she works fairly hard for those grades.</p>
<p>That being said, I'm not quite sure about her schedule for next year. NJ requires only 2 years of a language, 3 of math and history. After hearing how even your old "safeties" aren't as safe anymore, I'm wondering if she should take 3 or 4 years of language. I always thought that she would take math through Calculus (which would be 5 years for her), but when I see that even some more competitive colleges only require 3, I'm thinking of splitting the difference at 4 years (through pre-cal). </p>
<p>And is everyone doing APUSH nowadays? Because great grades don't come easy to her, I don't want to overload her, if it isn't necessary. But I also don't want her to be eliminated from many of her choices simply based on the fact that she either didn't have the minimum requirements, or her classes weren't competitive enough.</p>
<p>At 13, her interests have been theater and animals for the last 3 or 4 years. I told her she should work at Seaworld! :)</p>
<p>I know it seems early to be writing on this board, but I've heard too many stories about people finding out, in their senior year, that they fell short on the academics for the college they chose.</p>
<p>I think it is very wise that you are doing this. One of the biggest mistakes my daughter made was not planning well for her freshman year. She is now having to cram in a lot her sophomore through Senior years to try and fit everything in for academic honors diplomas. Most of the colleges in our state give more weight to academic honors. </p>
<p>I know our school says 3 years of one language or two years of two different languages is required for academic honors.</p>
<p>One thing I did was look at several of the in-state college websites and see what diploma’s/requirements they were looking for. This helped us greatly in planning for her classes.</p>
<p>You are right to think that college admissions *recommendations
[/quote]
and high school graduation requirements are quite different, and that, of course, they differ according to colleges.
Generally, colleges expect at least 3 years of a foreign language (not two of one and one or two of another) because this is what is required to be minimally able to function in that language and to have a hope of placing out of the foreign language requirement. They recommend four years of English and four years of social studies, three years of science and four of math. While it is a good idea to aim for AP level if possible, it is not absolutely required and it is not a good idea to get a mediocre grade in an AP class as opposed to a good grade in an Honors class. S1, for instance did not take Calculus, opting for Discrete math in his fourth year. I would suggest that your D take as many Honors classes as she can handle in 9th grade and go on from there. It is easier to drop down one level if the class is too hard than to go up one in case the class turns out too easy.</p>
<p>I would plan on 4 years of foreign language and 4 years of math. Wait and see how the pre-calc goes and if it goes well you might want to consider calculus. As for APUSH, I would also wait and see how things are going as to whether to have her take the AP or honors. </p>
<p>Two things I have observed with my own child: a great teacher can make a huge difference and don’t underestimate your child. I found that D was far more capable than either the school or I had given her credit for.</p>
<p>[from the above link]
In summary, we recommend:</p>
<p>•the study of English for four years: close and extensive reading of the classics of the world’s literature;
•four years of a single foreign language;
•the study of history for at least two, and preferably three years: American History, European History, and one additional advanced history course;
•the study of mathematics for four years, including the particular topics described;
•the study of science for four years: Physics, Chemistry, and Biology, and preferably one of these at an advanced level;
•frequent practice in the writing of expository prose.</p>
<p>It’s good to plan for the full 4 years but understand that 10-12 can be changed. And don’t look at what a college’s minimum requirements are, look at what typically admitted students have. Most colleges will have that on their site.</p>
<p>As a freshman, one of math, science, social studies. english and language plus elective(s). Recommend she challenge herself with honors when available. At my kid’s school students can drop from honors to regular at the 1st Q if they are struggling. It encourages kids to try challenging themselves. Check if that’s an option. See how that goes before locking in AP and the rest later on. If she’s on track for Calc senior year, I’d say keep on that track until she shows she can or can’t handle it.</p>
<p>I’d bet HS will be the same as middle school, honor roll but she’ll work fairly hard at it. Nothing wrong with that. Kids do grow in capacity as the subject matter gets more difficult. Don’t underestimate her.</p>
