Hello! I am currently a freshman in high school and am beginning the process of selecting classes for my sophmore year. I will be taking Chemistry Honors next year and have the option of also taking an AP Science along with it. My options are AP Biology and AP Physics 1 (Algebra Based). I have already decided that I do not want to take AP Physics 1 because I have heard that the teacher that teaches it is not very good, I have not yet taken Physics Honors in my school yet, and I would like to have already taken Algebra 2 before taking it. On the other hand, the AP Biology teacher at my school is outstanding and even won Biology Teacher of the Year Award in New York State. I am already taking Honors Biology too with a 99 average. I feel like I am very good at biology and may be successful in AP Biology next year. Please let me know if I should wait until later, or take it next year as a sophmore. Thanks!
Doesn’t matter, take it whenever you want.
My suggestion is if you think you can get a B or above in the AP classes and it doesn’t cause you too much stress then take as many as you can during your high school years. I think you should go for the AP Biology. As for the AP Physics 1 my daughter took that and her teacher was rather bad. It is a very difficult class and you want to make sure you have a great teacher when you take it. My daughter got a B- in the class and had to learn most of the material on her own. She is a senior today and if she had to do it all over, she would have taken the Physics 1 class over the summer at her local college instead.
I don’t think colleges care what year you take your classes in. The most competitive colleges want to see that you take the most rigorous schedule available to you that you can handle. I would try to stay away from C’s.
Combined in high school my daughter has taken over 20 honors & AP classes. She has always gotten above a 90% in all her honor classes and the grades in her AP classes range from an 81% to an 88%. So far she has been accepted to Tulane & Fordham.
If you plan on taking multiple AP classes as a junior or senior (especially English or History ones which are generally tougher or have more work), I’d advise you to take AP Bio as a sophomore. In my opinion, it’s among the easiest of AP classes, and you seem to be handling biology material pretty well already.
Also, it’s probably too early for you to know this, but if you plan on pursuing any life science-related field of study, AP Bio is a good class to take. Anyways, don’t worry too much about it! Above all, you should take classes you’re genuinely interested in. Just wanted to reassure you on the difficulty of the class.