<p>The answer from a CC participant who used to work as an MIT admission officer: </p>
<p>[MIT</a> Admissions | Blog Entry: “Many Ways To Define “The Best””](<a href=“http://www.mitadmissions.org/topics/before/recommended_high_school_preparation/many_ways_to_define_the_best.shtml]MIT”>http://www.mitadmissions.org/topics/before/recommended_high_school_preparation/many_ways_to_define_the_best.shtml)</p>
<p>i guess this is a special case, but at prep school (at least exeter), they didn’t place that much emphasis on taking the actual AP exams. one couldn’t avoid taking AP courses because all upper-level english and history classes were AP, and most kids reached AP math as well. we did some prep for the APUSH exam, but i would be surprised if more than a third of the kids took it. my siblings and i took two AP tests or less (i only took BC calc), and we are now at harvard, williams, and stanford. i remember meeting a girl freshman year who was saying she was a “second-semester sophomore” because she had 13 5s on AP exams, and i was shocked that anyone would take so many (they are expensive!)</p>
<p>Who said it was all about HYPSM? To add a much ignored side of Ben’s peculiar looking coin, there’s also the match for the learning environment in high school. D is taking every Pre-AP/AP/dual college credit class she can not to impress some adcom but to be with her friends and to avoid the regular classes with the slackers and troublemakers. By the time she graduates, she could have around 60 college hours already under her belt and couldn’t care less about HYPSM. And, btw, given the choice between AP and dual credits, DC wins every time. </p>
<p>Yes, she’s having fun in hs. Yes, she’s well-rounded. Yes, she has time for her ECs. Yes, she has time for her friends. No, she’s not stressing.</p>
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<p>There are schools which pay for the AP exams; the one my son is in does, even if the student doesn’t take the AP class, but wants to take the exam. I think the school is trying to boost its ranking, but I’m sure the school would say they don’t want cost to be a barrier to a kid’s taking the exam.</p>
<p>We paid only $80. If you want to avoid taking some classes at college, it definately worth time and $$, since AP are easier and cheaper. </p>
<p>I agree that it is NOT all about HYPSM. There are very selective programs at not so selective colleges that definately look for people with the most rigoruos HS classes and very high GPA’s becuase of fierce competition (like 800 applicants to 15 spots) </p>
<p>You just need to know your plans after HS. However, some kids might get plainly bored in regular HS classes, but it depend on a kid and HS that he is attending.</p>
<p>The cost of four or five exams is far less than the cost of a semester of college. (or the cost of a semester at Exeter.) You may also just want to make sure that you can avoid the introductory courses when you get to college. I know some parents here advocate repeating courses, but my family’s experience is that taking more advanced courses is much more interesting.</p>
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hmmm yeah i didn’t think about that. a lot of schools will only give you a limited amount of credit from AP scores, though. apparently one can get a full semester’s worth of credit from harvard for 4 AP scores of 5, which surprised me. in my limited experience with AP tests, they aren’t that hard. don’t 17% of test takers get a 5? i don’t think one should retake intro classes, but college classes are often much more rigorous than classes at a lot of high schools (thus, 4 5s does not have the same educational value to the student as a semester of college).</p>
<p>I still don’t understand if the top college AP game is worth it. My son goes to a very uber competitive/critically overcrowded hs where his “actual competition” is probably is roughly about 50 students (out of a class of 870). HE fully expects (time will tell) to graduate in the top 5%, which would be ranks 1-43ish) but wants to be in the top 5. The kids take 7 classes a year. The college GC has said that the very top students should take 11 AP’s by graduation (1 sophomore yr is allowed only, 5 junior year and 5 senior year). I think this is ridiculous! He would have NO life, no time for EC’s if he did this. But if he dosen’t, he will fall behind the other kids in class rank.
What really is more important? Should the kid take (to be competitive, his desire not mine, to Ivy/top 35 schools as alluded to on THIS THREAD), about 6-7 AP’s (1 soph, 3 junior, 3 senior yr)? This is definitely much more doable IMHO.
