<p>Okay so I'm just curious how rigorous my course load is compared to many of the people accepted to top 20-30 schools.</p>
<p>Freshman Year:
Honors Civics & Economics
Honors English I
Honors Algebra II
Honors Earth Science
Spanish II
Healthful Living A/B(required to graduate)
Computer Science I/free period 2nd Semester(I didn't want to take Comp Sci II)</p>
<p>Sophomore Year:
Honors World History
Honors English II
Honors Pre-Calculus
Honors Biology
Honors Spanish III
Medical Science I(required for a club that I'm in)
Sports Medicine I/Animal Behavior</p>
<p>Sophomore Year Summer:
Honors Chemistry(online lol)</p>
<p>Junior Year:
AP US History
AP English III(Lang and Comp)
AP Calculus AB
AP Biology
Honors Physics
Honors Medical Science II(required for the club)</p>
<p>Junior year summer(currently):
Honors Spanish IV(online)
Research Internship(counts for 1 credit and I've actually been interning in a lab for 4 summers now)</p>
<p>Senior year(90% sure):
AP Macroeconomics
AP Government & Politics
AP Calculus BC
AP Physics C
AP English IV(Lang and Comp)
EMT(Honors at local community college)
Possibly self studying for AP Microeconomics(not offered at school)</p>
<p>My school is a Magnet school with an IB program so it offers A LOT and I'm missing these AP's:
(<em>=eligible to take)
AP Chemistry(super hard at my school)</em>
AP Spanish Lang(not allowed to take since I'm taking Span IV online)
AP Spanish Lit
AP French
AP World History*
Calculus III/Differential Equations
AP Physics B*
AP Statistics*
AP Comp Sci AB
AP Environmental Science*
AP Music Theory
AP Japanese
AP Studio Art
AP Psychology*
whatever IB classes there are</p>
<p>I'm looking at 9 or 10 AP's total and I'm looking at colleges like UPenn(!!!!!), UC-Berkeley, UCLA, UNC(in-state), Brown, and NYU. I'm expecting 4's and 5's on all 4 AP exams I took junior year. And I'm fifty bagillion % sure it's not possible to exhaust all the AP's at my school lol</p>
<p>No one’s going to take all 15-20 AP’s at your school, so don’t force yourself to. Your coursework is quite decent…just make sure you get good grades, and make the rest of your application (rec letters, EC’s, outside activities, awards, etc.) stand out.</p>
<p>You and your family can pay $60,000 per year? UCs out-of-state and NYU are unlikely to come up with good financial aid.</p>
<p>It does look like you are taking a less rigorous math path by spreading calculus over two years instead of taking all of AB/BC in one year. Most students who are two grade levels ahead in math (as you are) are capable of taking all of AB/BC in one year (when I was in high school, such a student was considered a top math student who went straight to BC after precalculus and got an easy A in the class and an easy 5 on the AP test).</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus, my school runs on a yearlong system, not semester. So my Calc classes are yearlong. It is possible for me to take Calculus AB/BC in one year as a block class(90 minutes, 2 periods) but I chose not to(■■■). At my school we’re not allowed to skip Calc AB. I’m kind of confused how that would be possible honestly.</p>
<p>And yeah, I come in under “upper middle class” I believe. My parents have already told me if I get into Penn, I’ll go for sure but I don’t think they’ll find it worthwhile paying 60k for UC’s when I have UNC right here.</p>
<p>When I went to high school (a public (not magnet, charter, or otherwise special) school in a lower middle to upper income (mostly upper middle income) area), students who completed precalculus before senior year took a calculus course that included all of the AB and BC material in one year (the same pace that a college freshman calculus course would cover material; it was a normal single period course). Most students in this calculus course were seniors; the rare junior in this calculus course was typically considered a top student in math and expected to get an A in the course and a 5 on the BC test without having to try very hard.</p>
<p>I think he’s saying that if you have the privilege to be two years ahead of schedule for the normal math track (most kids take precalculus their senior year or in college), then you should be a more than capable enough student to take Calculus BC without AB, but like the above poster said, nothing wrong with going AB -> BC if that’s how your school does it.</p>
<p>Edit: To clarify, AP Calculus AB is usually considered to be the equivalent of a one semester, Calculus I class in college, while AP Calculus BC is the equivalent of two semesters of Calculus I and Calculus II in college. So at most schools, Calculus AB is simply a slower-paced version of Calculus BC (stretching a one-semester college course into a two-semester HS course) instead of being a pre-requisite. But some schools teach Calculus AB as a prerequisite for Calculus BC, which I’m assuming is how your school does it.</p>
<p>The degree of rigor in your schedule is evaluated relative to your peers at your high school by your guidance counselor in their evaluation form. (Download GC evaluation in the Common App and look at it.) It has nothing to do with posters on CC comparing your courseload to what’s available at their school and what would be considered rigorous in their context. If your school has NO APs and you took every available honors course, that would be considered ‘most rigorous’ and no college would penalize you for that.</p>
<p>If you are concerned, just ask your GC how he or she decides that a schedule is ‘most rigorous’ and whether your schedule meets that standard.</p>
<p>Oh I thought Calc I was one semester and Calc II was another.</p>
<p>I guess I’d fall into top 10% or 15% for rigor then. Thing is some of my friends have taken courses over the summer in a class setting at my school and they are going into classes such as Linear Algebra, Multivariable Calc, and IB Further Math. I’m behind them because I have been involved in research ever since the summer after 8th grade and therefore I cannot take any classes at school. Colleges will take that into account right?</p>
<p>Even Upenn isn’t expecting students to spend summers learning higher math. IMO, research is much more impressive anyway.</p>
<p>Your course rigor is fine for all of the schools you plan on applying to. It’ll come down to just how “poor” your freshman/sophomore GPA really was.</p>
<p>Hopefully I can get straight A’s first semester and show these schools that freshman and sophomore year are not representative of how I really am.</p>
<p>And if it changes anything EMT is required by one of the clubs I’m in as well.</p>
<p>Poor advice…you need it ALL to get into the colleges just mentioned! …unless you are a recruited athlete, your family has a building named after them, or one of your parents is a celebrity.</p>