Should I take off periods?? HELP

Pre-College Issues High School Life
1

Hi, I’m currently a junior in high school and I’m very conflicted and confused. We received our course a selection sheets last week and they’re due this Friday. I really want to take 2 off periods because I’m completely exhausted and the year isn’t even over. This is what my schedule is like currently:

Period 1: Varsity Dance Team (this includes 6:15am practices, practices 6-8 or 3-4:30 on Thursdays and practices 2-6 on Saturdays during contest season )
2: AP Physics
3: AP Psychology (I took AP Human Geo last semester)
4: AP Environmental Science
5: AP Us History
6: Pre-AP Pre-cal
7: AP English lll
(World History AP last year)

As you can probably tell based on my classes as well as dance every morning, I’m burnt out!

People have been telling me that off periods make you look lazy, so I’m not sure whether to take them or not. I slacked off A LOT freshman year so my gpa is really bad… above 3.0 but baaaad, it always makes me really sad. It’s been going up though because I began to care more about my classes and I managed to raise my rank by 40 spots with decent grades. I’ve been working hard this year because I wanna raise my gpa and show colleges that I can handle my classes. My grades look good too, especially with the AP points added on haha. I’m also doing SAT prep so hopefully I can get to my goal of 1350-1400! Anyways, here’s what I think I’ll take next year:

AP English Vl
AP Calculus AB
AP Bio
AP Gov AP Macro Eco
AP Statistics
Health/Speech (required, but I’m taking it over the summer to avoid having to take a class with majority freshmen in it :/, will be replaced with 6th period off)
7th off period
(no dance, this is my third year and I’m really tired)

I also plan on getting a job to show that I would be going to work during my off periods. Do you think I should take two off periods??

2

I think the periods off are fine. Gpa, SAT/ACT scores and rigorous coursework are what colleges look at most and what you have fits the bill.

3

No foreign language in junior and senior year? Depends on where you’re applying, but some schools want to see it every year.

4

Why don’t you take honors instead of AP in one or two areas? Colleges aren’t looking for the race to the most APs. Unless you are in a state where class rank determines flagship admission (like Texas).

5

My suggestion

AP English Vl
AP Calculus AB
AP Bio
AP Gov AP Macro Eco
AP Statistics
Health/Speech (required, but I’m taking it over the summer to avoid having to take a class with majority freshmen in it , will be replaced with 6th period off)
7th off period

Ditch AP stats. You need one english, one science, one math, and a Social science.
So dont’ take off two periods, but find a fun class (photography, etc) for at least one of them.

6

i took spanish 1-3 from 8th grade to 10th grade, maybe i shouldve done spanish 4 hmm

7

im in texas so rank is big here, i might lessen my load a little bit and just do one off though

8

Know your current rank, assuming you are shooting for UT-Austin autoadmit.

9

ut austin would be a good place to go but kids in my school will do ANYTHING to secure their position in the top 7% (stealing tests, copying work, cheating etc) so itll be hard to get in there. im trying my best though.

10

@justanothajunie

Dude same xD. Cheating is rampant in Texas

11

yeah lolll i swear its because of the top 10% auto admissions thing