OR… since he attends this particular crazy school, he HAS to take more AP’s because of his competition/class rank issue. Many of these kids take AP’s over the summer and online (secretly to try to edge each other out of class ranks). My kid is very smart but NOT a genius. He is just a kid who likes to play and likes to compete. I don’t know how to advise him. I think he is planning on getting in over his head.</p>
<p>Our district had an easy solution to the problem Stanford is concerned about. AP classes are reserved for jr’s and sr’s and they are able to take a max of 3-4 term equivelents per school year(ie 3 full yr courses or 2 full yr+2 half yr courses). This could be appealed by an individual student but according to my son never done while he was a jr or sr.</p>
<p>It seemed to have no impact on college admissions because the policy was clearly explained in the school profile.</p>
<p>HS’s allowing student to take 5+ AP courses at the same time are short changing their students imho because the course work has to be watered down. There werent enough hours in the day for our son to take more than 3 AP’s/yr. I am willing to wager that our district’s honors sections were as rigouous as most districts’ AP sections.</p>
<p>^^^I am so happy for you but our reality is not so forgiving. Given what I described, what should my son do? To be considered competitive for the schools he wants to attend does he have to play the AP/class rank game that WE have HERE OR, can he take 6 or 7 AP’s (or because of our location, would that knock him out of higher ranking school’s considerations)?</p>
<p>Restricting AP courses to just juniors and seniors is not a great solution. There are certainly students who can handle these courses as freshmen and sophomores, and such students should have these courses available to them IMO.</p>
<p>If my sophomore son stays where he is, he’ll be taking at least five, and possibly six, APs next year: Latin, Calc, Physics, World History, and an English. AP Chem is also a possibility, unless he decides to self-study for the AP Chem test this spring. It’s not that he’s competing – it’s just that the honors classes are so slow, he’s bored.</p>
<p>By the end of this year, he’ll have at least three AP exams under his belt, one self-studied last year (because the class wasn’t open to freshmen) and two this year, for which he is taking the courses.</p>
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<p>The policy in some schools and/or school districts is that students MUST take the AP test if they are enrolled in an AP class. If you don’t take the test, you don’t get the bump in weighted GPA. </p>
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<p>This is one of my big gripes about AP. D1’s AP classes are challenging, but in some ways they’re a pale imitation of the AP’s of my youth. My APUSH class issued 7 books that were college texts (Hofstadter!); ditto for my AP Chem class. D’s world history class last year had a special AP textbook that was larded with sample DBQ’s (document-based queries, an element on the test). What wusses! If it’s supposed to BE a college class, then teach it with freakin’ college texts, fercryinoutloud.</p>
<p>My son takes 6 APs this year – his senior year. Three each semester. Nothing is watered down. All classes have college-level textbooks. Four of the classes are online. If they water down a class, I can almost guarantee that the students will not prepared for the exam.</p>
<p>I don’t feel the AP Courses are that watered down at our school. APUSH has a textbook and then several other books they consult regularly (including Hofstadter). DS is taking a three hour midterm this morning. Last year in AP World he went into NYC several times to do research and find original sources for a paper. He was writing about Gustavas Adolphus and found a memoir from a Scottish soldier who had served in GA’s army. Remember too, that the APs are probably the equivalent of the average college class, not one of HYP caliber. </p>
<p>Our school is pretty strict about prerequisites and placement tests for the AP classes, but not at all about what year in school you are. Mathson took AP Comp Sci as a freshman. All he had to do was talk to the head of the math department and have a conversation about what he already knew.</p>
<p>Our curriculum is set up so that it’s easy for the top students to take 2 APs as sophomores, 3 as juniors, and 5 or 6 as seniors, but I think most students, don’t take that many. i.e they’ll take AP Physics B or AP World as sophomores, but not both. Or they’ll choose not to take the AP English options.</p>
<p>I mentioned before that super competitive HS will not let you take more than 3 APs / year. However, colleges are aware of it. I believe that the game is not only number of APs but also your HS and if it sends top kids to Ivy’s and other competitive schools on a regular basis. Colleges know that kids from schools like these prepared better in just regular/honors classes.</p>
<p>I think it’s wrong to restrict AP classes to just Jr and Sr, unless there are class enrollment issues. Sometimes the student is on a track that the next logical class to take may be the AP and that could happen sooner than the Jr year. Thus was the case with my S, who took AP Spanish Language, AP Calc BC and AP Euro History his sophomore year.</p>
<p>Yep, there was some concern about him taking three APs out of the box sophomore year. However, he’d already gone through Spanish III (he attended a language immersion elementary school), honors Trig/Math Analysis, and decided he wanted to take AP Euro History (usually the only AP sophomore take at the HS) for the challenge (and it ended up being the most challenging of the three, but he pulled a B= and A- as semester grades.)</p>
<p>The HS AP coordinator was his AP Euro teacher, who was concerned at him taking three APs but understood two of them were the next class in the sequence. She was pleased when he got 5,5,4 on the AP tests.</p>
<p>More importantly, he proved to himself that he could handle that level of workload. This year, he has a totally different challenge in self-pacing for an on line class in linear algebra. Sometimes it’s very tough (the “take home” tests are extraordinarily long) but he’s pulling his weight.</p>
<p>If HS does not allow to take more than 3 AP’s, nothing you can do. They know what they are doing. D’s Honors HS Freshman Bio used the same textbook as her college Freshman Bio. Yes, it was VERY challenging for 15 years olds, but other non-AP classes were also, particularly, English. No wonder, they restrict AP’s, knowing how challenging program is in regular and honors classes. This is not an argument, just stating facts.</p>
<p>MiamiDAP, for some kids 5 APs is not particularly challenging, for others it is. I think schools should be flexible. This is an argument. Not a fact. ;)</p>
<p>“for some kids 5 APs is not particularly challenging, for others it is”</p>
<p>And that IS a fact! :)</p>
<p>Common App Midyear Report:</p>
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<p>I wonder how the adcoms and counselors interprete this question and how students should interprete this question.</p>