<p>A lot depends on how high of a school your D will be aiming for. The higher the school, the more rigorous curriculum that they will be expecting. I would suggest to follow the Recommended curriculum rather than the Required curriculum for colleges of interest. Pick out a few schools and look them up - perhaps for Rutgers and TCNJ since they would be in-state for you.</p>
<p>I had hoped that my S would take 4 years each of English, math, social studies, science and foreign language. In the end he had only 3 foreign language and extra social studies, because of schedule conflicts. 3 years of foreign language is equal or more than the Required number for all of the schools he is applying for, and equal to the Recommended for most but not all of them. I’m planning on my freshman D taking 4 years each of all of those subjects. </p>
<p>If she will be interested in schools that require SAT subject tests, it is useful to plan to take related classes sophomore or junior year. APUSH is great prep for the USH subject test. Most schools that require subject tests require 2 of them.</p>
<p>I also am from NJ and APUSH is by far the most popular AP class in my kids’ HS, with more than 15% of the students taking it. </p>
<p>I agree the Harvard recommendations are pretty much what most of the selective colleges are expecting. That said, it you go down a step you can get away with three years of foreign language and three years of science. You don’t have to decide now whether your child will take AP History - in our high school a lot of kids take it. It’s not that much extra work and you get a lot of bang for you buck. At our school, they run one class of AP World History for sophomores and a couple of classes of AP Physics B. Lot of kids only take one or the other, and plenty don’t take those APs at all. You don’t have to decide today if she’s taking Calculus, but you don’t want to be closing doors unnecessarily. She should take courses that are advanced enough to be challenging, but not so advanced that she can’t get at least a B. (We miscalculated a bit on either side of this - for our two boys - sometimes they ended up in a class that was too easy, and once in one that was too difficult.)</p>
<p>I knew that I had come to the right place for answers! Thanks for the information. I searched Collegeboard for a numerous amount of colleges that “could” be possibilities and saw the recommended and required HS courses. Even with colleges that I thought were less competetive, I underestimated the minimum.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t take the recommendation for four years of “history” too literally.</p>
<p>If your school system requires a year of government, you can count that in the “history” total, even though, technically, it isn’t history. Most colleges would also consider economics to be an acceptable substitute for a history course.</p>
<p>Also, remember that “four years of foreign language” does not mean “four years of foreign language taken in high school.” It means “foreign language through Level 4.” Students who take foreign language in middle school and therefore complete Level 4 before their senior year of high school have “four years of foreign language.”</p>
<p>Ah, if only her middle school did this. We are lucky that she was able to take Algebra 1 this year (after much fuss). She has block scheduling now and doesn’t take her science and social studies at the same time. My concern is that going from this schedule, to one with five major subjects all at once, will be extremely challenging for someone who isn’t used to it. So, I was trying to see if she could take the minimum courses required to graduate while assuring she had enough to at least be considered for most of her college choices - all without jeopardizing her grades.</p>
<p>You are wise to be thinking about this now. </p>
<p>I went to the web site of our very selective Flagship and printed out the recommended courses, which were the same as the Harvard list. I showed this to our not-yet-freshman. I wish I could tell you that we worked out a plan together. But the project took so much study of various materials from the high school concerning prereqs and eligibility (and he was what, 14?), that I mapped out a 4-year master plan and then we talked about it again.</p>
<p>Having this plan for reference was extremely helpful in the years to come. Deviations were made due to scheduling conflicts, but it was very easy to see the implications of various choices and, when a scheduling issue was going to cause a longer term problem, our son had the information to take to his counselor.</p>
<p>Whether or not colleges require it, I think that 4 years of English, history/economics/government, math, and science is a great foundation for any future college attendance. 3-4 years of a language is also useful. </p>
