<p>What is better when selecting AP courses for high school? Take as many AP classes as possible so as to increase one's college admission chances? Or take only the AP courses that you know you will excel and engage in?
I selected the second route, as I know that I would bomb AP Calc and AP Computer Science. I instead opted for 2 APs junior year only, the ones that I excelled in.</p>
<p>Taking as many AP classes as possible will not increase a person’s college admission chances. It will likely buy a person the “most rigorous” check on his/her counselor’s recommendation, but if the same person ends up with 1s/2s on the AP test and/or Cs/Ds in the class it’s not worth it. </p>
<p>Basically, take AP classes that reflect your strengths and revolve around your passions and interests.</p>
<p>The first path is only suitable for people who are interested in everything AP offers and have the intellect to take more than 5 in a single year. There are some who can do this but obviously not everybody could do this and not everybody wants to because they would rather do thing they enjoy like sports and extracurriculars and going to dances. Taking more than 12 APs doesn’t really do much anyways because most colleges cut you off from receiving credit after you hit 45 credit hours. </p>
<p>AP is really the new honors courses and honors are for the most part the new regular classes. Any moderately intelligent student should take all subjects they excel in at the AP level when the school doesn’t prohibit it.</p>
<p>You should always strive for harder courses, but only when you know you can excel in them.</p>