To Report AP score or Not to Report. That is the question.

Applying to College
1

Hello everyone,

I am an senior preparing for the full International Baccaleaureate diploma (IBDP). To test my abilities as an IB student, I decided to take a few AP exams (I am NOT enrolled in ANY of AP course that I took the exam for). I SELF-STUDIED for the three exams I took.

These are what I got

  • 10th grade Calc BC: 5
  • 11th grade Chemistry: 4 (anything above 72% is a 5)
  • 11th grade Physics C: mechanics: 4 (anything above 52%? Is a 5)
  • AP scholars award or smth like that?

As you can see my score for the last two, especially physics, are not that good considering the grade boundaries. It may sound like an excuse but I took those two exams before I completed the IB curriculum (11th-12th grade). Now I have predicted score of 7/7 in both IB Chem HL and Physics HL.

I am planning to apply to the top schools in the Ivy League (e.g., HYPS).

Should I report my AP scores and tell the AOs the circumstances (talking about how I self-studied and took the exams to challenge myself academically and see how I am doing in IB?

Will these score increase my competitiveness or will it weaken my application due to the discrepancy between my IB predicted scores and AP scores?

2

I don’t think it matters much either way. The scores will be typical for the schools you mentioned. Self-studying for AP exams - I.e., not taking the class - isn’t very meaningful to many schools. A grade earned over a full year is much more meaningful than a 1-3 hour test.

CMU’s admin officer told us they don’t even look at them. They are placement exams, not an admissions tool, so that’s how CMU uses them. Other Ivy adcoms have been cool to self-study APs.

Fwiw, AP “grade boundaries” have nothing to do with normal HS course grades. A 5 is generally considered equivalent to an A/A+ - a 52% cutoff just indicates a difficult exam. College is like that. My D’s Freshman Engineering Physics class had a couple of exam averages in the 30s, so 52 was probably an A there. High School’s 90+ = A, 80-90=B, etc., is no longer relevant.