<p>If you think that taking AP classes in all of the above subjects is too much of a load for your kid, I might suggest seeing what area your kid is strong in and take AP classes in those areas. I’ve known kids (mainly boys) who took AP classes in math and science, but would take regular classes in English and history. Then again, I’ve known others (mostly girls) who took AP history and English classes and took regular science and math classes.</p>
<p>One thing that I’ve advised parents to do on the middle school level–make sure that your kid is tracked into the correct math class in middle school. At our high school, in order to be ready for calculus in grade 12, you need to have taken Algebra 1A and 1B in middle school, which means starting algebra in grade 7. So class planning can start to occur in middle school…</p>
<p>That is so true about the math. I am so glad that I found out about that before high school. I went to the local public high school during the summer after my daughter’s 6th grade, just to check it out in person. I was able to speak with the GC who told me to make sure that she took Algebra in the 8th grade. I tried to spread the word to as many people as possible, but I was surprised that this was not widely known to the parents.</p>
<p>A student who is taking Algebra 1 in 9th grade could take both Algebra 2 and Geometry their sophomore year to take Calc as a senior. They could learn a year of math on their own during summer or take one of the remedial CC classes during the summer.</p>
<p>Also, one other thing…</p>
<p>“If you think that taking AP classes in all of the above subjects is too much of a load for your kid, I might suggest seeing what area your kid is strong in and take AP classes in those areas. I’ve known kids (mainly boys) who took AP classes in math and science, but would take regular classes in English and history. Then again, I’ve known others (mostly girls) who took AP history and English classes and took regular science and math classes.”</p>
<p>That’s the norm, not the exception (it seemed like you were phrasing it as the exception). Only people here take every single AP class their school offers just because they can. Most just take the ones they want to. </p>
<p>And one more, let HER plan this. If she doesn’t want to (she’s 13, I’m assuming she’s not one of those crazy 13-year-olds who’s obsessed with getting into college already) don’t worry so much about it. They’ll make her take all the core subjects her freshman year, they’ll heavily recommend a foreign language, you might want to push her into Honors vs. Regular classes, but you don’t need to plan out every class she takes in High school.</p>
<p>By the way, thank you for typing out the word “daughter” and not saying ‘D’ or “DD” or something like that.</p>
<p>marite, the block scheduling is for middle school. Her high school doesn’t do block scheduling (yet).</p>
<p>QwertyKey, thanks for the information. Actually, the only reason that I was thinking about the entire 4 years of high school is to make sure that she takes what she needs as a freshman. Previously, I was under the impression that she would only take two years of a language. When I saw that many schools recommend 3 or 4, I realized that she would need to start her language as a freshman. That’s when I started researching the other subject recommendations.</p>
<p>I really just didn’t want her to be in a situation where she waited until her junior year to start a subject (like French or US history), only to realize that she should have taken more years of it in order to even get into our state colleges.</p>
<p>To be honest, my daughter isn’t at the level of maturity to even think about these types of things We talk about what language she would like to pursue, and what she would like to do as a career someday, but her mind isn’t wired to think about AP classes yet. Now her 12 year old best friend is telling her mom what high school she wants to attend because of the amount of AP classes. My daughter didn’t even know what an AP class was.</p>
<p>My daughter isn’t a typical CC child, but I have parent potential ;)</p>
<p>Thanks for the clarification. And don’t worry; most 8th graders have no idea what AP is. But teachers do make recommendations as to placement (eg. college prep vs. honors). In our high school, the GCs also held parents’ night at the very beginning of school to explain the curriculum. I remember the GC telling parents that if they wanted their child to take Calculus in senior year, the child should take a particular math sequence.
I am a bit surprised that your child has not taken a foreign language in middle school. At ours, it started in 7th grade when my children attended and now I hear it starts in 6th grade. However, beginning in 9th grade is absolutely fine. Some of my S’s friends switched from Spanish to another language then because they liked it better.</p>
We talk about what language she would like to pursue, and what she would like to do as a career someday, but her mind isn’t wired to think about AP classes yet. Now her 12 year old best friend is telling her mom what high school she wants to attend because of the amount of AP classes. My daughter didn’t even know what an AP class was.</p>