How many years of science courses would be considered selective for admission to colleges?Answered
Hello everyone, I'm a rising sophomore. Economics and political science are my fields of interest. I'm deciding what Science courses I will take years later. I took Biology Honors in 9th grade and must take Chemistry Honors in 10th grade. I plan to have AP Biology in 11th grade. Are three years of Science enough for a humanity student like me? Or should I take Physics and AP Chemistry in my third and fourth year to be considered selective for the Top 50 colleges? I have a 3.86 u/w GPA (My school doesn't offer a weighted GPA) and plan to have 8.5 honors and 14 APs throughout the four years. My primary goal will be to raise my GPA. As you can see below the schedule is going to be ultra-tight for me if I add one or two more science APs.
---My Four Year High School Course Plan for APs and Honors---
9th grade:
Biology Honors, English 1 Honors, U.S History Honors, Geometry Honors (Count: 4)
10th grade:
Chemistry Honors, English 2 Honors, 20th-century Lit Honors (0.5 credit), Pre-Calculus Honors (Count: 3.5)
AP World History, AP CompSci A| APLang (Self-study), AP CompGov (Self-study), AP Macroeconomics (CTY) (Count: 5)
11th grade:
European Lit Honors(0.5 credit), American Lit Honors (0.5 credit) (Count: 1)
AP Biology, APUSH, AP Calculus AB | AP Lit (Self-study), AP Microeconomics (CTY) (Count: 5)
12th grade:
AP French, AP US Gov, AP Calculus BC, AP Statistics (Count: 4)
Total Honors: 8.5
Total APs: 14
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1 answer
4 years of Science would be required for Harvard and schools like that. 3 for most T50 schools. So I recommend you take AP Chem or AP Env. Science 12 grade so you will have 4.
I strongly disagree with your schedule to take 3 English classes in 10th, and 3 English classes in 11th. And do not recommend self studying for AP Lang and AP Lit. I do not know what the acroym CTY stands for after AP Macro and AP Micro.
5 years of history seems a bit much (perhaps remove 1), and 4 years of math is good ( but honestly for an Econ/Poly Sci major, you'll never use Calc B/C and you'll get more use out of AP Stats). And I'm assuming you will have 5 years of French since AP French typically is offered after French Level 4.
AP Lang and AP Lit are extremely difficult courses to master. There is a ton of reading and material to cover and if you were to complete the writing assignments, they are very rigorous. Only 9.1% of AP Lang test takers get a 5 and it's even worse for AP Lit as 4.9% of test takers getting a 5. I took both full year courses and there was more homework and reading for those than my entire list of other 7 periods of classes. I worked very hard and got As in both and 5s on my AP exams. I don't think I could have taken a 2nd English class at the time.
Now if you goal is to get a 3 or a 4, on AP Lang or AP Lit, then I think self studying is doable. But remember that admissions officers all feel that taking the actual class is worth a lot more than self studying. And just showing a test score doesn't make up for the time and effort you dedicated in class taking it in person. Some people break downs APs as 80% class grade / 20% test score. I think it's more like 75/25. So I'm still not a big fan of self-studying APs because the test scores alone from a 2 hour test, doesn't help inform the admissions officer that you have the grit to perform well with college level courses, and that's the entire point of evaluating course rigor.
I recommend either taking AP Lang/Lit sequentially in 11th and 12th grade as most students do. Also, take them as real courses, not self studying ones. You can take them online an various HSs or even online at eDx.org through college programs.
Good luck.
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Thank you for responding, CameronBameron. The CTY stands for the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth, and it offers AP and Honors programs that our school accepts for credit.