Senior Year Schedule?

Pre-College Issues High School Life
1

Hello everyone.
I am currently a junior at a very large and competitive public high school which offers a lot of AP classes. I am definitely going to be pursuing a major in art, and likely either a major or a minor in history.

I was hoping you could give me some feedback on my plan for my senior year.

Freshman year:
World History and Geography 1
Studio Art and Design 1
Geometry
Biology
Spanish 2
Health/PE (required)
English 9 Honors

Sophomore year:
Chemistry
Studio Art and Design 2
Spanish 3
English 10 Honors
Algebra 2
World History and Geography 2 Honors
Health/PE (required)

Junior year (current year):
US History Honors
Photography 1
English 11 Honors
Spanish 4
Studio Art and Design 4: Portfolio Prep
Physics
Precalculus with Trigonometry

Plan for senior year:
AP Art
AP Human Geography
AP Spanish OR Spanish 5 (considered an honors class)
AP Government OR Honors Government
Honors English 12
Astronomy OR Oceanography OR Genetics (likely astronomy; the other classes are options in case of schedule conflicts)
Photography 2 (Photography 3 if my teacher allows me to jump ahead)

Furthermore, I would have taken World 1 Honors as a freshman, but I absolutely hated history back then. My teacher for World 1 changed my opinion on history completely, and it became one of my favorite classes so I decided to take World 2 Honors. I was one of the few students in my class who got an A (albeit barely) last year, and I was recommended for APUSH. I had a really hard time deciding between whether or not to take US Honors or APUSH this year, but after getting an idea of the workload for APUSH, I ultimately decided to take Honors. The teacher I have now supposedly does a good job of preparing students in US Honors for AP Government, but I am not very interested in government, so I am unsure of which class would be a good idea to take.

In addition, I barely study for Spanish and have maintained an A in each level I have taken, and will be in Spain for a week during the spring. However, I am unsure of taking AP because I tend to forget lots of material over the summer, but we do review in the beginning of the year - I do not think this review happens in AP though.

Thank you in advance!

2

The schedules look great! In terms of Honors Government vs AP Government, I would recommend AP Government for you. It seems as you have done very well in your previous social studies classes and since you’re thinking about majoring in history, Government is important to History, and since you have an opportunity to pick AP Government, I would recommend it to you.

For Spanish, since you have always been getting an A in the previous classes without much problem, I do not think AP Spanish should be a problem. However, since you said you sort of forget a lot of content over the summer, reviewing the content you learned beforehand over the summer may help. If you do not feel like taking the AP course, however, I think that is totally fine because you are already taking lots of APs, so the choice is really up to you.

However, sorry if this is rude. But out of curiosity, are you not taking a math in 12th grade? This should be okay because in my county, Fairfax County, only at least four years are required and since you were in Geometry in 9th grade, you would have four credits by 11th grade. However, even if you are not majoring in anything needing math, it is recommended you take a math course, even if it is not something rigorous because it may help you a lot in the future. For history majors/minors, AP Statistics is considered a very good math course. Have you ever thought of taking that? If you decide not to take a math, you should be fine still because you have four years done already.

If you have any more questions for me, or if I missed anything, please let me know.

Good luck in high school and have a good day!

3

I agree with the post above, AP Gov will most likely benefit you.

Also, I’d consider replacing AP Human Geo with a math class. Even if math may not be your thing, it will certainly help you from a “college admission” standpoint, and AP Human looks for like a filler IMO. I took the class last year, got a 5, and learned nothing. Don’t recommend.