I was planning on going to Virginia Tech, and I was wondering if I could skip my first year for engineering. My test are:
English Lit: 4
English Comp: 3
Physics 1: 4
Calc 1: 5
Calc 2: 5
Physics C Kin: 5
Physics C E&M: 4
Chem: 5
Econ: 5
World Hist: 5
US Hist: 5
French: 3
The Physics C’s were self studied.
I also did a big Chemistry project lab with a local college outside of school during the school year, dealing with spectroscopy and soil analysis.
I was just wondering if theses can add up to skip a year of engineering at VT, or another accredited university.
Every school has its own rules about using AP credit. You need to find their documentation via the Google to know what it will do for you. That’s only half of the story though. You need to know if your prep is equivalent to what would be expected of you at any given school.
The best way to do that is to use a method that was described to my son by @ucbalumnus. Find the syllabi and old tests from the classes you are considering skipping and take the tests, timed. If you do well, skip. If It’s rusry, but you can self study something like Kahn to fill in the gaps, skip. If you’re way over your head, repeat.
There’s also the issue of chronicity. Engineering curricula have multiple linear paths through them when plotted out. This is a simplified for instance, but you need physics to take statics, statics to take dynamics, dynamics before thermodynamics, thermo before advanced thermo, that before heat transfer and HT before senior project. Even if you bring in a bunch of credit, you still might not shave off a year, even though it’s nearly a years worth of hours.
That said, you should do it anyway. There will be quarters/semesters with really challenging courses. If you’re ahead, you can take a lighter load when you bump up against the back breakers every school is known for. At many schools you’ll get registration priority because you’ll be ahead on your degree progress. You can take broader and/or deeper courses in engineering than your peers that don’t have advanced credit. Lastly, if your school offers a 4+1 masters, you can start your masters during your senior year and finish in less than 5 years.
Hope that helps.
P.S. My son was in your exact situation except he took all the classes rather than self studying. He’s at a school that has a 4+1. It’s a 200h curriculum. He has 15h left his 4th year. That means of he takes 15h per quarter, he’ll have 30 hours of his masters done by the end of 4 years.
Here’s what you might want to keep in mind… assuming you’re accepted at and decide to enroll at VT, you register for classes at orientation with the help of an advisor. This is usually pretty straight forward since the freshman engineering curriculum is pretty well set. And advising isn’t in depth at this point. Lately due to the frosh class size and sheer volume of data to comb through, orientation has fallen before the registrar’s office has official HS transcripts and AP test scores processed to see which college courses you can receive credit for. Thus when you go to orientation (July time frame) they won’t have this credit /class info in their system yet. The normal solution is to sign up for classes you know you won’t need to take (Calc 1, etc) and by drop/add time things are straightened out and you change courses.
In your case, it would seem useful and maybe even necessary for you to get some solid one on one advising from a CoE advisor prior to putting together your schedule. Might want to try calling CoE sometime late May/June (after spring semester is finished) and talk to them about how you should proceed given your rather unusual circumstances. The big questions are which courses make sense to take the credit for and which ones they recommend you taking at VT.
I wouldn’t leave it in the school’s hands to determine whether you should use your credit or not. They have no idea how solid your prep is. AP scores are not indicative of readiness. Only using the method outlined above will let you know. You owe it to yourself to do that because it’s a huge shock to move on if you aren’t prepared and a huge waste to repeat if you are.
In general I agree @eyemgh . But the good profs/advisors have a lot of experience with students who have taken AP courses and know how well the knowledge gained in that way dovetails with the various CoE courses. It’s a pretty well accepted notion that certain AP classes don’t give adequate prep for a few follow on classes. And students aren’t always the best judge of the depth of their knowledge in certain areas as they evaluate syllabi. We can argue the WHY all day long but in the end it doesn’t matter. It’s also well known that if you can take AP credit for Calc2 at VT, do it and save your GPA and sanity (at UVa we heard the same thing). I’m sure each school has a class or 2 that fits this scenario. There’s also the strategy of which courses you might want to actually take at VT to give yourself a solid GPA start, given that GPA is what determines admission to specific engineering majors from general engineering. The OP has the potential to qualify to get AP credit in excess of the limit of what schools actually will accept so being strategic about this will be crucial.
@JustGraduate My kid at VT had good advising. Agree that the advisors/profs could be helpful. I am surprised to hear about the advice at UVa to automatically take the AP credit for Calc 2. My UVa kid, who had 5 on BC calculus, did not jump ahead at UVa engineering, at the advice of his advisor at first year orientation.
That is why it is best for the students to try the old final exams for the course that may be skipped with AP credit, in order to check their knowledge against what the college expects.
@sevmom at UVA that particular calc class is brutal and considered an engineering flunk out. Students that can take the credit but instead take the class to brush up on math skills routinely have their hands full pulling B’s and C’s in it- that’s the anecdotal evidence we hear consistently. Even heard that from student tour guide during a day program for just engineering students. The consensus of UVA students seems to be they do fine in subsequent calc/math classes if they take the credit for Calc 2 so skip the class. That’s not always the case with taking AP credit, and can be evidenced by going through a syllabus and tests.
Everyone at every school has horror stories about certain classes, yet the truth remains, some students do very well in those classes every year. The bottom line is this, repeated for the umpteenth time, you can easily know if you are ready to skip by simply taking old tests from the classes you want to use credit for. Don’t make it harder than it needs to be.
At UVa , all engineering students take APMA 1110 (Calc II), unless they choose to bypass it. Historically, 23% get an A, 41% a B, and 28% a C. Only 5% get a D, 3% an F. Average prof rating is 4.22. Yes, horror stories can be overblown and most kids are doing well in that class.
Out of curiosity, I looked on Koofers for APMA 1110 (calc II ) at UVa. All first year engineering students take it, unless they want to bypass it. Historically, 23% get A’s, 41% get B’s, 28% get C’s,. Only 5% get D’s, 3% get F’s. Average prof rating is 4.22. Yes, sometimes the horror stories are overblown.
Sorry for the double post on this. Didn’t think the first one went through. And , agree with looking online to see past tests , grade distributions, syllabus, for a course can help. That is easy to find for Virginia Tech. Advisors and professors should also be able to give you some guidance. What other schools are you considering? You can find lots of the info online for other schools as well. Good luck!
Your question should be if one can graduate one year earlier by having appropriate AP credits. For that, you may or may not need to skip all freshmen courses. Nevertheless, it may be not possible in some case due to course sequence prereq and availability. For instance, some course may not be offered every semester that would constrain your schedule.
