<p>I'm a current freshman living in Kentucky (just saying this so you know the curriculum at my school isn't as rigerous as schools in the east coast or whatever) and i'm currently in Honors Algebra 2 at my school. I want to move up a level in math, so I was thinking about taking a PreCalculus course this summer, and then going into AP Calculus BC sophmore year. Will this be too challenging? I received As on all my math tests this year so far, and everything (except a bit of the trig stuff) has been extremely easy for me.</p>
<p>Depends, most BC courses will cover AB material in addition to BC, so if you take Calc BC, assuming you have a firm grasp of algebra and pre-calc topics, you should be fine.</p>
<p>Taking BC SOPHOMORE year? What will you take the rest of high school? That seems pretty pointless to me. </p>
<p>I guess you could do that, but what you could also do is take precal over the summer and do AB Soph, BC JUnior, and senior year what ever you want (apstat, multivariable).</p>
<p>But before you do that, why do you want to skip a year? If its for college, I don’t think they care if you do that, your chances will be about the same who just took precalculus soph year. I’m taking precalculus right now and i wouldn’t want to take that over the summer (but yet again, although im good at math, i have no desire to take it over the summer but thats just me). But if you’re doing it because you love math and want to be the next great mathematician then go for it if you have the will.</p>
<p>Why in such a hurry? </p>
<p>BC is tougher than AB because it moves faster and so attracts the more hard core math students. PreCal is not that hard, mostly review and consolidation of topics already covered, except for some trig.</p>
<p>If your school is not that rigorous, I’m curious what your math options are for junior and senior year.</p>
<p>I did that… I’m still alive</p>
<p>@bodangles a lot of people at my school took Calculus BC sophomore year…(I took it as a junior).</p>
<p>After BC, a lot of people take multivariable calculus, linear algebra, differential equations, statistics (e.g. AP Stats), or a discrete math course. I know a few people that learned abstract algebra in high school (although those are rare cases).</p>
<p>@MITer94 Yeesh. My school doesn’t even get to BC (Calc II). That’s pretty impressive.</p>
<p>To the OP,
If you really want to take the class, go for it. If you take precalculus over the summer and actually learn from taking it, you should be fine taking BC. I’m taking BC right now as a junior (our school’s math system is very strict, so the earliest you could possibly take BC is as a junior), and our precalculus class covered a bit of derivation and limits/continuity at the end of the curriculum. Even without that, our BC class started at derivatives and made our way through the material (but probably a bit faster than most courses, since they probably start with integration).</p>
<p>I guess it really just depends on how mathematics-oriented you are. If you really love math and know how to do your stuff, then I highly recommend taking BC. If not, then you could still take precalculus over the summer and start with AB.</p>
<p>If you think about two to three years ahead, think about if you really want to show colleges how much you have challenged yourself. If barely anyone takes BC as a junior at your school and you want to apply to more selective schools, then you should take BC. Unfortunately, the college application system has become more “what stuff should I have to make myself more appealing to colleges?” and this way is one of them. You kind of have to go along with it (also doing what you love) and take BC.</p>