D20 has taken Honors Biology, Honors Chemistry, APES, and now wants to take AP Chemistry for her senior year. Is there any requirement that she take Physics, or is it okay to skip this one? Her schedule is pretty full, so she really doesn’t want to have to skip AP Chem to take Physics. Wasn’t there an admissions officer on here answering questions?
Depends on the major. It was a bad move to take APES instead of physics, unless she’s going into social science/Humanities.
@MYOS1634 Well in our public school system, Environmental Science is required to graduate. So her only other choices instead of APES were Standard or Honors Environmental. She is not interested in Engineering, if that helps.
Ok then she did well to take APES. (The rule of thumb is that a core course, such as physics we shouldn’t be replaced with an elective even if the elective is an AP. However if environmental science is required then it becomes a core class. That’s actually a very good requirement, it makes more sense to me than the usual trifecta since environmental science is interdisciplinary thus requires the application of many sciences to the ‘real world’ one of the few APs that relates to the world around us with AP HumanGeo).
What is she interested in (not necessarily a major, but in terms of field?)
Physics will indicate stronger quantitative skills - what math is she planning to take? Why AP chemistry?
@MYOS1634 Yes the ES, Chem, and Biology are all required. They are all offered as Standard, Honors, and AP. Physics is not required, and is only offered as Honors or AP. She is wanting to take AP Chemistry because she’s interested in it as a possibile major (possibly pre dental), but is also tossing around Psychology or Business. The question is, is Physics part of the required High School curriculum for admission? Or can she skip it for AP Chemistry? She would take Honors Physics if needed, not AP.
Don’t assume UVa is any less competitive, because it’s a state school. They’re trying to reach kids in all corners of the state, get that geo diversity. That makes it, imo, less predictable.
You go to the Common Data Set/CDS and can see they recommend 5 year long courses in sciences. (The min is 2.) Surprises me they seem to be saying to double up one year. (@MYOS1634 ?) Only a few colleges name specific courses, based on major. But you need to make sense of what she offers, how she matches up (CC advocates looking at the 75th percentile on all stats,) and how she’ll look against the competition, their rigor, their gpas, their ECs, in and out of school- including related to the possible major.
96% of UVa enrolling freshmen had a 3.75+ uw gpa.
@lookingforward she’s got a 4.0 uw and a 4.5 w. I think she’s fine stats wise. Just need to make sure we aren’t missing a required science class. Several schools listed requirements (UGA for example). I just couldn’t find it for UVA or Penn. She has emailed both Admissions offices to check, but hasn’t heard back yet.
^ they’re saying that most admitted students were tracked into a science class in the 8th grade and took a science every year in HS.
@chb088 : any chance she could take Conceptual Physics (or Physics Regular) + AP chem to cover all her bases? If not, would Honors physics + AP chem be too much?
I assume she’s also taking English, precalculus or calc, foreign language 4/AP, history/gov/econ with those all honors or AP level + perhaps one personal elective?
Have you checked out the school profile?
It’s just unusual to see them consider 8th. Then again, they’re dealing with all those N VA kids.
Best wishes, OP. I did confuse your two kids.
@MYOS1634 yeah she’s got everything else. 5 years of foreign language. 4 history, 4 English, 5 math- taking AP Calc AB next year. I guess I’ll just wait for the emails from their Admissions office to know for sure. Can’t find it on their websites.
The Common Data Sets show this, you can google to get there. It’s matriculated kids, but still an idea. She could get into either school without physics. But dig into how to make the full app/supps make sense to the targets. It’s about what they want to see in terms of not just academic success, but also activation, perspective, some impact, and various traits. More than the hs stats, etc.
Update…Admissions says Physics only needed for Engineering hopefuls. Whew!