<ol>
<li>SAT II
I plan to apply to U of Chicago via EA. As SAT II scores aren't required, I'm thinking if submitting them will help me in some way. Frankly speaking, I didn't get straight 800s (800 Math II, 750 Chem and 730 Physics), and I don't consider it as my "strength". I'll probably major in Econ, so what should I do about my SAT II scores? </li>
<li>AP
I'm an international student, and my school doesn't offer AP classes. Will it boost my acceptance chance if I take the Calculus BC, Micro&Macro Econ tests next May (as an EA applicant)?
Thanks a lot~~~~</li>
</ol>
<ol>
<li><p>Somewhere, sometime, someone from the admissions office said that SAT II scores were never included in an applicant’s file, even if they were submitted. I believe that’s still true, although I don’t know for certain. There’s a new Dean of Admissions, too, so things could change this year. I don’t see any harm in submitting those scores, but most likely there is no benefit, either.</p></li>
<li><p>I doubt Chicago admissions cares much about AP tests in general if your school doesn’t offer AP classes. It may be a little nice to have something objective to demonstrate your level of math education, if you haven’t taken some other kind of well-recognized test (IB, A-levels), and if you are coming from a country/school with which the admissions staff may not be familiar. But it’s not necessary, and it won’t give you a big boost.</p></li>
<li><p>I am sure that Chicago doesn’t care a whit about either AP Economics course, and probably wishes students would stop taking them.</p></li>
<li><p>If you are applying next fall (for the class of 2014), EA or RD, and you are talking about taking AP exams in May 2010 – that’s ridiculous, saying that you plan to do that won’t mean anything to anyone. Plus, if you wind up at Chicago it’s a waste of money. If you plan to apply in the fall of 2010 (for the class of 2015), then it’s not ridiculous, but what is ridiculous is you having decided already that you are going to apply to Chicago EA then.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>What an admissions officer told me (D is '11) was that SAT Writing was blacked out, but SAT IIs were included in the file, just not really looked at. This topic keeps coming up, so maybe we need new, more solid, information.</p>
<p>Seashore: Can SAT IIs still help an early app, especially if they validate a few blemishes on a transcript?</p>
<p>I think the concensus of this board would be “not much and probably not at all.” But of course, we don’t work in the admissions office. And they certainly couldn’t hurt.</p>
<p>@JHS Thank you very much. I guess I won’t bother taking those AP tests after I get my admission decision from U of Chicago then. But it just makes me feel better if they know I’ve worked hard in a way they are more familiar with, which is taking APs, or just tests.
@Seashore Thanks. I actually doubt that. If the school doesn’t really mind the SAT II, they’ll never look at it.</p>
<p>Hold up. I don’t know so much about AP Economics, but BC Calculus is a definite plus. If you are a non-science major, it will let you out of math and if you are a science/math major, a 5 will allow you to take IBL Honors Calculus. AP Economics 4/5 will just give you elective credits which may/may not be of interest to you.</p>
<p>Everyone will take a math placement exam during O-Week anyway, so AP Calc scores may be somewhat useful but not determinative for placement. Ditto foreign language. OTOH, S got credit for three quarters of Physics based on his Physics C scores. That was useful to him. English and History APs will not get you anything except elective credit, and if you had excellent teachers, a bit of a leg up on writing well for your Hum/Sosc/Civ courses.</p>
<p>When you can take Sanderson for Econ, why would anyone care about the corresponding APs?!? Chicago doesn’t give credit for them anyway.</p>
<p>I will add that IBL math at UChicago is awesome. Have a reliable source on this one. :)</p>
<p>Both my kids have sent SAT-II scores anyway. Can’t hurt, might help. It doesn’t cost anything extra since they are already sending SAT scores.</p>
<p>You don’t need to take any AP test to get into Honors Calculus Inquiry Based Learning sections. As far as I know, all you need is half a clue and a desire to work twice as hard for the same credit as all the people taking non-IBL sections of the same course (although if you want to be a math major I think it lets you skip a next-level course that would otherwise be required).</p>
<p>JHS, that would probably be the intro to proofs course, Math 19900. One could head directly to Analysis (and BTW, there is an IBL Analysis sequence, too).</p>
<p>Can’t hurt with those scores. I’ll just send them anyway.</p>
<p>JHS/CountingDown:</p>
<p>It’s not just IBL 160s that lets you skip 199 - although the inquiry-based classes are much more proof-intensive than anything else, any 160s class is proof-based enough to prep you adequately for analysis, and departmental requirements reflect this. IBL is only one or two special sections of the 160s, the rest are just plain honors.</p>
<p>Confirmation that IBL is totally awesome: I took it waaaaay back in the day, when they were still calling it ‘the experimental section’. Definitely not for everyone - it is a lot of work, and very different from the mathematics most high school students are familiar with. But for those who want to know not just the how of mathematics, but the why, it’s <em>the</em> way to really grok and own these concepts, not just skim over them well enough to do well on the next exam. You make all your own proofs, and work with classmates, and develop your own style and concepts and lecture capacity, and become intimately familiar not only with the material and your own conception of it, but the developing conceptions and explanations of your peers as well: you get to be part of a research community of sorts, even if those results have already been well-established, and you know what pieces that person will miss or which part this other person will skim over, and how to translate as they’re lecturing into not just notes the way they’ve explained it, but on-the-fly into proof the way you’d best understand later. Best way, in my opinion, to learn how to prove things: not just how to prove this thing and stuff like it, and that thing and stuff like it, but things in general, given a b and c is d true or flase and why? kind of stuff, and best way to learn how to take good notes from math lectures (and how to lecture effectively yourself). I loved it to bits: totally made my first year.</p>
<p>Every 160s IBL student I have ever spoken to has raved about it similarly.</p>
<p>Do other universities offer similar entry-level classes? It seems like this is a very special experience, and one that’s a lot more relevant to the average math-oriented first-year than Honors Analysis (with its Math 55-equivalent reputation).</p>
<p>JHS, S1 was offered the opportunity to take Honors Analysis and chose IBL Analysis instead. No regrets. </p>
<p>S attended a summer math program where the subject matter was taught in much the same way as IBL (in fact, John Boller is an alum of said program). He looked specifically for this kind of teaching when he looked at college math programs. There are a number of schools that offer multiple levels of Calc w/ or w/o analysis and proof (UMich, CMU, Stanford, Harvard, Caltech, MIT, Cornell amd UMD among those he considered) but Chicago and Mudd were the only ones that really had the IBL vibe he wanted.</p>
<p>CountingDown: I went to HCSSiM in 2004! and actually, am realizing I’m almost certain I and Boyfriend hosted your S1 when he overnighted at UChicago last year. He’s a great kid.</p>
<p>JHS: there are a few colleges toying with the Moore method or other inquiry-based ideas, but they are few and far between, and really each program is implemented in its own unique way. A lot of the ones I’ve heard of exist because of grants for research into IBL, with the schools continuing to tweak and evaluate the courses to get more data and writing detailed reports to the government, Moore’s legacy group, or whatnot. [Moore</a> method - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore_method]Moore”>Moore method - Wikipedia) lists some schools with such programs, although it is by no means complete.</p>
<p>I understand Diane Hermann and John Boller are teaching the Honors Abstract Algebra course this year, so I wonder if there will be an IBL section.</p>