Questions about coursework

Applying to College
1

Hello, I go to a school in a campus where the students do not really care about grades. The school added AP classes this year, and I am now going to be a junior. The school used to offer IB classes for juniors and seniors only, but they replaced with AP. The scores on the exams were not good, although I’m not too sure why they made the switch. Anyway, because these classes were only offered for 11th and 12th graders, I will only be taking AP and/or honor classes junior and senior year. They started with world history. The problems were that world history is a freshman class, and I already took the high school level equivalent of it freshman year. I am not too sure about how school reports work, but will colleges know that I was not able to take AP classes the first two years of hs? Now the school reports they have world history, and are offering an AP english for the incoming sophmores. I don’t want admissions to think I was taking easy classes on purpose.

Also, I wanted to take a foreign language for three years, but there wasn’t enough space for me to start in 10th grade. Can I tell colleges this in the 'additional information" part of the app? I am going to try to take it for two years. I already speak another language at home.

Lastly, since my hs does not have a lot students going past a hs diploma or community college, does it better my chances?My GPA is much higher than average in our school, although we don’t have ranks.

tl;dr: My school just started offering AP classes for freshmans and sophmores, but I am going to be a junior. Will colleges know about this timeline?

2

1.) There is a very good chance that school will know that they just added APs, yes. As long as you take as many as you think you can handle, then you’ll be fine.

2.) You can explain the situation if you want to, but there are a lot of schools that require a certain number of years in various classes and I worry that you may be prevented from attending those. And that sucks, don’t get me wrong, but unfortunately there’s not much you can do about it.

3.) Does it better your chances of what, getting in? I’m not sure. Again, the colleges you’re applying to may have information on your class’ average GPA, so it could be a benefit. I guess I just don’t know quite what you’re asking.

3

thanks phil, my school will currently allow me to take two-three APs next year. I am also trying my best to get a competitive SAT and ACT score. Hopefully these two would make up for a lack of FL, but I think this might have sealed my fate for any chance to get into an Ivy League.