If the student is taking Spanish at a local college, then in some years the student has 7 academic classes. That’s too much.
LOL, if this kid gets pushed into taking too many college classes he may have to apply later as a transfer. Goodbye elite schools.
Kid’s been in school for 2-3 weeks, is predicted to score above 33 ACT and be val or sal. Parents need to go into picking lottery numbers or join fanduel – they’ll be rich.
This is seriously, seriously unhealthy. As a recruiter for an Ivy, this kind of scenario makes me want to run away screaming into the night.
Students in our district are given a 4 year high school planning chart in February of their 8th grade year, which includes various possible academic tracks they can take that will fulfill graduation requirements. These tracks are labeled based on what sort of post-graduation plans the student has. Students are also reminded to check pre-reqs for advanced classes so they can successfully prepare for the AP courses they want to take in junior and senior year. Frankly, based on their class placement in 6-8th grades, to some extent their high school academic track has already been charted by 8th grade. Around here, in fact, kids will have been taking classes every summer well before freshman year to advance themselves, particularly in math. Therefore, a freshman planning all his high school courses in advance does not seem at all extreme to me. “Planning” a kid’s grades and test scores, well that is another story!
Similarly, around here no one can just decide as a high school freshman to be a good musician or good athlete or student council president. Unless the kid is a true diamond in the rough prodigy, the ship already sailed because many of his peers will have been taking instrumental lessons and playing league sports from the time they were 4 years old, and will have already acquired name recognition due to being an officer in the middle school student council. Becoming the kind of student that top schools accept doesn’t just happen accidentally. That sort of resume requires time and concerted effort to build. People that pretend otherwise are not being honest. That said, children are not puppets and are more than the sum of their academic career highlights and therefore parents should not micro-manage their every decision.
Planners?
JustOneDad, I’m all for planning but this seems way off the grid. Is the OP planning who the child will marry and what company s/he will work for?
I didn’t see any mention of marriage and/or other servitude.
Perhaps that’s coming as soon as the college prediction is solidly nailed down.
There’s a fine line between planning for and dreaming about a child’s future, and dictating it.
Could it be that you identify with people who predict?
We should hand the kid a Nobel prize. With those future high school accomplishments s/he will win it.
Since there is no Nobel awarded for “AP Accomplishment”, it would be incumbent upon someone here to predict which Nobel category this student should be pre-awarded for.
To be fair in the spring of 8th grade my kids were required by the GC to write down a proposed high school schedule. This was mostly an exercise to make sure he (we) read the high school handbook and got a handle on what graduation requirements in NYS are, and also to see the huge variety of courses offered.
But if we are going to play OP’s game I eliminate AP Human Bio, AP Stats, AP Environmental, AP Psych and take arts electives in their place, unless the kid has some burning interest in one of those subjects of course.
I’d also encourage the kid to have a life after school - whether that is through school ECs or things he does on his own. Pursuing something of interest at a high level - while maintaining excellent grades in a reasonably demanding curriculum (5 to 10 APs not 14) is the mostly likely path to acceptance at a top university.
Among my kids and their cohort some of those activities included: Science Olympiad (my kids were lucky to be part of a very strong team), computer science (mostly at home, but also working for both academics and industry), origami (very small business selling earrings eventually, also taught classes at the senior center), playing in rock and jazz bands as well as state orchestra, concertmaster of the high school orchestra, science research projects and of course sports.
Who does this?!?!? (And, no, I don’t care if the school asks for a four year plan. I’d tell the school they need to re-think education)
Look at the last bullet point in the summary: “doesn’t know what he wants to do in the future”. Then the kid needs to explore a variety of subjects that HE’s interested in and find out what HE wants to do. Try physics, try band, try chem, try art, … etc. but don’t program his life. Quit worry about AP’s and top twenty schools (seriously?) What if he finds something he’s really interested in but there’s no AP track? He can’t pursue it because it doesn’t fit the plan?!?
This is really sad.
In one way or another, OP had played this sort of question before. It’s all too intense and seems to count on the kid not developing interests of his/her own, never hitting a pothole…and not fully appreciating the hs experience or the growing that should accompany it. Just so contrary to the way most of us think about our kids’ futures (even when we drive them.)
My state requires a 5 year plan from the kids every year. Telling the school I think it’s stupid wouldn’t accomplish much.
That said, we view it as one of those forms you have to do every year. Like the emergency contact info and signing off on the school policy book. Nobody ever holds the kids to it. What matters is what they request when they do schedules every spring for the next year.
As for which APs to take, that’s going to depend on what the student wants/likes. If this student can ever figure that out.
@DesignerDad, no one was required to stick to the plan, but getting an idea of what it takes to be on track to graduate is a very good idea. But I don’t think anyone comes up with a schedule with 14 APs and if they did, the GC would probably tell the kid it was a very, very bad idea. Which would be a good thing, no?
Oh and back to which APs to take - it may also depend on the teacher. One of the reasons my younger son took AP Euro was that that particular teacher was considered to be the best writing teacher in the school. Most kids took AP Bio because we had two excellent teachers. The AP Chem teacher was not nearly as good, so only kids who really, really liked chem took it.
Agree that the teacher can definitely be a factor. AP world is extremely popular at my kids’ school because the teacher is excellent.
There is nothing wrong with having a four year plan with some target schools in mind. It is very good for some kids to have a goal to work towards.
When you start playing the “top 20 or bust” game, you’ve gone way way way overboard.
Admissions success at top 20 colleges will mostly be driven by the stuff that OP and others like already know:
- HS Course choices/rigor
- GPA
- Test scores
- Extracurriculars
- Hooks
OP is asking about the first of these. Sure, taking a very tough, 14 AP course load positions one POSSIBLY to get into a top 20 school (conditional upon the other factors).
Is it best for the kid? Depends on the kid. I would think most kids, especially one who is a bit unsure about where he is heading, to sample more of what the HS has to offer off of the AP track (what’s so bad about fine arts, music, shop, computer science, business, cooking, gym/health)?
Guesstimating with precision what a current 9th graders GPA and test scores will be is a bit of a fool’s errand. But I think you can speculate with some accuracy about these - after all, most kids are getting grades and taking standardized tests in 7th and 8th grade, too.
Don’t trivialize the ECs - encourage the kid to try these and, if they find something they love, go for it. Yeah, maybe it’s reasonable to expect that a 9th grader who is not already an art star of a football player or whatever to end up “typical” ECs, but it does come across as a bit fatalistic.
Lots of kids apply to top-20 schools with loads of APs- that won’t distinguish the student.
The kids that I know who get into the tippy top schools all have really strong GPAs, test scores and course rigor (and actually, none of them so far have had more than 8 or 9 APs, and most had fewer than that) AND something else that makes them stand out. It’s the “AND” that makes the difference and ‘typical’ ECs just don’t do it.
Without the “AND” - ie, with ‘typical’ ECs- the kid is most likely looking at colleges in the 20-40 rank range* even if the GPA is UW 4.0 and the SAT is 2400, and there are 14 APs. ESPECIALLY if they haven’t come up with something that is their own passion, something that they have worked at for a while and in which they can show depth and growth.
OP, I think that other people have linked this to you before, but just in case I am mis-remembering it, have your friends take a look at [url=<a href=“http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/applying_sideways%5Dthis%5B/url”>http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/applying_sideways]this[/url] and [url=<a href=“http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/there_is_no_formula%5Dthis%5B/url”>http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/there_is_no_formula]this[/url].
*depends a little which list of top-20 you are working from