Honors Calc or AP Calc AB

[Anonymous]

Back when I was in school, 20 years ago, the advanced sequence was Calc AB in 11th grade and Calc BC in 12th grade. I got Bs in both classes, but 5s on both APs. The college credit, if available, is based ONLY on the AP score, not the class grade. However, at the college I went to, you only get credit for Calc I (the equivalent of the Calc AB) for a 5 on the Calc BC exam, and no credit at all for the Calc AB exam (their rule is the same even now). A good question is whether you can take the easier class to keep the GPA up, and then prepare for the exam independently to take in May. If the student is a 12th grader, then check to see if he/she would get any credit for the AB exam in the schools to which he/she wants to apply. If there's no credit anyway, then there's no reason to take the AP or the AP class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Back when I was in school, 20 years ago, the advanced sequence was Calc AB in 11th grade and Calc BC in 12th grade. I got Bs in both classes, but 5s on both APs. The college credit, if available, is based ONLY on the AP score, not the class grade. However, at the college I went to, you only get credit for Calc I (the equivalent of the Calc AB) for a 5 on the Calc BC exam, and no credit at all for the Calc AB exam (their rule is the same even now). A good question is whether you can take the easier class to keep the GPA up, and then prepare for the exam independently to take in May. If the student is a 12th grader, then check to see if he/she would get any credit for the AB exam in the schools to which he/she wants to apply. If there's no credit anyway, then there's no reason to take the AP or the AP class.

We’re not interested in the AP credit. I’m realy just trying to find out how much harder/what the difference is between these two courses. She would take the AP if it’s not that much more work than honors and only because it would stronger on her transcript.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Back when I was in school, 20 years ago, the advanced sequence was Calc AB in 11th grade and Calc BC in 12th grade. I got Bs in both classes, but 5s on both APs. The college credit, if available, is based ONLY on the AP score, not the class grade. However, at the college I went to, you only get credit for Calc I (the equivalent of the Calc AB) for a 5 on the Calc BC exam, and no credit at all for the Calc AB exam (their rule is the same even now). A good question is whether you can take the easier class to keep the GPA up, and then prepare for the exam independently to take in May. If the student is a 12th grader, then check to see if he/she would get any credit for the AB exam in the schools to which he/she wants to apply. If there's no credit anyway, then there's no reason to take the AP or the AP class.

We’re not interested in the AP credit. I’m realy just trying to find out how much harder/what the difference is between these two courses. She would take the AP if it’s not that much more work than honors and only because it would stronger on her transcript.

I'd recommend asking the math department at your HS. I wish I could help answer your question, but DD is only in 9th grade. Based on comments from DD's friends, there is a huge difference between Honors Geometry and regular Geometry.

[Anonymous]

magrathean wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP, that was magrathean's logic. I assumed both scenarios were for the AP same class You don't take AP test with just the "honors" calculus.

Exactly. An advantage of the AP, even if one doesn't care about the potential college level credit, is that college admissions knows that a 5 is a 5 is a 5 on the AP no matter what high school taken at, while an "A" in one "honors" class may be mean less understanding than a "C" in some other "regular" class depending on the rigor, district, school, teacher, etc.

College admissions isn't going to know anything about Senior year AP scores so this whole line of reasoning makes zero sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Back when I was in school, 20 years ago, the advanced sequence was Calc AB in 11th grade and Calc BC in 12th grade. I got Bs in both classes, but 5s on both APs. The college credit, if available, is based ONLY on the AP score, not the class grade. However, at the college I went to, you only get credit for Calc I (the equivalent of the Calc AB) for a 5 on the Calc BC exam, and no credit at all for the Calc AB exam (their rule is the same even now). A good question is whether you can take the easier class to keep the GPA up, and then prepare for the exam independently to take in May. If the student is a 12th grader, then check to see if he/she would get any credit for the AB exam in the schools to which he/she wants to apply. If there's no credit anyway, then there's no reason to take the AP or the AP class.

Huh? I can't believe this is right... the classes are essentially the same, BC just goes faster and teaches more concepts. How did they fill a whole year of BC?

[Anonymous]

PP, this is probably right. In my DC's BC class, several kids took AB Calc last year. Some are doing well; some are struggling.

For the OP: what does your DD want to study in college? If she is going STEM, then AP is probably a good idea, if she's doing humanities, why not let her take regular Calc (still pretty impressive) and give her the space to do great things on her tough AP's in humanities?

FWIW, a friend's child spent three weeks struggling in AP Calc AB after Honors Pre-Calc this year, then dropped to regular Calc with Applications and is much, much happier. This person plans to study humanities, so this was the perfect level for them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP, this is probably right. In my DC's BC class, several kids took AB Calc last year. Some are doing well; some are struggling.

For the OP: what does your DD want to study in college? If she is going STEM, then AP is probably a good idea, if she's doing humanities, why not let her take regular Calc (still pretty impressive) and give her the space to do great things on her tough AP's in humanities?

FWIW, a friend's child spent three weeks struggling in AP Calc AB after Honors Pre-Calc this year, then dropped to regular Calc with Applications and is much, much happier. This person plans to study humanities, so this was the perfect level for them.

Op here. Are you sure it was honors pre-calc. At our school this is considered one of the hardest math classes and feeds into calc BC. I’m surprised that someone coming out of honors precalc and not regular precalc found calc AB so hard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP, this is probably right. In my DC's BC class, several kids took AB Calc last year. Some are doing well; some are struggling.

For the OP: what does your DD want to study in college? If she is going STEM, then AP is probably a good idea, if she's doing humanities, why not let her take regular Calc (still pretty impressive) and give her the space to do great things on her tough AP's in humanities?

FWIW, a friend's child spent three weeks struggling in AP Calc AB after Honors Pre-Calc this year, then dropped to regular Calc with Applications and is much, much happier. This person plans to study humanities, so this was the perfect level for them.

Op here. Are you sure it was honors pre-calc. At our school this is considered one of the hardest math classes and feeds into calc BC. I’m surprised that someone coming out of honors precalc and not regular precalc found calc AB so hard.

Different PP, here, but last year when my DC was in AB she thinks about 30% of the class decided to drop down to calc w/Apps, and thinks very few would have come from regular pre-calc since regular pre-calc students usually continue to Apps in the first place. But so much is school dependent. The calc AB teacher wasn't great and the students weren't that motivated. She's in BC this year and finds the students much harder working, but is disappointed that it actually doesn't feel like repeating a class, it's moving very quickly and requiring a lot of work to keep up. Anyway, the comparison between AB and BC at our school is all I can really speak to. Also, it sounds like the distinction between pre-calc classes is school dependent. Honors pre-calc was known as a bear at our school but this year things were reworked and my second DC isn't being worked nearly as hard. And who knows, although my older DC was worked harder in pre-calc it was partly a confidence killer for older DC and others.

Your DC can always sign up for the harder class and plan to re-evaluate quickly in the fall, but senior year does have plenty of other time demands.