<p>I am trying to understand the pro's and con's of having a home-schooled student take university classes during high school years. Here is what I have-- please correct my thinking!</p>
<p>Pro's:
1. Shows that the student is interested in and capable of college-level work
2. Could provide a superior course, such as science with labs, that's not too easily done at home
3. Would be an easy way to take AP exams and build a profile of high achievement while still a high school student
4. Fun and stimulating!</p>
<p>Con's:
1. Might make the student "over-qualified" when applying to university at age 18, in that the university pushes the student into higher level courses in first year.
2. Could be seen as "double dipping" or trying to get credit for college and high school coursework at the same time
3. Could rush the student through university in less years, compressing the four-year experience too much</p>
<p>and most of the more selective colleges have half or more of their successful applicants who already have a year of "college-level" work before enrolling as freshmen. The colleges know how to place such students in classes and how to arrange four worthwhile years in an undergraduate degree program. </p>
<p>Please ask follow-up questions as needed. My son will be doing this--he already is doing this, really.</p>
<p>Based on your post at the top, I am not sure if you know this, so please forgive me for mentioning this if you do know it, but --</p>
<p>Community college classes or other college-level classes do NOT necessarily prepare a student for an AP exam. (I'm not sure why you would want to take an AP exam after a college-level class.....) If you want your child to take an AP exam, he should take an AP course. The AP exams cover a VERY specific amount of material.</p>
<p>My dd is a freshman at a top LAC. She entered with 21 credits, most from AP exams but 6 from classes taken at a local 4-year college, and because of her AP scores and transfer credits she has already fulfilled the math, writing, foreign language, and 2/3 of the literature requirement. She will be able to double major AND take the additional 6 classes that her grad school of choice wants AND still graduate in 4 years. AP credits are wonderful!</p>
<p>CON #1 also doesn't really apply -- if the student is capable of higher-level work, he should go for it and enjoy the challenge!</p>
<p>CON #2 has already been dealt with by many colleges -- all the colleges dd looked at had the stipulation that college courses could only transfer IF the course was not taken to meet high school graduation requirements. In other words, the colleges did not allow "double dipping." (This stipulation was above and beyond the obvious one that the college needed to approve the class being transferred.)</p>
<p>CON #3 really doesn't apply. If your child enters with so many credits that he/she can graduate early, he can 1) graduate early; 2) take extra classes in areas of interest; 3) pursue a double major. If the student doesn't want to graduate early, no one will make him/her leave campus! And a student can always postpone that one last graduation requirement until 2nd semester senior year so he 'needs" to stay that extra semester. (That is what I did.)</p>
<p>As for "doubledipping," my boys both did that, no problem. Community college courses they took as high schoolers were also able to be transferred to the colleges they attended, thus reducing some basic requirements or just giving a cushion so they could take more classes of their own interest. I realize that some colleges don't allow this, but some do. (This at least applies to Stanford and Indiana Universities, my sons' colleges.)</p>
<p>The only con that I know of is that some colleges will require a student with a certain number of college classes to apply as a transfer student, rather than as a freshman. Again, this did not apply to my sons' colleges, but I have heard it does at some universities, so it would be something to look into, if there are certain colleges being considered.</p>
<p>My sons both enjoyed their cc classes very much and were glad they had taken them in place of more high school level work.</p>
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The only con that I know of is that some colleges will require a student with a certain number of college classes to apply as a transfer student, rather than as a freshman.
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<p>This is a common belief, but I've never heard of an example beyond the practice of some U of CA treatments of credits from CA community colleges. What examples do you have in mind? Where can we find statements by colleges on such issues?</p>
<p>Thank you all for your comments-- they are very helpful. Let me add a follow-up question for our specific situation. We have a 13 year old who probably will take his first science class, Environmental Science, at our local private university (if this goes well, he can take the biology, chem, physics sequence there through the high school years). I was thinking of having him take the AP exam, independently, after the university course, to validate the grade he earns there, because this is a small, local university, and not Harvard after all! I thought the AP exam would be good to take, because it would be more universally known (and a chance to begin accummulating good AP scores over the high school years).</p>
<p>Would you recommend that he not take the AP exam, since he will have an official grade from the small university? Or go ahead and do both? It seems that he would be poised to do well on the AP test, having just finished the university course, so why not, in my opinion...</p>
<p>In the situation described, I would recommend taking the AP exam after each matching course. And as someone has already said in this thread, it's a good idea to do some additional AP self-study just because a college course won't necessarily touch base with everything in the AP fair-game syllabus. (But note that if you check the Bulletin for AP Students and Parents </p>
<p>you will find that AP tests are actually validated by giving them to samples of college students, so the whole program is designed to correspond to genuine college-level courses.)</p>
<p>My opinion is that if a course is taken at an accredited university, then there would be no benefit in taking the AP exam unless you thought the college which your son ultimately attends would not allow the university course to count as transfer credit. If your son receives excellent grades at a university, then why bother with the AP exam? Most students (even those on CC) indicate that college courses are more demainding than AP courses. Furthermore, some AP and SAT II topics are dumbed down so your son would need to relearn the material using a less rigorous approach (e.g. more memorization).</p>
<p>My daughter, who was also homeschooled, completed about 45 semester hours of university courses (calculus 1, 2 & 3, physics 1 & 2 with lab, chemistry 1 & 2 with lab, physical chemistry, organic chemistry 1 & 2 with lab, biology, writing 1 & 2, and spanish), and she was still considered a freshman at all schools where she applied. She did not take any AP exams, and all of her credits have transferred, allowing her to major in bioengineering / pre-med, and still have time to spend her junior year abroad. She entered college at age 16, was accepted at CalTech and Princeton, and is attending Case Western (with scholarship).</p>
<p>tokenadult, my information about some colleges having a limit of college courses allowed before considering the student a transfer student comes from comments others made on a homeschooling high school list to which I formerly belonged. The comments came from people who had personally been in that situation. However, I don't remember which colleges were mentioned, since they were not ones which my boys were considering. And perhaps this is something that is changing as more students take college courses while in high school.</p>
<p>My younger son entered college this year with 5 credits from CC classes which he enjoyed. He also loved the independence of being a student there. He received a large merit scholarship as a freshman and next semester will get to register early as a sophomore. My older son entered college with credits also and could have graduated early, but chose to stay on saying there were so many great classes he wanted to take. We were fine with that and were thrilled to see his love of learning stay with him. That's why we homeschooled!</p>