My friends have been warning me that my schedule is too rigorous for a Sophomore, but I genuinely want to make the most of my time in high school. For context, I’m a straight A student, and my GPA is a 96.0. I run on the Cross Country and Track teams, though I’m not in any after-school clubs. I’m taking the ACT this September, so I won’t have to worry about that for most of next year.
These are the classes I want to take next year:
AP Prep/Pre-calc
AP English Language and Composition
AP World History
Chemistry
AP Biology
German 200
Concert (junior varsity) Orchestra
In addition to Cross Country in the Fall and Track in the Spring.
I wouldn’t mind trading out either AP World for regular World History or AP Lang for Pre-AP 10 if my schedule is too rigorous, but I do have a genuine interest in the topics. Additionally, I’m pretty darn good at English and analysis.
So the question is, will I be able to take three challenging AP Classes, in addition to preserving my GPA (for the most part), and staying on the Track and Cross teams?
Honestly it looks fine, but you need to make sure you set aside time for studying for subjects like AP Bio and recognize that the courses will take more time, if you haven’t taken AP classes before. You want to make sure the transition is as smooth as possible.
I took AP Macroeconomics and AP Microeconomics last year, but my teacher assigned homework sparingly, since most of our work was done in class. Thanks so much for the advice!
How hard or easy it will be will depend, in part, on the teacher and also on you. Many people do fine with multiple AP’s while others struggle with one. None of us know the type of person you are.
My only concern is AP English. It might be different at your school, but it is traditionally a course for juniors, So say you take AP Engligh Language next year and AP Lit as a junior, what are your English options for senior year?
My school has a bunch of options for elective English classes, like Creative Writing, that I could take Senior year that would count towards my four required years of English.
I think I’ll be able to handle AP World and AP Lang because I’m interested in the topics and am willing to put in the work to do well in the classes. I’ve taken an AP class before and really enjoyed the pacing of it, but my concern is that the workload for the class I took (AP Macro/Micro) is way different than the amount of work required for these classes.
I know AP World and AP Lang have a lot of reading and interpretation, and that AP Bio has a lot of memorization (at least, that’s the way it’s taught at my school).
I guess it really comes down to my GPA, and whether it might be better to just take regular English classes that I can do well in, as opposed to one that will be more challenging that I might not necessarily perform as well in.
Do you think the best way to move forward would be to talk to the teachers about what the AP Lang workload is like, as opposed to regular English?
Sorry for the huge chunk of text, thanks for your reply.
The obvious answer is to take the challenging course and get an A.
Or current students. But I would not be scared off by workload. A strong AP course should entail more work. And I was not advocating not taking AP Lang, just questioning whether you should take it next year. The course is valuable, IMO, as it helps you write more effectively, which will prove invaluable when writing college apps.
At the end of the day, if you/your parents/teachers/GC think you can handle the work, you probably can.