Why Your Kids Should Take AP Classes

[jayceee]

The AP physics and AP calculus courses, didn't prepare me at all for how brutal the freshman university versions were.

 

[Pondwater]

That is awesome and congrats for all the hard work paying off.

I never enrolled in an AP course, however, I would recommend it for the challenges.

 

[PsychoPere]

My high school offered two AP classes - AP US History and AP English something-or-other. I didn't take the latter one (hence not being clear on what the name was...), but I did take the former. I only received a 3 on the exam, though, which wasn't sufficient for credit at my first college.

Out of my class, though, that 3 was the second highest. One person got a 4, and everyone else who took the exam scored 2 or below.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Three is supposed to be passing, so it's a shame you didn't get credit for it.

 

[Lindley]

It's pretty cool, it's all computerized of course. The units were automatically inserted into her degree planner where they fit: GE, Electives, Major Requirements.

Don't trust the automated system to always slot them incorrectly. It'll generally get most of them right, but *always* double-check that it's doing what you think it should be doing, especially in the last few semesters before graduation.

 

[the 4th hanson bro]

Congratulations to your daughter!

I took a number of AP exams in high school as well as AP classes so I entered college with 28 hours and had my language and first two years of history requirements already completed.

It allowed me to take other, more interesting courses so that I earned a philosophy minor and international studies minor along with my history major.

After all that, I work in wealth management.

 

[Spot's Meow]

I took as many AP classes as I could in high school, which was only 5. Unfortunately you are at the mercy of the classes your school/district offers. In underpriveleged neighborhoods I can imagine this would be very little.

I think my credits amounted to a little more than a semester's worth of college credits. However, to fulfill the degree requirements I still had to take the full 4 years. But the AP credits were helpful in allowing me to skip some of those GE requirements in favor of picking up a minor in Economics.

My high school offered two AP classes - AP US History and AP English something-or-other. I didn't take the latter one (hence not being clear on what the name was...), but I did take the former. I only received a 3 on the exam, though, which wasn't sufficient for credit at my first college.

Out of my class, though, that 3 was the second highest. One person got a 4, and everyone else who took the exam scored 2 or below.

The 3 definitely should have counted, that's unfortunate. And don't feel bad - the AP US History test is actually one of the harder ones. I "only" got a 3 and that was the highest score in my class, and I went to college to get a history degree! It was just a tough test.

 

[Captain Ice]

Don't trust the automated system to always slot them incorrectly.

Thanks for the laugh

I took a few AP courses in my junior and senior year. IIRC, I got out of about half a semester's worth of 100 level courses. Definitely worth it. I have to admit that I did it more for the challenge though.

 

[Captain Ice]

The 3 definitely should have counted, that's unfortunate. And don't feel bad - the AP US History test is actually one of the harder ones. I "only" got a 3 and that was the highest score in my class, and I went to college to get a history degree! It was just a tough test.

Agreed. I do remember the AP History exam being a particular PITA, though strangely I also got one of my best scores on it.

And I too went and got a History degree.